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Musk And Ramaswamy Visit With Republicans On Capitol Hill; Hegseth Remains Defiant Despite Misconduct Allegations; NASA Delays First Crewed Flight To The Moon In Over 50 Years. Aired 5:30-6a ET
Aired December 06, 2024 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: All right, 5:29 a.m. here on the East Coast. A live look at Philadelphia. It's the City of Brotherly Love. They've been -- they lit their Christmas tree -- it's in front of City Hall -- last night. Very pretty.
Good morning, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us.
Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk walking their DOGE plans over to Capitol Hill. They met with lawmakers Thursday. They, of course, have been tapped by Donald Trump to lead the so-called Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE which, of course, isn't actually a government department at all. The initiative will sit outside the government.
They won't have any actual power to make changes. Instead, they're going to make recommendations to the president. But that, of course, hasn't stopped the duo from proposing a totally overhauled federal budget. It's still unclear what might end up on the chopping block but according to Republicans who were in yesterday's meeting with Musk and Ramaswamy "everything is on the table."
Following the meeting CNN's Manu Raju tried to ask Musk whether certain social programs would be safe.
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MANU RAJU, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Elon, is Social Security and Medicare -- is it off the table? Is it off the table?
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HUNT: Earlier this week one Republican congressman had suggested this.
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REP. RICHARD MCCORMICK (R-GA): You're talking about 75 percent of the budget. Seventy-five percent is non-discretionary. We're going to have to have some hard decisions. We've got to bring the Democrats in to talk about Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare. There is hundreds of billions of dollars to be saved and we know how to do it. We just have to have the stomach to actually take those challenges on.
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HUNT: Easy to say, hard to do. Some other Republicans warning exactly that.
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SEN. JOHN KENNEDY (R-LA): Cutting waste appears kind of like going to heaven, you know? Everybody wants to do it but nobody's quite ready to make the trip, OK? Will this time be different? I hope so.
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HUNT: Joining us now, NOTUS reporter -- a political reporter, Reese Gorman. Reese, good morning. Nice to see you.
REESE GORMAN, POLITICAL REPORTER, NOTUS: Good morning.
HUNT: So that was Manu there following up on suggestions Musk has made himself on social media that things like Medicare should be on the table, and Social Security should be on the table here. I feel like he's probably going to learn pretty quick just how difficult it is to grab that third rail of American politics. It still remains a third rail.
GORMAN: Yeah.
HUNT: What was your take covering this yesterday?
GORMAN: I mean, I think Sen. Kennedy's words were exactly right. I mean, people like to talk the game about wanting to cut funding. In reality it really never happens regardless of which party is in power.
And Rep. Max Miller told reporters yesterday as he was leaving the DOGE meeting -- he said half the people in there are really excited; the other half are in reality.
Really, they're like this is not going to happen. I mean, the last Trump administration -- I mean, government funding did not get cut. There's -- spending kind of increased -- or it drastically increased.
HUNT: Yeah.
GORMAN: The same under this administration. Spending has increased.
And so it just -- I mean, people like to say oh, we're going to cut funding, we're going to cut funding. But when it comes down to it -- I mean, no one really wants to do it.
HUNT: Well, and these big entitlement programs also. I mean, we saw Donald Trump campaign as a populist in all of the campaigns that he has run in a way that really put the Republican Party in a place that was much closer where the Democratic Party had been for many years on this.
Do you think it's plausible that if they -- if Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy were to go to President Trump with proposals around Social Security and Medicare that he would go for it?
GORMAN: I think -- I think -- there's always a possibility. I mean, Trump could always be persuaded one way or the other -- I mean, just depending -- I know during the campaign he did put on Truth Social a couple of times that these things would be off the table. But if he's truly serious about cutting government funding, as McCormick said, those are really the things that you really have to touch because those do make up a big part.
And that is such -- like you said, the kind of third rail -- the third rail. That you grab it, and you can't really go back from it. And it is really politically unpopular to touch those things, which is why, again, you never really see government funding get cut.
So will -- could Trump be convinced? Maybe. Will it actually happen because again, you have spending -- like Congress controls it -- probably not.
HUNT: Yeah.
So let's also touch on the fact that we learned yesterday part of why Elon Musk is likely in this position that he's in is that he spent more than a quarter billion dollars on Donald Trump. These new filings show that Musk is one of the largest single political underwriters of a presidential campaign and underscores the outsized influence of the world's wealthiest person on this year's election.
Does that explain why he's where he is?
GORMAN: I think after you spend a quarter billion dollars you probably need some position in government. I think that he wanted to be close to Trump. He saw -- I mean, he has a lot of business interests before the government. I think that he did spend money because it was in his best interest to see Trump elected, and Trump's rewarding him for this.
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But again, I mean, this is not like a government agency that has any power. It's not an agency at all. It's a commission, basically, that can make recommendations. And so I do think that this is why Trump gave him this position because of how much he helped him. But at the end of the day -- I mean, it really has no power to do anything other than just say hey, we should do this, and Trump can listen or not listen.
HUNT: Right. And, of course, there may be a little bit more leeway over things like the federal workforce -- places where the executive branch has some discretion over how the money Congress gives them can be spent. But to your point, at the end of the day, it's Congress that writes the checks.
GORMAN: Yeah.
HUNT: Reese Gorman, thanks very much for being here --
GORMAN: Thanks for having me.
HUNT: -- on this Friday. Appreciate it.
All right, let's turn now to this. Donald picks Trump -- Donald Trump's pick for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, remaining defiant despite multiple allegations of misconduct putting his confirmation in jeopardy.
This week he's continued to try to win over congressional support meeting with lawmakers on the Hill, including a number who have voiced concern about his nomination while at least one staunch Trump supporter criticized Republicans for their hesitation.
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SEN. TOMMY TUBERVILLE (R-AL): Who are we to say that we're a better vetter and picker of people than Donald Trump?
RAJU: But isn't that your advice and consent? That's your job.
TUBERVILLE: We can advise and consent but that's more the Democrats.
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HUNT: Sources tell CNN that Trump is sticking by Hegseth as his choice to run the Pentagon for now. Trump telling Hegseth he wants to see him fight for votes, according to sources close to both men. It seems like Hegseth trying to do just that.
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PETE HEGSETH, FORMER FOX NEWS HOST, TRUMP'S PICK FOR DEFENSE SECRETARY: I'm not going to back down from them one bit. I want to answer all of these senators' questions. But this will not be a process tried in the media. I don't answer to anyone in this group -- none of you -- not to that camera at all. I answer to President Trump, I answer to the 50 -- the 100 senators who are part of this process and those in the committee, and I answer to my lord and savior, and my wife and my family.
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HUNT: He doesn't answer to the camera, he says -- clearly, expertly looking right at it.
Joining us now to discuss, national political reporter for The Washington Post, Sabrina Rodriguez. Sabrina, good morning. It's nice to see.
What's your read on where this nomination stands? Because the reporting seems to be that Donald Trump isn't going out of his way necessarily to push him forward, but he's willing to let -- to watch him fight to see if he can do it. And there aren't very many senators right now who are coming out -- straight out saying they're going to vote no on Hegseth but there is a lot of concern behind the scenes.
What are you hearing?
SABRINA RODRIGUEZ, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST (via Webex by Cisco): I think right now we're in some level of a standstill and Trump is not going out of his way here. It's not that we're seeing Trump come out defiantly in support of Pete Hegseth. He's clearly letting him kind of have to navigate and do the jostling on Capitol Hill.
We've seen him throughout this week meeting with senators across the board -- across the Republican Party but especially some of those who he knows have reservations about him. We haven't heard those senators come out either saying that OK, he sold me. OK, he talked about the allegations of misconduct against women or the drinking, and just all of those allegations. And we haven't heard people come out and say OK, no -- now I have no reservations. I'm ready to support him.
So really, the reality is we've had the reporting earlier this week about Trump have conversations about potentially replacing him with Ron DeSantis and potentially replacing him with Congressman Michael Waltz.
So it's clear that Trump is kind of letting this simmer, letting this see how this plays out. But it's clear also that Trump is not above moving on to someone else if need be.
HUNT: So once critical person that we're all watching in this debate is Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa. She's obviously a veteran. She was a victim of sexual assault. She's talked about that publicly. And she's been meeting with Hegseth.
She did an interview on Fox News yesterday and it -- let's watch the clip and we'll talk about it. Take a look.
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SEN. JONI ERNST (R-IA): We will continue with the vetting process. I think that is incredibly important.
BILL HEMMER, FOX NEWS ANCHOR, "AMERICA'S NEWSROOM": It doesn't sound on your answer that you've gotten to a yes. If I'm wrong about that, correct me. And if that is the case it sounds to me as if the hearing will be critical for his nomination. Am I right about that?
ERNST: I think -- I think you are right. I think for a number of our senators they want to make sure that any allegations have been cleared.
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HUNT: What do you make of how she framed that?
RODRIGUEZ: I mean, I think it speaks to the fact that senators are going to let this go through. I think it's not lost on anyone that Matt Gaetz's nomination was derailed because he did not have the votes because there was not going to be the support for him.
Clearly, here with Pete Hegseth people are (audio gap) get there. There are those conversations happening. Pete Hegseth is being defiant and saying I will continue to have as many conversations as I need to have. So clearly, they're trying to see this process through and really go through that vetting process in a way that it just wasn't going to happen with Matt Gaetz.
[05:40:15]
But I think it's a question of -- you know, we've talked about this before -- but sort of the juggling over OK, who is -- who are the positions that people are not going to move on? You know, there's conversations that'll be happening soon more around Tulsi Gabbard, around RFK Jr. And I think that Republicans on Capitol Hill -- there's sort of a question of OK, who is someone that -- is there anyone left that we just cannot support, and who are they going to sort of use that political capital around.
HUNT: All right, Sabrina Rodriguez for us this morning. Sabrina, very grateful to have you on the show. Thanks for being here.
All right. Ahead here on CNN THIS MORNING sending astronauts back to the moon. Why NASA's ambitious Artemis program just got pushed back.
Plus, the last-second kick that led the Lions over the Packers. The Bleacher Report next.
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NEIL ARMSTRONG, ASTRONAUT: That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, it's beautiful, Mike. It really is.
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HUNT: It was beautiful. But we are now a giant leap away from that. The moon is going to have to wait for its next human visitor. NASA announcing that its Artemis lunar mission planned for 2026 will now take place in mid-2027 at the earliest. The delay linked to issues with the Orion crew capsule. Its heat shield was unexpectedly charred and eroded during an uncrewed mission in 2022.
NASA's administrator not taking any chances.
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BILL NELSON, NASA ADMINISTRATOR: We need to get this test flight right -- this Artemis 2 test flight right to ensure the success of our return to the moon and then return safely to Earth in order for the rest of the Artemis campaign to proceed.
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HUNT: All right, Keith Cowing joins us now. He's a former NASA space biologist and the editor of NASAwatch.com. Keith, thanks so much for being back with us. I appreciate it.
KEITH COWING, ROCKET SCIENTIST, FORMER NASA SPACE BIOLOGIST, EDITOR, NASAWATCH.COM (via Webex by Cisco): Good morning.
HUNT: Can you help us understand -- I mean, I think for so many people obviously the moon landing -- I'm dating myself here. I don't remember it myself, but my parents sure remember exactly where they were. I mean, this is something that we did a generation ago and now our technology should be so much better. I feel like there are a lot of people out there being, like, why? Why can't we do this?
COWING: Well, I'll date myself. I was 14. I watched it and I remember it like it was yesterday. And we were told at the time that we're going to keep doing it. We'd be on Mars by 1981. Eh, here we are. I'll be 70 next year. I'll be in my 70s when we go back to something we did when I was a teenager.
So, yeah, we're -- been there, done that, but we're going back. That's the important thing. It's just frustrating that it takes so long.
HUNT: So what is it about this technology? I mean, if we could build the Apollo capsule with computing power that now is dwarfed by what's just in this -- in this phone, like, why can't we get this capsule right when we've done it before?
COWING: Well, it is rocket science. The interesting thing is that the rocket that we're using -- at least NASA is using was mandated by Congress to be built out of parts from a 70s era space shuttle and had to be built in certain ways in certain states, and la, la, la, la. And when Congress starts to design things, as you set-up piece before the last story, I mean, it gets complicated.
And it's frustrating because just as NASA says well, it was six years to fly the first SLS, four to fly the second, and now there's more delays. How do you get the cadence that we had with Apollo where it was every six months?
But then you look at Starship and Elon Musk makes these things like corn silos, and he just keeps launching them. And why can't we have that? Well, maybe we will.
HUNT: Well, I mean, then -- let's -- I mean, let's dig into that a little bit because it's clear -- I mean, when I was -- I took -- my son is super into space as well, probably partly because I am and my husband is, too, and we're introducing it to him early. But the rocket launches we were able to see were all SpaceX launches. And we saw a number of them in just a week's time when we were down there.
What is it about SpaceX and the things that they have to deal with that make it different from what NASA is able to do? COWING: Well, what you're seeing with the SpaceX rockets, it's a consumer product. Elon Musk came from the Silicon Valley world. He -- it's a continuous improvement process. These things are designed to be upgraded and reused, thrown away, and improved. And they put some thought into how that -- what the customer needs and how to adapt it.
NASA's rockets have one use and one use only. You don't get them back. They cost far too much and the more they cost and the more they're delayed, the fewer they can launch.
So you have to completely opposing takes on how to launch things into space. And again, those of us in the space community are saying well, can I have some of that Space X stuff and I maybe don't want that other stuff that NASA's been building.
HUNT: So, I mean, it seems -- it's like almost duplicative, right, because, I mean, Elon Musk has also been working on crewed missions and human spacewalks. And his stated goal is ultimately to go to Mars obviously. We see him wear that "Occupy Mars" shirt at a lot of the events that he does.
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How do you think -- what do you think the best plan would be for the U.S. government in terms of human space flight with SpaceX because clearly, as you note, we're on two different tracks here?
COWING: Well, I -- some history. I met -- I've known Elon for a long time. I met him when he was in his 20s at a conference about going to Mars, and that's all he talked about, and that's all he has talked about. So anybody who thinks that this is just a thing that he's thought up -- no. This is what he's been his entire adult life.
And like Jeff Bezos and some other people of means, they've read too much science fiction as kids, and they have the money to do it. And they don't know any better than to try to make this fantasy reality, and we're seeing that every day.
So you have that new space, as they call it, trend going while you have the old way of NASA doing things, and there is a conflict. And NASA has sought to take a new approach to a lunar lander from SpaceX and one from Blue Origin. That's just the beginning.
But the real question now is with a new administration coming in with Mr. Musk having some influence and somebody he knows well as the nominee to be NASA administrator, I think you're going to see some changes. We might see things sooner but at the end of the day it comes to show me the money, show me the money, show me the money.
HUNT: Money and, of course, safety at the very top of the list. But that, of course, not cheap.
Keith Cowing, very grateful to have you. Love having you. I hope you'll come back. Thank you.
All right, time now sports. The Lions playoff bound after a gusty last-second win over the Packers.
Andy Scholes has this morning's Bleacher Report. Andy, good morning.
ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Yeah, good morning, Kasie.
So Lions' head coach Dan Campbell -- he's arguably the most aggressive coach in the NFL and he was in gambling mood last night going for it on fourth down five times. And this was a great game.
Pick in the third quarter, Lions fourth and goal. Jared Goff -- he's going to find Tim Patrick for the touchdown. This makes it 24-21 Lions. And then later in the quarter Detroit with the ball inside their own 30. They go for it on fourth and one. The Packers stop Jahmyr Gibbs to take over. And that led to Josh Jacobs' four-yard touchdown to give the Packers the lead.
We're in the fourth quarter now tied at 31. The Lions in field goal range. With a minute left they decide to go for it on fourth and one. A near disaster as Goff fell down, but he's able to get that handoff to David Montgomery and gets the first down. The Lions converting four of their five fourth down tries. They were then able to kick a game- winning field goal as time expired.
They win 34-31. Detroit the first team in the NFC to clinch a playoff spot. They get their 11th win a row.
Here was Goff afterwards on his coach's fourth down calls.
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JARED GOFF, QUARTERBACK, DETROIT LIONS: I think he's done a really good job of deciding when to go and when not to go. And certainly because it worked everyone's going to say -- you guys are going to say great call, and if it didn't work you guys would be crushing him. And that's the game he plays and that's why he's the guy with the big stones and we trust him.
DAN CAMPBELL, HEAD COACH, DETROIT LIONS: I just felt like we needed to end it on offense, you know, and I did not want to get that ball back. And I believed we could get that. I believed we could convert. I knew how I wanted to play this game, the team knew it, and everything in me told me to let's finish this, and so we did.
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SCHOLES: All right. Former Patriots head coach Bill Belichick, meanwhile, has interviewed with North Carolina for their head coaching job according to multiple reports. The 72-year-old parted ways with New England after last season, ending the legendary coach's stint after 24 years and six Super Bowl titles.
Belichick has never coached at the college in his nearly 50 years on the sidelines. The Tar Heels job is open after Mack Brown was fired last month.
All right, to the NBA where the Rockets just can't seem to beat the Warriors no matter who is playing. Golden State was without Steph Curry and Draymond Green, but Jonathan Kuminga poured in a career high 33 points, including two clutch buckets late.
The Warriors would win 99-93. It's the 15th straight time they've beaten Houston.
Rockets head coach Ime Udoka said it was one the Rockets' softest games since he's been the coach.
All right. Elsewhere, Nikola Jokic knocks his 139th triple-double of his career against the Cavs passing Magic Johnson for third-most all- time. Jokic trails now only his teammate Russell Westbrook and Oscar Robertson on that list.
But his 27 points, 20 rebounds, and 11 assists weren't enough to get a win in Cleveland. The Cavs making a season high 22 three-pointers. They outscored the Nuggets 66-18 from beyond the arc. That was certainly the difference.
The Cavs winning 126-114.
Luka Doncic, meanwhile, also a triple-double, 21 points, 10 assists, and 10 rebounds in a 137-101 win over the Wizards. And Washington tying their franchise record with their 16th straight loss.
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Kasie, the last time the Wizards won a game was October 30. That was the same day the Dodgers won the World Series. They ran the table in November. Will they win by Christmas? I don't know. I looked at the schedule and it doesn't -- it doesn't look likely.
HUNT: It doesn't look like it.
SCHOLES: Dark times there for Wizards fans in D.C.
HUNT: Yeah, for sure.
And I'm sorry about your Rockets, man.
SCHOLES: We'll beat the Warriors one day.
HUNT: One day.
Andy, thank you.
SCHOLES: All right.
HUNT: Have a great weekend.
SCHOLES: You, too.
HUNT: All right, straight ahead here on CNN THIS MORNING former President Obama's first speech since Kamala Harris lost the election. We're going to speak live with Democratic Congressman Seth Magaziner on the path forward for his party. Plus, what Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy want to see on the federal budget chopping block.
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JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, ABC "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE!": This group they run, DOGE, has no power to make laws, to cut budget, or to do anything. It's like when you're a kid and you visit the cockpit. The pilot will -- he gives you -- you get a set of wings. It doesn't mean you get to fly the plane.
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