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Early Start with Rahel Solomon
Trump's Plan On Greenland; Minneapolis On Alert; Official: Iran To Decide On Lifting Internet Blackout. Aired 4-4:30a ET
Aired January 20, 2026 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
The bunker is being replaced with a modern high tech version as President Trump moves ahead with the new ballroom above it. The space does have a long history, from secret emergency planning on 9/11, when then Vice President Cheney was evacuated there, to sensitive presidential trips abroad. A source tells CNN the bunker is now being upgraded to meet evolving security threats.
And thank you for watching NewsNight. CNN coverage continues next.
[04:00:37]
RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning and welcome to our viewers joining us from the U.S. and all around the world. I'm Rahel Solomon. It is Tuesday, January 20, 4:00 a.m. here in New York.
And straight ahead on Early Start, President Donald Trump is escalating his campaign to annex Greenland. How European leaders are preparing to respond to his plans. Plus, a tense situation in Minneapolis, 1,500 active duty troops are on standby for possible deployment as anti-ICE protests continue. And Spain grappling with a deadly railway disaster as investigators search for answers. We are hearing harrowing stories from survivors.
All right. We begin this hour with Donald Trump's upcoming trip to Davos, Switzerland, where the World Economic Forum is getting underway. In the days ahead, the U.S. president will come face to face with many of the European leaders he's targeting with the new round of tariffs over their support for Greenland's sovereignty. Despite growing concerns across the U.S., U.S. Treasury Secretary downplayed those tariffs at a news conference in Davos a short time ago. He claimed that European economic retaliation is a false narrative and that countries should take a deep breath and let things play out. President Trump remains adamant about his ambitions to control Greenland.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Look, we have to have it. They have to have this done. They can't protect it. Denmark, they're wonderful people and I know the leaders are very good people, but they don't even go there. And you know, because the boat went there 500 years ago and then left, that doesn't give you title to property. So we'll be talking about it with the various people. (END VIDEO CLIP)
SOLOMON: Denmark is responding to the pressure by bolstering its military presence across the Arctic Island. According to a Danish spokesperson, there will be a substantial increase in the number of troops positioned in Greenland with deployments already underway. This comes as several NATO allies have conducted joint exercises around the island. During a phone call with the British prime minister over the weekend, a U.K. Official says that President Trump conceded that he may have been given, quote, "bad information" about European troop deployments in Greenland. As E.U. officials wave potential off ramps from the mounting tensions, many continue to stress the need for dialogue.
Joining us now live from Paris is CNN Senior International Correspondent Melissa Bell.
Melissa, just a few hours ago, Trump posted on social media a screenshot that appears to be from the French president Emmanuel Macron. Bring us up to speed what's happening here.
MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, people around the French president have confirmed that it is a genuine exchange. And what you can see when you read it, this published, a private text published by President Trump and sent privately to him by the French president, is that essentially President Macron is repeating the European position on Greenland, refusing to take part in his peace council for Gaza. Just after the publication of that private text message, President Trump responded by threatening President Macron with added tariffs, saying he was going to put tariffs 200 percent on his wines and champagne. So that is how frosty the relationship has gone, long gone, long forgotten the days of that very cultivated -- carefully cultivated bromance by Emmanuel Macron. That is the tenure of the exchanges this morning as these leaders prepare to meet tomorrow when President Trump arrives in Davos.
You mentioned a moment ago, Scott Bessent, doubling down on that message that Europeans essentially should refrain from the retaliatory measures. What's been happening here in Europe ever since the weekend's announcement of this resumption of the trade war with the United States is one hand, Europeans saying that they intend to try and engage and deescalate, but also preparing very strongly to respond. Have a listen, Rahel, to what the German finance minister had to say yesterday.
[04:05:01]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LARS KLINGBEIL, GERMAN FINANCE MINISTER (through translator): Germany and France are in agreement. We will not allow ourselves to be blackmailed. Europe will give a united, clear response. And we are now preparing united countermeasures with our European partners. We are preparing them in case President Trump maintains his tariff threats.
(END VIDEO CLIP) BELL: There will be further discussion this week of those countermeasures that are being prepared and that Scott Bessent warned against this morning. The European leaders will meeting -- be meeting on Thursday in Brussels to consider the question of the transatlantic relationship in an extraordinary council meeting as a result of these tensions. And what they'll be looking at is the retaliatory tariffs that they had frozen as a result of the trade deal reached the United States last summer. They could come into effect in February and cause another escalation in this growing row now on the question of tariffs, not just out of Greenland. Rahel.
SOLOMON: OK. Melissa Bell for us there in Paris. Melissa, thank you.
On Monday, CNN spoke with a former U.S. ambassador to Denmark under President Biden, and he pushed back on President Trump's argument that the U.S. is the only one who can defend Greenland from NATO adversaries.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALAN LEVENTHAL, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO DENMARK UNDER PRES. BIDEN: Well, first of all, there are no Chinese and Russian vessels around Greenland. It's just not the case. It's true that the Arctic is going to be increasing importance. It's warming at four times the rate of the rest of the plan. So we need to be concerned about that.
It is a very important location when you think about protecting North America from the Arctic. But we could have anything we want within our existing agreement or Denmark and Greenland would modify the agreement. This is not about that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SOLOMON: Right now to the protests in Minnesota. Sources tell CNN that the FBI had briefly opened a civil rights probe into the federal agent who shot and killed Renee Good in Minneapolis this month. That investigation has shifted away from the agent, Jonathan Ross, and it now focuses on Good herself and her widow. Some inside the Justice Department see that switch as politically motivated. And at least six federal prosecutors in Minnesota have resigned because of it. Good's killing has sparked public outrage and kicked off days of protests against federal agents conducting immigration raids in Minnesota.
The Justice Department also investigating anti-ICE protesters who disrupted a church service in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Sunday. The demonstrators say that one of the church leaders is an ICE official. Trump administration officials accused the protesters of violating the civil rights of Christians. But Minnesota's attorney general says that the protest was a First Amendment activity. CNN's Julia Vargas Jones brings us the details.
JULIA VARGAS JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: In the video of that protest disrupting service in the church you can hear quite clearly those protesters chanting ICE out and justice for Renee Good, the 37-year- old mother of three who was shot by ICE earlier month. And we spoke to one of the organizers of that protest to understand what was the impetus for going there and why they decided to disrupt that church service.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEKIMA LEVY ARMSTRONG, ATTORNEY AND FOUNDER, RACIAL JUSTICE NETWORK: And so to think about someone claiming to be a pastor, I watched part of a sermon that he gave on Saturday that was online, you know, to see his demeanor, you know, looking calm, looking like he cared. But then on the flip side, being an overseer for these agents that again are brutalizing people in our community. I mean, cutting women out of seat belts in their cars, dragging them out of cars, breaking their car windows, attacking children on school grounds, spraying them with pepper spray, I don't understand how you can reconcile the two.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VARGAS JONES: She's talking about David Easterwood, an acting field office of -- and director of Enforcement and Removal operations for ICE in St. Paul who is believed to also be a pastor in that church. Now, CNN did reach out to DHS to confirm the identity of this officer. And DHS basically declined to confirm or deny. They said in a statement to CNN from Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, "DHS will never confirm or deny attempts to dox our law enforcement officers." This after the Attorney General Pam Bondi had posted on X the night before on Sunday night that she had just spoken to the pastor in Minnesota whose church was targeted in attacks against law enforcement in the intimidation of Christians are being met with the full force of federal law.
Now, I want to bring you to outside the Whipple Federal Building. This is where we are right now. It is now the fifth day of protests after on Friday a federal judge issued an order for those federal agents to stop using chemical agents such as pepper spray and tear gas onto the protesters. That had been for a couple of days straight clashing with police -- with federal police, I should say, that has since calmed down. We're also seeing a very heavy presence of the sheriff's department here.
[04:10:04]
But today we're hearing from the federal government that that decision is now being challenged. This after the DHS secretary, Kristi Noem, saying that decision would have changed nothing in the conduct of these agents.
Julia Vargas Jones, CNN, Minneapolis.
SOLOMON: Parts of Kyiv, Ukraine, thousands are once again without power after Russia's latest bombardment. Ukraine's air force reported a missile and drone attack in Kyiv earlier. A CNN team also heard explosions in the city. The mayor says that around 1,500 multi-story buildings have no heat and that at least one person is injured. Russia launched a massive attack on key energy infrastructure earlier this month, leaving hundreds of thousands of households, businesses and schools without power amid below freezing temperatures.
Spain's prime minister is promising to get to the truth behind the cause of a deadly train crash. He's also declared three days of mourning. At least 40 people were killed and dozens more hurt after two high speed trains collided Sunday night. CNN's Pau Mosquera has the latest from Spain.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAU MOSQUERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A high speed train collision in southern Spain, the country's deadliest rail disaster in more than a decade. Dozens were killed and many more injured when two trains collided at speed near the town of Adamuz. Officials say a northbound high speed train operated by private rail company Iryo was traveling from Malaga to Madrid with 371 passengers on board when its rear three carriages derailed and slammed into the front of an oncoming state operated train. The impact violent both trains overturned, sending some carriages plunging down an embankment, according to news agency EFE.
Video verified by CNN shows passengers scrambling out through windows, others climbing onto the roof to escape. Rescue crews work through the night in near total darkness, cutting through twisted metal to reach those still trapped inside.
Survivor Anna (ph) was pulled from the wreckage through a shattered window by fellow passengers who had already made it out.
ANNA, SURVIVOR (through translator): Some people were fine and others were really bad and we had them in front of us and you could see them dying and you could do nothing.
MOSQUERA (voice-over): Abdul Rahman (ph) said he rushed to the scene after learning of the crash, searching desperately for his sister-in- law, Amir (ph), who was traveling one of the trains.
ABDUL RAHMAN: They say they don't know anything and there are people who are missing and suffering. We went to the Civil Guard and they also don't know anything. They are doing DNA tests to find out where she is, but they don't know anything about her. On top of that, we are here with a little girl. We are tired and haven't slept.
MOSQUERA (voice-over): Spain's transport minister says the cause of the crash remains unknown noting the collision happened on a straight stretch of recently renovated track.
OSCAR PUENTE, SPANISH TRANSPORT MINISTER (through translator): The accident is extremely strange. It happened on a straight stretch of track. All the railway experts who have been here today at this center and those we have been able to consult are extremely surprised by the accident because, as I say, it is strange. Very strange.
MOSQUERA (voice-over): Andalusian officials warned the death toll could rise. Forensic teams work to identify the victims as families anxiously wait, fearing the worst.
Pau Mosquera, CNN, Adamuz, Spain.
(END VIDEOTAPE) SOLOMON: Still to come, Iran cut off Internet communications during the unrest in the country. Now it's expected to consider lifting that blackout. We'll have the latest in live reports straight ahead. Plus, that unrest raising hopes among Iranian-Kurdish rebels that the end of the Islamic Republic may be in sight. We'll take you inside one of their training camps straight ahead.
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[04:18:31]
SOLOMON: Welcome back. A senior Iranian parliament member says that Iran will decide on lifting its Internet blackout in the coming days. Communications were shut off nearly two weeks ago as nationwide protests were violently put down by security forces. An Iranian official says that Internet service will return when, quote, "security conditions are appropriate." Let's go to CNN's Nada Bashir following the developments from London.
Nada, what more do we know about a potential lifting of the blackout? That would be pretty significant, if true.
NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. We've seen over 12 days now of Internet blackout in Iran, preventing, for the most part, everyday average Iranians from being able to make contact with people outside of Iran, from sharing videos of what is unfolding inside the country, and of course, crucially, from sharing videos evidence of the violent crackdown by the Iranian security forces, although there have been some breaks in that blackout, we have seen some individuals being able to access family members and contacts outside of Iran through landline phones or through Starlink's satellite connection. There has been some breaks in connectivity, and it's understood that Iran has established some limited access to general Internet access within the country in a sort of Internet format.
But we are hearing that the ban may be lifted, and we had previously heard from the Iranian state officials saying that the restrictions on Internet access on communications would be lifted once the security situation inside Iran is secured. So this does indicate that we are still seeing protests waning, as we have heard from individuals on the ground in Iran who have said to us in their brief contact with individuals outside the country that those protests have grown smaller. They have been more concentrated in Tehran, for example, as opposed to the towns and cities across the country, as we had seen in the course of the protest movement as it began to gain momentum.
[04:20:29]
And of course, this is likely a result of that violent crackdown. Nearly 4,000 people killed, according to one U.S. based human rights organization. Thousands more said to have been detained. Of course, it's extremely difficult for CNN to independently verify those figures. But we have seen the distressing videos coming out of Iran.
What little video has actually emerged from Iran showing the impact of that crackdown, we have seen hospitals overrun. We've heard harrowing testimonies from doctors. And of course, those distressing images of morgues overrun with the bodies of victim of the Iranian regime crackdown. Again, we are only getting a glimpse into what has unfolded over the course of this protest movement.
SOLOMON: Nada, what about, the latest on where Trump stands on coming to terms here or intervening. I mean, he had previously said that help is on its way. Where does that stand?
BASHIR: That's right. We have heard from U.S. officials previously saying that there are a number of options at the U.S. president's disposal when it comes to what his plan of action is in Iran, that he is weighing up options. At no point, according to one U.S. official, has the consideration of U.S. troops, boots on the ground actually been in play or in any sort of discussion. But there has of course been suggestions and discussions around possible military action. Most recently we've heard from the U.S. president saying that in his words, it is time for new leadership in Iran, that he wants to see the regime toppled, of course, and that is something that protesters have been calling for.
But of course there's also been very clear and stark warnings from the Iranian regime as well. We've heard from the Iranian president saying that any threat towards Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, would be in their words, tantamount to all-out war. And of course, there has been some questions as to what exactly is next. What is the U.S. president's goal? Is there a viable opposition in Iran?
We know that the U.S. president has not exactly expressed firm backing for example, Reza Pahlavi, the son of the last Shah of Iran, who has been clearly a standout opposition figure, it could be said. But again, there isn't really a united opposition figure. Certainly with that united backing in Iran, this issue still questions as to what exactly is the next step.
SOLOMON: Nada Bashar force there in London. Nada, thank you.
And the recent wave of unrest in Iran is being viewed by some rebel groups as proof that the Iranian regime's days are numbered. CNN's Ben Wedeman has new reporting from northern Iraq, where he visited an Iranian Kurdish military training camp. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The instructor puts fresh recruits in the paces of how to handle their AK- 47 assault rifles. The men and women in this unit call themselves Peshmerga, Kurdish for those who face death, fighters with the KDPI, the Kurdish Democratic Party Iran.
With the bloody nationwide protests that began late last month, 42- year-old Haman (ph) says the end of the reign of the Ayatollahs is approaching. The government has economic resources and military power, he says, but now we can see they're slowly losing power in popular support. The KDPI is the largest and oldest Iranian Kurdish rebel group. For 80 years, they fought for Kurdish rights in a country where they make up about 10 percent of the population. These rugged mountains in northern Iraq have long served as a safe haven for the Kurds and a launching pad for their fight first against the Shah and for the past 47 years, theocratic rulers in Tehran.
WEDEMAN: This is just one of a variety of groups which has been preparing for decades for the day when the regime in Tehran falls.
WEDEMAN (voice-over): Party leader Mustafa Hijri shows me where he was born in Iran, but he hasn't been back in decades. Ultimately, he believes it's up to the Iranians alone to change their leaders. Help from the U.S. and Europe for the Iranian people is heartwarming, he tells me. But the people won't put their hopes in the decisions and actions of Mr. Trump or any other international leader.
[04:25:01]
Nineteen-year-old Farina (ph) fled her home in Iran to become a Peshmerga. She's training to be a sniper. In Iran, she says, we have no rights, especially as women. That's why I became a Peshmerga, to defend my rights as a Kurd and as a woman.
Another generation is treading a well-worn path of struggle against their oppressors.
Ben Wedeman, CNN, in northern Iraq.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SOLOMON: President Trump is slamming the U.K.'s move to cede control of the Chagos Islands to the African country of Mauritius. He criticized the decision when Britain announced it back in May because it gives control of the land surrounding a joint U.S.-U.K. military base to a close trading partner of China. And a Truth Social post a short time ago, he called the move an act of great stupidity, claiming quote, "There is no doubt that China and Russia have noticed this act of total weakness."
All right. Coming up on Early Start, we are live in London as U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson is set to address the British Parliament. We'll take you there after this.
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