Return to Transcripts main page

CNN News Central

New Crowdsourcing App Flags ICE Sightings; Two Idaho Firefighters Killed in Deadly Ambush; Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR): Senate Set to Begin Voting on Amendments to Trump Agenda Bill; Jury Deliberations to Begin in Sean Diddy Combs Trial. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired June 30, 2025 - 08:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[08:00:00]

CLARE DUFFY, CNN BUSINESS WRITER: ... in the app, it looks like a map, and users can tap the map to report an ICE sighting in their area. And then everybody who uses the platform within five miles of that sighting will get a push alert. This is a free iPhone app. It is anonymous. Aaron says he doesn't collect any user data. And what I think is really interesting about this in this moment is we've seen so many of the biggest leaders in tech supporting President Trump.

But Aaron is sort of an example of the fact that there are people within the tech industry who are really resistant to Trump's policies. I asked him what he would say to those tech leaders who, for example, were at the inauguration. Here's what he told me.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSHUA AARON, CREATOR, ICEBLOCK APP: I understand that you have shareholders to report to. I understand that you have employees that need their paychecks. But at what point do you say enough is enough?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DUFFY: And John, I should say that ICE did not respond when I asked them about this platform and about Aaron's opposition to their activity.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. It'd be interesting to see where that goes next. Clare Duffy, thank you so much for your reporting.

A brand new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking overnight, the deadly ambush, firefighters coming under attack from sniper fire in Idaho this morning. The suspect is dead, where the investigation now leads.

And senators are gearing up for a marathon day of votes on President Trump's sweeping domestic policy bill. The final hurdle before the final vote. Why there is such a long road still ahead.

And also happening very soon, the case is going to the jury. A panel of 12 New Yorkers will begin deliberations today in the criminal trial of Sean Diddy Combs.

I'm Kate Bolduan with John Berman and Sara Sidner. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking overnight, the man accused of deliberately setting a brush fire to lure firefighters out to a mountain trail and then opening fire on them has been found dead. Authorities say the suspect laid the trap in what they describe as a sniper attack. Some 300 officers from various agencies in neighboring counties raced to help those firefighters as they took sustained gunfire.

Two firefighters, though, were killed. A third was wounded and is said to be fighting for his life. Police found the suspect's body after six hours.

CNN's Julia Vargas Jones is live in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. What are you learning after this absolutely unbelievable tragedy there?

JULIA VARGAS JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Sara, this is a community that's waking up grieving for the loss of those two firefighters. And all of that is made worse by hearing these harrowing moments of what they went through as they were talking to dispatch and receiving that fire. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Send law enforcement right now. There's an active shooter zone. They're shot. BC three is down. BC one is down. Everybody's shot up here. Law enforcement code three now up here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VARGAS JONES: Unimaginable, Sara, what those firefighters went through. As the investigation returns -- resumes today, the plan is for authorities to go back into the scene where they found the body of that shooter yesterday. Now, they did say that that scene is contained, but they had to move the body out of there really quickly because of the fire threat.

I'll tell you, we are really close to where that mountain fire is burning, and we can smell and feel that smoke down here by the highway still. And the sheriff did say, of Kootenai County, did say that what they're looking for as they go up in the mountain today is other weapons that this shooter might have used. But I will say, and this is important to highlight, that they do believe that this man acted alone as of now, that he was the only person that was on that mountain.

He said that they will be collecting more evidence as the threat of the fire diminishes so they will have more information to this preliminary report. But that is the belief of the authorities at this time, and there is no further threat to this community, Sara. And this is an important message to highlight as we go into this new day.

One last detail that I want to add is that investigators did use his cell phone data to find the suspect in those last 90 minutes before he died, and we still don't know how exactly that shooter died -- Sara.

SIDNER: Yes, it's good to learn that new information that police do not believe there was anyone else involved in this. And now the big question is, why? Why did this happen?

Why did he do this? Julia Vargas Jones, thank you so much. Great reporting for us this morning -- John.

[08:05:00]

BERMAN: All right, with us now, CNN senior law enforcement analyst Charles Ramsey, former Philadelphia police commissioner, former Washington, D.C. police chief. Thank you so much for being with us.

The immediate threat does appear to be over. So what do investigators want to find out now and how do they go about doing that?

CHARLES RAMSEY, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, obviously, they've got to identify the suspect. They probably already have. That'll lead to search warrants being conducted at a home, in a vehicle, interviewing family, friends, finding his social media footprint, doing everything they can to try to find out the motive.

You know, why did he do this? They mentioned earlier that they were able to trace him through his cell phone. That's one of the technologies that obviously they would have to use, hopefully, to be able to pinpoint his location early on before he can do any more damage.

So there are a lot of things going on right now, trying to really pinpoint the reason why best they can and also determine his cause of death. Did he commit suicide? Was he killed by police?

It definitely was a deadly force situation. So either way, at least he's not in a position to be able to hurt anyone else.

BERMAN: Commissioner, can we just talk about the nature of this crime in general in the type of chill that it might send through the law enforcement community? There are signs that this guy may have, or this person, may have set this fire to get a response to target the firefighters. When you hear that, what goes through your mind?

RAMSEY: Well, I mean, it's a little unusual for it to happen to firefighters like that. You've had several instances where police get set up that way and ambushed and so forth. It's something that you think about and you have to be very cautious whenever you approach a scene.

But for firefighters, an actual brush fire, I'm sure the last thing they thought was that they would come under fire. So it certainly is something that's unusual, in my opinion. Sometimes you hear firefighters having rocks and bricks thrown at them, and that's usually in urban areas if there's some kind of issue going on or something like that, but rarely actually get shots fired at them.

So again, once they find a motive, get more information on this guy. Did he have an existing beef with the firemen? I mean, who knows? But in any event, all that will come out during the course of the investigation.

BERMAN: Why target firefighters? I mean, that's just -- that's the part of this that seems confounding and frankly frightening.

RAMSEY: Well, again, you know, I don't know why, and that's one of the things you're going to have to look into. Because again, you know, I've seen where police get set up with ambushes and so forth, but it's rare that firefighters do. In fact, I can't personally think of a situation like what we just saw yesterday, but it happened.

And so this is an area of the country where you have a lot of anti- government groups that exist. I'm not saying he was part of that, I don't know, but they'll have to look at a variety of different issues and ways in which they can try to zero in on whether or not there's still an existing threat toward firefighters or whether this was just a one person situation and he's no longer there.

BERMAN: Commissioner Charles Ramsey, always great to have you on. Thank you very much -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: We're going to show you a live look on Capitol Hill -- at Capitol Hill, where in less than an hour, the Senate will begin a marathon series of votes on possible changes to President Trump's sweeping domestic policy bill. It's the last hurdle that Republicans need to overcome to get to a final yes or no vote on that massive bill. Only two Republican senators voted against advancing it, Rand Paul and Thom Tillis.

Tillis said that he couldn't stand for the cuts that it would be making to Medicaid and how that would hurt his constituents. And after Trump attacked him for it, Tillis said he's out, he's no longer running for reelection.

The Congressional Budget Office, the nonpartisan referee on The Hill, also added a new layer of complexity to the equation overnight. It now says that the Senate version would result in 12 million more people becoming uninsured and that the Senate version also is more expensive, will increase the deficit even further -- even more than the House version, which was already a bitter pill to swallow for many lawmakers.

CNN's Arlette Saenz is on The Hill for us this morning and joining us now. So Arlette set the scene for everyone. It was a busy weekend on Capitol Hill in the Senate. What is about to happen this morning?

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Kate, well, the Senate worked through the weekend and they will be back at it this morning. In the coming hour, we anticipate the Senate will start the so-called Voterama.

This is a process where senators can introduce amendments to President Trump's big agenda bill.

[08:10:00] Now it comes after there was really a weekend of dealmaking and cajoling to try to keep Republican senators on board. There were only two GOP senators who voted against a procedural vote on this bill. That's Rand Paul and Thom Tillis. And then Thom Tillis surprised many up here on Capitol Hill by announcing that he would not seek re- election. Tillis says that he respects President Trump, but that he thinks that this bill in its current form is a mistake.

Take a listen to a bit from his fiery speech on the floor last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): I believe that we can make sure that we do not break the promise of Donald J. Trump that he's made to the people who are on Medicaid today, Mr. President. But what we're doing, because we've got a view on an artificial deadline on July 4th that means nothing but another date and time, we could take the time to get this right if we lay down the House mark of the Medicaid bill and fix it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Now this Voterama that's expected to get underway around 9 a.m. could take several hours. We anticipate that Democrats who have railed against this bill will introduce amendments. But then there are also a number of amendments being introduced on the Republican side to try to get GOP senators on board.

Some of those amendments to watch include one from Senator Rick Scott of Florida who is suggesting reducing the federal matching rate for states who expanded Medicaid under President Obama. There's also Senator Susan Collins of Maine who's expected to introduce some amendments.

And then there's a lot of attention being paid to Senator Lisa Murkowski. There were two provisions that were added to the bill related to her home state. But the Senate parliamentarian ruled that those could not move forward. So big questions if she will be a yes on final passage of that bill.

There's a lot more work for the Senate to do. And then this bill would still need to go over to the House, where some House conservatives have said that this does not cut enough spending. Others have concerns about the cuts it does make to Medicaid.

And then there's that July 4th deadline that President Biden had set as he is hoping to get this bill across this finish line and implement a key part of his agenda.

BOLDUAN: Arlette, thank you so much for being there. We'll be back to you -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right, joining us now to discuss the bill and the Votorama, senators will be taking part in, Senator Jeff Merkley, Democrat from Oregon and ranking member on the Senate Budget Committee. Thank you so much for being here, Senator. One of your fellow congressional Democrats, Brian Schatz, says after listing problems with the bill that we can, quote, as he put it, kill this thing. Do you think that?

SEN. JEFF MERKLEY (D-OR), SENATE BUDGET COMMITTEE: Well, I'd sure like to see that happen because this bill at its core is families lose and billionaires win. I mean, 16 million people or so lose health care to fund tax breaks for billionaires. Four million children go hungry to fund tax breaks for billionaires.

It's incredible. And we run up the huge, huge, massive debt. And that means we're compromising the future generation, our children's generation and their children in the course of this runaway debt, all to fund tax breaks for billionaires.

That is horrific policy. And we're saying stop. We need to have a different policy in which families thrive and billionaires, they pay their fair share.

SIDNER: I'm curious your take on what's happened with Thom Tillis. He is one of the two senators who, you know, have voted against this bill. Here's a little more of what he said and really a fiery speech on the floor.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): What do I tell 663,000 people in two years or three years when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding's not there?

It is inescapable that this bill and its current form will betray the very promise that Donald J. Trump made in the Oval Office.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: What do you expect from Tillis now that he says he's not running after Trump threatened to primary him? And do Democrats think that there's some way to work with him to move their agenda forward?

MERKLEY: Well, certainly, I very much respect that he's being honest about the impact of this bill. And we do hope that a couple other senators will join him. If two are voting no, well, we need two more to say, no, I'm not going to do this.

Why should I make it hard, life hard for those who are struggling to get on their feet and just give away the treasury to the people who are already on their yachts? I mean, why would we do that? And he's saying he's not going to be part of it. And I respect that. And I've worked with Thom on other issues. I look forward to working with him on others in the future.

But there's something here that everyone should notice. We are slipping into a strongman state where the president has such an acquiescent Republican caucus that they're doing this crazy policy, hurting America, hurting the next generation, because Donald Trump wants it. [08:15:00]

You saw the billionaires lined up behind him at the inauguration. That's who he's working for. It's a massive betrayal of the way he campaigned, saying he was going to be there fighting for ordinary people. And this ability for him to say, I have this massive super PAC, and I will destroy you in a primary if you do not follow exactly what I say.

This is very dangerous for the separation of powers, the checks and balances, and so we're in a bigger fight here. It's not just over this bill. It's also over preventing America from losing its architecture of its constitution, separation of powers, so that we can have government by and for the people, not government by and for the powerful.

SIDNER: We also heard from one of the potential holdouts, though now she has changed, because she's gotten a carve-out for Alaska, and that is Lisa Murkowski. The bill gave Alaska a break, basically by giving it waivers, which helps them get around the new SNAP or food stamps, if you will, work requirements. What does this tell you about the bill and how it will affect other states that did not get carve-outs?

MERKLEY: And also special carve-outs for Medicaid and Medicare. Those have been tossed by the parliamentarian now, but these caribou carve- outs, this is exactly the type of indication that it's bad policy. We shouldn't just fight for our own state. We should fight for every state.

So I'm hoping now that the special Medicaid and Medicare carve-outs have been tossed out, that Senator Murkowski will join us in saying this is wrong for all Americans, not just wrong for Alaskans.

SIDNER: I want to move on to something that happened here in New York. New York's mayoral primary winner, Zohran Mamdani, is everywhere. Trump has made no bones about criticizing him being a democratic socialist.

And here are some of the things he said. He said there should not be billionaires in this country. He just said that to NBC. He is calling for government-run grocery stores, called for a rent freeze, is pushing for more affordable housing. And when it comes to the slogan, globalize the intifada, Mamdani says it isn't the language he uses, but he will not condemn it. Do you think Mamdani will win, will be a big winner to help Democrats move forward on how they do their campaigns or hurt Democrats in other states?

MERKLEY: Well, I can't speak to any of his individual statements that I'm not familiar with, but his general theme, which is we have gotten into the place where we are becoming more and more wealth inequality, that wealth inequality hurts all Americans because then the wealthy use their lobbyists, their lawyers, their dark money in campaigns to keep getting policies for the powerful, and we have to put an end to that and we have to fight for ordinary people who we need the foundations for. The four foundations, I call them, health care, housing, education, and investment that creates good-paying jobs, because there's no government policy that does better by a family than a good-paying job. He's pointing out in very stark terms that we've gone way off track in this country, and I absolutely agree with his fundamental premise that we should, and it goes back to what I -- my version of the world, let's enable families to thrive and billionaires to pay their fair share.

SIDNER: Senator Jeff Merkley, thank you so much. Really appreciate it. I know you're going to have a very busy day today.

MERKLEY: We will indeed, Sara, and we will try to highlight -- we will try to highlight with our amendments how the money that goes over $2 trillion that goes to the affluent Americans, and we will try to amend that out of the bill.

SIDNER: All right, we'll see what happens -- John.

BERMAN: Right after weeks of explicit and shocking testimony in the Sean Combs federal trial, it will soon be in the hands of the jury. We're standing by for deliberations to begin at any moment.

And while President Trump insists Iran's nuclear sites were, quote, obliterated by U.S. strikes, the UN's nuclear watchdog now warns Iran could enrich uranium within months.

And what's next for cases challenging the president's executive order ending birthright citizenship after a landmark Supreme Court ruling?

[08:20:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: We are standing by for jury deliberations to begin in the sex trafficking and racketeering trial of Sean Combs. In closing arguments, the defense accused prosecutors of going after Combs because of his lifestyle, and prosecutors said Combs used his money and violence to do whatever he wanted, and it is time to hold him accountable.

CNN's Kara Scannell has been in court for this entire trial. She's outside this morning. What can we expect over the next, you know, minutes and hours, Kara?

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, John. The jury will begin deliberations this morning, but first the judge will charge them, tell them what the law is in this case, and that is expected to take at least more than an hour because Combs is facing multiple charges, racketeering, conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation for prostitution. And once they get this case, as you said, it's after closing arguments took place over two days last week, Combs' lawyers asking for an acquittal, saying that he's been targeted for his lifestyle, his personal drug use.

They also argue that his two former girlfriends agreed to participate in the sex acts at the center of this, and that now they're after a money grab. A prosecutor said that Combs is not a god, and it's time to hold him accountable. The stakes here are high on the sex trafficking count.

[08:25:00]

If Combs is convicted of just one of the two of those, he faces a mandatory prison sentence of 15 years in prison. The racketeering and the sex trafficking charges also carry a maximum sentence of life in prison. So a lot is on the line here. And soon, once this gets underway today, his fate will be in the hands of eight men and four women --John.

BERMAN: Kara, what struck you in the defense closing? What jumped out at you as being some of their strongest arguments?

SCANNELL: Well, they're really focusing on the element of sex trafficking and whether this was consensual sex that the women participated in with the male prostitutes or if it was not, if it was forced as the government has alleged. So they were underscoring the fact that at various times, these women, his former girlfriends, willingly participated in these sex acts. And they said that the government conceded that in their closing argument.

And so Combs' lawyers asked the jury, how is he supposed to know the difference of when it was consensual and when it wasn't? So they're really trying to get the jury's focus on that.

Also, they looked at a lot of these racketeering counts for that. They need to agree on two acts that could be witness tampering, arson. They're really trying to undercut. They're saying that this was Combs' business. It was one thing, but this was his personal life, which was separate. And there was no racketeering conspiracy -- John.

BERMAN: It will be interesting to see how this unfolds today, as will it be interesting to see the jury instructions in and of themselves. Kara Scannell, outside the court. Thank you very, very much -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: And for us, the Senate's gearing up for a marathon day, which will help decide the fate of the president's massive domestic policy bill. How do Americans feel about it? We have a new look for you this morning.

Also, it was a landmark ruling on presidential power, a big win for President Trump. But the fight over birthright citizenship, not over. Two of the attorneys general leading the fight against the president's moves will join us to talk about what's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:30:00]