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Lawmakers Slam Trump DOJ for Not Releasing All Epstein Files; Investigation Seeking Motive in Brown University, MIT Killings; U.S. Strikes Targets inside Syria Tied to ISIS; Elise Stefanik Drops New York Governor Bid, Won't Seek Reelection; E.U. Remains Deadlocked over Use of Russian Assets; AI Chip Costs and Lifespan Spark Fears of Tech Bubble. Aired 4-5a ET

Aired December 20, 2025 - 04:00   ET

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

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KIM BRUNHUBER, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Welcome to all of you watching us here in the United States, Canada and around the world. I'm Kim Brunhuber. This is CNN NEWSROOM.

Frustration is only growing after the U.S. Justice Department releases a trove of Epstein files. We'll hear from survivors and lawmakers about why they're disappointed.

We're learning more about the suspect in the Brown University and MIT killings. But what authorities don't know is a motive. We'll have the latest on the investigation.

And the U.S. strikes targets in Syria tied to ISIS. We'll have details on how the White House is responding to the recent attack on American service members there.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from Atlanta, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Kim Brunhuber

BRUNHUBER: Donald Trump's Department of Justice has released thousands of documents from the Jeffrey Epstein files. The batch of documents appears, at least after early reviews, to include no smoking guns and relatively few major revelations.

But there are many more files that haven't been released. Democrats and some Republicans are slamming the Department of Justice for not releasing all of the files. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. RO KHANNA (D-CA): Let me be very clear. We need a full release. Anyone who tampers with these documents or conceals documents or engages in excessive redaction will be prosecuted because of obstruction of justice. We will prosecute individuals regardless of whether the attorney general or a career or political appointee. (END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Republican congressman Thomas Massie posted this on social media Friday.

"Unfortunately, today's document released by attorney general Pam Bondi and deputy attorney general Todd Blanche grossly fails to comply with both the spirit and the letter of the law that Donald Trump signed just 30 days ago."

Many of the documents have been heavily redacted. They have big black marks covering information that the Justice Department decided couldn't be revealed.

The department says it's trying to protect innocent people mentioned in the files. The deputy attorney general says there's no coverup to protect the president or anyone else.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TODD BLANCHE, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: There's no effort to hold anything back because there's the name Donald J. Trump or anybody else's name. Bill Clinton's name, Reid Hoffman's name.

There's no effort to hold back or not hold back because of that. And so -- but again, we're not -- we're not redacting the names of famous men and women that are associated with Epstein.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: CNN's senior U.S. Justice correspondent Evan Perez has more on the files and the fallout

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EVAN PEREZ, CNN SR. JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Hundreds of thousands of pages of documents from the Justice Department's investigation of sex predator Jeffrey Epstein, more than 200 Justice Department lawyers spending weeks reviewing them and the names of more than 1,200 victims and their relatives redacted.

The Justice Department says it at least partially complied with the deadline set by Congress to produce a trove of so-called Epstein files. What's not in the files might be a bigger deal than what's in this massive trove posted on the Justice Department's website on Friday.

Deputy attorney general Todd Blanche sent a letter to Congress, saying that there were several categories of documents that the department is withholding.

In addition to the sex abuse materials and the personal data on Epstein survivors, Blanche says that the department is withholding material covered by various privileges, including deliberative process, privilege, work product privilege and attorney-client privilege. Democrats are accusing the department of violating the law. Here's

Robert Garcia, the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee.

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ROBERT GARCIA, RANKING MEMBER, HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE: This is absolutely breaking the law. I mean, they have not produced, actually, what they were required to do, which was all the files by today in a way that was searchable for the public and that is not what's the case.

What we have essentially is one, we have a group of documents that have already been released to the public and so there's -- could be even more than half of the documents we're reviewing right now have already been released that already does not count for new information.

Then we have of what is appears to be new, including some photos and other documents those are highly redacted and we don't really have any explanation as to why they've been redacted or what is actually there in those documents and so we have right now are what we're seeing is not transparency.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREZ: Blanche, in his letter, says that the law passed by Congress last month, forcing the release of the Epstein documents, quote, "does not include language expressly requiring the department to produce privileged materials."

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Blanche also says that the department is going to continue producing more documents in the coming weeks -- Evan Perez, CNN, Washington

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRUNHUBER: Survivors of Epstein's abuse are speaking out about the DOJ release, with some telling CNN that they're frustrated at the lack of new information coming out. Here is Jena-Lisa Jones, who says that she met Epstein when she was just 14 years old.

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JENA-LISA JONES, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: To see that a lot of the files have been heavily redacted in a sense that gives no clarity in any description way and some of these photos being completely Blacked out with no rhyme or reason or any -- I would say telling signs of why they were redacted, right?

Giving us an idea of a little bit of the picture of why they might be redacted.

So I feel like this was kind of another joke to string it along a little bit. I am pretty disappointed at what has been released. I am -- I definitely agree with Ro Khanna that they could have picked and chosen a lot better things to have released today if they weren't going to be able to release them all today.

I can understand the amount of documents that they have and files and all of that but Ro Khanna said it perfectly, that there are important things and I am very sure that the DOJ is very aware of what important things that we are asking for as survivors.

So to give us that in hopes that you guys could continue to go and continue to release the files, would probably give us a little bit more hope. But right now, I am seeing the bare minimum. And even at the bare minimum, I think the American people should be looking at these and being like, why?

Why is this going on?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Lisa Phillips also questioned the amount of material that was redacted in the documents. Here's her response to the Justice Department saying it's trying to protect the victims

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LISA PHILLIPS, JEFFREY EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: Victims want answers. We want -- we want to know. We want to connect the dots. We want our stories to make sense. We want to know a lot of different things. So I mean, of course, they're just going to say that, that just buys time but they're protecting themselves, not the victims.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: For more on this, I want to bring in Jeff Swartz, who's a former Miami-Dade County court judge. He's currently a professor at the Cooley Law School's Tampa Bay campus and he joins us live from Tampa Bay, Florida.

Thank you so much for being up early with us here. So you've had a chance to look at what came out yesterday. Take us through what's actually in there and what's missing.

JEFF SWARTZ, FORMER MIAMI-DADE COUNTY COURT JUDGE: Almost nothing is in there. I think that it was mentioned by one of the other people that was interviewed, that, in fact, what you're seeing most of has already been released. This isn't even as much as the Epstein estate has furnished.

The one thing that's missing and the most important things missing are the FBI 302 reports. Those are the reports by agents and other people within the FBI as to what they did, where they went; execution of warrants, interviews with witnesses. Those type of things are not there.

And they were purposely left out. This to me, was nothing more than Pam Bondi being Pam Bondi and being arrogant and answering nobody's questions.

BRUNHUBER: The administration made a big deal about photos of Bill Clinton in a pool with Epstein and Maxwell.

Does it seem like they were more focused on the -- on the political optics than actually complying with the law here?

SWARTZ: It kind of -- kind of brings the question, why is it that there's all of the -- they found Bill Clinton's pictures but they can't find pictures of Donald Trump?

They found Bill Clinton's pictures and the implication that comes from it -- and it was a very young Bill Clinton, by the way, if you take a look at him, you know that. OK.

And they can't give you FBI 302s. There's something very -- this is just an act that they're not going to furnish anything. They're claiming privilege.

I would point out to you that, if I were litigating a case against them and they wanted to claim privilege, every single document that they claim was privileged would have to be on a privilege log with a specific reason why it's considered to be privileged.

So a judge could look at it and say, this is not privileged to give it to the other people or it is privilege and you're entitled to the protection.

BRUNHUBER: All right. So in the case that we're seeing here, I mean, obviously not everything's been released. We heard both Democrats and Republicans say the DOJ isn't complying with the law.

Are they breaking the law here?

And what can Congress actually do about it?

SWARTZ: Well, that's part of the problem. The statute that was passed and the bill that was passed simply has no enforcement proceedings.

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It didn't say that failure to comply will result in whatever penalty would be applied and who it would be applied to. That's not been done.

So the only thing that they can do is, if the committee authorizes litigation, which I don't think they will because the Republicans run the committee, they would have to file an action known as a writ of mandamus.

That is a special writ that says you must comply with this statute. Then if they fail to comply, then there could be contempt proceedings. But right now, I don't know what enforcement arm can be used. I think that the Department of Justice knows that. And that's why they're playing the games that they're playing.

BRUNHUBER: Will we ever see it all, do you think?

SWARTZ: I'm very -- I just -- I just don't think that's going to happen. I think that, at this point, they'll claim that there's an ongoing investigation. I have no idea what investigation could be ongoing for 10 or 12 years.

I think that, at this point, they're just stalling, hoping that something else will happen that will distract from this. And it won't be that important. But I don't think that Democrats are going to let this go. I don't think the victims are going to let this go.

BRUNHUBER: Yes. And on the victims, I mean we heard them say that not enough was released. But from what was released, I imagine it wouldn't be easy reading. We have confirmation that Maria Farmer filed a complaint with the FBI back in 1996, accusing Epstein of child pornography and threatening to burn her house down.

I mean, it took nearly 25 years for him to face real justice. I mean, this enforces that question that everybody's asking.

I mean, how does something like that just sit in a drawer?

SWARTZ: Well, that kind of brings forward another question and things that people are looking for. They're looking for the internal documents between Mr. Acosta, who was the U.S. attorney in Miami, and Mr. Kirshner, who was the state attorney in Palm Beach County.

What went on between the two of them?

Emails, memos, letters, whatever, that got Mr. Acosta to drop the federal investigation and possible charges and turn it over to the state for the sweetheart deal that we saw. So that's one of the things that we're looking for.

I just don't understand at this -- well, I do understand why but I don't understand the things that happened. And I know people that were in the U.S. attorney's office at that time and they didn't understand.

BRUNHUBER: As you say, it seems increasingly unlikely that we'll get all the answers that we're looking for. Jeff Swartz, thank you so much for that.

SWARTZ: Unfortunately, it's probably true.

BRUNHUBER: Yes.

SWARTZ: Thank you very much for having me, Kim. Appreciate it.

BRUNHUBER: You as well.

Rhode Island's attorney general says forensic tests have confirmed the ID in connections of the suspect in the shooting deaths of an MIT professor and two victims at Brown University.

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PETER NERONHA, RHODE ISLAND ATTORNEY GENERAL: Ballistics evidence now matches him to both shootings, both in Massachusetts and Rhode Island and DNA evidence matches him to Rhode Island.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BRUNHUBER: The suspect, Claudio Neves Valente, killed himself in a

New Hampshire self-storage facility. CNN's Brian Todd is following the story.

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BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With the manhunt finally over in the Brown University and MIT professor shootings, many questions still remain as to a clear motive in the killings. Providence Chief of Police Colonel Oscar Perez believes the killer was very strategic in his measures to dodge detection before the shootings.

COL. OSCAR L. PEREZ JR. PROVIDENCE POLICE CHIEF: I mean, he was communicating with apps. He was utilizing certain ways to drive and picking certain neighborhoods to drive around. He wasn't picking main streets. I would assume that he was probably trying to avoid, like certain license plate readers.

TODD (voice-over): The gunman, 48-year-old Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, was found dead late Thursday in a New Hampshire storage unit from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He is originally from Portugal and his last known address was in Miami.

PEREZ: We also learned that he had an address here in the city of Providence. We led us to believe that he was pretty familiar with the east side, with Brown University.

TODD (voice-over): And they know that Neves Valente attended Brown roughly two decades ago as a PhD student studying physics but he only stayed for about a year, enrolling in the fall of 2000 and leaving in the spring of 2001. At one point, he was even assigned an office in the same building where the shooting took place.

CHRISTINA PAXSON, PRESIDENT, BROWN UNIVERSITY: I think it's safe to assume that this man, when he was a student, spent a great deal of time in that building for classes and other activities as a PhD student in physics.

TODD (voice-over): A post pulled from an Internet Archive first reported by "The New York Times," but which could not be independently verified, appears to show a post left by Neves Valente on a Brown physics message board after he left the school.

Part of it was left in Portuguese and was translated to, quote, "The greatest liar is the one who is able to lie to themselves.

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"These exist everywhere but they sometimes proliferate in the most unexpected places."

Authorities also know Neves Valente attended the same university in Portugal as the MIT professor he killed.

In an interview with "Publico," a newspaper in Portugal, former classmate Felipe Moura describes his impressions of Neves Valente as aggressive.

Quote, "He had a confrontational personality in class. In other words, the other good students would intervene, ask questions. But Claudio liked to say that he was the one who knew."

And in a Facebook post in Portuguese, Moura wrote, "Claudio was obviously one of the best but in class he had a great need to stand out and show that he was better than the rest."

As for the man who helped break the case wide open, a man known only as John in the affidavit, who posted on Reddit, writing in part, quote, "I'm being dead serious. The police need to look into a gray Nissan with Florida plates, possibly a rental. That was the car he was driving."

That post eventually leading investigators to his car.

PEREZ: It was a great thing that he was actually paying attention and that he was actually observing his surroundings. He helped us out a lot. He was able to break this case.

TODD: Police Chief Oscar Perez says, even though authorities have had the shooter's name since Wednesday, they have not yet made contact with any relatives he may have in the U.S. or Portugal. But he says Portuguese police are helping in the investigation -- Brian Todd, CNN, Providence, Rhode Island.

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BRUNHUBER: And we're learning more about how that suspect in the Brown University shooting entered the country legally. In a post on social media. Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem said Claudio Neves Valente used the diversity visa lottery program to enter the U.S. in 2017 and was given a green card, then one went on to say this.

Quote, "Heinous individual should never have been allowed into the country."

Well, that program is now suspended. This comes as president Trump on Friday touted his new gold card visa program. By paying $1 million, foreigners can fast track their visa applications. Businesses can also fast track applications for employees by paying $2 million.

Trump's Commerce Secretary, Howard Lutnick, says the program has generated more than $1 billion in just a few days. Trump says this is benefiting the U.S.

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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: That's a -- essentially, it's the green card on steroids. And it's a pathway. And it's been an amazing thing.

And as you know, millions of people pour into our country from the border and not anymore, they don't. And now --

(AUDIO GAP)

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BRUNHUBER: The U.S. launches strikes in Syria. President Trump says it's retaliation. We'll share what we know about the attacks next.

And later, the U.S. is planning an overhaul of the childhood vaccine schedule. We'll tell you why it might look similar to Denmark's.

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BRUNHUBER: The U.S. has struck a number of targets in Syria linked to ISIS. One official tells CNN the strikes hit dozens of targets, including infrastructure and weapons caches. President Trump says the strikes are retaliation for an attack that killed two American service members and a civilian interpreter on December 13th.

The gunman who killed the two U.S. service members was part of Syria's internal security service. Syria says it's steadfast in its commitment to fighting ISIS. The gunman's connections to ISIS aren't clear and the group has claimed responsibility for the attack.

CNN military analyst and retired U.S. air force colonel Cedric Leighton says the U.S. strikes in Syria could be especially damaging to ISIS now, given the diminished size of the group. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: if they hit the intended targets -- and they usually do nowadays -- it's -- could be pretty damaging to an organization like ISIS if weapons caches were hit, if personnel were eliminated, that could really decimate ISIS.

ISIS has basically been really whittled down from a previous estimated strength that could be as high as 200,000.

Other estimates were around 30,000 when it was at the height of its power, now down to somewhere between 1,500 and 3,000 fighters in Syria itself. That -- if that is the case, then any loss that ISIS experiences now would be even more profound and more impactful on the organization.

So that particular element, you know, could very well be considerable for ISIS. But ISIS is a very flexible organization. So we can't bank on these strikes as numerous as they were, as many targets as they hit, to totally eliminate that organization. I don't think it did that.

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BRUNHUBER: CNN's Barbie Latza Nadeau is following developments from Rome.

Take us through the latest on those strikes.

BARBIE LATZA NADEAU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. You know, we know that there were 70 specified targets hit. These were infrastructure, weapons stores, things like that. We also understand that there were detentions and deaths and the U.S. administration has been very clear that this is not an act of war but an act of vengeance.

[04:25:00]

But it does really call into question whether there are other people who may still be very sympathetic to ISIS who do not want this relative peace in the region, who do not want to cooperate with the United States.

So a lot of people have their eyes on what happened to that because this is going to die down now or if there's going to be some sort of retaliation attack against these strikes . It's a very volatile situation. This peace in the Middle East is incredibly important to the president, Donald Trump.

He's promised this peace there. A team (ph) that there will be peace in the Middle East any sort of hiccup in that really does make things difficult for everybody.

BRUNHUBER: Yes, extremely volatile, as you say. Barbie Latza Nadeau in Rome, thank you so much.

A U.N.-backed monitoring group says Gaza is no longer experiencing a manmade famine due to an influx of humanitarian aid following the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas.

But the organization noted that, despite improvements, most people are still facing high levels of acute food insecurity. The U.N. secretary general says the situation in Gaza is slowly improving but the challenges are dire, deep and ongoing. The people are suffering here. Here he is

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ANTONIO GUTERRES, SECRETARY-GENERAL OF THE UNITED NATIONS: But the gains are fragile, perilously so. And 1.6 million people in Gaza, more than 75 percent of the population, are projected to face extreme levels of acute food insecurity and critical malnutrition risks.

It breaks my heart to see the ongoing scale of human suffering in Gaza. Families are enduring the unendurable. Children are forced to sleep in flooded tents. Buildings already battered by bombardment are collapsing under the weight of rain and wind, claiming more civilian lives.

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BRUNHUBER: All right, we'll take a quick break for our viewers here in North America. We'll have more news in a moment. For our international viewers, "CNN CREATORS" is next.

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BRUNHUBER: Welcome back to all of you watching us here in the United States and Canada. I'm Kim Brunhuber. This is CNN NEWSROOM.

The Justice Department says it will release more documents from its files on Jeffrey Epstein in the coming weeks. On Friday, the agency released a large trove of documents but not all of them.

In fact, the lead Democrat on the House Oversight Committee says he thinks the DOJ only released about 10 percent of the documents. Here's what the deputy attorney general said on Friday about plans for future releases.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TODD BLANCHE, U.S. DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: I expect that we're going to release more documents over the next couple of weeks. So today several hundred thousand and then, over the next couple weeks, I expect several hundred thousand more.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Attorney Gloria Allred represents some of the Epstein survivors. She says there are good reasons for some of the DOJ's redactions but she also says the department should release all the files on Friday. Here she is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GLORIA ALLRED, LEADING WOMEN'S RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Bottom line is the justice system. In the past, Department of Justice has failed Epstein survivors and today they failed them again because they didn't put out all of the files.

And what they did put out is heavily redacted. Now some of it has to be redacted because there are exceptions, exemptions. For example, the names of victims. Also, they are blacking out family members' names who are in the photos because that might identify who that victim is.

And in addition, they're redacting sexually explicit videos involving sex with children, which, of course, is pornography that should be redacted. And even Congress should not be allowed to see that. And in addition, they allege they're redacting anything involving pending investigations.

Well, which investigations are pending and against whom?

We know what the president said. He said investigate prominent Democrats but we don't know who else.

Now the work product is going to be an argument that they may have also redacted that meaning discussions internally among DOJ prosecutors that generally is not something that must be provided but perhaps, under the law, it must be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: President Trump spoke in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, Friday night, touting his economic accomplishments and claiming credit for cooling inflation. The latest Consumer Price Index report shows inflation slowing down.

But economists warn that the government shutdown likely impacted the data. A survey by the University of Michigan shows consumer sentiment flagging slightly. It reflects persistent concerns about higher costs and indicates that inflation remains top of mind for many.

But in North Carolina Friday, Trump insisted that the economy is improving. He also repeated his call for the government to give health care money directly to Americans rather than fund insurance subsidies. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Let the money not go to the insurance companies. The problem is the Democrats were shut down the government because they are totally beholden and so simple, the money should go to the people.

The people should then take all of this money and buy the best health care there is. I took office last January. I inherited a mess and very simply, I'm fixing it. Joe Biden gave us the worst inflation in the history of our country.

One year ago, our country was dead. Now we are the hottest country anywhere in the world, because we finally have a president who puts America first.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Earlier, the president announced so-called most favored nations deals with nine pharmaceutical companies. They require medications to be sold in the U.S. at the lowest cost available in peer nations.

Crews in Washington have now added president Trump's names to the sign on the Kennedy Center. The new name now also appears on the center's social media accounts. It comes after the board of trustees voted to rename the performing arts facility to honor the president.

Notably, president Trump replaced several board members earlier this year with people from his inner circle. He was elected chair of the center shortly after.

But there are questions about whether the board has the authority to rename the center. It was designated by Congress as a memorial to John F. Kennedy in 1964, following his assassination.

One of president Trump's strongest supporters, Republican congresswoman Elise Stefanik, says she's dropping out of the race for New York governor and she's also not running for another term in Congress. She said challenging Democratic governor Kathy Hochul in a heavily Democratic state would be a waste of time and resources.

[04:35:03]

President Trump praised Stefanik, saying she's a, quote, "tremendous talent and will be successful regardless of what she does."

The U.S. Health Department is planning to overhaul the recommended vaccines for children. According to a person familiar with the plans, the proposed new schedule would recommend fewer shots, bringing the U.S. in line with what's recommended in some other developed countries. CNN's Meg Tirrell has details.

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MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: While the Trump administration's latest move to pare back the number of recommended childhood vaccines in the United States, CNN has learned that the department of Health and Human Services is considering overhauling the childhood vaccination schedule.

And in fact, a person familiar with the plan suggests that the proposed new schedule could look something like Denmark's, if not totally identical to Denmark's.

Now this is not finalized and could still change. But it comes after the president sent a memo to the Department of Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the acting director of the CDC, directing them to evaluate the U.S. childhood vaccine schedule.

That's the list of vaccines that are routinely recommended for kids in the United States. And to compare that with the recommended vaccines in peer countries.

The president called the U.S. a, quote, "high outlier in terms of the number of diseases that we vaccinate against in childhood here." And said that they should compare and come up with a new strategy for vaccination.

So this came about two weeks after the CDC advisory committee meeting on vaccines, where RFK Jr.'s handpicked group of vaccine advisers voted to pare back a recommendation for the hepatitis B vaccine birth dose in the United States.

And we heard a lot of discussions at that meeting about comparisons with other countries' vaccine schedules and, in particular, Denmark, where an FDA staff member, who was put in place by the Trump administration, had lived for several years. So she made comparisons between that country and the United States. Now if we were to adopt Denmark's vaccination schedule, we in the

United States right now vaccinate against about 17 to 18 diseases in childhood, compared with 11 in Denmark.

So if we were to change the recommendations, that would be removing potentially universal vaccination recommendations for diseases like RSV, rotavirus, flu, chickenpox and other diseases.

Now RSV is the most common cause of hospitalization among infants in the United States. And a new immunization for babies has reduced hospitalizations by 80 percent to 90 percent with RSV.

So experts are really scratching their heads about why the U.S. would change its vaccination schedules to match a country that really is unlike the United States. In many ways, it has free universal health care in Denmark and a population of about 6 million people, which is smaller than the state of Missouri.

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BRUNHUBER: Cracks are starting to show in Russia's economy, which has largely defied international sanctions so far. Still ahead, we'll look at whether Moscow can keep the economy afloat.

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BRUNHUBER: Special envoy for Russian president Vladimir Putin is expected in Miami for more talks with the U.S. on Ukraine. A Russian source told CNN Friday that Kirill Dmitriev was on his way to the U.S. to be briefed on revised proposals to end the war.

A Ukrainian delegation wrapped up its own talks with the U.S. and European negotiators in Miami on Friday and they agreed to continue diplomatic work.

Meanwhile, Ukraine says it has struck a tanker linked to Russia in the Mediterranean for the first time. A security source says a drone hit the vessel, belonging to the so-called shadow fleet, which helps Moscow evade sanctions on its oil exports.

Well, it's not often we hear both sides claiming victory when it comes to Russia's war on Ukraine. But that's what we heard this week when the E.U. announced it's extending a $105 billion loan to help Ukraine's economy and military from a budgetary black hole through 2027.

The E.U. will borrow the money from investors for a loan to Ukraine, while Kyiv will not have to pay back the money until Russia pays reparations at the end of the conflict. But for now, frozen Russian assets worth an estimated $250 billion

remain safe, which is a huge win for Moscow, something Russian president Vladimir Putin noted in his marathon year-end news conference this time yesterday. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VLADIMIR PUTIN, PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA (through translator): Theft is a secret stealing of property but here they're trying to do it openly. It's a robbery.

But why are they failing?

Because the consequences for them will be severe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNHUBER: Putin said the Russian economy is experiencing a bit of a cooldown from 4.3 percent growth in 2024 to around 1 percent this year. Yesterday Russia's central bank cut the key rate of interest by 50 basis points to 16 percent and that's down from a high of 21 percent in late 2024.

For more, I'm joined from Berlin by Alexandra Prokopenko. She's a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center and, before that, Alexandra worked at the central bank of Russia.

Thank you so much for being here with us. Really appreciate it.

So Europe just pulled off this $105 billion loan to Ukraine after 16 hours of negotiations. They backed away from using the frozen Russian assets directly. I mentioned Putin's claiming this as a win.

So how does this deal look from Moscow's perspective?

ALEXANDRA PROKOPENKO, FELLOW, CARNEGIE RUSSIA EURASIA CENTER: So first and furthermost (sic), it's really great that European leaders, secured financing for Ukraine. It's really important for now, at the moment. And it was a real strong signal to Moscow that, well, basically, Ukraine is not fall before Russia.

That's one of the, I think, major calculus of Vladimir Putin, that he has more resources than Ukraine. So he has an upper hand.

Well, the recent decision of European leaders shows that it's -- that the things is not so simple. And at least for the coming year and maybe -- and maybe longer, Ukraine finance is secured.

But, of course, we see that this attempt to use Russian frozen assets was taken serious in Moscow and Russian central bank started to retaliate. They filed a lawsuit in Moscow, arbitrary. It's not something important for Euroclear, for Belgium. They are not under Moscow court jurisdiction.

But with this step, the Kremlin obtains a legal justification for mirror measures in Russia. So in addition, frozen reserves proved to be a convenient tool for sowing discord among European leaders. And that was also a goal for Putin. The last agreement there is among European capitals, the most comfortable the Kremlin feels politically.

[04:45:02]

BRUNHUBER: So on that last point that you're making about reciprocal measures, I mean, just to put a fine point on it, Russia is sitting on about $127 billion in Western assets and Moscow has threatened, as you say, to seize them.

I mean, could they actually do that?

How realistic a risk is that?

PROKOPENKO: I think yes. There are two, at least two options I see which Kremlin can use. First, a selective approach is possible where it be not all assets in these C type accounts could be nationalized and bring into budget.

And not worthy (ph) to mention that Kremlin could do this very quickly without any long consultations. So Kremlin could use not all assets of all investors from unfriendly countries. And here is also very important thing which usually miss, that division on friendly and non- friendly countries is not a matter of speech. It's a matter of legislation.

So all countries which Kremlin considers as unfriendly has very different operational conditions as other countries. So Kremlin could take some funds, not everyone, but funds of certain structures like quasi-sovereign and sovereign funds or banks from these unfriendly states.

So there wouldn't be the whole bunch of money Kremlin sits on. Also, there could be, I think Kremlin will use the intimidation strategy. So they will fill (sic) as much litigation, lawsuits internationally as possible so to ensure that as few investors as possible will participate in the purchase of securities issued by operational law.

BRUNHUBER: Right.

PROKOPENKO: So --

BRUNHUBER: Let me ask you, because I do want to get to this because we mentioned it earlier.

What's happening inside Russia right now?

I mean, yesterday, Putin said the slowdown to just 1 percent growth was a conscious decision to fight inflation. You've written that Russia's economy is basically running on fumes.

But some analysts are now saying Putin could keep this war going on for another, you know, 3-5 years without the economy forcing him to the table.

Do you agree with that assessment? PROKOPENKO: I don't think that 3-5 years is an accurate assessment. My predictions is grim. And -- grimmer. And I think that for 2026, for 12-18 months, Putin is secured with the current stance of the economy because the economy, as I see, stuck in the so-called negative equilibrium.

It's like a car idling in neutral with the engine still overheating. So the car isn't moving backward but it's not going anywhere, either. The economy generates the amount of cash, which is enough for Putin to finance military effort and to keep social spending declining. But relatively okayish to the population.

But we see that Russian government, of three years in a row, raising taxes for population and for corporates. And this already started to hit the economy. So for 2026, if everything is equal, Putin is OK for 2027.

The budgetary situation would be much grimmer because investments are going to negative territory.

What means -- what does it mean for the economy?

It means that in future there would be no growth.

BRUNHUBER: Yes. And the low price of oil as well certainly will further hit Russia's economy.

We'll have to leave it there. Alexandra Prokopenko, thank you so much for speaking with us. Appreciate it.

PROKOPENKO: Thank you.

BRUNHUBER: We have some big questions on investors' minds these days concerning the value of AI and the powerful chips holding up the tech industry. And that's fueling fears of a market bubble with billions of dollars and the U.S. economy on the line. We'll have that next. Stay with us.

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BRUNHUBER: After a seven-year-long legal battle, the world's richest person has won a $139 billion pay package from Tesla. Shareholders first approved the plan for Elon Musk back in 2018 but the lower court ruled that the payout was unfairly large.

Now Delaware's supreme court has restored the deal, saying blocking it would have left Musk unpaid for years of work.

Separately, Tesla shareholders approved a potential $1 trillion package for Musk earlier this year. There are new worries that the billions of dollars invested into AI

data centers and the chips that power them may not pay off. Some people are questioning how quickly those chips will wear out and whether artificial intelligence will deliver on investments fast enough. CNN's tech reporter Clare Duffy has our story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLARE DUFFY, CNN TECH CORRESPONDENT: This year alone, tech giants are expected to spend around $400 billion on AI infrastructure. That's data centers and the chips that are used to power them.

But that's not just going to be a one-time spending spree and then this infrastructure is done and built. These companies are going to have to continue spending to upgrade the chips that power these AI data centers.

And there are growing questions about just how frequently they're going to have to do that, about the life cycle of these AI chips.

Now I spoke with experts who said that the GPU chips that power AI data centers, they don't last as long as the CPU chips that power traditional data centers. And that is in part because AI model training is just a really intensive process that exposes the chips to a lot of heat and strain.

The failure rate of GPUs is around 9 percent annually, compared to 5 percent annually for CPUS. But this is also because the chipmakers themselves are just innovating so quickly and making their chips more power-efficient.

So even if you have a chip that can technically live for five or six years, it may not be economical to keep running your data center on those chips after two or three years, rather than upgrading to the latest products.

So all of this matters because there are questions about how quickly these companies will see returns on their AI investments and whether that will happen fast enough to recoup not just their existing massive investments in AI infrastructure but also cover these future chip purchases.

[04:55:00]

One expert I spoke to said the extent to which this buildout is a bubble depends on the lifespan of these investments and that's because, if chips last six years, the companies have a bit more time to figure out this business model.

But if they only last 18 months to two years, as some experts suggested to me they might, then there's a lot more pressure on these companies to get this business model sorted out.

And, of course, this matters for all of us because so much of the economy is riding on the success of this AI industry. So if this is a bubble that pops, if there are companies that fail, all of our 401(k)s could be feeling it -- back to you.

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BRUNHUBER: The Alabama Crimson Tide is heading to the Rose Bowl after making a huge comeback in the first round of the college football playoff. The Oklahoma Sooners held an early lead Friday night but Alabama fought back and took home a 34-24 win.

Ninth-ranked Alabama will now face the top-ranked Indiana Hoosiers in Pasadena on New Year's Day.

So here's a look at the matchup today. First up is Miami and Texas A&M. Then Tulane and Ole Miss with James Madison and Oregon wrapping up the first round.

The Olympic flame continued its journey through Italy on Friday, crossing from Sicily to the mainland. The torch relay began in Rome earlier this month and will cover about 12,000 kilometers, about 5700 miles, passing through all 110 Italian provinces.

The flame will end its journey in Milan ahead of February's opening ceremony for the 2026 Winter Games.

Before we go, here's a look at the world's largest gingerbread house, officially verified by the Guinness book of world records. It's a full scale replica of the McCallister house from the movie "Home Alone." That's why you might recognize it there.

Made by Disney+ and Hulu for the film's 35th anniversary, it took eight days to build using several thousand gingerbread bricks and more than 20 gallons of edible glue; 6,600 eggs went into the fondant, helping to hold it all together.

Well, that wraps this hour of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Kim Brunhuber. I'll be back with more news in just a moment