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Kerr County Officials Dodge Questions on Flood Response Timeline; 108 People Confirmed Dead in Central Texas Floods; Mexican Rescue Team Joins Texas Flood Search; Trump Says No Extensions Will Be Granted on Tariffs; New 50 Percent Tariff on Copper Imports is Coming as Per President Trump; Trump Says Fed Chair Powell Should Resign Immediately. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired July 08, 2025 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:00:10]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": The death toll here in Central Texas climbing to 108 people. And as families deal with unimaginable loss, there are new questions about when county officials knew these floods would pose a deadly threat. Was there more that could have been done to save lives? We're following the latest.

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Plus, President Trump's new trade threats set off a mad dash by countries to avoid tariffs. And now, the president says there will not be any extensions to a new August 1st deadline. An artificial imposter, someone using A.I. was able to impersonate Secretary of State Marco Rubio and contact at least five people, including several foreign ministers. I'll tell you what they were after. We are following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to "CNN News Central."

SANCHEZ: Thanks so much for being with us. I'm Boris Sanchez coming to you live from Kerrville, Texas where we are continuing to track breaking news. Search and recovery teams are desperately looking for people still missing after devastating historic flooding as hope is fading of finding more survivors on this fifth day of the operation. We learned just a short time ago that the death toll has climbed to 108 people, the majority here in Kerr County, where at least 30 children are among those lost.

At a press conference this morning, officials revealed they don't have a clear number of how many exactly are still unaccounted for. A short time later at a White House cabinet meeting, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem assured families they will not rest until everyone is found.

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KRISTI NOEM, UNITED STATES SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY: They still are looking for people. We're still looking for a lot of little girls and other family members that were camping along that river. And they will continue until they find every single person and we will continue to help them and assist in that. (END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: That effort is underway right now, even here in Kerrville. Let's go live to CNN's Isabel Rosales who is monitoring those efforts. Isabel, there are some divers near you searching right now.

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Boris, I'm in Center Point, just southeast of Hunt and Kerrville, down river from the Guadalupe River, where you can see that there are firefighters, EMTs. There's also volunteers and the United Cajun Navy is out here too. To my right is the Guadalupe River. You can't see it beyond these trees. And right behind me, it looks like a lake. But this is actually, something that has puddled here from all of the flood waters. This was not here before.

All of this happening from the flash flooding. And I'm being told here on the ground that if we zoom in, you can kind of see this twisted metal there all the way in the back. I'm being told that that is some sort of overturned vehicle with an axle sticking out. So, they're not sure if that is an RV, a truck, a flatbed trailer. That's actually, I'm told, totally, pretty much buried underneath the gravel and gravel is so easy to move with these raging flood waters. And then that is not the only vehicle that they're searching right now and trying to get access to.

But in this body of water, you can see another piece of metal sticking out. That is a secondary vehicle. So there are divers that are going into this water, trying to figure out what is happening under there with that vehicle, if there's any victim that could be inside. And over there in the distance, you can see that piece of white metal, that heavy machinery. That's actually a pump. So they told me that they are pumping out this water to help them more easily access these vehicles. And if left on its own, this would take weeks for it to dry out on its own.

So Boris, we'll keep you updated as to what first responders find here. Obviously, a dire situation all through Central Texas as they're attempting to find these missing people, now, on day five of this search.

SANCHEZ: Isabel Rosales live for us in Center Point. Thank you so much for that update. As the floodwaters rushed in, many survivors were forced to race toward higher ground in the dead of night. We are joined now by one of those survivors. Barry Adelman waited out the disaster in his attic while surrounded by his family. Barry, we're so glad that you made it out and that you're safe. If you could take us back to that morning, when did you first realize that something was wrong?

BARRY ADELMAN, SURVIVED FLOOD BY CLIMBING INTO ATTIC: Yeah, we -- my wife had gone to bed. I went to bed around one o'clock, and Chris Flowers, he was in the basement and he ran up the stairs after hearing electrical pops and threw open the door and said, we're flooding. We need to get out.

[14:05:00] And what he didn't realize was that, that he was already submerged, because we all congregated towards the back of the house overlooking the river, and we saw cars floating by at the second level. So the first level had already flooded the second level, and I mean, it was fast. So yeah, I think about four o'clock, 4:10-ish.

SANCHEZ: Did you get any kind of alert on your phone, Barry? There are all kinds of questions about whether folks had enough warning that something like this was coming. Did your phone light up at all with that emergency alert?

ADELMAN: Yes. We got eight different alerts. The first one came at one o'clock in the morning. The second one came at three o'clock in the morning. And the rest, to be honest with you, I mean, I counted (ph) to see, but the rest, I mean, we were in the attic, trying to survive at that point. Yeah.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. What was going through your mind at that time? You had to race into that attic with your kids, your wife, your 94-year-old grandmother, cats and dogs. I imagine it had to be almost a mission to get everybody together and get everyone to safety.

ADELMAN: Absolutely. And I think the thing -- first thing on our minds was getting in the car. We had already seen the car floating by at the second level. I ran out into the front yard. My calf was at -- the water was at mid-calf, and I decided to turn around. I was like, wait a minute, I don't want to be in a car floating like the rest of the folks. And I think it was a good decision that minutes after that we could see our cars floating from the attic window. But, I think the thing that we saw next was the most harrowing.

This was terrifying to be on the main level in your family home at Casa del Rio and see water coming through those old wooden floors, silently, just coming through the floors at you. And it wasn't stopping. And at that point, yeah, that's when we made the decision to get the family up the stairs. And from there, it was calling anybody we could call, trying to understand what was happening to us, trying to understand what we could do. So that's what was going through our mind. And I did get a hold of my sister, Shannon (ph) and I got a hold of my grandson, Cole (ph), who was with us in the attic. His father, Jake Morris, and he's a first responder. He was very helpful.

We ended up taking some Christmas tree lights out of a basket and going out the window on the roof. I think at the time, the water was probably two feet away from the roof line and just tying the Christmas lights onto the chimney above, and then tying the Christmas lights from the chimney to the top exhaust. And the idea was that we may have to evacuate the attic, and in fact, the water was quickly approaching the very top step. It was -- it was terrifying.

SANCHEZ: I can only imagine. I also read that you heard screaming while you were up there, people screaming. I mean, you had to at some point cross the thought that you might not make it out of this.

ADELMAN: Oh, no, absolutely. That was the thought. And I'll tell you, my grandson, Cole (ph), he said, papa, we're going to die. Papa, we're going to die. I think we're going to die. Papa, are we going to die? And I said to him, as best I could, I looked him in the face. And I don't know how I manufactured this, but I smiled and I said, we are going to be OK. Do not worry. Everything is going to be fine. We will be safe. But inside, I was completely terrified, just trying to maintain a cool head, trying to find things that floated, trying to have the next step of evacuation in our minds, so that we could have something to focus on to help us.

SANCHEZ: Understood. I wonder, Barry, where did that faith come from, that everything was going to be OK, to share that message with your grandson?

ADELMAN: Yeah. It's interesting, born and raised in Texas, we had four generations of Texans in there. We all are believers and have very strong faith. When I got a hold of my sister, finally, she asked what she could do. We did have cell service and she asked what she could do. And I said, you can't do anything except get a hold of everyone you know and pray and just pray. And at one point, I remembered this because I had forgotten that I grabbed my grandmother. We had her sitting in the corner of the attic in a chair. I grabbed her and put my arms around her. And I'm not hugely religious, but I just was moved to pray and I said a prayer with her for God to watch over and protect the family, to help the waters recede and, and Amen both of us.

[14:10:00]

And then I went back to the window to watch, to see if we could still get out. And I will tell you a miracle happened. The water stopped at the very top of the stairs and we saw it drop by six inches. Then we saw it drop by a foot and a half. Then we saw it drop by three more feet. It was truly a miracle.

SANCHEZ: Wow. Barry Adelman, thank you so much for sharing your story with us. We're glad that everyone is OK.

ADELMAN: Thank you. And I want to say too, for my grandmother, Betty Mattison's (ph) Flood Fund is out there. She has lost everything. And Casa del Rio has been a staple in the community for many, many years.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, we certainly hope that all the help that's needed get to the folks that need it. Barry, thank you again.

The search and rescue operations in Central Texas has now become an international effort. A team of first responders from Mexico has joined in on search operations. The team traveled from a region that borders Del Rio and includes nine members of the Ciudad Acuna Fire Department, along with four members of the organization Fundacion 911. Joining us now on the phone is the President of Fundacion 911, Ismael Aldaba. Ismael, thank you so much for being with us. Talk to us about what your mission is here, what you're hoping to do.

ISMAEL ALDABA, PRESIDENT, FUNDACION 911 (via telephone): Hi. We've been summoned by Acuna Search and Mountain Home Fire Department to assist us with this emergency. And as we have several -- our team has been prepared in disasters. They've been to different disasters around the world. We decided to come and help our friends to try to make this a little easier for them. What we found here has been incredible though.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. Tell us about that. What has your team seen and what has stayed with you?

ALDABA: A lot of the challenges that we've seen here, we've never seen in any of the emergencies that we've had before, not to this magnitude. It's amazing to see personal items, clothing, 20, 25 feet in -- stuck on the trees. Trees that were snapped in half that were huge. The power and the pressure of the water, incredible. And it's amazing that the people that have survived this are still with us.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. It is incredible to hear stories of survivals like what we just heard from Barry. I wonder what your message is to the community as we get now to Day 5 of this rescue effort and the hopes of finding survivors starts to dwindle. Talk to us about what your message is to folks out here who are concerned about missing loved ones.

ALDABA: On our end, the sections that we have been searching, we're trying our best. We're using every little bit of manpower we have. We're adding an additional team that's coming in from Mexico as well, which has canine search and rescue capabilities, and they're from the state of Nuevo Leon. So, we're adding 15 more guys to this ops and hopefully, we can still find somebody out here that we -- we never lose hope, right?

And appreciate also the community that has been very welcoming to our team from Mexico. We have guys that just get hugs all day, so we really appreciate the guys from here and we're here to help.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. And I'm sure folks in the area appreciate very much what you're doing. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum confirmed today that one Mexican citizen died in these floods and that another one is missing. Have you gotten any update on them?

ALDABA: No. We did some recoveries yesterday, but we've not -- have any information on identities. Like I said, we're under the command of Mountain Home Fire Department and a unit from the State of Texas. So, wherever they're sending us to do our search is where we're accommodating the help.

SANCHEZ: Understood. The U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, Ronald Johnson, thanked Mexican rescuers for your help and collaboration. He wrote, "The United States and Mexico are united not only as neighbors, but as family, especially in times of need." What does it mean for your crew to work side by side with American rescue teams at a time like this and to get the reception that you've gotten?

[14:15:00]

ALDABA: We've received a lot of love from these guys and we appreciate all the other guys that are here from different fire departments in Texas. They've been great. They've been very welcoming as well. We're learning from each other, obviously, that's a great, experience for us. My message, and I'll say this, we don't -- when it comes to firefighters, there's no borders. There's nothing that'll avoid us from helping another firefighter, another family. It doesn't matter where we're on in the world. That's the whole point of our discipline and what do we do.

SANCHEZ: A really powerful message. Ismael Aldaba, thank you so much for your work and for speaking to us today.

ALDABA: You're welcome. Thank you. We are going to help.

SANCHEZ: Of course. Just something that is unavoidable here as you make your way through these devastated communities is how much help folks need. You can lend a helping hand, and we have resources for you to do that. You can help Texas flood victims by going to cnn.com/impact. You can also text Flood to 707070. There are a number of organizations that we have vetted to make sure that any contribution that you make gets exactly to where it needs to go. So if you can help, that's one way to do it.

This tragedy has shocked the core of this community and so many families connected to Camp Mystic, that all-girls camp, which suffered immense losses. A Dallas-based chef recently picked up his daughters at that camp, and he came right back to volunteer with Mercy Chefs, serving thousands of meals each day to victims and first responders. Listen to this.

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JEFF ROCKOW, CAMP MYSTIC PARENT AND VOLUNTEER: It hit her hard. Hit my other daughter hard too. So I just -- I had to come. I had to come. I was here a week-and-a-half ago picking up my girls from the camp.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As a fellow, like, Mystic parent and somebody who does have their babies close, what would you want to tell the parents who don't anymore?

ROCKOW: I don't know. I can't -- I can't -- I can't tell them anything other than I'm sorry. I'm -- no, I can't say anything. Mine are home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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[14:22:02]

DEAN: President Trump meeting with his cabinet for a sixth time today. And ahead of that sit down, the president took the Truth Social to lay out another deadline in his trade war, writing "Tariffs will start being paid on August 1, 2025." Adding, no extensions will be granted. Now, this is less than 24 hours after he moved tomorrow's planned reciprocal tariffs to August 1, but said this August deadline was firm, but not 100 percent firm.

The whiplash comes after the president unveiled new tariff rates for several key U.S. trading partners. He's sending letters to 14 different nations, telling them their tariff rate is about to go up and some as high as 40 percent. Joining us now to talk more about all of these developments, Douglas Holtz Egan. He served as the Chief Economist for the White House Council of Economic Advisors under President George W. Bush. He's also the president of the American Action Forum. Doug, thank you so much for being here with us. Let's talk first about this --

DOUGLAS HOLTZ-EAKIN, CHIEF ECONOMIST, WHITE HOUSE COUNCIL OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS UNDER PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: My pleasure.

DEAN: -- back and forth over the tariff deadlines. I think for a lot of people, they think back to the spring and kind of the chaos that surrounded that moment in time. Do you think this is similar?

HOLTZ-EAKIN: Well, I think what happened on April 2nd was not so much the timing as the magnitude. People were shocked by the size of the combination of the universal 10 percent tariff and then the so-called reciprocal tariffs. And we saw the fallout in financial markets and the reaction around the globe. The magnitudes are now familiar to people. In fact, most of these tariffs have been in place for quite some time now. The average effective tariff rate was 15 percent. These new announcements raise it to 17 percent.

So, the world is adapting to the existence of the tariffs. And I think you get less of the big shock. And now, it's more the slow and deepening impact of having these tariffs embedded in the U.S. supply chains and consumers' decisions. I also -- we got this announcement from the president today about a 50 percent tariff on copper. What do you think about that?

HOLTZ-EAKIN: Well, the president has a whole series of tariffs, which he thinks of as sectoral tariffs. These are the aluminum, the steel. This would be copper, autos, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, foreign films is on that list. All of those have been invoked in the interest of national security. And so first, you have to decide, well, is there really a national security risk that surrounds copper, that merits a 50 percent cost increase for imports? And then there's a second question which is, will the tariff alleviate that risk in any way? Will it produce more domestic production of copper? Or we'll simply just be paying more for copper?

And I think there's a real question in some of these cases about whether the tariffs will do anything to change the underlying production in the U.S. and need for the materials in the United States, and thus alleviate the national security risk at all. And so, all we've done then is make things more expensive for domestic producers and we've certainly seen that with the steel and aluminum tariffs so far.

DEAN: I also want to ask you about something Trump said at this cabinet meeting.

[14:25:00]

He again called for the Fed Chair Jerome Powell to resign. Kevin Warsh, who's a potential -- been floated as a potential pick for Powell's replacement and a former Fed governor said on Fox Business yesterday, in his words, he said tariffs are not inflationary and that he has sympathy for Trump's frustration over the Fed's policy here. What do you think of Warsh's comments there? Both that tariffs are not inflationary and his frustration over the Fed policy as it stands right now?

HOLTZ-EAKIN: Well, certainly, on the merits, I mean, no one thinks of tariffs as inflationary in the sense that they will push prices ever further higher. But there's no question, tariffs raise costs and costs get passed along the form of higher prices. These tariffs will cause prices to rise for some period. Fed Chair Jerome Powell has emphasized again and again, the whole goal is to have that be a temporary phenomenon and not let it get embedded into the system.

And so, I think everyone is agreeing that they don't want to have a long-run inflation problem, but you will have something you have to merit -- have to deal with in the short run. The discussion about whether the Fed's policy is correct or not, reasonable people can disagree. You put tariffs into this system, you have two pressures. One is higher prices. The Fed would typically raise rates or hold rates to fight that. And the other is slower growth in employment. And the Fed would usually cut rates to mediate that.

Well, now you have to decide which direction you're going to go at, at first, and people can disagree about that. So I don't think that's shocking. I think the bigger problem is the president openly auditioning people who are only going to come down one direction on that and have lower rates because he's been pushing the Fed for that for quite some time.

DEAN: Yeah. And I do want to ask you about that because as you mentioned, the president has been saying for some time that the Fed should be lowering interest rates. A couple of current Fed officials have said a cut could come as soon as July. What do you think about that as a potential move?

HOLTZ-EAKIN: Well, I think you can make that case on the merits. For example, we got last Friday's employment report and everyone said, oh, great report, 140,000 jobs. Well, not really, 70,000 of that were state and local governments. Within the private sector, only education and health hired. Hiring is going to stand still out there. There are a lot of people who say, OK, we need to cut to offset that. The opposition would be, well, if you do that, you're giving up on inflation and inflation's not back to the 2 percent target. We, the Fed, promised to get it back to the 2 percent target. And so, there's going to be a vigorous discussion at the Fed about what should be done. They've had this discussion for months. They've elected (inaudible) to do nothing, stay where they are. We'll see what happens in the July meeting.

DEAN: All right. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate it.

HOLTZ-EAKIN: Thank you.

DEAN: Still to come, Sean Combs gets closer today to learning his sentence, but we've already learned about the reaction he received on his way back to jail after the verdict. Plus, TSA making a policy change that could shorten the security lines, would allow you to keep your shoes on at some airports. That and much more, coming up here on "CNN News Central."

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