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What We Know with Max Foster
Vance Takes Questions On Trip To Minnesota; Zelenskyy Gives Blistering Speech At Davos, Criticizes Europe; E.U. Leaders Holding Emergency Summit In Brussels On Greenland; Trump Holds Signing Ceremony For Gaza Board Of Peace. Aired 3-4p ET
Aired January 22, 2026 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: -- with his staff over the past week.
[15:00:03]
We've been at -- in my office in constant contact with people here on the ground in Minneapolis. There were certainly people at a roundtable with
opposing views.
And look, I don't even know, you know what? Whether it's public. But yes, we met with people with opposing views here at the roundtable. I wanted to
get a perspective from everybody, but also, of course, offer my opinion that with a little bit more cooperation, we could lower the chaos. We're
going to keep on doing that. If Governor Walz wants to call me, we'll continue talking.
I will say that my sense of this situation, having talked to these guys for a long time, as this is primarily a law enforcement issue, this is the
attorney general, this is the local mayor. This is all of the organs of local and state law enforcement. That's who we focus on. But we've
certainly been in communication with the governor and his office as well.
REPORTER: Vice President --
VANCE: Yeah?
REPORTER: Local law enforcement obviously hasn't been really helping out with the agents who've been assaulted repeatedly. What's the plan if
nothing changes? They're here locally. And this operation has attracted thousands of agents. Are there any plans to go to any other cities from
here?
VANCE: Well, right now, we're focused on Minneapolis because that's where we have the highest concentration of people who have violated our
immigration laws. And that's also, frankly, where we see the most assault of our law enforcement officers.
Our plan is very simple, if you assault a federal law enforcement officer, we are going to do everything we can to put you in prison. It's very
simple. And most of these protesters, as much as I may disagree with their politics, most of them have been peaceful, but a lot of them have not been
peaceful. And if you go and storm a church, if you go and assault a federal law enforcement officer, we are going to try very hard. We're going to use
every resource, the federal government to put you in prison, respect people's rights, respect people's rights to worship, respect people's
rights to do their job without being assaulted.
If you follow that basic principle, the Trump administration will do everything that we can to protect your rights. But if you go after
somebody, if you assault somebody, if you make a nine-year-old girl cry because you walked into a church and harassed her, we're going to go after
you with every single tool that we have
REPORTER: Vice President, with NBC News, sir. Your administration has said repeatedly this is about safety, about making Americans feel safer. So,
what do you say to people here in Minnesota who say it's the overwhelming presence of ICE officers and federal officers and their tactics that are
making them feel less safe?
VANCE: Well, one thing I would say is, first of all, we saw in 2025, the biggest one year drop in murders in the history of the United States of
America, significant reductions in violent crime. The reason why we have less violent crime is really two reasons. Number one, because we're
enforcing the immigration laws and getting very violent criminals out of our country. And number two, because we're enforcing our criminal laws and
putting guys who assault and murder behind bars.
This is part of a broader effort to make us safe. And the chaos that people are seeing. And I understand there is frustration of the chaos. I say that
we're doing everything we can to lower the temperature, and we would like federal and local -- excuse me -- state and local officials to meet us
halfway. So much -- so --
REPORTER: Are you saying that they're not perceiving it correctly? Are you saying that they're not seeing that it's the tactics or the presence of the
officers that are --
VANCE: Look, I'm sure that people are seeing a lot of things that would make any member of our community feel very upset. But I also think that if
you understand this in context, this is the inevitable consequence of a state and local government that have decided that they're not going to
cooperate with immigration enforcement at all. In fact, they're going to aggressively not cooperate.
So -- here, I mean, here's a basic illustration of this. If you are an ICE officer and you have to arrest a person who's committed assault and is also
an illegal alien, but the state and local officials won't help you identify that person. Many of the things that people in Minneapolis are seeing that
give them pause, that frustrate them, that worry them, that make them feel like things are too chaotic, many of these things are coming from the fact
that there's no cooperation with state and local law enforcement.
And I guess what I would -- I would tell people again, many of whom are justifiably concerned and worried about what they're seeing in their
communities, is why are we not seeing it anywhere else? We're seeing this level of chaos only in Minneapolis, L.A. and Chicago. We had some problems
there. Pretty much every jurisdiction where these guys are operating, you don't see the same level of chaos.
You don't see the same level of violence. You don't see the problems that we're seeing in Minneapolis. Maybe the problem is unique to Minneapolis,
and we believe that it is. And it's the lack of cooperation between state and local law enforcement and federal law enforcement.
REPORTER: Mr. Vice President --
REPORTER: Omar Jimenez, CNN. ICE has been operating here for years with less pushback than we're seeing right now. And even the Saint Paul police
chief recently said, is there not a way to find common ground without scaring the hell out of people in the community? Those are his words.
And I just wonder with this operation metro surge, is any part of it meant to send a form of political message to the leaders here in Minneapolis and
the state of Minnesota? And I know you talked about you've been in touch with the governor's offices and the mayor's offices. But why have you not
been able to speak to them directly? Have they not been willing to do so?
VANCE: Well, look, I have spoken to some of the people in Minnesota directly. I spoke to some of them today. I spoke to others in the past. And
again, our staff has been in very direct contact with pretty much every official with any influence or any power in Minneapolis.
[15:05:00]
But no, we're not trying to send a political message. We're trying to enforce the law. And unfortunately, what has happened is that as we've
enforced the law, there's been this weird reaction, again, unique to this city. This is not a common thing across the United States of America.
There's been a very unique, very Minneapolis specific reaction to our enforcement of federal immigration laws.
What I'm trying to do here today is understand why that is. What is it about Minneapolis that has become so chaotic? What are the specific types
of cooperation that we need?
Look, I don't need Tim Walz or Jacob Frey or anybody else to come out and say that they agree with J.D. Vance or Donald Trump on immigration. I just
don't need that. What I do need them to do is empower their local officials to help our local -- or help our federal officials out in a way where this
can be a little bit less chaotic and it can be a little bit more targeted, like if we're trying to find a sex offender, tell us where the guy lives.
Simple things like that. Simple changes in how they're approaching immigration enforcement would make this work a lot better. It would make
Minneapolis streets a lot safer, and it would make this whole thing a lot less traumatic for this community.
I'll take one more question.
REPORTER: Vice President, Vice President, you've said that its time to turn down the temperature. Does that include changes to both ICE and CBP
tactics that we've seen employed on the streets, including less than lethal tactics, pepper spray, pepper balls? Beyond that, what is the federal
government's role in turning down the temperature? And the Minnesota department of corrections says that its own officers have been cooperating
with ICE all along, handing over criminals once they serve their sentences to ICE officials. Can you concede that there is some cooperation with the
state?
VANCE: Yeah. Look, if I was going to list the five agencies locally and statewide that I'm most worried about, I wouldn't put the Department of
Corrections on that list. I think that while there are certain things we'd like to see more from them, they've hardly been the worst offenders. Do you
agree with that, guys? That's a fair -- that's a fair assessment.
But I think -- when you talk about tactics and you talked about the response to things, look, we don't want to employ tactics that we don't
employ, the kind of tactics that are only necessary when violence is committed against officers. That is, these guy's directive. And that's what
we're going to try to do.
And again, the president said this a couple of days ago. Whenever you have a law enforcement operation, even if 99.99 percent of the guys do
everything perfectly, you're going to have people that make mistakes. That is the nature of law enforcement.
What I do think that we can do is working with state and local officials. We can make the worst moments of chaos, much less common, and all they've
got to do is meet us halfway. These guys want to communicate with them.
They want to talk to the local business leaders. They -- many of these guys, many of the people standing behind me are members of the Minneapolis
community. Many of the officials that I met today who work in federal immigration enforcement, this is their home. They love this place. These
are their neighbors.
They want this to work a lot more smoothly. I think that we can get there. We just got to work at it a little bit and we need some cooperation from
state and local officials. The last thing I'll say is I just hope they give it.
This is a beautiful city. I've only been here a few times. I love it even in this weather. I love Minneapolis.
We could do a lot better. We could do a lot more with more cooperation. The Trump administration, the directive that I got from the president of the
United States is meet these guys halfway, work with them so that we can make these immigration enforcement operations successful without
endangering our ICE officers, and so that we can turn down the chaos a little bit, at least I think a lot, actually.
But for us to do that, we need some help from the state and local officials. We will keep on working with them, and so long as they're
willing to work with us, they will always find a partner in public safety and law enforcement and the Trump administration. Thank you all.
MAX FOSTER, CNN HOST: I'm Max Foster.
Beginning then in Minneapolis tonight, where U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance has just been speaking. His visit comes amid soaring tensions over the
Trump administration's immigration crackdown and the death of Renee Good.
Now tensions he said he hoped to calm by making this trip. It also coincides with news of a controversial internal memo authorizing ICE
officers to enter homes without a judge's warrant and an admission today from Vance that ICE has made some mistakes. But he had harsh words for
Minneapolis police, accusing them of not defending ICE agents. He talked about a lack of cooperation between local -- local, federal and state law
enforcement. He said that was the core of the problem here, and he talked about federal law enforcement and the challenges they face.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VANCE: We can do a good job of enforcing our immigration laws without the chaos, but it actually requires the cooperation of state and local
officials. If you look at blue cities and blue states, red cities and red states, you go to Austin, Texas, or Memphis, Tennessee. You go to the state
of Texas, obviously a very red state or the state of Tennessee, a very red state.
[15:10:00]
But you've got blue cities within those states. You do not have this level of chaos.
The reason why things have gotten so out of hand is because of failure, of cooperation between the state and local authorities, and what these guys
are trying to do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Let's get some perspective on this story. We're joined by Andrew McCabe, our senior law enforcement analyst, also former deputy director of
the FBI.
Also, Kevin Liptak is at the White House for you.
But if we start with you, Andrew, I think that everyone has agreed, there isn't the right coordination between local, state and federal agencies in
Minneapolis. But there's a different view on who's to blame for that?
ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, let's be clear: the vice president is a very skilled speaker. And
so, he is very capable of presenting his perspective in a way that seems eminently reasonable. And that's certainly how that came over.
But when you look a little more closely, you see kind of the problem here is not -- this is not just the typical law enforcement, not well-
coordinated. One institution not talking well to the other. This is a very different situation, entirely.
And at the end of the day, the citizens of Minnesota and Minneapolis specifically have the right to elect representatives and choose
representatives who reflect their views on issues like, should -- do they want their local law enforcement and local health services and other
departments cooperating with federal immigration authorities? And apparently, they've taken that opportunity and chosen that they do not want
that sort of cooperation.
So, for the -- for the mayor and for the governor to be presiding over Minnesota and prohibiting their law enforcement from cooperating on these
matters, they're simply acting at the will of their constituents and their voters, which is what they are supposed to do.
At the end of the day, the federal government -- the local government doesn't have to help the federal government if they choose not to. And your
obligation as the federal law enforcement entity is to get your job done, regardless of that.
I know this very well. From my time in the FBI, there were cities and locations that cooperated well with us. I always wanted that, but there
were other places that didn't. And in those places, I still had to do my job. I had to get it done. Despite the lack of cooperation. And I didn't do
it by unleashing agents on the city to engage in violence. Intimidation tactics, to interact with citizens in ways that are profane and frightening
and likely violations of the Constitution.
We now know that they were instructed by their own officials in DHS to start doing what you can see here in this video, to be kicking in people's
doors and entering their homes --
FOSTER: Yeah.
MCCABE: -- without judicially issued warrants. I mean, these are these are very, very troubling things that are happening up there. And the citizens
of Minnesota and their institutions aren't obligated to go along with that.
FOSTER: The president -- the vice president, did try to clarify that, saying they don't need a warrant if they're being fired upon. I think you'd
probably agree with that. But it's -- if they're not fired upon, I guess that is the issue here.
MCCABE: Well, it's not exactly that clear. I'm not aware of a single situation in which ICE officers have been shot at from inside a residence
that they -- that they wanted to enter, have not heard anything about that lately. And in fact, the opposite is true.
Law enforcement goes to a residence or a location, and they have reason to believe that someone is firing upon them, typically, what you see is a
barricaded subject situation where you take up a position, establish a perimeter, you start trying to negotiate. There are all sorts of tactics
that are short of just kicking in the door with machine guns and pulling people out in their underwear.
FOSTER: Kevin, looking from Washington, how does this fit into the national politics right now?
KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yeah, and certainly, Vance has been kind of at the forefront of all of this for the administration.
Remember, he came out to the White House briefing room last week in the wake of the shooting death of Renee Good in Minneapolis and very much
defended that ICE officer and essentially said that Renee Good had done this to herself. I do think, you know, reading between the lines of what
Vance was saying and how he was describing what he was doing in Minneapolis, kind of describing it as a fact finding mission to go in there
and to try and turn down the chaos. It is, I think, sort of a tacit acknowledgment from the White House that this operation in Minneapolis is
not going particularly well, that these scenes of chaos from the ground there are not helpful for them politically.
And you heard President Trump sort of allude to that earlier this week when he himself was in the briefing room. And certainly, we have seen in polling
that many, many Americans, sort of a significant majority of Americans, oppose what the administration is doing on this front, not necessarily the
policy itself, but the tactics.
[15:15:04]
And I think what you see Vance doing here, certainly he's not coming out and saying it explicitly, but if you read between the lines, he is
essentially acknowledging that these scenes of violence, of people being dragged, of people being pepper sprayed, of shootings are not what they
want to see happening on the ground there. And that, I think, is actually something of a new development, because until this week and until President
Trump himself came out and said that ICE officers were making mistakes, you had really seen them hardening their position on all of that, whether it
was the Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem or Stephen Miller, who's the immigration sort of guru here at the White House, there was no sense
from them that anything was going awry, that this these scenes were essentially what this all was intended as.
But Vance today, I think making clear that this is not how the White House wants to see this going, that it could be a politically damaging scene for
them. But blaming all of this on the local officials and saying that they weren't getting the cooperation that they needed, although I think it bears
reminding that the Justice Department and the Trump administration has not necessarily cultivated the best attempts at cooperation with these
officials. The Justice Department is, in fact, investigating Tim Walz and Jacob Frey and Keith Ellison, who's the attorney general in Minneapolis, in
Minnesota.
And so, if you're working to cooperate with these state officials, you know, putting them under investigation and issuing subpoenas, it's not
clear how that's going to cultivate the type of cooperation that Vance is describing here.
FOSTER: Andrew, the other story that's blowing up right now is this five year old who was detained, J.D. Vance suggesting that he wasn't the target,
rather his father, who ICE officers were, you know, pursuing different perspectives on this story and exactly what happened. But this is a sort of
story that they've got to get a hold of, right?
MCCABE: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this is yet another story coming out of, Minneapolis that really makes the federal law enforcement action up there
look terrible. And again, I think the vice president's addressing it and trying to do so in a way that seems reasonable. He's kind of bringing out
the other side of the story, saying that the child's -- that the child was with his parent, who was the, I guess, the subject of the action. And that
person fled, kind of abandoning the child at the location.
Well, there are, you know, law enforcement interacts or frequently is in the -- in the bad position of having to arrest the parent of a child in the
house, near the house, whatever that might be, and is stuck with a child who doesn't have a parent to supervise them. There are procedures for this.
You reach out to child welfare services and you bring in official representatives of the government who are responsible for taking care of
children in these circumstances.
You stay on site. You keep that child in the residence or in the place where you found them. You make sure that they're supervised. You don't
throw them in the back of a -- of a police vehicle and drive them away or take them somewhere else.
Or there are ways to handle this. It's done every day on the streets of this country and big cities and small by police entities, large and small,
every single day. Whether or not the ICE officers in this situation handled it well. Very hard to say. We're getting, like, wildly different
descriptions of this from folks on the ground. And now, of course, from the vice president himself.
FOSTER: Andrew McCabe, Kevin Liptak, thank you both very much for analyzing that press conference from J.D. Vance.
Our other top story tonight, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stunning many of his country's biggest supporters, slamming them for not
doing more to bring the war with Russia to an end. Mr. Zelenskyy met with U.S. President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in
Davos, describing the meeting as positive. President Trump called talks an ongoing process.
Later, the Ukrainian leader delivered a blistering speech at the conference, suggesting that Europe is far too reliant on the U.S. for its
security and needs, united armed forces. He likened his repeated warnings about Russia to a popular movie.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT: Everyone remembers the great American film, Groundhog Day with Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell. Yes, but
no one would want to live like that. Repeating the same thing for weeks, months, and of course, for years. And yet, that's exactly how we like --
how we live now. We have told our European partners multiple times, act now, act now. But Europe still remains in Greenland mode.
[15:20:02]
Maybe someday, someone will do something.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: U.S. and Ukraine officials will meet their Russian counterparts in the United Arab Emirates on Friday. That's according to President Volodymyr
Zelenskyy.
This as U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and President Trump's son in law Jared Kushner, hold talks today with Russian President Vladimir Putin in
Moscow. Russian state media says Witkoff has arrived for that meeting. Witkoff says negotiations on a peace deal are now down to one issue. So,
what is it?
Nick Paton Walsh is with us now -- Nick.
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, I mean, as we have known from the start of this invasion, it's about land.
According to one European official I spoke to. So, suggesting were down to one issue is kind of a gloss on the enormity of what Vladimir Putin still
wants from this peace deal, which is for Ukraine to cede to him the remainder of the Donbas region that he hasn't managed to take militarily
over now, what is nearly a four-year war.
So, I think it's fair to say we are far from a simple, small technical issue being resolved. Although Witkoff did suggest that he'd been managing
various different permutations and ideas around how to fix this particular problem, and therefore he felt it was solvable.
He's going to face a real litmus test, though, in Moscow, because ultimately, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he felt the documents were
almost ready for some kind of peace deal. It's unclear if they're ready for him or he thinks they're ready for the Russians to sign as well. We'll
learn about that probably in the hours ahead.
But it has been a stunning series of words to hear from the Ukrainian president to that selective European audience of officials, leaders.
They're essentially hearing him say, look, Europe is unable to act without some kind of U.S. approval, that Europe is slow, that Europe is, as you
heard there, living in Greenland mode, waiting for someone else to act, waiting for U.S. President Donald Trump to change his mind. Ultimately, he
was complimentary towards the United Kingdom and France and their contributions potentially towards a ground force peacekeeping ultimately,
if there was any sort of peace deal to actually come out of this lengthy process.
But it was a stark message, particularly to an audience. Still, I think discombobulated, reeling from the last week around Greenland that
ultimately, has led to very little strategic, actual practical change. We appear to be seeing some kind of diplomatic move here to resolve this
crisis, but it hasn't actually led to the full scale military invasion many we're fearing. Instead, it's left many in the transatlantic alliance deeply
concerned about the predictability, the functionality even of the United States.
One thing you pointed out there to, Max, is one practical piece of news, potentially from Zelenskyy's speech. He referred to how there was supposed
to be the first trilateral meeting between the United States, Russia and Ukraine in the Emirates tomorrow and potentially Saturday as well. That's
according to the Ukrainian president.
We don't yet know if the Russians will attend. They've been silent on this so far. Is this Zelenskyy referring to something Trump suggested late
December and suggesting it might indeed happen to potentially curry favor with Trump, but at the same time leave Moscow embarrassed if they don't
agree to go.
Unclear at this stage, even if they do meet, it would be a procedural step forwards. It wouldn't necessarily suggest a peace deal as actually
imminent. That territorial issue so utterly vital to Ukraine and indeed Russia as well. Remember, it's why Russia invaded in the first place to
take territory, and they still want to take more.
So I think a very confident Zelenskyy we saw there emerging from meeting President Trump, saying how the meeting was positive, was good, certainly
not the blowout that many had feared potentially could come given the sort of erratic mood we've seen from the U.S. president over recent days, but an
audience before him, reeling from the Greenland debacle of the last week or so, and potentially listening to a Ukrainian president who's trying, I
think, to lead Europe out of its own inability to act over the past days and seen minimal response so far -- Max.
FOSTER: Nick Paton Walsh, appreciate it. Thank you.
More news in a moment, including what Greenland's prime minister has to say about Donald Trump's new deal.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:27:30]
FOSTER: E.U. leaders are holding an emergency meeting in Brussels this evening to talk about Donald Trump's push for control of Greenland.
President Trump has, for now, backed off his threats to slap tariffs on Europe. He also seems pleased about a vague framework deal involving
Greenland, but it remains unclear what it actually means.
A short time ago, our Nic Robertson tried to get some more detail about this deal from Greenland's prime minister.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Does Donald Trump, the United States get anything more out of this agreement than he already had?
And what are the details of that agreement?
JENS-FREDERIK NIELSEN, GREENLANDIC PRIME MINISTER: Thank you for the question. First of all, nobody else than Greenland and the kingdom of
Denmark have the mandate to make deals or agreements about Greenland and the kingdom of Denmark without us. That's not going to happen.
In terms of the deal there's been talking about, I don't know what's concrete in that deal either, but I know that we have now a high level
working group working on a solution for both parties. We have said from the -- from the beginning in Greenland, we have some red lines. We cannot cross
the red lines.
We have to respect our territorial integrity. We have to respect international law, sovereignty. We are ready to cooperate more in
economics, in other areas. But that's something we have to talk about in mutual respect.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Nic Robertson joins us from Greenland.
It's interesting, isn't it, because one of the, you know, one of the sources involved in this suggesting that actually they would give up some
land on the sites of those U.S. bases, they would be sovereign there. But that doesn't seem to tie in with what the prime minister was saying there.
ROBERTSON: Yeah, the prime minister has taken a very, very diplomatic tone, and that's been clear throughout. And he was asked that specific
question by me and by others. You know, the 1951 agreement between Denmark and the United States over Greenland, over access those military bases. He
was asked, is it a rework of that deal? Is there something else added on to it? And he really just stayed away from it. He wouldn't answer it. He said,
we've got these talks coming up.
You know, the very fact that he said that he didn't know the details. That's something else I've heard from other people in the in the government
here does tend to indicate that this is very much a work in progress, a work in progress, though, that the prime minister says does envisage having
more NATO presence in and around Greenland.
[15:30:03]
Part of the sort of Arctic security does perhaps have a permanent NATO presence here in Greenland as well. But all of this is something that he
feels has been within those parameters, the sovereignty, territorial integrity. He does believe that those points have been communicated very
clearly to President Trump, that absolutely not for sale. Whatever we discuss has to respect the sovereignty.
So, it's very hard to sort of get into -- well, could the U.S. have their bases under a different level of sovereignty than they have now because
they have access to bases, they can have any number of bases and troops as the understanding already. I think one other takeaway was the prime
minister was being diplomatic. You know, he spoke about the idea that he does feel that Greenland is out from under the threat of immediate U.S.
military action.
But when you talk to people on the streets here, as we have done today, they're a bit less diplomatic. And they say, look, we really don't trust
President Trump. We don't know if he's going to change his mind if we're going to find ourselves back in this situation in days or weeks from now.
But it does seem that there is a diplomatic track but it also, you know, is part of that spectrum of European politics with the United States right
now, that is just in an entirely new place. And I don't think anyone really knows where they stand right now.
FOSTER: Yeah, absolutely. Nic Robertson in Nuuk, thank you so much for joining us. We'll be back in a moment with more on the Board of Peace.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:35:02]
FOSTER: President Trump launched his Gaza Board of Peace with a signing ceremony earlier in Davos in Switzerland. It's intended to oversee the
reconstruction of the region. Representatives from less than 20 nations attended that ceremony. Many of those present were from the Middle East and
Latin America.
Hungary's Viktor Orban was one of the suggested the border piece could replace the United Nations.
Now, he says, it will work with the U.N.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: But there's tremendous potential with the United Nations. And I think the combination of the Board of Peace with the kind of people we have
here, coupled with the United Nations, can be something very, very unique for the world. It's for the world. This isn't United States. This is for
the world.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: While Donald Trump touts the new Board of Peace, Gaza remains a war-torn region. A fighting is still ongoing, with several Israeli
airstrikes hitting the area on Wednesday, including one that killed three journalists in a marked humanitarian vehicle.
Despite that, Donald Trump remains optimistic.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: See, I'm a real estate person at heart, and it's all about location. And I said, look at this location on the sea. Look at this
beautiful piece of property. What it could be for so many people. It will be so, so great.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Oren Liebermann joins us from Jerusalem. Close to the conflict, Oren.
Are they confident that this board of peace will help things move forward?
OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN JERUSALEM BUREAU CHIEF: Well, that, of course, is the whole idea here. And President Donald Trump's son in law, Jared Kushner,
laid out a vision of how that would happen and how it would look with, frankly, a glitzy PowerPoint presentation that he showed everybody in Davos
showing what the rebuilding could or would look like, including a map of Gaza that showed a port, an airport. Multi-use high rises along the beach,
residential areas.
But from where we sit right now and from what we see unfolding in Gaza on a daily basis here, that is a is a far-off fantasy. As you heard in that
quote from Trump, they very much view part of this as simply a real estate deal. It is no doubt beachfront property between Israel and Egypt. And
that's where they see the potential. And they're trying to draw in what would take billions upon billions of dollars of investment to make that
vision happen.
Of course, there is the problem here that they're trying to move forward. The second phase of the ceasefire. And for that to happen, Kushner made
clear for any investment money to flow in, he said Hamas has to disarm and Gaza has to be demilitarized.
And yet the steps to make that happen are still very much unclear. The international stabilization force that's required under the second phase of
the ceasefire plan, that was hardly, if at all, mentioned today. So, these are prerequisites for moving forward here. And yet, the U.S., the Board of
Peace, Kushner is very much laying out what they see Gaza looking like at some point in the future. But that future here is a very long way off, Max.
FOSTER: Yeah. Oren, appreciate it. Thanks for joining us from Jerusalem.
Now it is the final moments of trade on Wall Street. Stocks are up again. The bounce back continues after Donald Trump gave up on Greenland tariffs.
This is our business breakout.
President Trump suing the country's largest bank JPMorgan Chase, over claims it unfairly dropped him as a client after the January 6th attacks.
Mr. Trump is suing both the bank and its CEO, Jamie Dimon, for $5 billion in damages. JPMorgan says the suit has no merit and will fight it in court.
Elizabeth Holmes, the healthcare CEO convicted of fraud, has asked Donald Trump to release her from prison early. Holmes is serving an 11-year
sentence for defrauding investors after making false claims about her blood test company, Theranos. She's not due to leave prison until 2031.
Consumer spending in the United States staying strong during last year's holiday season. That's according to a new report from the Department of
Commerce. Spending was up half of 1 percent in November, more than economists had expected. Now the report was delayed because of last year's
government shutdown.
Still to come, the man known as the Trump whisperer plants the seeds of a deal on Greenland. What's the NATO chief secret, though? We'll take a look.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:42:29]
FOSTER: European leaders didn't seem overly confident of reaching a compromise with Donald Trump over Greenland, and then Mark Rutte came
along. It was after a meeting with the NATO secretary general on Wednesday that Donald Trump announced a framework of a deal had been agreed.
This morning, Mr. Rutte explained how it came together.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK RUTTE, NATO SECRETARY GENERAL: What we discussed yesterday, it was a very good discussion is how can we do that one? How can collectively, the
NATO allies help here? The seventh and the high north and also others to support that? But the seven and the high north, including the United
States, because also the United States is an Arctic country, because of Alaska and, of course, Canada, Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and
Norway. How can we make sure that these countries collectively make sure that the arctic stays safe, that the Russians and the Chinese stay out?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: This relationship has become one of the more unlikely subplots in the Greenland saga. Russia has a long history of being kind of Trump
whisperer almost. Earlier, the U.S. president had leaked one of Russia's text messages to him, calling his work in Syria incredible and saying he
couldn't wait to see him. Then there was the time when Russia referred to Mr. Trump as daddy, which clearly left an impression.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: They called me daddy, right? Last time, very smart man said he's our daddy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: So, what we want to know is, how did Mark Rutte strike a deal with Donald Trump?
Joining me now is Gabriel Gavin. He's the diplomatic reporter at "Politico". Thank you so much for joining us.
I mean, you know, this was the most, you know, incredible day yesterday. There was huge tension in Europe. And then suddenly, Russia comes along,
calms things down. You've worked with him closely. I mean, what was his tactic here? How does he do it?
GABRIEL GAVIN, DIPLOMATIC REPORTER, POLITICO: Well, I think that's the question that's being asked by 27 European presidents and prime ministers
having dinner just 100 meters away from where I'm sitting here in Brussels tonight. They've called an emergency conference to try and work out how
they responded to Trump's tariff threats, assuming that these hard hitting new tariffs would come in from February the 1st. Obviously, last night it
was made very clear that wasn't going to happen.
And it left leaders, sherpas, diplomats reeling. People really had not expected to see such a sudden announcement. And then they've got to turn
up. They've got to down, they've got to have dinner and they've got to work out how this happened.
We know that Rutte spoke last night to European Council President Atonio Costa. We know he's been in touch with a number of other European leaders
throughout the day. So people have been getting information in dribs and drabs. But what's really important to note is that all the way up until the
start of this summit this evening, there was no clarity on what this deal looked like, what this deal entailed, what was agreed, if anything.
And I think one of the big problems that people have encountered is that the way that Donald Trump works is that he doesn't write things down. He
doesn't tend to work up memorandums until the very last minute. And so there wasn't something substantive that they could discuss, that the media
could see. And I think what this summit has now become this evening is basically a kind of crisis moment where you go, well, how did we get here
and where are we? And that's what we'll be finding out in the next few hours.
FOSTER: The Greenland issue has been interesting, hasn't it? Because most European leaders were using a similar tactic with Trump. And, you know,
showering him with praise, thanking him, all of that. But for the first time, we saw them standing up to Trump.
I'm wondering if that was the problem for Trump rather than Rutte doing I think anything particularly special because he just carried on with the
same tactic, it seemed.
GAVIN: You've got these two kind of camps emerging here in brussels between countries that really want to hit Trump hard and fight fire with
fire and say, well, if you tariff us, were going to tariff you back. But you've also got a number of countries that say, well, actually, no, the
best way to go is to is to charm Trump, to look after his interests, to make him feel special. And so, you saw French President Emmanuel Macron,
who's been very openly calling for the E.U. to deploy really hard-hitting punitive measures against American markets. If he went through with this
tariff deal.
Simultaneously, according to messages posted by Trump himself, you're trying to flatter him, saying, you know, I might not understand what you're
doing, but I realize you're a good guy and we're going to have dinner together and work it out. But to actually both camps are kind of claiming
victory because on one hand, you've got people saying, well, we acted, we said we were going to dust off our weaponry. And we were going to, you
know, respond with one voice.
And then you've got those saying, well, actually, no, the reason this happened was because Mark Rutte and Donald Trump have a close personal
friendship. So, it's not clear really which of those two strategies prevailed and which of -- which of those two strategies the Europeans are
going to use in the future.
FOSTER: Rutte is very experienced, of course, but could he have overpromised here because we were hearing from the Greenland prime minister
that he doesn't know anything about the deal, and surely, you can't have any sort of deal without the prime minister of Greenland's agreement.
GAVIN: The Danes have been really clear that this deal was kind of done somewhat over their heads and, you know, all the way through the night,
Danish diplomats were surprised by the fact that deal had been done at all, particularly without their input, without Greenland, without the input of
the Greenlandic people. The legitimately elected representatives of Greenland.
Now, Rutte has a careful balancing act, but I think everybody realizes that the sting has slightly been taken out of this situation, and everyone's
pleased to see Donald Trump ruling out a military intervention. Everybody seemed pleased to see Donald Trump ruling out tariffs taking effect from
the 1st of February.
So as far as that goes, Russia's kind of had -- got a bit of an easy sell. And as the detail becomes clear, you can have a bit of a negotiation. But I
think what people think will work best is to give Trump a chance to declare victory over something, even if it's something he could have probably
gotten all the way along. And I think the next -- what the next step now is, has the E.U. learned anything from this? Because the thing that we hear
time and time again from diplomats and officials here is, okay, Greenland situation might be more stable, but what's the next thing that comes up?
We're dealing with an unpredictable U.S. president, and Brussels wants to try and work out what strategy is going to work next. Is it -- do you -- do
your piece? Do you flatter or do you fight back?
FOSTER: I wanted to ask your reaction as well as you're amongst all the European leaders to Zelenskyy's speech today because he was very punchy
against his European allies, who have given him apparently unconditional support during this war in Ukraine. He made the point that everyone's
focused on Greenland right now, but he laid into the European leaders. I mean, how's that being received there?
GAVIN: I think there are very few leaders in the world who can look President Zelenskyy in the eyes and have any kind of real criticism of how
he's working to defend his country internationally at home. So, when Zelenskyy speaks, it's with a great deal of credibility and a great deal of
sympathy among leaders. So he's made an intervention, obviously, to try and say, well, look, you've become distracted from the things that are really
important here. You're arguing about tariffs, you're arguing about Greenland. These are -- this isn't the pressing conflict that's dividing
Europe.
And as a result, people hear that. And I think there's been a lot of hope that, bandwidth in brussels, the diplomatic political bandwidth could be on
how we ensure that Ukraine gets through a cold winter where it's under constant Russian bombardment, where we can talk about better targeting,
support for Ukraine financially, militarily and a collective European position on these peace talks that President Donald Trump continues to push
between Moscow and Kyiv.
And those things have become side issues, as least as far as today this week goes, because of this political spat, that's kind of become very hot,
then gone quite cold, and no one's really gained anything from it.
[15:50:07]
I think there is a degree of frustration, but there's also a realization that if Europe works out how to talk to Trump, these things become less
common in the future, and we can continue to focus on both sides of the Atlantic on the things that really do matter.
FOSTER: Gabriel Gavin from "Politico" in Brussels, thank you so much for joining us.
Still to come tonight, an Oscar record. "Sinners" gets more Academy Award nominations than any film in history.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
FOSTER: Some pictures just in to CNN. Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner meeting with Vladimir Putin just now. We did have those pictures, but instead there
we are. Let's just take a look. Since we haven't seen them ourselves yet, we're going to as soon as we have them. A key meeting where they will, of
course, be discussing those key security issues, trying to set up some sort of later meeting, no doubt which Donald Trump can get involved with. But
there you are, Witkoff on the left and Kushner on the right.
Meanwhile, Ryan Coogler's monsters and music mash up "Sinners" has set a Hollywood record.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've been gone a long time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're back now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: It earns 16 Oscar nominations today from the Motion Picture Academy. That's more than any film in history, besting the previous record
of 14 nominations, which was shared by "All About Eve", Titanic" and "La La Land".
Wha we don't know is, will "Sinners" take home the biggest prize of all?
Take me now -- joining me now, entertainment journalist Segun Oduolowu.
Thank you so much for joining us.
I mean, a lot of people are shocked by this because at one point people were saying this movie wasn't even going to break even. Now we're talking
about it potentially becoming the most important movie ever if it wins all of these awards.
SEGUN ODUOLOWU, ENTERTAINMENT JOURNALIST & MEDIA PERSONALITY: Yeah, the entertainment industry has literally just turned into Trump at Davos,
right? A minute ago, "Sinners" was Greenland. And oh, at the Golden Globes, you don't get to win anything. We're going to invade you.
And then the Oscars come around and -- don't worry about it. We're not going to invade you. In fact, you get 16 nominations, the most of any movie
of all time. You make Ruth E. Carter the wardrobe, the woman in charge of wardrobe, the most nominated Oscar woman of color ever in the history of
the event.
[15:55:05]
And now, instead of marching at dawn, which is why I'm wearing camouflage, I'm getting -- I'm going to hope and pray that what happened at the Golden
Globes gets written properly at the Oscars. And Ryan Coogler, Michael B. Jordan, and editing and tech win out for "Sinners".
So that is the big story, the record breaking. And maybe, maybe Oscars hashtag not so this year.
FOSTER: It feels, now, doesn't it? I mean, that horror theme is quite current.
ODUOLOWU: It is. Horror is a genre that sells. People scare easy. Comedy doesn't always translate, but we are universally afraid of monsters and
vampires.
And what Ryan Coogler has done with this original screenplay is tap into that, but also give historical context, which we really haven't seen
before, especially in a movie that is predominantly people of color. It's going to be an interesting Oscars for sure.
FOSTER: Segun, we're going to see. I'm going to have you on lots to talk about it. Thank you so much as ever for joining us.
That's WHAT WE KNOW.
END
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