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GOP Defectors Back Extending Obamacare Subsidies; Nick Reiner Makes First Court Appearance; President Trump to Address Nation; Rhode Island Manhunt. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired December 17, 2025 - 13:00   ET

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

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BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: It is now day five in the manhunt for the person behind Saturday's deadly shooting at Brown University, investigators out searching for evidence near the building where the shooting occurred. We have details straight ahead.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: As Nick Reiner makes his first court appearance, his brother and sister speaking out about the murders of their parents. We're live from Los Angeles.

And Republican centrists are going with the nuclear option by siding with Democrats to force a floor vote on extending Obamacare subsidies.

We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SANCHEZ: We begin with new details in what has become a desperate manhunt for the Brown University shooter, a gunman who is believed to be armed and dangerous and still out there, somehow evading police since Saturday.

Investigators say they are working hundreds of tips in hopes of identifying this person of interest seen pacing for hours around campus before the shooting. Police now believe the shooter fired a nine-millimeter gun, the most common caliber of weapon used in violent crimes.

KEILAR: We're told there is hope that DNA swabs collected at the scene will provide additional clues. And the FBI is now offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the shooter's arrest and conviction.

Today, the university is defending its security measures amid criticism about the lack of surveillance footage obtained by the school. A university spokesperson says the campus has an expansive network of more than 1,200 cameras and highlighted the school's emergency notification system.

CNN senior law enforcement analyst and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe is with us.

I do wonder, Andy, as you hear what the school is saying about this video evidence, if you were expecting that there would have been more, considering how many video opportunities they're describing and why it might be that there are not so many videos from campus.

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, it's a really confusing picture that authorities and the and the university, quite frankly, have painted of the university's kind of security posture.

We know that they now claim to have over 1,000 cameras, but we also know they have said in the past that the particular building where the shooting took place, there's a older portion and a newer portion, and the older portion where the shooting took place does not have, according to them, many or any cameras at all.

Now, they have also made statements that -- at least the mayor has referred to the fact that the sidewalk -- as soon as the shooter left the building, as soon as he stepped onto the sidewalk, he's no longer on school property.

He's in the city proper and suggesting that that's not part of the university's security posture, whereas we know that there are many businesses and academic institutions and other things that are -- maintain a very complete video capture of the perimeter around their building. Whether or not it strays onto public right of ways and sidewalks makes no difference legally.

Certainly, Brown University would have been entitled to put cameras on their building that would have shown who was coming and going from the building at any given time. That certainly would be helpful at this point. But we have the facts that we have and that's what investigators are dealing with.

SANCHEZ: When you see this footage, Andy, what stands out to you, especially given that this person of interest was out there literally for hours walking around what eventually became his crime scene?

MCCABE: Yes, it's really good question, Boris.

It's -- when we saw the first kind of decent round of videos, we got a lot of detail out of that, that, clearly, this person has a unique and distinctive gait, the way he walks, the way he possibly favors his left side. So that was a potentially identifying factor that the -- that authorities are really trying to point people to.

We saw some nuances in the clothing that he was wearing, the mask that he was wearing, the fact that he seems to be wearing gloves. These are all interesting details for the investigators.

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This new round of videos that shows how long he was there and the kind of disorganized, almost pointless way that he is covering the same ground in the same basic areas in this neighborhood for hours, apparently without a specific place to go at a specific time -- so I think that undermines the assumption that's been prevalent all along that this was a very clearly targeted, carefully planned attack.

I think there is the possibility anyway that this might just have been a disturbed person who was experiencing some sort of crisis. And we have no idea what's in his head as he's walking around on those videos, but he ends up at the building where he ends up on that tragic Saturday afternoon.

And so I think the disorganized way that you see him walking here really potentially undermines the theory that this whole thing was carefully planned out.

SANCHEZ: Wow.

KEILAR: That's interesting. So you think it's disorganized?

Because some people look at that and say, he's kind of killing time, he's waiting for a busy moment. Dispel us of that notion of folks who may see that.

MCCABE: You know, there's a lot of ways to burn time when you wait.

If he was waiting for this 4:00 moment to go to that building, burning that time, wasting that time would have been much better to do in your car, at home, someplace where you're not exposing yourself to potentially video cameras, to people in the street, to people who could have seen you and identified you later.

It's not a very effective way of planning a mass shooting. There's also capture here where he clearly, like, walks up one block and then turns around and walks down the other way. He seems to walk with a purpose at some times, and then other times he stops mid-block, turns around, looks at the sign in front of the building, stays there for a second, continues walking.

It doesn't have -- he doesn't look like he is clearly on his way from point A to point B on some sort of a timeline. I do think, though, there's an argument you could make that he looks somewhat comfortable in that walking around. You don't ever see him pull a phone out of his pocket, look at a map.

He doesn't even really particularly stop at corners to try to assess what the next turn will be. In fact, some corners, he cuts the corner and walks into the street to make a faster path to the other side of the street. So those were all things that you would expect from someone who essentially is comfortable in the place they are.

They know generally kind of where -- what street to take to wherever they're going to get to, all of which might suggest that he is from that area or at least familiar with it.

KEILAR: Yes, but it might -- it seems like it feels a little disorganized to you. Would that be a fair assessment, yes?

MCCABE: It does. It does.

(CROSSTALK) MCCABE: He looks like he knows where he is, but he doesn't look like, to me anyway -- this is obviously speculation. It doesn't look like he is walking with purpose to get to a place at a specific time.

KEILAR: Andy, thank you so much. Andy McCabe, really appreciate it.

MCCABE: Sure thing.

SANCHEZ: So, at 9:00 Eastern tonight, President Trump is going to address the nation on his accomplishments this year, just as a new poll shows him getting the worst ratings on the economy of his second term.

The NPR/Marist poll shows 57 percent disapprove of how Trump is handling the economy, just a point below former President Biden's worst economic rating in the same poll. Yesterday, Vice President Vance addressed the -- quote -- "affordability crisis," though President Trump has repeatedly called it a hoax.

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J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And I promise you, there is no person more impatient to solve the affordability crisis than Donald J. Trump, the president of the United States.

(CHEERING)

VANCE: I hear these guys, I hear these Democrats talk about this as if you were going to fix these problems in a single day.

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KEILAR: Well, you know who else talked about it as if there would be a fast drop in prices? And this is one of the problems for President Trump was that it was then-candidate Trump last year.

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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: From today and from the day I take the oath of office, we will rapidly drive prices down and make America affordable again.

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TRUMP: My plan will rapidly defeat inflation, quickly bring down prices and reignite explosive economic growth.

And I will cut your energy prices in half within 12 months. If we are quickly going to turn this economic nightmare into an economic miracle, wait until you see how fast we're going to get it going.

We're going to get those prices down. We're going to get them down quickly. We're two days away from the best jobs and biggest paychecks and brightest economic future the world has ever seen.

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KEILAR: CNN senior White House correspondent Kristen Holmes is with us now.

These are his expectations that he set, Kristen, and is failing to meet. What should we be expecting to hear from President Trump tonight during his address?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, well, I'm told by sources inside the White House that there's going to be a number of components to his speech tonight. Some of it's going to be an end-of-the year wrap, going through all of the accomplishments that the administration had as we head into the holidays.

But there is going to be an addressing of affordability and the crisis. And I do want to note, the White House has pushed back on this notion -- and I will say President Trump himself has called affordability a hoax. The White House has pushed back on the notion that he's calling affordability itself a hoax.

He's saying, according to the White House, that Democrats don't get to run on affordability because they were part of the problem. But, of course, as we know, this is what happens in an election. People run on the biggest problem that is facing Americans. And, right now, the biggest problem facing Americans is the economy.

And we can go through various fact-checks on President Trump and what he says, but the real fact-check is not one that Americans need to hear. It's what they feel every single day when they go to purchase items that they need to survive, like groceries, like gas.

And if you talk to almost anyone who is out there, they feel like prices have gotten worse. They say their bills are higher. But we do know that this is likely to be a pivot point for President Trump, or at least for the White House and Republicans as a whole, as we head into that midterm year.

They need to be focusing, and this is what we have heard from Republican strategists, on the economy, on how they are going to fix the economy. And we are told President Trump is going to be shifting some of his messaging a lot more domestic than it has been international.

SANCHEZ: That's actually something that Susie Wiles spoke about to "Vanity Fair" during one of the 11 interviews over 11 months that she did with Chris Whipple.

Today, the president, vice president, and their team are standing fully behind her. Does it look like she isn't going to face any repercussions for some of the comments she made?

HOLMES: It certainly does look that way.

And we saw President Trump himself not only coming out and defending his chief of staff yesterday, but essentially agreeing with this idea that he has an alcoholic's personality, which just goes to show you how deep his loyalty is when it comes to Susie Wiles, somebody he believes helped him crawl out of the hole that he was in when Republicans essentially turned their back on him after January 6, 2021, when he left office.

From everyone that we have talked to, they believe -- and there was definitely a coordinated effort yesterday to have everyone kind of circle the wagons around Susie Wiles. That's why you saw this outpouring of support, even from people who she had seemingly trashed in this "Vanity Fair" piece, coming to her defense.

And that was intentional to try and minimize any impact that the story had. And, right now, talking to White House officials, they believe they were successful.

KEILAR: And, Kristen, the White House gave some new information about these so-called new Trump Accounts, $1,000 given to each American child born 2025 through 2028 to help build wealth. Tell us about those.

HOLMES: Yes. And, Brianna and Boris, you should expect to hear Donald Trump talk about this tonight. It's something that they believe is going to be incredibly effective, but, of course, they have to actually get started on them for anyone to see an impact of those accounts.

So what we know so far is, this is a tax-advantaged savings account for these children born between 2025 and 2028, the government giving that seed money, which would be $1,000. We heard Secretary of Treasury Scott Bessent today calling this a merger between Wall Street and Main Street.

And the idea behind it is that the companies and philanthropies are also going to be donating to these accounts that they say will eventually build generational wealth. And we will note that BlackRock has announced that, for all of its employees, it will match funding in these Trump Accounts.

And a reminder that just a week ago, the Dells announced that they would be giving $6.25 billion to these Trump Accounts. So, again, that's something that President Trump is going to be talking about tonight as one of these accomplishments that is expected to eventually help offset issues in the economy.

KEILAR: All right, Kristen Holmes at the White House for us, thank you.

Still to come, Nick Reiner appearing behind a glass wall in court, accused of murdering his parents, Rob and Michele Reiner, inside their Brentwood mansion. Our reporter was inside the courtroom, and we will get the latest.

Plus, former special prosecutor Jack Smith telling Congress he had proved beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the 2020 election and prevent a lawful transfer of power. We have the latest on that closed-door hearing. SANCHEZ: And, later, a closer look at the new employment report

revealing blue-collar jobs are shrinking, despite President Trump's promise of a manufacturing boom -- that and much more coming your way next.

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SANCHEZ: We have breaking news in the double murder of director Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele.

Moments ago, the Reiners' son Nick Reiner making his first court appearance, the judge allowing cameras inside the courtroom, but not allowing for Reiner himself to be filmed.

KEILAR: The 32-year-old was sitting behind glass as he waved his right to a speedy arraignment, meaning he did not enter a plea today on the two counts of first-degree murder in connection with the stabbing deaths of his parents.

CNN's Stephanie Elam is live outside the court in downtown Los Angeles.

Stephanie, what did you learn in there?

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it was a very quick proceeding today, Brianna and Boris, and it was really just about moving this first arraignment to January 7.

In that time, I could see that his attorneys, Alan Jackson, another man -- and two other men were with him standing in front of the glass in front of Nick Reiner. While he was standing there, they were answering questions with the judge, but then the judge specifically asked Nick Reiner if he was OK waiving his right to a speedy arraignment, because his lawyer had said that that's what they were going to do because it was such a complex case and they didn't want to do things right then.

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That is when we in the court heard Nick Reiner say, "Yes, Your Honor." He was very calm while he was there. We did later see that his hands were shackled. He appeared to be wearing some sort of vest, and his hair was kind of swooped to the side, but he was very, very calm.

After court, we came down here and we heard from his attorney, Alan Jackson, who was talking about the complicated nature of this case, especially with the family involved, and asking people to be respectful of this journey that they're about to embark on going into court.

But he also acknowledged how difficult this will be for the family. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ALAN JACKSON, ATTORNEY FOR NICK REINER: Our hearts go out to the entire Reiner family. There are very, very complex and serious issues that are associated with this case. They just need to be thoroughly, but very carefully dealt with.

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ELAM: Now, keep in mind the logistics of this story and how awful they are, right?

We understand that it was the Reiners' daughter who lives across the street who discovered her parents slain in their Brentwood home here in Los Angeles around 3:00 p.m. on Sunday. And then, at 9:00 p.m. on Sunday, the law officials arrested her brother.

And now we have a statement coming out from the two other siblings, Romy and Jake, the two siblings who are survived now by their parents. And they say in here -- quote -- "Words cannot even begin to describe the unimaginable pain we are experiencing every moment of the day. The horrific and devastating loss of our parents, Rob and Michele Reiner, is something that no one should ever experience. They weren't just our parents. They were our best friends.

"We are grateful for the outpouring of condolences, kindness and support we have received not only from family and friends, but people from all walks of life. We now ask for respect and privacy, for speculation to be tempered with compassion and humanity, and for our parents to be remembered for the incredible lives they lived and the love they gave."

This from the two siblings who have lost their parents, and now their brother is the one who is suspected of killing them, just a tragic, tragic situation.

SANCHEZ: Yes, no doubt.

Stephanie Elam outside the courthouse in Los Angeles, thank you.

Up next: In a stunning revolt, four Republican lawmakers agree to back a Democratic push to vote on extending Obamacare subsidies. What this means for Americans who are just weeks away from seeing a steep increase in their insurance premiums.

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KEILAR: In a blow to House Speaker Mike Johnson, four Republicans are now siding with Democrats in a last-minute push to renew enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that expire in two weeks. These are subsidies for health insurance.

Congressman Mike Lawler among those demanding a floor vote to extend these health care tax credits.

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QUESTION: So where does that lead to?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You sound pissed off.

REP. MIKE LAWLER (R-NY): I am pissed for the American people. This is absolute bullshit and it's absurd that we are in a body with 435 members. Everybody has a responsibility to serve their district, to serve their constituents.

RAJU: What do you say, though, to the speaker, who is not going to give you a vote on this ACA extension?

REP. KEVIN KILEY (R-CA): It's a failure of leadership. I mean, we have members on both sides who believe this is an urgent issue. And it is for all of our members in terms of what their constituents are going to have to deal with in the start of the new year. So what's wrong with having a vote?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: A new poll shows just how important this issue could be for voters, with a majority, 54 percent, saying they're concerned their household won't be able to afford health care next year.

Let's go live to Capitol Hill with CNN's Arlette Saenz.

Arlette -- that is not Arlette Saenz. That is Katelyn Polantz.

KEILAR: But we do love Katelyn Polantz.

SANCHEZ: But we do appreciate Katelyn being here.

KEILAR: She's the best. That's -- there's Arlette.

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here I am.

SANCHEZ: Arlette...

KEILAR: We love Arlette too.

(LAUGHTER)

SANCHEZ: Arlette, this goes over the wishes of Speaker Johnson, and this is the second time that a discharge petition has gone against his wishes. The first was the Epstein files, right?

SAENZ: Yes, these four centrist Republicans really issued a stunning blow to House Speaker Mike Johnson's leadership, as they decided to side with Democrats to force a vote on the House floor on extending Obamacare subsidies.

These Republican lawmakers have been frustrated with GOP leadership for not helping to advance another proposal that would have extended these subsidies for a shorter period of time with some reforms. They said that they simply wanted to have some type of vote on these premiums, which, if they expire, which they are expected to do, will send insurance premiums skyrocketing for millions of Americans.

It's really raising the question about whether House Speaker Mike Johnson has a hold of his Republican Conference. We have seen Republican lawmakers over and over bring up these discharge petitions, the most successful being that effort to force a vote to release the Epstein files in full.

But House Speaker Mike Johnson this morning was defiant, saying that he does have control of his conference. Take a listen.

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QUESTION: Have you lost control of the House?

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): I have not lost control of the House.

QUESTION: Because this is the third time.

JOHNSON: There are mech -- look, we have the smallest majority in U.S. history, OK? These are not normal times. There are processes and procedures in the House that are less frequently used when there are larger majorities and when you have the luxury of having 10 or 15 people who disagree on something that you don't have to deal with it.

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SAENZ: Now, this discharge petition, which was presented by the Democratic leader in the House, Hakeem Jeffries, will now force a vote on that three-year extension of the expiring Obamacare subsidies.

But that's a vote that will not be able to happen until January. And then there are big questions of what Senate Majority Leader John Thune will do with it over in the Senate.