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Trump Sues JPMorgan, CEO Dimon Alleged Blacklist After January 6; More than Half of U.S. Bracing for Potentially Historic Winter Storm; Growing Outrage Over 5-Year-Old Boy Detained by ICE; Axios: The Rich are Powering Spending in the U.S. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired January 23, 2026 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: The president, quote, dropped him as a client in the wake of the January 6th Capitol riots. Trump says he and his family were placed on a blacklist. Let's get to CNN's Matt Egan for the latest on this.

Matt, what are you hearing?

MATT EGAN, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Well, John, it's just stunning to see the president get into a legal war with America's biggest bank and Wall Street's most powerful CEO. But here we are. In this 56 page lawsuit filed yesterday by the president, he alleges that JPMorgan, quote, unilaterally debanked him in early 2021, shortly after the January 6th insurrection.

This lawsuit also goes on to allege that the bank and Jamie Dimon specifically authorized blacklisting Trump, parts of his family and parts of his business empire. And the lawsuit says that all of this caused a, quote, devastating impact on the president's ability to transact. And then JPMorgan did this because of their political and social motivations, as well as their woke beliefs.

Now, the bank fired back in a statement where they said that the while we regret President Trump has sued us, we believe the suit has no merit. We respect the president's right to sue us and our right to defend ourselves. That's what courts are for.

And JP Morgan went on to say that they don't debank people and close their accounts for political or religious reasons. But they said that sometimes they do need to close accounts for legal or regulatory risks. And I talked to Wharton professor Peter Conte-Brown.

He told me he thinks that this lawsuit is frivolous. He says that the president has a long history of stiffing business partners, of evading responsibilities as a borrower. And he says that no bank should be forced to do business with a financial risk like that.

And we should just note that all this comes after Jamie Dimon has started to push back publicly against some Trump policies, right? He says that interfering with the Fed is not a good idea. He says that 10 percent credit card rate cap would be an economic disaster. So, John, look, bottom line, this is just the latest chapter in the president's volatile relationship with the business community in general and with Jamie Dimon in particular.

BERMAN: And the timing is quite notable. Matt Egan, thank you --

EGAN: Thanks, John.

BERMAN: -- very much.

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

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: We are following breaking news all throughout the morning because it's already beginning to hit. We are tracking a potentially historic winter storm that will impact more than half the country. At least 10 states have already declared states of emergency in anticipation.

Heavy snow, ice, bitterly cold temperatures. More than 230 million people are under winter alerts. And this is across some 1,500 miles from Texas to the northeast.

And just look at some of these snow forecasts that are coming in. You can see up to two feet in Oklahoma City, up to a foot in parts of the Midwest, 18 inches forecasted in parts of the northeast. The biggest threat, though, continues to be and always really generally is ice that could just knock out power.

And the big threat there is across the south, more than three quarters of an inch in some areas. You can also expect widespread, well, travel on roads is going to be extremely treacherous for periods of time and also widespread flight disruptions. Already more than 1,400 flights have been canceled for Saturday.

The timing matters to everyone in all of our lives. Today, here's how it pans out. Today, Dallas and Memphis, they're going to begin feeling the brunt of it.

Tomorrow, Atlanta, Louisville, Charlotte. Then it moves up to the New England in the northeast on Sunday, Philadelphia, New York City, Washington, D.C., beginning to really feel it. CNN's Allison Chinchar is watching all of this.

The forecast, how it shifts, how it doesn't shift, it matters to, well, more than half the country now, Allison. What are you seeing?

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: It does. It absolutely matters because some of these areas are actually going to get a little bit of everything. They may get some rain, some snow, some ice.

So the timeline is really important here. So the purple color you see on the map, those are the areas that are strictly just going to get mostly snow. The green, just rain. But this pinkish purple color in the middle, these are the folks that are going to get a little bit of a mix of several different things over the next 72 hours. So let's break it down. Across the southern plains, we already start to see some of that snow and ice creep in as we head into the evening hours tonight.

By Saturday morning, it's starting to spread eastward, but also expand. Notice how that pink and purple color really start to get larger on the map as it spreads into Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana, and even into Mississippi. By Saturday evening, now we're starting to see a little bit of a break from that first round before the second round starts to spread in during the overnight hours and continue in through Sunday morning.

Now once we get to Sunday afternoon, though, most of these areas across the southern plains and along the Gulf Coast, that's when you're going to finally start to see an end to that. In total, though, you could be looking at half an inch to up to an inch of ice in some of these places.

[08:05:00]

And in terms of snowfall, the highest amounts are going to be just north of that, where yes, you could be looking at 12, even 18 inches of snow in some of these locations.

Now let's shift it a little bit farther eastward and move the timeline forward. So here's a look at Saturday morning. Now you're just now starting to see it creep into places like Nashville, Memphis.

But then as we transition through the rest of the day, now the Carolinas, Virginia, Georgia, now they're starting to see some of that winter precipitation begin to build. By the time we get into Sunday morning, again, more of that winter precipitation coming in. But then notice in the afternoon, those temperatures start to warm back up above freezing.

So we see it change back over into rain. But then Sunday night, the temperatures cool back down, and you'll see a little bit more frozen precipitation on the back end before all of this finally ends on early Monday. In total, some of these areas could be looking at up to an inch of ice.

Yes, this includes places like Charlotte, portions of northwestern South Carolina, even areas of Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas could be looking at extremely high amounts of ice. Farther to the north where it's simply going to be snow, yes, some of these areas, especially where you see that dark purple color, they could be looking at 18 to even 24 inches of snow. Yes, two feet.

We get it. The northern cities are more used to handling snow than some of the folks in the south. But even for them, 18 to 24 inches is a substantial amount of snow.

The other key thing to note is that the temperatures are going to get bitter cold early next week. That means whatever ice and whatever snow comes down is likely going to stick around for some of these places for a couple of days, especially Memphis. Look at these morning low temperatures in Memphis.

Monday, eight degrees. Tuesday, nine degrees. You are looking at bitter cold temperatures that some of these southern cities just are not used to having, which means all of that winter precipitation is going to stick around as well.

BOLDUAN: Oh my goodness. We're going to be speaking to leaders in Memphis a little later in the show, because they really have like a trifecta mix of just bad coming at them right now and need to be -- and are preparing for it. Allison, thank you so much for that -- John.

BERMAN: So many cities with that mix of bad headed toward them right now. The snow is expected to arrive in St. Louis by 6 a.m. tomorrow and get really heavy by noon by the time it's all over. They could get up to a foot of snow.

That city's mayor, Cara Spencer, joins us now. Mayor, thank you so much for being with us. Up to a foot of snow in St. Louis, that's a lot for you. How are you preparing?

MAYOR CARA SPENCER, ST. LOUIS: It's a lot of snow. And of course, as you mentioned, the bitterly cold temperatures, you know, and this comes on the heels of an enormous tornado that we had just last year. In fact, the most destructive tornado the nation has seen since Joplin in 2011.

So we have a lot of folks that are still displaced, thousands of households that are still displaced following that tornado. So our preparation is really twofold here. We're focused on, of course, clearing the streets and making our city passable.

But we're also deeply concerned about keeping people safe. And so we're focused. We're expanding our shelter space.

We have this year for the first time provided transportation to shelter. And we are really working on getting the word out to make sure that folks are taking advantage of those resources to get in a safe place, a warm place to spend the night.

BERMAN: Yes, get into a warm place to spend the night. What's your message to the people over the next few days as this develops starting tomorrow?

SPENCER: Well, this year is the first year the city launched something called a winter weather unified command. And we have a code blue in place this year. So we've been working on getting the word out for some weeks now to connect folks to those resources.

Again, we've expanded the shelter capacity by putting city dollars into homelessness this year, something that was absolutely necessary, particularly following the tornado. But homelessness is on the rise. Folks living in vulnerable situations has been on the rise nationwide.

Of course, we're no different here in the city of St. Louis. But we are connecting all of our departments. We have right now 90 crew members out there treating streets.

We have about 450 miles of snow route here in the city of St. Louis. So we're out there putting down brine. We've got our salt tracks ready.

We have dump trucks and every truck in the city fleet right now ready to go to remove snow once that snow starts hitting tomorrow morning.

BERMAN: How do you feel about the power grid?

SPENCER: Well, you know, Amron has been -- Amron is our power provider here in St. Louis. They've been a great partner. You know, we went through just a tremendous amount of work last year when the tornado hit.

We had, you know, tens of thousands of families without power and Amron got out here with all of their subs and they were able to get power back on within 48 hours for the vast majority of folks. So we have a great partnership with our utility company.

[08:10:00]

They've been able to restore folks in crisis in the recent past, and we feel confident we'll be able to do that here as well.

BERMAN: Cara Spencer --

SPENCER: But it's always a concern. I mean --

BERMAN: Oh, yes.

SPENCER: -- folks in crisis in the recent past, and we feel confident we'll be able to do that here as well.

SPENCER: Yes, I mean, it's always a concern, and it should be for Americans as we look at, you know, kind of how we how we're shoring up our power grid. We're having more and more massive, destructive weather events.

And this is a question we should be asking ourselves across the board.

BERMAN: Yes, look, it could be a trying few days. Mayor Cara Spencer, we appreciate you taking some time for us this morning. Good luck. Thank you -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Today a first, the first time that U.S., Russia -- the U.S., Russia and Ukraine are going to be sitting down together since Russia launched its invasion nearly four years ago. What this means for the possibility for peace?

And Luigi Mangione returns to court today. The critical piece of evidence the judge is now considering. Will it be allowed in court or not? And what it means for this murder case?

And fishing guides in Florida have once again caught and released a massive great white shark, 12 feet long, 1,000 pounds. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:15:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, I am live here in Minneapolis. I am inside because it is negative 21 degrees outside without the windchill. But there is a whole movement here today to protest the Trump administration's immigration crackdown here.

There are businesses and Minnesotans across the state are being encouraged not to go shopping, to stay home. There are several businesses who are closing as part of a mass protest trying to use the economy as a wedge here. It comes amid growing outrage over what happened to a five year old child who ICE detained, the preschooler.

His name, Liam Conejo Ramos, was in the driveway of his home after coming home from school with his father. Vice President J.D. Vance said he looked into this because, of course, he has a five year old himself and was concerned. But his version of events does not match up with what witnesses on the ground, including a school board official and the family attorney told us. Here's what J.D. Vance said when asked about this five year old being detained by ICE.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm a father of a five year old, actually a five year old little boy, and I think to myself, oh, my God, this is terrible. How did we arrest a five year old? Well, I do a little bit more follow up research.

And what I find is that the five year old was not arrested, that his dad was an illegal alien. And then when they went to arrest his illegal alien father, the father ran. So the story is that ICE detained a five year old.

Well, what are they supposed to do? Are they supposed to let a five year old child freeze to death?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: There was never any chance of this child being left outside of the home to freeze to death because his mother was inside the home. Now, here is what the attorney for the family says about J.D. Vance saying that this father was here illegally trying to run from authorities. Is attorney disputing that?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARC PROKOSCH, ATTORNEY REPRESENTING FAMILY OF 5-YEAR-OLD DETAINED BY ICE: These are not illegal aliens. They came properly. They came legally and are pursuing a legal pathway.

So that's just not accurate.

(END VIDEO CLIP) SIDNER: Now, the chairperson of the school board happened to witness this. She was on her way home from school and noticed the commotion at this home. She noticed it in part because there have been several students who have been detained by ICE from her school.

And so she was curious and wanted to see if she could help. And she told me that there were family members and other adults who volunteered, including herself, to take little Liam. This is how she described what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARY GRANLUND, SCHOOL BOARD CHAIR, COLUMBIA HEIGHTS PUBLIC SCHOOL DISTRICT: I heard, what are you doing? Don't take the child. His mom, like there are people here that can take him.

There was another adult who lived in the home that was there saying, I will take the child. I will take the child. Somebody else was yelling.

They saw that I was there and said, school is here. They can take the child. You don't have to take them.

And there were -- there were there was ample opportunity to be able to safely hand that child off to adults. And mom, mom was there. She saw the window and dad was yelling.

Please do not open the door. Don't open the door.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: So school officials have accused ICE of using Liam as bait to try and get to his other family members. ICE, of course, and the Trump administration are refuting this. They claim the child was, quote, abandoned when his father ran away from agents.

But again, saying that this child was abandoned is just not true because the mother was on the other side of the door. The father was screaming at her not to open it. No one in the immigration community trusts ICE, who was then saying, look, we will not detain you. Just open the door.

So there was, as you might imagine, a huge amount of fear and emotion happening while all this is going on. Meantime, you had school officials there saying, hey, we can help out. We can take custody of the child for a bit as ICE moves on and does its business.

There is just a lot to get through here. But there is no one story is matching. The only thing that people here care about right now is the safety of this child.

And most people, especially those in the immigrant community here, want to see ICE stop what it is doing here, many of whom believe that it is breaking laws, that it is going against the Constitution -- John, Kate. BOLDUAN: Sara, thank you so much. We're going to get back to Sara, who's in Minneapolis, watching all of this. It's going to be a very important day there today.

[08:20:00]

Still ahead for us in the show, court is back in session in the trial today -- in the trial of the man accused of crafting an elaborate plot with the family's au pair to kill his wife. Why the defense is focused on a so-called catfish theory.

And what do a three hundred dollar Apple phone holder thing and a Chipotle burrito have in common? They're both indicators of the so- called K-shaped economy. And it's a problem.

Get more on why.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: All right, let's take a look at stock futures this morning. You see the market slightly down but basically opening a bit flat after all the turmoil and concern over international affairs the last few days. So when you look at these futures, it's really a look at an American economy that you might hear is currently K-shaped, meaning the rich are doing better and the not rich, not so much.

The wealthier doing so well, their spending alone can make the economy look strong, even if other Americans are struggling to keep up with food, rent and imported goods. With us now, Madison Mills, senior markets reporter for Axios. And just first sort of the geometry of the K, explain why we do call it a K-shaped economy.

MADISON MILLS, SENIOR MARKETS REPORTER, AXIOS: Yes, we'll do some choreography here. So everyone starts here, right?

[08:25:00]

And K-shaped comes into play where the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. And we're seeing that gap really widen and increase at a rapid pace that we haven't seen even since World War II, the rich being so much richer than the lowest earners in our economy.

BERMAN: You put some numbers behind that. When we talk about that, I mean, how much are we actually talking here?

MILLS: Yes, so the top 20 percent of earners, they are spending about 59 percent of the consumer spending pile right now, whereas the other 80 percent are just spending 40 percent of that pile -- 41 percent. So and what stands out to me about those numbers is how quickly they've gotten worse.

Just about six months ago, the top earners were spending about half of all consumer spending, and it's already gotten up to 59 percent. So we're seeing this wealth gap widen even further. And as you said, that can have serious implications for how we're viewing the economy. BERMAN: I mean, it really does, because when you see economic growth at four percent or higher, which is a good number, it's a good number. You would think, hey, everyone's feeling great. No, really growing number aren't.

MILLS: Yes. And especially because to your point, consumer spending is the biggest driver of GDP of economic growth. So if you just look at consumer spending on a headline basis, it's looking pretty good because the rich people are spending a lot.

You also have the AI companies spending a lot. So that's making that headline number appear better than it might actually be.

BERMAN: You brought up AI. What's driving this gap? What's making it happen so quickly and in such a big way?

MILLS: Well, it's two things. On the consumer side, you have the stock market hitting multiple record highs today withstanding. And then you also have asset prices like homes hitting record highs.

That's increasing that wealth gap because the people who already owned those assets are getting richer all the time because they're invested. Meantime, people who didn't have a chance to get in, they're faring even worse. At the same time, you have these big tech companies who have more cash flow than we've seen companies have ever in history, spending billions and now expected to be trillions of dollars on AI And that also fuels the economy. So both of those things are leading to this kind of asset bubble that some sources call it when they talk to me. And that makes it difficult to suss out the health of the economy.

BERMAN: We love everything you write. You've also been writing about the so-called TACO trade --

MILLS: Yes.

BERMAN: -- when it comes to Donald Trump, which is something I think that investors feel they saw this week. Explain exactly what it is and the potential impact.

MILLS: Yes, the TACO trade is an acronym called Trump Always Chickens Out. And it's the idea for investors that you don't want to trade on something that Trump says he's going to do because it may not actually happen. A source told me this week 70 percent of what Trump says in this source's view is just bluster.

Traders have to focus on the other 30 percent. So you started off the week with stocks down about 2 percent, which, by the way, is not a huge sell off. Everyone freaked out.

It's not that big of a deal. And then the market started to recover. So it'll be interesting to see how we end the day today and whether or not we're able to recoup.

BERMAN: Yes. And that was, of course, all over Greenland, which he goes to Davos and announces no military force and maybe potentially no U.S. ownership. After all of that, we will see.

Madison Mills, great to see you this weekend, as always. Big fans of your work. Enjoy the snow.

MILLS: Thank you.

BERMAN: So the new forecasts are coming in this morning ahead of one of the most powerful winter storms we have seen in years. I mean, we're talking like two feet of snow in some places, a foot and a half in some of the biggest cities in the country. We have a latest update on the timing of when it's all going to hit you.

And then new video of a fishing crew catching a pretty big shark. We'll tell you how it happened next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)