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Early Start with Rahel Solomon

Trump Signs Funding Package To Reopen Federal Government; Arizona's Adelita Grijalva Finally Sworn Into Congress; Trump Mentioned In Newly Released Epstein Emails; Trump Asks Israeli President To "Fully Pardon" Netanyahu. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired November 13, 2025 - 05:00   ET

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

[05:00:23]

BRIAN ABEL, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning and welcome to our viewers joining us from the United States and all around the world. I'm Brian Abel. Thank you so much for being with us.

It is Thursday, November 13th, 5:00 a.m. here in Washington, D.C.

And straight ahead on EARLY START.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The longest government shutdown in American history now over.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I just want to tell the American people, you should not forget this, when we come up to midterms.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Jeffrey Epstein mentioning Donald Trump multiple times in this private correspondence.

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: These emails prove absolutely nothing other than the fact that President Trump did nothing wrong.

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: There are positive trends in the air travel space after 43 days of chaos caused by the shutdown.

CHRIS SUNUNU, AIRLINES FOR AMERICA: I'm very hopeful that the American public can enjoy Thanksgiving, as they always have.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(MUSIC)

ABEL: After a record 43 days, the U.S. federal government is finally set to reopen. Just hours ago, U.S. President Donald Trump signing a bill to temporarily fund the government until the end of January.

But the President accused Democrats of attempting to extort the U.S. government with their demands and reminded voters of the upcoming midterm elections next year.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: They caused tens of thousands of federal contractors and small businesses to go unpaid, and the total effect of the damage, their antics caused will take weeks and probably months to really calculate accurately, including the serious harm that they did to our economy and to people and to families.

So, I just want to tell the American people, you should not forget this when we come up to midterms and other things, don't forget what they've done to our country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: Now a new clock is ticking down until Congress adjourns for the year, until the temporary funding runs out and health care subsidies expire, the majority of Democrats strongly opposed the funding package, which offers no guarantee Republicans will keep their word on a vote to extend those subsidies.

CNN's Manu Raju has the details on how the bill passed from Capitol Hill.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The longest government shutdown in American history. Now over after 43 days in a bitter feuding between the two parties and painful consequences for the American public that were just piling up by the day, that is now over. The bill passed the House on Wednesday evening. The vote was 222 to 209. That vote came as a result of six Democrats voting, with all but two Republicans. The Democrats coming mostly from swing districts, breaking with their party leaders who are trying to push them to vote against this bill because of their concerns that the final product did not include an extension of expiring subsidies under the Affordable Care Act.

It was that fight that demand by Democrats that ultimately led to this prolonged shutdown fight. Democrats were concerned that if those subsidies were not extended immediately, people would see their premiums skyrocket. The 22 million people or so who do get their health insurance through Obamacare would be hit hard by those premium increases, and they insisted that any funding bill must be tied to an extension of those health care increases.

Well, that did not happen. In fact, at the end of the day, a deal was cut by the Senate on Sunday night that would not include the health care provisions in that bill. It was now a separate commitment that they got from the Senate majority leader to have a vote on a separate bill on health care at a later date. The question is going to be what will ultimately happen with that? Bill is unlikely to pass the Senate and is unlikely to even get a vote in the United States House.

Meantime, those Democrats who voted yes are explaining their position and why they broke from their party, including Congressman Don Davis, who comes from a swing district in North Carolina. I caught up with him in the immediate aftermath of the vote.

You could have dug in and you could have fought to include this in the bill.

REP. DON DAVIS (D-NC): And I could have reopened the government because a lot of people are hurting right now. And that's what I did.

RAJU: Was the shutdown worth it?

DAVIS: Was it worth it? Again, I'll put it this way. You have to start the process by trying. You have to allow an opportunity to talk and allow the negotiations to take its place.

I mean, did I want more? Absolutely. I wanted to see more. I would love for us to prepare for the holidays and know that people, their minds are at ease.

[05:05:03]

RAJU: But this bill only keeps the government open significantly, a fair amount of the federal government through January 30th, which means that they will be -- there will be another fight that will intensify almost right away, beginning in December, over the issue of health care could lead into the new year, and it could prompt another shutdown fear by early next year.

But at the moment, federal employees are breathing a sigh of relief. The ones who can now get paychecks in the aftermath of this feud, where they were not getting paychecks, many hundreds of thousands were furloughed, people not getting federal food aid. Now that coming to an end in the aftermath of this bitter feud leading to a law reopening the government.

Manu Raju, CNN, Capitol Hill.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ABEL: And after waiting 50 days, Adelita Grijalva was finally sworn in to Congress Wednesday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Congratulations, you're now a member 119th Congress.

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: The representative from Arizona received a standing ovation. You're hearing it and seeing it hear from her Democratic colleagues. House Speaker Mike Johnson had said her swearing in was delayed as the House was out of session, but Democrats believe he did it to stop her from signing a petition to force a vote on releasing the Jeffrey Epstein case files.

Grijalva says that the delay was for different reasons.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADELITA GRIJALVA (D-AZ): Let's understand very clearly that if I were a Republican, I would not have waited this long. If I were a man, I would not have waited this long. We all know that this -- that the rules are always different for women of color and people of color. And we have to fight against that. There is no way that this can ever happen again to anyone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: The vote on the Epstein files release bill will come next week, and the House is expected to approve the measure. Meanwhile, Democrats on the Oversight Committee have released multiple emails in which Jeffrey Epstein mentions Donald Trump. The late sex offender appears to reference Trump being aware that his girlfriend and accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, was poaching girls from Mar-a-Lago. In another email, amid years of investigation, Epstein refers to Trump as the dog that hasn't barked.

President Trump posted on Truth Social that the Epstein case is a hoax by Democrats to deflect from the government shutdown. And here's White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEAVITT: These emails prove absolutely nothing other than the fact that President Trump did nothing wrong. And what President Trump has always said is that he was from palm beach, and so was Jeffrey Epstein. Jeffrey Epstein was a member at Mar-a-Lago until President Trump kicked him out, because Jeffrey Epstein was a pedophile and he was a creep. Ms. Giuffre maintained, and God rest her soul, that she maintained that there was nothing inappropriate she ever witnessed, that President Trump was always extremely professional and friendly to her.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: Now, Donald Trump has always denied any wrongdoing and has never been charged with a crime in relation to Epstein.

More on the White House's response now from CNN's Jeff Zeleny.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An all-out White House pressure campaign was underway throughout the day on Wednesday, trying to get Republicans to not sign on to a discharge petition in the House of Representatives to move forward and call on the Department of Justice to release the Jeffrey Epstein files, an extraordinary meeting took place on Wednesday in the Situation Room here at the White House, a room that is generally reserved for national security matters. Well, this was not that meeting. Lauren Boebert, a Republican congresswoman from Colorado, she was summoned here to the White House to have a meeting with the attorney general, Pam Bondi, the deputy attorney general, the director of the FBI.

They were trying to urge her to not sign on to this so-called discharge petition. She did not do that. She said she does believe the Epstein file should be released.

So, now, there will be a vote of the full House of Representatives next week. Speaker Mike Johnson making that clear. And that pressure campaign is going to continue apace here with the White House very focused on what the margin of that vote may be, how many Republicans would, in the end, sign onto that.

Now, this is all coming as there are new revelations about the president and his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Of course, there is no specific example of wrongdoing, but there was much that is learned from troves of emails. Some 20,000 documents that were released. It's going to take some time to go through those.

But one thing is clear, the relationship between the president and Jeffrey Epstein -- of course, Donald Trump at that point was just a celebrity on "Celebrity Apprentice". But this has effectively dogged him.

And during the presidential campaign, he said that he would be supportive of releasing these documents. Now, this White House is doing anything they can to try and stop that.

So, the open question, how many Republicans are going to join on, on the Epstein files now, it's unclear if this will ever go anywhere if the DOJ will release these files. But for now, at least, the White House once again dealing with Jeffrey Epstein.

[05:10:06]

Jeff Zeleny, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ABEL: All right, let's break all of this down with Julia Manchester, White House reporter for "The Hill".

Good morning, Julia.

Thank you for joining us. Let's start with the government shutdown.

JULIA MANCHESTER, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, THE HILL: Good morning, Brian.

ABEL: Great to have you with us.

President Trump signing that funding bill last night. And he seemed to again push for the removal of the filibuster. And Republicans are coming out of these 43 days of shutdown, not having to really capitulate on anything. What are you hearing from the White House and how it views the last month and a half, and whether it's actually hearing the pain from everyday Americans impacted? MANCHESTER: Well, it was interesting. I think really what we've seen over the course of the last week, following last week's off-year elections, in fact, the day after we heard president Trump in a breakfast with Republican senators, sort of acknowledge that those sweeping losses for Republicans in Virginia and New Jersey, obviously New York City, some other smaller elections around the country were a result, in his view, of the government shutdown and that essentially, voters were blaming the party in power, the party that has majority in Washington. And that's the Republican Party.

However, I think the White House and Republicans somewhat feel like they have the wind at their back a bit following the division. We've seen among Democrats in the senate over this effort to reopen the government, and that legislation. We saw, of course, seven or eight -- seven Democrats and one, senator who caucuses with Democrats, break with the party to vote for that legislation in the Senate. And then last night, we saw six House Democrats vote with Republicans to reopen the government. So, I think the White House feels that they've been able to tap in to this division among Democrats on Capitol Hill.

But at the same time, I think President Trump and Republicans still realize that they need to sort of fix their messaging in the wake of the government shutdown. And also in the wake of those election losses. I mean, the one issue that I think ties these two things together, whether it's the impact of the government shutdown and the election losses, is the issue of affordability. You have President Trump really trying to figure out what the best message is, which message sticks best for Republicans.

And of course, there's this issue of health care, and the pressure is going to be on Republicans to craft an alternative to the Affordable Care Act.

ABEL: Julia, let's talk about that a little bit about what comes next, because the health care subsidies significantly increased health care premiums, the things that Democrats were holding out for, those aren't resolved. And this funding only goes through January.

So, does the White House have a plan to address any of it to prevent us from being here again in just a couple of months?

MANCHESTER: Well, and just to rewind, you know, those seven Democrats who broke with their party to vote to reopen the government said they had an assurance from Senate Majority Leader John Thune that there would be a vote on extending the Obamacare subsidies next month in the Senate. But we don't know what's going to happen in the House of Representatives.

So, we don't know necessarily if President Trump or the Republicans have a concrete plan yet to present within the past, within the next month or so. We know that President Trump has been floating this idea of essentially bypassing the insurance companies and creating funds, if you will, to get that money for health care to the American people directly as an alternative to Obamacare.

But I think what you're hearing from the president is him sort of throwing ideas out into the universe to see what sticks best with Republican lawmakers. The Republican base, et cetera. But the pressure is going to be on because for the past ten years or so, that's always been a criticism of Republicans when it comes to health care. This criticism of we want to repeal, repeal, repeal Obamacare, but there doesn't appear to be a plan to replace it.

ABEL: Okay. So, in the last 24 hours we have seen it did not take long for Jeffrey Epstein to be back at the forefront of Congress. House Oversight Democrats releasing emails sent by Epstein that mentioned Trump. And as Democrats get the vote needed to release the files with the swearing in of Adelita Grijalva, there are more questions now about what president Trump knew or didn't know.

And now, as we saw from my colleague Jeff Zeleny reporting, there was the Situation Room summit on this subject, it was serious enough for that.

So how is the White House responding to all of this? And the idea that the president is perpetuating the perception of a cover up because he campaigned on releasing these files and now, he's trying to push Republicans to take their votes back.

[05:15:01]

MANCHESTER: I thought it was remarkable to hear that news that the White House summoned Lauren -- Congresswoman Lauren Boebert, to the situation room to try to get her to take her name off of that discharge petition. Of course, she did not agree to that. They were also playing phone tag with Congresswoman Nancy Mace. So there really was this pressure campaign.

But look, I think there is some concern because you have a number of Republicans in the House who have signed on to this. Congressman Thomas Massie, for example, a real rare Republican critic of President Trump is in many ways leading the effort on this. You know, I think there could be some momentum on this in the House. But if it were -- if this were to pass through the House, we don't know if it will there's even, I think, larger doubt of what happens when it comes to the Senate.

So, we don't know essentially what the fate of all of this will be. But no doubt the White House is facing pressure on this regardless. You mentioned that this is something the president, the vice president, Republicans campaigned on in 2024, in part, it was something that drove out their base.

So, this is a rare issue, I think, where you're seeing President Trump facing pushback from his base politically and going into the midterms. You know, the White House doesn't want to have distractions here. They want to be talking about the domestic policy, what they say are domestic policy wins, even talking about, you know, foreign policy wins, if you will. They don't want to be talking about Jeffrey Epstein, but it seems to be the story that literally follows President Trump around the world.

ABEL: Julia Manchester, covering the White House for "The Hill". Julia, thank you for being with us. Appreciate it.

MANCHESTER: Thank you.

ABEL: U.S. civil rights leader Jesse Jackson is in a Chicago hospital. There's a statement from his Rainbow Push Coalition that says the 84-year-old is under observation for a condition called progressive supranuclear palsy. He was originally diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, but received a new diagnosis back in April.

Jackson was a protege of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He's spent more than 60 years advocating for racial equality and voter rights.

Coming up, President Donald Trump has made a unique request to Israel's president. We'll have details on what he wants in a report from Jerusalem.

Plus, Britain's prime minister is battling infighting in his own party. Keir Starmer confronting rumors about a challenge to his leadership at a pivotal time for the Labour government.

And later fear, uncertainty and skepticism in Venezuela after the U.S. moves its most advanced aircraft carrier to the region.

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[05:22:09]

ABEL: President Donald Trump has written a letter to Israel's President Isaac Herzog, asking him to fully pardon Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in his ongoing corruption trial. Netanyahu has pleaded not guilty to charges of fraud, bribery and breach of trust and is currently testifying in court.

CNN's Jeremy Diamond has details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TRUMP: Mr. President, why don't you give him a pardon?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What began as an astonishing request at the Israeli parliament podium in October, now inked onto formal White House letterhead, the president of the United States urging the Israeli president to fully pardon Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, writing, "While I absolutely respect the independence of the Israeli justice system and its requirements, I believe that this case against Bibi is a political, unjustified prosecution, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname.

Netanyahu welcoming the incredible support. Writing, as usual, you get right to the point and call it like it is. Trump's attempt to interfere in a sovereign country's judicial system marks an extraordinary breach of diplomatic protocol. But it is also the culmination of Trump's frequent criticism of the case. He first began floating the idea of a pardon for Netanyahu in June, calling the case a ridiculous witch hunt against their great wartime prime minister.

TRUMP: You know, we'll be involved in that to help him out a little bit, because I think it's very unfair.

DIAMOND (voice-over): The Israeli prime minister has been on trial for more than five years. Amid a slew of delays, he only took the stand for the first time late last year. The first sitting prime minister to do so in Israels history. He is facing charges of fraud, bribery and breach of trust in three separate cases.

In one, he is accused of receiving cigars, champagne and other expensive gifts from wealthy businessmen in exchange for political favors. In the other two, he is accused of discussing quid pro quo arrangements to receive more favorable coverage in Israeli media. Netanyahu maintains his innocence and hasn't asked for a pardon.

While the Israeli president does have the power to issue pardons, his office says that can only happen following a formal request from the person seeking it.

TRUMP: A little risque. You know, bring it up a pretty sore subject in Israel. But the people were fantastic.

DIAMOND (voice-over): By wading into one of Israels most divisive issues, Trump is putting his own sky high approval among Israelis on the line.

In a country where the mere mention of Netanyahu's name --

STEVE WITKOFF, U.S. SPECIAL ENVOY: To Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu --

(BOOS)

WITKOFF: Oh.

DIAMOND (voice-over): -- often triggers a charged reaction.

Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Jerusalem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ABEL: And to the U.K. now. Swirling political rumors are adding pressure to Britain's embattled prime minister.

[05:25:04]

Keir Starmer went before parliament on Wednesday to address reports that rivals in his own Labour Party are plotting to replace him as leader.

Several British news outlets quoted his allies saying his job might be under immediate threat, and singled out Health Secretary Wes Streeting as a potential challenger. Streeting rejects those claims as self- defeating nonsense by people trying to knee-cap him.

The prime minister told parliament he did not authorize his allies to share negative claims against senior members of his government. The longest government shutdown in U.S. history has come to an end.

Coming up, a look at what's in the funding bill that's helping to reopen the government.

Plus, protesters defend their actions after trying to storm into the United Nations climate change -- climate change conference in Brazil. Why they feel they should have been included in the talks. That's ahead.

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