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Interview with Doug Collins, Veterans Affairs Secretary: Medical Care, Critical Services for Veterans Not Interrupted; Government Shutdown Expected to Extend into Next Week; Pentagon Defends One of the Three Deadly Boat Strikes Against Alleged Drug Smugglers; Hollywood is Fuming Over New AI Actress. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired October 02, 2025 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: While the government is shut down, some 97 percent of the Department of Veterans Affairs is still working, most with pay through other sources. Medical care, homelessness services, and a crisis hotline are among the programs that are still operating for now. But even before the shutdown started, hundreds of current and former VA doctors, nurses, and other caregivers warned that the Department of Veterans Affairs were seeing negative impacts of the agency's recent staffing cuts and other policy changes.

We're joined now by Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins. Mr. Secretary, thank you so much for joining us.

DOUG COLLINS, VETERANS AFFAIRS SECRETARY: Glad to be here.

KEILAR: So VA centers, hospitals, they're still open. Can you tell us about the services that have stopped and how that is impacting veterans?

COLLINS: I'll be happy to, and I'm glad you mentioned that up front because I don't want any of our veterans to think that the actions up here in Washington, D.C. are affecting their healthcare, dealing with homelessness, dealing with our benefits and going on. Things that are impacted right now are basically our outreach. Our outreach to new veterans, our having to get to them, bringing them in the system, our transition assistance programs.

Some of our regional offices are closed, so they can't go in to actually get answers. They can still get answers by calling our numbers but also using the websites. We have ground maintenance at our cemeteries.

We can't place permanent markers at our cemeteries, pre-burial needs, those kinds of things are not available. And so it's just basically right now in this early stages, this is mainly our outreach to get those involved that need to be involved or have an outlet to be a part of the VA.

KEILAR: The president is threatening to fire, in his words, a lot of federal workers. Will that include employees at the VA? COLLINS: At this point in time, the president and his team are working everything they want to do to control this situation. We're not at this point prepared on any point to do that here. We've actually had a reduction in our force, which has actually turned out very well when you look at the numbers of what we've had.

But at this point in time, we're focused on one thing, and that is to get the veterans through this time of government shutdown, which may be some concern out there, just to let them know that we're continuing on doing what we're supposed to be doing.

KEILAR: I ask because, as you know, and you've been talking about it, a third of the federal workforce are veterans, more so at the VA. Have you been assured that no one at the VA is being fired?

COLLINS: Brianna, why don't we, at this point, I mean, I just told you that we have no plans at this point. The government -- the president and folks will determine what they need to do.

[15:35:00]

But at this point in time, our focus is on one thing and one thing only, and that is to make sure that the veterans are getting the services of which we have funding for, which we're going to continue to do.

And I have -- there's no plans at this point to do anything past that. If those were to come along, then we will deal with that. But that focus is right now on just taking care of our veterans.

KEILAR: So you and Senator Ruben Gallego, who's a veteran, have kind of been getting, trading some words online, I guess you could say. And he has been questioning your sincerity on this issue of standing up for veterans during the shutdown, because of all of the cuts at the VA that are negatively affecting veterans, according to doctors and other staff. I mean, what do you say to that?

COLLINS: Well, one, you took up a definition of hypocrisy, and you'll find Ruben's picture right now. Because here's a man who actually went online and said, yes, I'm going to take my paycheck. I have stuff to pay. I've got bills to pay, child support and everything else.

But yet, he actually voted to keep the government closed. I don't put a lot of stock in that. And if you followed, Brianna, if you've been following the VA for the whole year, he's never really had a good thing to say about what we're trying to do to improve services for the VA.

And this wonderful letter that you talked about, which again, people are entitled to their own opinion. They're just not entitled to their own facts.

And the facts are, is that while we have streamlined our services, we have actually had better performance in our wait times, in our hospitals, and getting people into mental health care quicker, getting the emergency places done so they can get their care quicker across our spectrum all along. And also, we have just finished up the year, we did 3 million processed disability claims. 2.4 was the previous record. And we also lowered our backlog from 260,000, where it was under the previous administration, when I got here, to we're at 132,000.

All the while, while we were doing all of this that they said was harming the VA by reshaping our force and allowing people to take early retirement. I challenge you, if that's hurting veteran services, I think we got a different metric we got to look at, because our metrics are improving, and veterans are getting the services that they need.

KEILAR: Well, part of this letter says, and this was 350 doctors, psychologists, nurses, researchers, and others who said, we write to raise urgent concerns about proposed policies, which in addition to ones already enacted, will undermine VA's healthcare system, overwhelm VA's budget, and negatively affect the lives of all veterans. We have witnessed these ongoing harms and can provide evidence and testimony of their impacts.

They're saying they have evidence and testimony of those impacts. Is that something you're seeking?

COLLINS: I tell you, I'm sure they'll run to you to let them know what they think they have, but I can just go on the facts that I run this department every day.

KEILAR: I'm not asking that, I'm asking, are you interested in hearing that, if they have evidence?

COLLINS: I actually read the letter. If you want me to talk, I'll talk. If you want to talk, I'll be happy to let you.

KEILAR: No, please go ahead.

COLLINS: OK. I mean, I've read the letter. It was very interesting.

A couple of doctors actually quoted in some of the articles are either not affiliated full-time with the VA, they deal with some of our graduate medical education folks. What we're dealing with right here, if they have stuff to bring forward, they want to bring it forward. We have plenty of opportunities to show inside our system, if there are doctors inside our system, to talk about issues that they have.

They have ways to complain. That has never been shut down. But what I can tell you is, is by someone who's 26 states, who's visited almost 40 of our hospitals in person, and talked to the BAMC directors directly on many occasions, we're seeing good things happen.

And what they're upset about is it's not done business the old way. The old business the old way was the VA taking care of itself, taking care of making sure we put in processes that made the VA look OK, but the veteran many times was left out.

Since I've been here, we changed that model. The veteran is taken first at the VA, not our organizations, where organization exists only to take care of a veteran. And like I said earlier, I presented evidence to you just a few minutes ago about how we're actually improved veteran services in many ways, but yet that seemingly gets ignored by a letter in which they just say these could happen. I don't deal in could-haves, I deal in what is.

KEILAR: I think they also are talking about things that have happened and having concerns about the future as well.

COLLINS: I agree.

KEILAR: But of these folks in this letter, are you going to cancel the medical staff privileges at VA medical centers for staff who signed that letter?

COLLINS: No.

KEILAR: OK. Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins, thanks for being with us.

COLLINS: Here's the interesting thing. Here's the interesting thing, Brianna. And that question begs the idea that we don't accept input from our staff. It begs the input that if we disagree with people that something's going to bad happen.

That is an honest discussion we can have. It's typically not good to have it in a letter put out to the general public in which you give no context for what you're talking about. When I will actually come on the show and actually give you the real world context of what we're dealing with.

I mean, look, if they get pleasure out of writing that letter, great. We want to -- if they want to help the VA get better, then show us what we need to get better. Show us and disagree.

[15:40:00]

You can have your opinion, but not your own facts. This letter is simply a lot of what I read in that letter was simply also, we believe this might happen because we don't like the fact that over time we protected 350,000 positions. We allowed 30,000 roughly to take early retirement.

And you know what shockingly happened? Our metrics got better and more services went to the veteran. We opened 17 new clinics.

We're just moving right ahead. If they want to complain, they can complain. I'm willing to take input on criticism, but we're also going to make sure that we're doing what's right for the veteran.

KEILAR: Secretary Collins, thank you so much for taking the time to be with us this afternoon. We really appreciate it.

COLLINS: I appreciate you letting me have it. Thanks a lot.

KEILAR: And still ahead, this actress is not real, but the controversy that she's sparking certainly is. We're going to discuss with actor and president of the Screen Actors Guild, Sean Astin next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: We are told the government shutdown is now expected to drag into at least next week. A vote on the spending bill that's scheduled for tomorrow is expected to fail, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune telling CNN it's unlikely that senators will stay in D.C. over the weekend.

We have CNN's Arlette Saenz live for us on The Hill. And Arlette, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries just spoke. What did he say?

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Democratic leader in the House, Hakeem Jeffries, really stressed that Democrats want to hold the line when it comes to some of their demands relating to health care, specifically those subsidies of Obamacare that are set to expire at the end of the year. He also said that they are -- that Democrats are ready and willing to meet at any time with Republicans, but that is not a meeting that has come to fruition since they met with President Trump in the Oval Office earlier this week.

Take a listen to the Democratic leader.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. HAKEEM JEFFRIES (D-NY), MINORITY LEADER: Willing, we are able to sit down with anyone, anytime, anyplace, including the president and the vice president to try to find a path forward to reopen the government, enact a spending agreement that actually meets the needs of the American people, while at the same time addressing the Republican health care crisis. Unfortunately, Republicans have shown zero interest in even having a conversation. After the White House meeting on Monday, we've seen behavior by the president that is unserious and unhinged.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Jeffries also called out a social media post by President Trump earlier today when he had said that he would meet with the OMB director to talk about cuts to Democrat agencies. In that social media post, the president had referred to Project 2025. Jeffries says that that is something that he really ran away from during the campaign, said that he was not a part of, but now is fully embracing.

Now, right now, it does not appear that any efforts to end the shutdown will be coming to a quick resolution at this point. The Senate is expected to begin holding votes again tomorrow, but unless enough Democrats start to move over, it's unlikely that will pass. And it's looking like Democrats -- the Senate will not be back until Monday, meaning that this is still going to be a prolonged shutdown for a bit longer.

KEILAR: All right. Arlette Saenz live for us on Capitol Hill -- Boris.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: This just into CNN. In a new notice to Congress, the Pentagon is defending one of three boat strikes carried out in the Caribbean last month. The strikes, which the White House says targeted alleged drug smugglers, have killed 17 people in total.

CNN's Natasha Bertrand is here for us. Natasha, what is the Pentagon saying about this?

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Boris, so this is a new notice that the Pentagon provided to lawmakers yesterday in conjunction with a briefing that the Pentagon's general counsel gave to lawmakers. Essentially, what they're saying is that the president has made the determination that the U.S. is in a non-international armed conflict with these drug cartels and has also deemed these cartels to be enemy combatants.

Now, this is pretty significant because it essentially facilitates, according to their interpretation of the law, the strikes that we have seen on those drug boats in the Caribbean over the last month or so. There have been three. There have been serious legal questions raised by experts about whether those were actually legally justified.

Now the administration is trying to say, well, the president has deemed not only that it is within his Article 2 authority to assist in the defense of the United States when necessary, but also that these are legitimate military targets because we are in an armed conflict with these groups.

They are attacking the United States. They are bringing drugs into the U.S., which are killing people. And we have also deemed them to be enemy combatants, which is a really key shift from previously when they were just considered to be criminals.

Now they have even fewer rights. They have no due process. And they are legally able to strike them and kill them in a way, of course, that they can't do with just criminals.

SANCHEZ: So why is the Pentagon only referencing one of the three strikes?

BERTRAND: Yes, that's something that is totally unclear. In this legal memo to Congress, they only said -- they were only making reference to the strike on September 15th, even though there were three last month. We have questions about that, but we don't know why they've only mentioned that one specific strike.

SANCHEZ: Thanks so much for the update, Natasha Bertrand. Appreciate it.

Stay with CNN NEWS CENTRAL. We're back in moments.

[15:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Hollywood is fuming and it's because of this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Let's get to know each other and thanks for watching.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: That's Tilly Norwood. And I know she seems kind of real there, but that is a completely AI-generated character. There are postings of her on Instagram about pursuing an acting career, doing screen tests, writing, find yourself an actress who can do it all with the hashtag AI actress.

SANCHEZ: There has been anger from the acting community, with some suggesting that rage should be directed at any agency that signs this artificial actress. Here is actress Emily Blunt, as she was shown an image of Norwood during an interview with Variety.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLAYTON DAVIS: This is her, by the way, just in case you haven't seen her.

EMILY BLUNT, ACTRESS: No. Are you serious?

DAVIS: Yes.

BLUNT: That's an AI?

DAVIS: Yes, that is the --

BLUNT: Good Lord. We're screwed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: Screwed. We're joined now by Sean Astin, star of films like Rudy and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. He's also the newly elected leader of the Screen Actors Guild.

Sean, thanks so much for sharing your afternoon with us. I wonder what you make of Tilly's creator saying that she's not meant to replace human actors but is rather just a piece of art in the way that animators or puppeteers or CGI artists try to imagine new works to spread emotion and tell stories.

[15:55:00]

SEAN ASTIN, ACTOR AND PRESIDENT, SAG-AFTRA: Well, without disparaging her, that's a fantastic rationalization of what's happening. The problem is that the data that's used to create Tilly, who is not a human being, she, it, is a synthetic creation garnered from ill-gotten data, the data that comes from our performers, that is ingested into these models and then spit out and manipulated by creative, thoughtful people, but, you know, in a way that disadvantages the members of my union financially and emotionally.

And, you know, so we're talking about not just the ethical use of this exciting new technology, we're talking about a business practice that is unacceptable.

KEILAR: It's like a rip-off. I mean, is that a fair way to explain how people feel about this?

ASTIN: Well, it's not like a rip-off, it is a rip-off.

KEILAR: Yes.

ASTIN: What you got to -- you got to realize the, the information that's being scraped into these models, they're taking all of the film, television, radio, footage, images from our lives, but also from proprietary works and they're illegally using it to create new, seemingly new things, but they're not new, they're actually just reassembled parts of stuff that doesn't belong to them.

SANCHEZ: AI was a huge part of the writers and actor strikes that disrupted Hollywood in 2023, and to end the strike, SAG reached a deal that the union described as extraordinary at the time, saying that it included AI protections. I wonder, would that agreement be violated if somehow this character wound up being used by a major studio or a character like her?

ASTIN: Probably. The achievements that we got in that contract were extraordinary. They were groundbreaking, they were first of its kind, but it's just a start.

One of the things we did achieve with regard to the generative AI, which is what Tilly is, is that if it's used by any of our signatory producers or companies, they have to notify us and they have to bargain with us and they have to compensate with us -- compensate us. So, so very possibly they could be doing that. But, you know, we can only achieve so much in contract language. What's required now, additionally, is improved legal protections, and there are several bills that are making their way through Congress right now.

The state of California and the state of New York have done great work, you know, starting to address this, you know, new reality that we're all living in, which is on the one hand really exciting. Yes, the characters are looking more and more real, they're approximating emotions that are more and more real, but it's really important to me, to the members here, and I think probably to the public that we remind ourselves it's not actually real. It's not real.

And, you know, if people are consuming entertainment and they are being misled or tricked or don't know that what they're watching isn't real, that's a problem.

KEILAR: Some of your members are calling for the talent agents who are interested in signing Norwood to be outed. Are you working with talent agencies on this? I mean, where is that?

ASTIN: Well, we've talked about the conversations with the ATA that are -- that I'm excited about, actually. I think our -- I don't think there needs to be anything combative right now in terms of our relationships with our agents. Our agents are working hard to find us work, and this is a new wrinkle for them, too.

So, those conversations with the ATA will be ongoing, and I think they'll be constructive and healthy, and I expect. You know, the upset and the anger that the members feel that they would be somehow pushed out by their agents because of some synthetic character, that's a real emotional response to it. And they have every right to make whatever statements they want about how they will protect themselves and their relationships with their agents.

From an institutional perspective for our union, we have to have some of the conversations on behalf of our members that they may not be disposed to having themselves just yet.

SANCHEZ: Yes, in theory, it could pose a threat to the agents as well because someone, a fake image like Tilly -- I'm talking about her like she's a real person -- she may not even actually need representation, right?

Sean, we only have a few seconds. I wonder how much of this you think has to do with supply and demand when it comes to audience taste, because this kind of disruption, I mean, it may be inevitable if the audience is there for it.

[16:00:00]

ASTIN: Well, the audience will be there for some of it, but we feel absolutely confident that the audience wants to develop its relationship with our performers the way they have with movies like Lord of the Rings or Rudy or Goonies that I was in or any of the other TV shows or music or, you know, video games we play or audiobooks we listen to or whatever. Like, we performers in this union have a long- standing relationship with the audience and we're not going anywhere and they're not going anywhere, no matter how much they enjoy whatever additional things are created with this exciting and interesting technology.

SANCHEZ: And we appreciate you joining us today, Sean Astin. Thank you so much for your performances and for the time as well.

Stay with CNN. "THE ARENA" with Kasie Hunt starts right now.

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