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Leaders Gather at Economic Forum as Trump Leaks Macron Message; Woman Pulled Out of Her Car by ICE Agents Speaks to CNN; Treasury Secretary Says, Trump Could Pick New Fed Reserve Chair Soon. Aired 10- 10:30a ET

Aired January 20, 2026 - 10:00   ET

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

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WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now, breaking news, private messages exposed. President Trump posted conversations with the European leaders while slamming allies. The U.S. pushed for Greenland is quickly turning the Davos Economic Forum into an emergency summit. We have new reaction this morning from the Trump administration and from world leaders.

Plus, we're watching Wall Street as tariff and trade bazooka threats are making investors uneasy.

And year two, how the U.S. economy and immigration are shaping President Trump's second term.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer. Pamela Brown is off today. You're in The Situation Room.

The breaking news, world leaders assembling right now in Davos, Switzerland, for the annual World Economic Forum. President Trump arrives there tomorrow facing European allies, deeply perplexed and very worried by his escalating threats to take over Greenland. This morning on social media, he posted this A.I.-generated image of him planting the U.S. flag in Greenland with a sign declaring it a U.S. territory established this year.

Overnight, the president added his own baffling twist by leaking this private message from the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and I'm quoting now, my friend, we are totally in line on Syria, we can do great things on Iran. I do not understand what you are doing on Greenland, end quote. And just a short time ago at the forum, Macron criticized President Trump's policies. Listen.

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EMMANUEL MACRON, FRENCH PRESIDENT: Without collective governance, cooperation gives way to relentless competition, competition from the United States of America through trade agreements that undermine our export interests, demand maximum concessions, and openly aim to weaken and subordinate Europe combined with an endless accumulation of tariffs that are fundamentally unacceptable, even more so when they are used so as a leverage against territorial sovereignty

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BLITZER: Also happening now, the U.S. Supreme Court is handing down decisions, one that could drop at any moment is the legality of the president sweeping global tariffs.

Let's go live right now to CNN's Kevin Liptak over at the White House. Kevin, the president speaks tomorrow at the Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Do we know what his message will be?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: You know, heading into this summit, the White House has said that the president would use this address to talk about the United States economic resurgence in his view, to talk about this question of affordability. But, clearly, this entire summit up in the Swiss Alps is now gaining a new degree of urgency, as these European leaders rushed to try and get in front of President Trump to talk him down off of these Greenland threats, or at least to gain some sense of understanding of what exactly his ambitions are.

And you saw that in that text message from the French president, Emmanuel Macron, even inviting President Trump to Paris for an emergency G7 summit after Davos to try and get a better understanding of what the president is trying to do here.

And, you know, those remarks from Macron earlier today were really kind of remarkable. He's talking about a shift towards a world without rules, where international law is trampled underfoot, talking about imperial ambitions. He's not talking necessarily about Russia or China here. He is talking about the United States, a staunch U.S. ally, which I think just gives you a sense of this moment that the president seems to have brought the entire western alliance to.

Now, Macron is not the only leader that has been messaging with Trump to try and talk about this. The president also posted a message from Mark Rutte, the secretary general of NATO, who has spent the entire last year trying to cultivate President Trump. What Rutte said is that he was going to spend his time at Davos talking about President Trump's foreign policy accomplishments, really kind of as sycophantic message, and saying that he was committed to finding a way forward on Greenland.

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Now, it doesn't seem as any of this as having much of an effect on President Trump. He was out yesterday talking about Greenland, really sort of hardened in his position. He does say that he's committed to a meeting with various parties in Davos to discuss all of this. But he said that he had expressed to everyone, quote, very plainly that Greenland was an imperative for the entire world's security and that there could be no going back. So, as President Trump said yesterday, this is going to be a very interesting Davos. Wolf?

BLITZER: It certainly will be. Kevin Liptak at the White House for us, thank you very much. Also new this morning, House Speaker Mike Johnson attempting to quell fears in Europe as President Trump doubles down and his push to acquire Greenland. Listen to this.

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REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): I spoke to President Trump at length yesterday, and I told him that I really felt that my mission here, even though we planned this back in the fall, we didn't know how the events would develop over the last few days. But I told the president that I felt that my mission here today was to encourage our friends and help to calm the waters, so to speak, and I hope to do so.

As the prime minister said yesterday, let us look to agreement, continue our dialogue, and find a resolution, just as we always have in the past.

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BLITZER: Let's go live right now to see you in Business and Economics Reporter Anna Cooban. Anna, the speaker, Mike Johnson, says he hopes to calm the waters, his words, calm the waters, we all heard him say that, between the U.S. and the U.K. What more did he say?

ANNA COOBAN, CNN BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS REPORTER: Oh, yes. You heard his tone there, very warm. He talked also about the special relationship. He made more than one reference to Winston Churchill. But he also talked about, in his words, these internal challenges that are shared between the United States and the U.K. He went on to elaborate that he believes that educational institutions have been teaching young people in his words that their history to view their history only through the lens of its sins.

Now, this kind of language really mirrors what we heard from Vice President J.D. Vance at the Munich Security Conference last year in a now pretty famous speech talking about the challenges within. But today in parliament with Johnson, the big elephant in the room was, of course, Greenland, Trump's new tariff threats.

And I think that the U.K. has a particular reason to feel quite stung by these new threats because the U.K., remember, has always enjoyed a friendlier relationship with the United States than the European Union. For example, it was the first country to score that tentative trade deal with an overall tariff of 10 percent lower than many other countries. But then Keir Starmer, the prime minister of U.K., yesterday was speaking very stridently in about his opposition to Trump's plans for Greenland. But, clearly, Johnson there is trying to calm the waters. He believes that dialogue is possible.

BLITZER: Anna Cooban in London for us, Anna, thank you very, very much.

Still ahead, how the woman yanked from her vehicle by ICE agents in Minneapolis last week is now responding to Homeland Security's claims that she's a, quote, known agitator. And after months of speculation and pressure, President Trump is apparently close to picking a new Federal Reserve chair who'd have a great deal of control over the U.S. economy.

Stay with us, lots going on. You're in The Situation Room.

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BLITZER: New this morning, we're hearing from a woman pulled from her car by ICE agents in Minnesota and detained in this incident. Watch this.

She says she was just on her way to the doctor and spoke about the incident to CNN's Laura Coates last night. Listen to this.

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ALIYA RAHMAN, WOMAN DRAGGED FROM CAR BY ICE AGENTS: I was on my way to the doctor. I was on a main road that is a direct road from my house to the parking lot. Suddenly, there's traffic in the road, there are vehicles blocking it ahead, vehicles that later, I understood, were ICE vehicles. People around me trying to understand what to do, and I think that you see the rest.

I will break your F-ing window, and then back and forth between move, get out, trying to open my door, more threats of breaking a window, which I don't understand the functional purpose of. And it's not a warning. It's a threat of violence that really shouldn't be packaged with an instruction.

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BLITZER: Joining us now, CNN Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig. Elie, what impact can a video like this one have in any kind of legal proceeding that could come up in the future?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, Wolf, the first question is did these ICE officers have reasonable suspicion to make a stop? And what we see here is plainly a stop in a legal sense. Now, that's a fairly low bar, but it is something. And ICE agents, what they have to do is be able to articulate why exactly did they stop this person? What about the circumstances led them to believe that that person was here in the United States illegally?

The second question could go to the level of force that was used. Obviously, ICE agents, like any police officer, can only use a reasonable amount of force necessary to detain a person or to diffuse a threat. And so if you look at that video, if this person ends up filing some sort of lawsuit, I'm sure she will argue that that force right there was excessive to what was needed.

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BLITZER: You know, I'm reminded because last week we asked the spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security about this incident. Here's part of that exchange. Listen.

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TRICIA MCLAUGHLIN, ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS, DHS: This individual was actually arrested because she was, time and time again, impeding law enforcement officers. Again, a small snippet of this video, so she was an agitator intentionally, again, trying to impede federal law enforcement officers, which is a federal crime, it is a felony.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: How do you know for certainty though that she wasn't just caught up in the protests and the traffic and the chaos and was trying to get to -- how do you know that was --

MCLAUGHLIN: Because she was doing this time and time again, over and over and over again. We've talked to federal law enforcement on the ground. We talked to their supervisors in this case. We knew exactly what happened here and she'll be charged as such.

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BLITZER: My colleague, Laura Coates, asked that woman's lawyer last night if she's aware of any charges being brought against her client, and she said they haven't heard anything, but she believes they'd be completely baseless or where it's completely baseless. What do you make of that assessment, Elie?

HONIG: Well, you heard the DHS spokesperson there tell you and Pam that this person was a, quote, agitator. It is not a crime to be an agitator. It is not a crime to be a nuisance or to be a pest or to be a difficult protester. Where the line gets crossed is if a person is physically obstructing ICE from doing its job. And so that's going to depend on all those circumstances. That's going to depend on whether this person was physically blocking ICE vehicles or getting in the way of ICE doing its job.

So, I think it's important that we separate labels like agitator from actual conduct. That's where criminality can enter into the scene.

BLITZER: And last week, Elie, a judge ordered federal agents not to retaliate against anyone engaging in peaceful protests. How far does the court say ICE can go when detaining people?

HONIG: Well, essentially, what the judge, Judge Menendez, a federal judge in Minnesota, said in that ruling is that ICE has to follow the law. The judge specified that ICE cannot use force if somebody is protesting peacefully and unobstructively and cannot retaliate against somebody if they're merely expressing First Amendment speech. Now, that is the law. So, the judge's ruling really just is sort of a reiteration, a reminder of things that ICE cannot do.

Now, the Justice Department last night filed a notice of appeal. They'll be appealing that decision. And, Wolf, I think the reason for that is the Justice Department is very wary of judges getting involved in managing their on-the-ground law enforcement activities. I think they object as a matter of principle to judges telling them in advance what they can and cannot do on the streets. So, we'll see that appeal as it goes up to the Eighth Circuit Court of appeals in the next few days.

BLITZER: And as you know, Elie, there have been a lot of questions raised over what level of immunity ICE agents actually have in the wake of the fatal shooting of Renee Good. Vice President J.D. Vance suggested they have absolute immunity. What does the law actually say?

HONIG: Well, that's false. ICE agents or any federal agents do not have absolute immunity. They certainly can be charged with federal crimes, theoretically. It's clear here that DOJ has no intention to even investigate this. There's actually a really difficult and interesting question about whether the state authorities in Minnesota can bring a state level criminal charge against this ICE agent.

There's nothing prohibiting such a charge. But if such a charge were to be made, again, a state level charge against a federal agent, that federal agent would almost certainly move to get the case moved over to federal court, and then would argue qualified immunity, not absolute immunity, but would argue that what he was doing was within the scope of his job and therefore he's protected.

So, can the state charge him? Theoretically, yes, but it would face some major legal obstacles once it got over to federal court.

BLITZER: Interesting. All right, Elie Honig, thank you very, very much.

HONIG: Thanks, Wolf.

BLITZER: I appreciate it.

Coming up after a year of trash talk and threats toward Fed Chair Jerome Powell, President Trump is apparently very close right now to naming his replacement, a decision that would have major implications for the U.S. economy. The new details straight ahead right here in The Situation Room.

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BLITZER: There's more breaking news. The U.S. treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, says, President Trump could soon pick a new Federal Reserve chairman, this as the president has repeatedly threatened to fire the current Fed chair, Jerome Powell, for not lowering interest rates fast enough. This month, the U.S. Justice Department announced a criminal investigation into Powell over the renovation of the Federal Reserve's building headquarters here in Washington. Powell called that, quote, a pretext for putting more pressure on the Fed to lower interest rates.

CNN Business and Politics Correspondent Vanessa Yurkevich is joining us right now. Vanessa, what else is Bessent revealing about this selection process? VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, President Trump himself says that he's going to reveal his pick soon. However, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gave us a little bit of a tighter timeline. This is an individual, Scott Bessent, who's then kind of leading the search for the next chairman of the Federal Reserve who will replace Jerome Powell when his term ends in May. So, he gave us a tighter timeline when he was speaking in Davos earlier. Listen to what he said.

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SCOTT BESSENT, TREASURY SECRETARY: My guess is that the president will reach a decision may maybe soon as next week. We've had substantial conversations about this. We've run a process that started in September 11, very strong candidates.

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We're now down to four candidates. The president has personally met with all of them, and it's going to be his decision.

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YURKEVICH: So, the update there is we could soon learn who President Trump is picking for the next chair of the Federal Reserve as soon as next week.

And here are those four candidates that the treasury secretary was alluding to. First, you have Kevin Hassett. He's the director of the National Economic Council. He has been the frontrunner. But President Trump said recently that actually he's really liked him in his current post and that he may actually keep him there. So, who's left? You have Kevin Warsh. He's a former Fed governor. You have Rick Reeder, he's the chief investment officer at BlackRock. And then you have Chris Christopher Waller, who's currently on the board of the Federal Reserve. But these are the four candidates that we believe that President Trump has narrowed down to.

But there could be a little bit of a hiccup, Wolf, because we have heard from several key Republican senators that they plan on blocking any nominee for the head of the Federal Reserve as long as this DOJ investigation into Jerome Powell is continuing. Remember, Wolf, this is this criminal investigation into whether or not Jerome Powell lied to Congress about the scope and the cost of the renovations of the Federal Reserve's headquarters in Washington, D.C.

So, while Trump is gearing up, Wolf, to make his pick and announce his pick, he's going to be facing a lot of headwinds. And that's really going to take a lot of the wind out of this announcement from President Trump. Wolf?

BLITZER: And one question, Vanessa, President Trump's recent comments already seemed to have rattled the markets out there this morning. The Dow was down, what, over 700 points upon opening. How significant is this and should investors be concerned? YURKEVICH: Well, Wolf, the Dow, as you can see, recovered ever so slightly, but still down 500 points. Remember, the markets, Wall Street was closed yesterday because it was a holiday, Martin Luther King Day. So, this is really Wall Street's first reaction to what has happened over the weekend, and a lot has happened, Wolf.

Remember, Trump has said that he wants Greenland no matter what, and he's also threatened to escalate the trade war against key European allies, eight countries starting at a 10 percent tariff, ratcheting it up to 25 percent. So, you have investors reacting for the first time. These are nerves about what this could pot potentially look like. But a lot of analysts that we've been speaking to do believe that this is -- there could be an off-ramp both with Greenland, but also with these tariffs that President Trump is potentially using the tariffs as a threat to better negotiate with Greenland.

But, of course, you see it there in the picture, Dow down 500 points, NASDAQ and S&P also falling this morning. Wolf?

BLITZER: All down, indeed. All right, Vanessa Yurkevich, thank you very, very much.

Just ahead, President Trump standing firmly in his fight for Greenland overnight, saying, and I'm quoting him now, there is no going back, as he prepares to meet with other leaders about his push for the territory.

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