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Trump and Starmer Meet in Scotland for Talks on Trade, Gaza, Ukraine; Trump Says U.S. To Set Up Food Centers in Gaza to Stop Starvation Crisis; Trump Gives Putin 10 or 12 Days for Ceasefire Deadline With Ukraine; Trump Breaks With Netanyahu, Who Claims No Starvation in Gaza; Trump Touts E.U. Trade Agreement as Biggest Deal Ever Made; Federal Reserve to Make Decision on Interest Rates This Week; Manhunt After Couple Killed at State Park; Ghislaine Maxwell Urges Supreme Court to Overturn Conviction. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired July 28, 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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[14:01:40]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Weighing in on two wars, President Trump publicly rejects Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's claim that there's no starvation in Gaza. And in the war in Ukraine, he's moving up his deadline for Russian leader Vladimir Putin to agree to a ceasefire.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Plus, the uproar over the Epstein files, following President Trump across the Atlantic as he was asked again today about a possible pardon for convicted child sex trafficker, Ghislaine Maxwell. At the same time, her lawyers are urging the Supreme Court to toss her conviction. And later, murdered in broad daylight, a couple killed while hiking with their young daughters in an Arkansas State Park. We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to "CNN News Central."

KEILAR: Hello, I'm Brianna Keilar in Washington alongside Boris Sanchez. Welcome back.

SANCHEZ: Glad to be back.

(LAUGH)

KEILAR: And we are starting with some major developments in President Trump's overseas trip. The president sitting down with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer today in Scotland and the two talk trade after the U.S. announced a new 15 percent tariff rate on most E.U. imports. They also address though, what Starmer's office called the appalling scenes in Gaza.

SANCHEZ: Palestinian health officials say another 14 people have died there in the last 24 hours because of starvation. Today, President Trump announced the U.S. would look to open food centers in the enclave, breaking with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who claimed over the weekend that there is no starvation in Gaza. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: So, we're going to set up food centers and where the people can walk in and no boundaries. We're also going to make sure that they don't have barriers stopping people. You've seen the areas where they actually have food and the people are screaming for the food in there. We can save a lot of people. I mean, some of those kids are -- that's real starvation stuff. I see it, and you can't fake that. So, we're going to be even more involved.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: President Trump also announcing a significant policy shift in regards to Russia, shortening the deadline for Vladimir Putin to reach a peace agreement with Ukraine to just 10 to 12 days. CNN's Alayna Treene is live force at the White House. Alayna, what more is the White House saying about Gaza specifically and how it intends to push aid into the enclave?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yeah, this was a very notable moment, Boris and Brianna, and I think of course, we could tell that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza right now was the central focus of that meeting between President Donald Trump and the U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer. It was actually the leading reason why Starmer actually went to Scotland to meet with the president during this trip, which was originally supposed to be more about the president going to visit some of his properties there in addition to some of the diplomatic relationships.

So, this was really the central focus of that. And you could hear Starmer, I think one of his key goals, of that visit with the president was to try and apply pressure on Donald Trump to do more about the humanitarian crisis. He talked about this revulsion among the British public in seeing these images from Gaza, but also wanting to have the president do more to put pressure on the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well to deal with this. I think one of the most notable parts from what we heard the president say during that bilateral press conference with Starmer was when he called on Prime Minister Netanyahu to do more amid Israel's aid blockade.

[14:05:00]

And he also said at one point that he believes that perhaps Netanyahu needs to be approaching the war differently. And this is definitely a shift in tone from what we've heard President Donald Trump say before. And of course, very notable, given that Netanyahu over the weekend really called into question whether or not those images of these starving children in Gaza were actually real. Now, we heard the president as well condemn those photos. He was asked if he agreed with Netanyahu about whether it's up for question that those kids and these people in Gaza were starving.

President Donald Trump said that based on television, he'd say, not particularly because those children look very hungry. Then he went on to detail, of course, what the United States is going to do with -- to help deal with this issue. He said that they're going to be a setting up food centers and helping set up food centers to provide more aid to people in Gaza. He did not offer specifics, but again, a notable shift. And I think a key question is that we heard the president say he's going to be calling Netanyahu again to talk about all of this, what actually he's going to be asking for. That's a key question of course, that I'll be asking my sources as well, Boris and Brianna.

SANCHEZ: Alayna Treene, please keep us posted. Thank you so much, from the White House. So, Ukraine is praising President Trump's decision to impose a new deadline on Russia. The Chief of Staff to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying that Trump was "Standing firm and delivering a clear message of peace through strength."

KEILAR: We're joined now by CNN's former Moscow Bureau Chief, Jill Dougherty. She is the author of the book, "My Russia: What I Saw Inside the Kremlin," Jill, Ukraine seeing a glimmer of hope in this new 10 to 12 day deadline that Trump has set for Putin to reach a ceasefire. That's the reporting that we're getting from our Nick Paton Walsh, who's there in Eastern Ukraine. What is Russia understanding this to mean, what Trump is saying?

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN FORMER MOSCOW BUREAU CHIEF: You know, Russia is doing what it always does, which is -- I was actually looking at the choreography of this. So President Putin remains aloof. He doesn't say anything. The stock market is taking a hit today in Russia, so obviously, they're worried. You have the former president who is now the head of this -- or Deputy Head of his Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev saying -- he does the trolling in Russia. So he said, Trump's playing the ultimatum game with Russia.

And then I think interesting too is this kind of new note, and it's coming from the Foreign Minister, Mr. Sergey Lavrov. And he said, Trump is not getting the full information about the conflict in Ukraine. And he said, the data is sifted through a sieve. Now, what he means by that is of course, unknowable. But I think what he's saying, he's trying to soften that relationship with Trump because what they're doing, even though President Trump seems to be more and more angry, although, it's not really tough rhetoric today, so much as what he ultimately said.

But I think what they're trying to do is keep the relationship open with Trump. So they're essentially saying, he doesn't really know what's happening. He's being misled. But they're not saying what would happen. What are they afraid? Of course, they're not going to say that. But I think, ultimately, the bottom line in this kind of confusing situation is they don't know what's going to happen. They don't know what is going to happen in two weeks. They don't know what is going to come out of Washington tomorrow. So, they have to keep all the possibilities open and hope that in the end, Trump does not do what he says he's going to do.

SANCHEZ: Is it fair to say, Jill, that the situation on the battlefield with Ukraine facing its most challenging moment on the frontlines, essentially since the start of the war, is factoring into this new approach by Trump? DOUGHERTY: Well, yeah, I think, if you look at -- he mentioned specifically Kyiv and Kyiv, the capital, has been hit really, really hard recently. And civilians, also they have apparently hit, or damaged a European embassy. And so these things are in the reports to President Trump, he's getting them. And I think that the, the fact that the Russians unleashed over the past few weeks, an entire barrage, really dangerous, has definitely affected Trump's view of this.

It's horrendous. So that might be affecting it. But I think the ultimate question is, what will he do about it? Because all of these things, ultimately, let's say tariffs on Russia, we don't buy anything from Russia particularly. So, tariffs with Russia won't make any difference.

[14:10:00]

Tariffs, secondary tariffs on countries that buy energy from Russia, China, India, et cetera, could be a very big deal. And so the Russians, I think, again, reading another few tea leaves here, they're banking on some type of bet that Trump won't do that, that it would hurt Trump. So, you're hearing that message too. Don't do this. It's a mistake. But, we'll have to see. Again, every day is a new development.

KEILAR: Yeah. If it interrupts the energy market and comes back on American consumers, they feel it as well. The new E.U.-U.S. Trade Framework, Jill, that was just announced over the weekend, includes the E.U. commitment to buy $750 billion of energy from the U.S., which would take the pressure off NATO and E.U. countries that still have all that Russian natural gas coming in. How much of a lever do you think that could be on Russia, and if they might actually think that Trump is serious about these secondary sanctions?

DOUGHERTY: Well, these are -- I think these are the interesting things because Russians really would worry about that. An enormous percentage of their budget comes from energy sales. That's what they live on. And so if that is hit, it's very serious. And the other side of this, remember, back on the 14th of July, when Trump introduced this 50-day threat against Russia, he was also talking about the Europeans purchasing weapons from the United States and giving them to the Ukrainians.

And the Europeans actually have been doing that. There's not a lot of big reporting on that, but that is happening. So that is another thing that would worry the Russians as well. So, that's -- we have to watch that as well as well.

KEILAR: All, right, Jill, we'll keep our eye on that as well. Jill Dougherty, thank you so much. And as we mentioned, President Trump is touting what he calls that "biggest deal ever made." The U.S. and the E.U. reaching a new framework for a trade deal that would end a months-long saga with one of America's biggest trading partners. The deal would drop tariffs to 15 percent on most E.U. imports, down from the 30 percent targeted for August 1st. And as we mentioned, it includes billions of dollars invested in the U.S. economy. The market is reacting to the news with the Dow briefly approaching a new record high today. So let's bring in the host of NPR's "Full Disclosure" business journalist, Roben Farzad for us. All right, Roben, the Dow approaching a record high after this deal. What could the looming August 1st deadline for dozens of other countries mean for the markets and 401(k)s?

ROBEN FARZAD, HOST, PUBLIC RADIO'S "FULL DISCLOSURE": I feel like it's wash, rinse, repeat, yawn, wash, rinse, repeat, yawn. This goes back to what? April 2nd and emancipation day, I even forgot what it's called. You first had all that shock and awe. You saw that he pulls back. Some people call it TACO, some people call it the art of the deal. And then in the very end, it all gets caught up in the wash, whatever you want to call it.

In this case though, the Europeans are actually pretty angry. France and others are saying, look, I understand we're a collective negotiating bloc, but this is like paying tribute. We got screwed here. And the others are like, calm down. He is going to tie this to NATO, just hang low. And hopefully, we live to see another president.

KEILAR: Do you think that's what happens?

FARZAD: Yeah, I think he comes in, he comes in with these ridiculous -- I mean, do you remember that chart on April 2nd? I don't know if ChatGPT created it. I don't know if the Huddle (ph) did the -- the White House or the OOB (ph) and created it. But these were startling numbers and you're going to shoot yourself because who ends up paying for these things with vehicle parts? And the way that the supply chain is global, wine, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals. But in the end, the market is saying that we can kind of live with 15 percent with significant carve-outs for major players like aerospace companies and airplane builders.

KEILAR: OK, so in the deal, cars from European car makers face a 15 percent tariff. In the U.S.-Japan deal, Japanese cars imported to the U.S. face a 15 percent tariff. It's lower than the 25 percent rate on cars that American companies assemble in Canada and Mexico. How are you seeing that? What is that going to mean for Detroit, for the big three automakers, for auto workers in America?

FARZAD: I think it would've been something far more significant -- let's -- had this happened 40 years ago because we have in the Sun Belt such an abundance of foreign manufacturers building their cars here. Look at BMW, you look at Toyota, Honda, they're all kind of here. What is a Japanese car anymore? What is a European car anymore? Subaru of Indiana, I said it before, that's a major facility outside of Indianapolis that builds ridiculously popular cars. So, it's far easier to kind of inveigh against this. And we're getting hit. And our car makers, and by the way, we're not selling a ton of our cars abroad, and there is a significant trade imbalance between us and the broad bloc of 27 European countries.

[14:15:00]

But the market is telling you that it's not its biggest concern. KEILAR: We saw on that graphic we just put up, pharmaceuticals and this E.U. deal places a 15 percent tariff on them. It's the number one good the U.S. imported from the E.U. last year according to commerce. What does that mean for Americans with prescriptions? I mean, just noting that Ireland, part of the E.U. of course, is the top single foreign country supplying the U.S. with pharmaceuticals.

FARZAD: That's not good. You already have this process convoluted by pharmacy benefit managers and the insurance companies and the pharmacies and the drug retailers. The last thing you need is another kind of reason for them to hike prices 20, 25 percent, and to be able to blame tariffs, even if it isn't about tariffs, even if they could afford to absorb this hit. So, I don't think that's very smart. I don't think it's very tactical.

A lot of these companies went to places like Ireland for tax shelter reasons to begin with, but they're going to come out and say -- and blame this. And you're certainly going to feel it within the next year or two at the prescription counter.

KEILAR: Fed meeting this week. Trump's clear, he wants a cut. The Fed Chair Jerome Powell signaling there will not be one. What do you think?

FARZAD: He's a lame duck at this point, Powell, he's been so abused. What is it that, he called him numbskull. That he had this embarrassing tour with the hard hats last week.

KEILAR: Yeah.

FARZAD: Trump is really good at finding that vulnerability and kind of playing it. But this guy is -- he has a responsibility. There is supposed to be a separation of state and bank in this case. And if the numbers don't give him the ammo to go out and cut wildly the way Trump does it, it would be hugely reckless. The markets would immediately come back and say, whoa, what's going on here? We're seeing the full politicization of the Fed on the largest economy on the planet, and that would in turn reign in Donald Trump.

Having said that, his term ends next year and there's only so much he can do between now and then.

KEILAR: Yeah. Roben, always great to talk through these things with you.

FARZAD: Thank you, Brianna.

KEILAR: Roben Farzad, always appreciate it. And still to come, President Trump again, not ruling out a pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein's accomplice, convicted sex trafficker, even as his own DOJ argues that her conviction should stay in place.

SANCHEZ: Plus, a family outing ends in horror after a husband and wife were killed while hiking with their two young daughters. We have the latest on the manhunt for a suspect when we come back.

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[14:22:13]

SANCHEZ: More on the breaking story we've been following all afternoon. Attorneys for Ghislaine Maxwell made a final pitch to the Supreme Court, asking justices to overturn her 2021 conviction for conspiring with Jeffrey Epstein to sexually abuse young girls. Her attorneys argue that it violates an agreement that Epstein made that shielded any potential co-conspirators from prosecution. The Justice Department wants that to -- wants the high court to reject that appeal.

KEILAR: That's right. And in the meantime, a source is telling CNN Maxwell received limited immunity to speak with the Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who is formerly the personal lawyer of the President, about the Epstein files last week. Those discussions were not mentioned in today's Supreme Court filing, we should note. And when asked about it again today in Scotland, president Trump again said, he's not ruling out a pardon for Maxwell. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Well, I'm allowed to give her a pardon.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are.

TRUMP: But, nobody has approached me with it. Nobody has asked me about it. It's in the news about that, that aspect of it. But, right now, it would be inappropriate to talk about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: And we're joined now by CNN Chief Legal Affairs Correspondent, Paula Reid. Paula walk us through Maxwell's argument before the Supreme Court, what her rationale is for wanting this.

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, all of this comes of course, as the White House and Congress are embroiled in this controversy related to the Epstein files. And now the third branch of government, the Supreme Court has a chance to wade in here too, because they are being asked to take a look at her 2021 conviction. Her lawyers argue that should be overturned because they're looking back to a 2007 deal that Epstein made as a non-prosecution and plea agreement that they believe should have also shielded his associates because there were really two big rounds of federal grand jury activity related to Epstein, the first down in Florida, between 2005, around 2007. And then there was the subsequent round that happened in recent years that resulted in charges against Epstein and Maxwell.

So, they're arguing that her conviction, where she was sentenced to 20 years in prison after being convicted of helping Epstein abuse teenage girls, that that should be thrown out. Now, will this work? Well, one reason the Supreme Court takes up cases is when there is disagreement across the different regions or circuits in the U.S. And this is not a common issue, these kinds of non-prosecution and plea agreements, but this is something that has come up and there is disagreement across the circuit. So, it's possible that the Supreme Court would want to take this up.

Now, it is notable that this appeal filing comes just days after Maxwell met with the Deputy Attorney General.

[14:25:00]

We're told that she answered questions about roughly a hundred people. It's unclear what the Justice Department is going to do with that material, but we know here, in this case, the Justice Department has opposed overturning her conviction. Supreme Court, they're currently on summer recess. If they decide to wade in here, they would likely wait until the new term, which begins in October. And it's unclear when we'd get a decision. But the big, big cases usually come in June.

SANCHEZ: And Paula, President Trump made a claim yet again today that the so-called Epstein files have been manipulated. The president has not provided any evidence of this. I wonder what you make of what he's claiming there.

REID: Yeah. Let's take a listen to exactly what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Well, I haven't been overly interested in it. It's something -- it's a hoax that's been built up way beyond proportion. The whole thing is a hoax. They ran the files. I was running against somebody that ran the files. If they had something, they would've released, now they can easily put something in the files that's a phony.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

REID: Now, of course, this is his own attorney general, his own administration that reversed course on a promise to release additional materials. This is just his latest effort to undermine maybe the credibility of what is in those files. But so far, nothing the president has done to try to divert attention from this issue has worked.

SANCHEZ: Paula Reid, thank you so much for that reporting. Let's talk about the politics of this with Andrew Egger. He's a White House Correspondent for The Bulwark. Andrew, thanks so much for being with us. I wonder what you make of the volume and intensity and at times, odd detail that Trump has used to respond to some of these questions about Epstein.

ANDREW EGGER, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, THE BULWARK: Yeah. What's -- one of the things that's really unusual about this particular controversy is how it is really concentrated, the people who care about it, in his own base. Right? And that's kind of a unique and new thing for the president to care about. A lot of the people who have been tracking this Epstein conspiracy for -- or the just the Epstein case for quite a long time are big Trump supporters, were counting on him to shed some light on a lot of the outstanding questions about all of this.

And so, when the Department of Justice reversed course and said a couple of weeks ago that there wasn't expected to be anything else released and essentially, tried to say move on, obviously, that created a large amount of consternation. And so I think one thing that you're seeing with the president himself is just that this is a rare situation where his ordinary playbook for responding to these sorts of stories, which is trying to pick fights with the media as the adversary or with Democrats as the adversary, this is more of like a fight between Trump and his own people and what he promised them before.

And so, I think you're seeing a certain amount of squabbling and, dare I say, flailing in how he's responding to that.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, I think, in part because for so long, there was a promise that we would get some big revelation. I mean, he ran on it partly on his campaign. A lot of the folks that he put in at DOJ and at the FBI also talked about releasing all the information. And so for his supporters, it's either they overpromised and were dishonest about how much was actually there, or now, they're being dishonest about what is actually there and not wanting to release it. So, I wonder within the base as Republicans on Capitol Hill are on recess and going home and listening to constituents, can this actually drive a wedge within Trump's supporters? And is there a political risk for him?

EGGER: Yeah. And what's particularly interesting is that the sort of messaging dissonance that we were talking about, has continued, right?

SANCHEZ: Yeah.

EGGER: I mean, you have people like Attorney General Pam Bondi, or her Deputy Todd Blanche, who are talking about the need for ongoing transparency. That's why they're saying they went to interview Ghislaine Maxwell over the weekend. They are saying they still want to get to the bottom of this. Meanwhile, the president this morning, and every time he's asked about it, couldn't be clearer that he doesn't like this story, that he's kind of angry that this story has persisted in the news. He just wants people to move on.

So there's that amount of dissonance there. That said, I do think that one thing that we need to keep in mind about the president's base here is that they are -- they've been kind of hit upside the head with some of the cognitive dissonance here, just because the transition was so abrupt. But, they really like him. They have liked him a lot for a really long time, and they're looking for a way to get to yes on this. And I think that's part of what we're seeing now from some of the later strategic moves from the White House, like trying to pivot to a different alleged conspiracy to frame him in the files, along the lines of sort of the witch hunt talk that has played really well for him in the past with his base, or a lot of this talk about maybe it's Ghislaine who's the -- who's the key to all of this.

And maybe if the White House can now sort of shift from being this entity that is holding back information to, in the minds of its supporters now, again, being the relentless pursuer of new information, by going and interviewing her, they're, I think that they're hoping, and not without reason, that those sorts of narrative shifts may be able to fix this up as far as that problem with his base is concerned.

SANCHEZ: What incentive would Trump have for pardoning her, if a lot of folks out there may see that as a way to get her to comply with his version of events? If you're looking at this from a conspirator --