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President Trump Speaks Ahead of Trip to Scotland; Soon, DOJ to Interview Ghislaine Maxwell for Second Day; Trump Says, Had a Very Good Meeting With Fed Chair Powell. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired July 25, 2025 - 10:00   ET

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

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Gets taken, the food gets taken.

[10:00:01]

We're going to do more. But we gave a lot of money. We gave a majority of the money. And the sad part is that no other country other than us gives anything.

REPORTER: Have you spoken to Michael Whatley about running for that North Carolina --

TRUMP: I have, yes.

REPORTER: And will he run, do you I think?

TRUMP: he will.

REPORTER: So, teacher shortages, so what can be done to get --

TRUMP: Are you from North Carolina?

REPORTER: My father lives there.

TRUMP: He'll be a good candidate.

REPORTER: What can be done to bring more teachers, more educators into the classroom to alleviate the teacher shortage across the country?

TRUMP: We're doing that and we're doing it strongly. What we're doing is moving education back to the states. The states will run education. When they do it, you're going to have the best education in the world. We'll have 35 or 40 states where it will be as good as Sweden, Norway, Denmark, you know, the top five or six countries.

REPORTER: Are there (INAUDIBLE) top talent, the top talent, the top teacher?

TRUMP: We're going to get them. We already have them. When we bring -- when we go back to the states with education, you're going to see a big difference.

REPORTER: Mr. President, (INAUDIBLE)? TRUMP: He's a good lawyer. Todd Blanche is a great gentleman. He's a great man. He's a great lawyer. He has got a great heart. But he's over there now. I don't know exactly what's happening, but I certainly can't talk about pardons.

REPORTER: Can you trust what she's telling him? He's a convicted trafficker who's eager to get out of prison.

TRUMP: Well, you know, he's a professional lawyer. I think he he's been through things like this before. But, you know, you should focus on Clinton. You should focus on the president of Harvard, the former president of Harvard. You should focus on some of the hedge fund guys. I'll give you a list. These guys lived with Jeffrey Epstein. I sure as hell didn't. Thank you very much.

(INAUDIBLE).

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in The Situation Room. Pamela Brown is off today. You've been listening to President Trump speaking to reporters over at the White House just before leaving for his trip to Scotland.

I want to go right to our Senior White House Reporter Kevin Liptak. Kevin, you've been listening to what the president had to say. Update our viewers who may have just tuned in.

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes. And it was quite a lengthy session that we had with President Trump out on the South Lawn as he's heading now on his way to Scotland. And I think one of the most interesting things that he was asked and sort of answered was whether he was considering a pardon or commutation for Ghislaine Maxwell.

Remember, she is the associate of Jeffrey Epstein, who is down in Tallahassee, Florida, yesterday and today speaking with the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, who is potentially looking for more information about this Epstein case in a bid to kind of tamp down on the furor among some of the president's supporters who believe the administration has not been transparent enough.

And the reason this question of a pardon or commutation has come up is because people are wondering what incentive Maxwell will have to kind of spill the beans, to talk to Blanche to give him the information that he needs. You know, she's serving a 20-year prison sentence down there for sex trafficking, and she has appealed her case. She wants to get out of prison.

Listen to what the president said when I asked him this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LIPTAK: Would you consider a pardon or a commutation for Ghislaine Maxwell?

TRUMP: It's something I haven't thought about. It's really something -- it's something -- I'm allowed to do it, but it's something I have not thought about.

LIPTAK: But you wouldn't rule it out, Mr. President?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIPTAK: So you hear the President saying that he hasn't thought about it, but that it is within his power to do that. At another point in this, the president was asked, well, do you think Maxwell's words are really credible given she clearly seems to be jockeying for some sort of leniency.

[10:05:06]

And the president said that Todd Blanche, the person who is interviewing her down there, that he has an enormous amount of faith in him, that he is a great man, that he kind of knows what he's doing. Remember, Blanche is also President Trump's former criminal defense attorney.

Now, on this Epstein matter, the president also clearly looking to deflect some of the questions asking why people aren't asking more about, for instance, Bill Clinton's associations with Epstein, other Democrats who may have had associations with the late convicted sex offender. And so the president, you know, clearly trying to deflect some of those questions as he now tries to also put some geographic distance between himself in this matter. He's on his way now to Scotland, putting the entire Atlantic Ocean between himself and Washington, where this furor has kind of built up. Wolf?

BLITZER: And he answered our reporter's questions on several of other important news related issues, including what's going on between Israel and these negotiations in Doha, Qatar, that have apparently ended with the U.S. and Israel pulling its diplomatic team out of those talks.

LIPTAK: Yes. And the president sounded quite pessimistic on the prospects of a ceasefire deal that would also allow some of the hostages to come out of Gaza. You know, it was only a couple of weeks ago when the president was here at the White House with Benjamin Netanyahu saying that he thought a deal was in the offing within a week. But now that optimism seems to have vanished as he pulls Steve Witkoff and the negotiating team back from those talks. He says that Hamas doesn't want to make a deal. He says that Hamas has essentially given up on this and that because so many of the hostages have either gotten out of Gaza or have died in custody, that they have lost some of their negotiating chips in all of this.

The president also asked about the very, very dire humanitarian situation that is unfolding there now. The president said that Hamas was the one that was not letting some of this aid into the Palestinian enclave. He says, his hope is that aid does give it in and sort of touted the amount that the U.S. has provided. But he also said, I think, you know, somewhat strikingly to my ears that he thought Israel would need to, quote, finish the job in Gaza. So, no indication of any signals to the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to pull back on the military operation that is still underway there, even as this humanitarian situation worsens and worsens.

One final thing, I did ask the president, his view, of the French President Emmanuel Macron's decision to recognize the Palestinian state and the president kind of dismissed that out of hand and said that it would have no effect, whatsoever.

BLITZER: And I thought it was interesting that he repeatedly a few times during the course of this question and answer session with the reporters, an informal session as he was getting ready to leave the White House. He basically suggested that it's going to be very, very difficult, much more difficult to get the remaining 10 or 20 or 30 Israeli hostages out of Gaza than it was some of the earlier hostages because he said that the Hamas, who's holding those hostages, that's their only bargaining chip that they have, that they're probably not going to release those hostages, but elaborate a little bit on what he had to say.

LIPTAK: Yes, and I think just very much sort of tamping down the idea that this ceasefire deal could be happening at anytime soon. And, obviously, the decision to pull Witkoff back from those talks just indicates how little the U.S. thinks can be achieved at the moment. They aren't giving up entirely, and, certainly, Witkoff said in that statement yesterday, they would still try and find other ways to try and get the hostages out and to improve the humanitarian situation that's unfolding there.

But I think listening to the president on the South Lawn here, it is, I think, the most sort of down that he's been on this idea of a ceasefire in quite some time. He had been really kind of optimistic earlier this month that this could potentially result in something positive, now the president far less positive, and as I said, saying that Israel would have to finish the job. I don't think that will be welcome news to anyone who's looking at the images coming out of Gaza, the very, very dire pictures of starvation and need and hunger, and thinking that this is going to ease up anytime soon.

BLITZER: All right. Kevin Liptak at the White House for us, Kevin, we'll stay in touch with you. Thank you very, very much.

There's more breaking news right now in Florida. It's day two of the Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche's interview is conversations with longtime Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell. It's set to get underway at any minute now.

And we're getting brand new video into The Situation Room, which shows Maxwell's attorney arriving only moments ago at the U.S. attorney's office in Tallahassee, Florida. Here's what he told reporters. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID MARKUS, ATTORNEY FOR GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Round two, ready to go in for round two.

[10:10:02] We're hoping for another productive day. You know, it's -- Ghislaine has been treated unfairly for over five years now. If you looked up scapegoat in the dictionary, her face would be next to the definition -- next to the dictionary definition of it. So, you know, we're grateful for this opportunity to finally be able to say what really happened, and that's what we're going to do, yesterday and today.

REPORTER: You know, I know you didn't want to discuss the substance of the questions that the deputy attorney general was asking, but can you talk about her and how she's feeling about the meeting and what might be coming out of it?

MARKUS: Yes. She's keeping her spirits up as much as she can. She's one of the strongest people I've ever met. She's been in terrible, awful conditions for five years. We wouldn't keep animals the way she's been kept in prison. So, you know, it's unbelievable that she can keep her spirits up this high and we're proud of her.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: David Markus answering reporters' questions as he's walking out of that courthouse in at Tallahassee. The negotiations, the talks continue today between Ghislaine Maxwell and Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, the number two official in the U.S. Justice Department.

CNNs Ivan Rodriguez, there you see him, he's in Tallahassee covering all of this for us. Ivan, what are you seeing so far this morning?

IVAN RODRIGUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, we're now entering, as you said, that highly anticipated day two of meetings between Ghislaine Maxwell, her attorneys, and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. As we saw there earlier this morning, we saw Maxwell's attorney, David Markus, enter the courthouse. Very interestingly, we heard him regard her as a scapegoat to those sex trafficking crimes, but he also ended by saying that Maxwell has no reason to lie and that she's going to keep telling the truth.

Yesterday, both sides met for about six hours. It was a very long meeting. And we expect that meeting to probably last at least a couple of hours today as well, Wolf. But a big question here is, what is Maxwell actually saying? And maybe even a bigger question here is what is Blanche asking? Yesterday, we did see a statement from Blanche on X saying that, at the right time he will talk about the information that he learned during these meetings.

He has not spoken really at all about what's been going on. Yesterday morning, he walked into the courthouse and we saw him exit in a vehicle. We maybe expect them to exit in a similar fashion today without making many comments.

Later today, we might expect to hear again from, Maxwell's attorney, David Markus. He's been a little bit more vocal every time he's entered and so far exited the courthouse.

BLITZER: All right. Ivan Rodriguez, we'll stay in close touch with you as well.

I want to continue our conversation right now. CNN Legal Analyst and Criminal Defense Attorney Joey Jackson is joining us right now. Joey, is it unusual for the deputy attorney general of the United States to be the one interviewing Ghislaine Maxwell at that courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida, very close to the prison where she's spending 20 years?

JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: So, Wolf, good to be with you. The answer is, yes, it is. But I think it goes to the sensitivity of the issue and the fact that they want to keep tight reins on it, they being the White House and the president, and I think you want someone who is a direct rapport, because you want to control the information, you want to control the narrative and you want to control the flow. And so if you really obviously, want to get at the truth, the truth would be, and it would lie in the files, and you could be fully transparent by releasing them and they'll speak for themselves, but I think, certainly, she's a critical component, Wolf, with regard to gathering information that's important to who was around Jeffrey Epstein and what specifically they were doing.

BLITZER: Are you surprised, Joey, that this interview is now in its second day?

JACKSON: So, I am. I mean, obviously there's a lot of information to unpack and, you know, a lot has been said about whether she's truthful or not truthful, and I think she's in an impossible, impossible situation, Wolf. Why? If she says things that are damning to the president, she's going to be deemed to be a liar. If she says things that are, you know, supportive of the president, she's going to be deemed to be a liar. But I think no matter how long the interview goes, it's important that everything, everything she says be corroborated, and that can be done. You're going to ask who, what, when, where, and why, and how, et cetera.

And I think that what you want to do, in addition to gleaning from her, the specifics to your questions is you want to vet it. We have the best intelligence sources in the world. And I think you can do that by looking at text messages, emails, surveillance, documentation, flight records, and other things that would go to show whether what she says would be credible.

BLITZER: What's the significance, Joey, of this interview, this meeting, that is being done in the U.S. attorney's office down there in Tallahassee, Florida, and not at the nearby prison, where it could be recorded by the Bureau of Prisons?

[10:15:05]

JACKSON: Again, I think it's important that they want to, that is the White House, control the information. And to your question, Wolf, what will be important to me is not only the transcript with respect to what was said and how it was answered, meaning the questions posed in the answers, but what was it like off of that, meaning, Hey, we're here just to get at the truth, but realize and recognize that certainly the president has an interest here and, you know, what you say, you know, may, in fact, influenced whether or not a pardon might be available, but we just want the truth.

I mean, again, I don't really mean to, to be in a position of being skeptical, but you have to be skeptical. And if it's really about the truth, Wolf, I think we would see files and we would see those files released to the American public. And the question has been posed, well, you know, Biden was in charge and why didn't he release the file? I think there's an easy answer to that. I think the answer is that there might be information that's damning to both sides and neither side wants it released.

But if you want to get at the truth, release the files, ask her questions, corroborate what she says, and I think we will all know what was happening and who was involved, if anyone.

BLITZER: All right. Joey Jackson, thank you very, very much.

There's other breaking news we're following this morning as well. President Trump appears to be softening his tone when it comes to the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell. He has been openly critical of Powell, as we all know, pressuring him to lower interest rates. Here's what the president told reporters just a few moments ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I think we had a very good meeting. We're getting about the building that's out of control and all that, but I think we had a very good meeting on interest rates and he said to me -- now, I don't know if he's going to say this on Thursday or every Thursday (ph), but. he said to me very strongly, the country is doing well. He said, congratulations. The country is doing really well. And I got that to mean that I think he's going to start recommending lower rates.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: This comes after a rather surreal moment less than 24 hours ago when the two men actually toured ongoing renovations at the Federal Reserve building here in Washington. They openly argued about the costs, but watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: The 2.7 is now 3.1.

JEROME POWELL, CHAIRMAN, FEDERAL RESERVE: I'm not aware of that.

TRUMP: Yes, it just came out.

POWELL: I haven't heard that from anybody from the Fed.

TRUMP: It just came out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Our note said about 3.1 as well, 3.1. 3.2.

POWELL: This came from us?

TRUMP: Yes. I don't know who does that. POWELL: You're including the Martin renovation. You just added.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's our entire capital.

POWELL: You just added in the third building is what that is. That's the third building.

TRUMP: It's the building that's being built.

POWELL: No, it's been -- it was built five years ago. We finished Martin five years ago.

TRUMP: It's part of the overall work. So --

POWELL: That's not new.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right. Let's go to our Business and Politics Correspondent Vanessa Yurkevich, who's been following all of this. Vanessa, we're also learning that Jerome Powell is adamant that he'll serve out the remainder of his term. What more can you tell us?

VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, sources telling CNN that Jerome Powell behind the scenes has been telling his allies that he has no plans to leave his position as chair of the Federal Reserve before that term is up in May of 2026.

And this is really what we've been hearing from Jerome Powell for years now. This is sort of nothing new, but it does really reaffirm the fact that even though he is facing this public pressure from the president, a visit from the president to the headquarters of the Federal Reserve yesterday, he's really not changing his mind about his commitment to serving out his term.

And he says it's really not about personal feelings. It's simply because he wants to ensure that the Federal Reserve and the chairman position of the Federal Reserve remains independent from the federal government and from political pressure.

And, really, Wolf, he has been saying this, as I mentioned, for years now. In 2022, he told Nick Timiraos, a Wall Street Journal reporter, who wrote a book sort of about the Federal Reserve in the pandemic, and he's quoted, Jerome Powell is quoted, saying that there's no way that he would leave his term or not complete his term unless he died. I mean, you cannot get more definitive than that.

Of course, a lot of the pressure coming on Jerome Powell is about his move to lower interest rates. There is a meeting next week where we will learn what the Federal Reserve will do. Of course, Jerome Powell is just one member of 12 members of this board that vote on interest rates. But, of course, Wolf, he has been taking most of the heat from the President. Wolf?

BLITZER: Yes, enormous amount of heat from the president. Vanessa Yurkevich, Thank you very, very much. Still ahead, we'll go live to the International Space Station, yes, the International Space Station, as astronauts discuss their mission and their upcoming return home.

[10:20:00]

And coming up next, helping people recover from natural disasters. I'll speak to Republican Congressman David Kustoff about his bill that President Trump just signed.

Stay with us. You're in The Situation Room.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: The breaking news this hour, the U.S. Justice Department is in is including a second day of interviews with Jeffrey Epstein's companion and accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted sex trafficker who met yesterday with the deputy attorney general as well. We're talking about Todd Blanche.

Minutes ago, Maxwell's attorney, David Markus, arrived at the U.S. district courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida.

[10:25:00]

He and Maxwell are to meet with Blanche once again near the prison in Tallahassee where she is currently serving a 20-year sentence.

Joining us now is Republican Congressman David Kustoff of Tennessee. Congressman, thanks so much for joining us once again.

I also want to discuss your tax relief bill for disaster victims that has just been signed into law by the president. But let's start with the Epstein case. I'm anxious to get your thoughts. What do you make of the Justice Department now meeting with Maxwell for a second straight day?

REP. DAVID KUSTOFF (R-TN): Good morning. Well, thank you for having me on today.

Obviously the Justice Department's trying to get to the, to the bottom and try to get conclusions. I will say this though about the interviews and I think people watching understand this. Number one, Ms. Maxwell is -- she's a liar. She was charged with, with perjury early on in her prosecution. I'm a former United States attorney. I recognize, and I think we all recognize that there are victims.

But I will say this also, I think if CNN were to take a poll of the American people and ask the top five in ten issues that they're concerned about, Jeffrey Epstein doesn't rank. I mean, the American people are not concerned with it. I think that there's some manufactured outrage, if you will, among Democrats to try to shift the attention off of their bad poll numbers. The Congressional Democrats are polling at around 19 percent, which is the lowest, I believe, that they've ever polled. So, they're trying to create whatever issue is out there. That's not to take anything away, again, from these innocent victims. We all know that Jeffrey Epstein was a --

BLITZER: But Congressman, let me just -- with all due respect, let me just point out what you clearly also know the Republican leadership in your House of Representatives is very, very interested in the whole Jeffrey Epstein case. The House Oversight Committee, for example, led by Republicans has just subpoenaed Ghislaine Maxwell for a deposition and its subcommittee has voted to subpoena the U.S. Justice Department for all of the Epstein files. Do you support these moves led by your fellow Republicans in the House?

KUSTOFF: You know, we don't know what we don't know. And so when we talk about subpoenaing files and records, we've got distinct branches of government. I'm not sure that the Justice Department, even if the House of Representatives issues these proclamations and resolutions, and what have you, that they can't deem that some material remains confidential and privileged.

But, you know, I want to focus on the issues that my constituents sent me to Washington to focus on, and I guarantee in Tennessee's eighth Congressional district, Jeffrey Epstein doesn't rank in these top issues.

BLITZER: So, why do you think your fellow Republicans, the leadership in the House, are focusing big time on Jeffrey Epstein?

KUSTOFF: Well, you say -- you do say leadership. I'm not sure that, in fact, I know that this is not a top issue for Mike Johnson. There are members who are interested. All the Democrats are interested because they don't have anything else to talk about. They don't have anything else to brag about and their rankings and their polling is very, very low.

So, my sense is that when I'm back home in the next few days, during the August district work period, and I met Kiwanis Clubs and farm bureaus and other gatherings, I may get a question or two about Jeffrey Epstein, but it's going to be about the economy and affordability and the border and all the other issues that we talked about in the 2024 campaign.

BLITZER: And on that issue, Congressman, I want to turn to your tax relief bill for disaster victims, very important legislation that President Trump just signed into law yesterday. For the first time, the U.S. Treasury Department can postpone tax filing deadlines for those affected by disasters declared by the state, not just the federal government. Tell us why you wrote this bill and what the impact, practically speaking, will be on Americans.

KUSTOFF: So, Wolf, it was bipartisan legislation. My co-sponsor was Judy Chu, who's a Democrat from California. Obviously, California has a lot of, and has had a lot of natural disasters with wildfires and what have you. We've seen across the nation in the last X number of years, all these wildfires, the hurricanes, the tornadoes, the flooding. And the fact of the matter is that when these natural disasters strike, people shouldn't have to worry about having to report to the IRS file their returns.

[10:30:07]

They may -- frankly, they may not have the record.