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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Israeli Official: Cabinet To Vote On Ceasefire Deal Friday After Delay; Defense Secy's Hospital Stays "Unnecessarily" Risked Security; 52 Percent Of Americans See U.S. Better Off In Four Years Under Trump; Trump's favorability Rating Jumps To 46 Percent Ahead Of Inauguration; Trump Picks For Attorney General Promises No "Enemies List"; Sen. Adam Schiff, (D-CA), Is Interviewed About Pam Bondi; Sen. Schiff Spars With Pam Bondi Over Prosecuting Jack Smith. Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA), Is Interviewed About Sparing With Pam Bondi Over Prosecuting Jack Smith; ATF: 150 Plus Leads In Wildfire Investigations; Inside The Home Of Man Who Organized Slaughter At Auschwitz. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired January 16, 2025 - 17:00   ET

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

[17:00:00]

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Or heartbreak out of California as those evacuated from wildfires are told it's going to be at least another week before they can return to their homes or what's left of their homes. Are investigators any closer to figuring out what started these blazes? Were any of them arson? We'll ask the head of the ATF, the agency responsible for investigating that.

Plus, with just four days until Donald Trump returns to the White House, I will be joined live by one of the best source Trump reporters in the world. What is she learning about Trump's plans for day one and whether he really has an enemies list?

But leading this hour, after some last minute speed bumps, Israel's security cabinet now plans to vote in just hours on the deal that would temporarily end the fighting in Gaza and bring dozens of hostages home. How confident is the U.S. that this deal will go into effect this weekend? We'll talk to White House official John Kirby in minutes.

But let's start with CNN's Bianna Golodryga who's in Tel Aviv, Israel for us.

And Bianna, what is Prime Minister Netanyahu's next move now that the far right minister Ben-Gvir has threatened to leave the government if the ceasefire-hostage deal goes through, which could theoretically, if he's joined by Smotrich, another far right minister, it could collapse the Netanyahu government.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN SENIOR GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, Jake, Prime Minister Netanyahu could try to convince Ben-Gvir to stay, which is highly unlikely given that he announced that he would resign if in fact this bill does go through, if it is approved, this vote for a ceasefire deal. And you mentioned Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister, he's also voiced his concern in opposition to this deal. But now this puts him in a bind if he's viewed as following Ben-Gvir in leaving the government. Right now there's no love lost between these two men, though they are both considered to be far right members of this opposition. So right now it does appear that Betzel Smotrich would stay through at least phase one of this deal.

He's argued that he would leave if after phase one is implemented, the IDF is not allowed to go back into Gaza. And it's also worth reiterating, Jake, that this deal as it stands right now does have majority approval with the cabinet. So it does seem highly likely that we will see it pass though a day later.

TAPPER: Bianna, you spoke with the brother of American Israeli hostage Keith Siegel. He's still presumed alive. He's expected to be released in phase one of this deal because he's older. What did the brother have to say?

GOLODRYGA: Yes, I spoke with his older brother, Lee Siegel, just a few hours ago, and he is hopeful finally that he could possibly be reunited with his brother. He knows that his conditions would be horrible given that the hostage video released of his brother a few months ago just showed how weak and feeble he looked. He said that that is my younger brother and he looks like he is a few decades older than me now, given what we saw a few months ago. That having been said, he was very thankful to the Biden administration for speaking to the members, the family members of the American hostages regularly, almost weekly, he said, giving them updates, showing their support, telling them that they are doing everything to bring their loved ones home.

Obviously, he acknowledged that the President himself wasn't able to get this deal across the finish line without the help from President- elect Donald Trump. And I asked him his views on how President-elect Donald Trump has handled this issue and some of the statements and ultimatums he's given. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEE SIEGEL, BROTHER OF AMERICAN-ISRAELI HOSTAGE KEITH SIEGEL: It is politics at the end of the day. Trump has spoken very strongly to the release of the hostages and the end of the war. I need to believe that. I need to see him fulfill that policy. And I am more than willing to tell him, thank you. You did what needed to be done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GOLODRYGA: And of course, Jake, Lee reiterated what every other family member of hostages said, and that is that this wound won't be closed or won't begin to heal until all of the 98 hostages eventually come home. And they want that to happen as soon as possible.

TAPPER: All right, Bianna Golodryga and Tel Aviv, thank you so much.

Let's bring in White House National Security Communications Adviser, retired Admiral John Kirby. Admiral, what's your understanding of the latest status of the deal? Is it on track?

JOHN KIRBY, WHITE HOUSE NATIONAL SECURITY COMMUNICATIONS ADVISER: Yes, it is. All the parameters have been agreed to. We've ironed out these last bit of details that needed to be flattened out and fixed. We believe we're on a good path here to start implementation by the end of the weekend. So all systems are go right now.

Obviously, Israeli politics have to churn through this. There's a governmental process there we have to respect, but we are seeing nothing that would tell us that this is going to get derailed at this point.

TAPPER: The Biden administration has been consumed in many ways by this conflict for the last 15 months. How do you think history will remember the Biden administration's role in this conflict 10, 20 years down the line?

[17:05:10]

KIRBY: Number one, I think it'll be very clear that we came to the defense of our ally and friend Israel, in fact, to the point of putting U.S. pilots and U.S. jets in the air to defend Israel from missiles and drones fired by Iran and kept the IDF in the fight. I think it will be clear that we did everything we could to try to get hostages home, get humanitarian assistance in. And I hope that if this deal gets fully implemented, what we'll definitely see is that the Biden administration was critical to ending this war.

TAPPER: We've had a couple Democrats or Senate Democrat Chris Murphy, Independent Senator Bernie Sanders on the last couple days talking about how the death toll in Gaza they think is more than 60,000, based on a story in the Lancet Medical Journal in the U.K. Have you seen that? Do you have any reaction to that?

KIRBY: I have not seen that number, Jake, and I'm not in a position to confirm it one way or another. What I can tell you is that the civilian casualties have been way too high, just unacceptably high. And while I couldn't put a data, a figure on it, it's clear that every single one is a tragedy. And we worked hard throughout this conflict to do everything we could to try to minimize those casualties, work with the IDF to be more discreet, more careful, more deliberate in their targeting. Now obviously that didn't happen in every operation, clearly, because there's been too many civilian casualties.

But that's why also President Biden has been working so hard to get this ceasefire deal in place because in phase one, as soon as this thing gets implemented, the first thing that happens is a ceasefire. The bombs stop dropping, the military operations cease, and that will restore a good sense of calm and hopefully security to the people of Gaza.

TAPPER: So Gaza Officials are estimating 83 people have been killed since the cease fire deal was announced. Obviously Gaza is run by Hamas, a terrorist group. Israel says it struck approximately 50 terror targets across the Gaza Strip. Is Israel's continued bombing of Gaza a threat to this deal? And why is Israel continuing to do this if this deal is in the works?

KIRBY: Don't believe that operations that are ongoing right now are going to upset the deal. As I said, we're on a glide path here to start implementation as soon as late this weekend. We believe that's still going to happen. I think it's important to remember that Hamas still represents a threat to the Israeli people and Israel's security. I'll let them speak to their targeting and their operations.

But what we worked hard on is getting this deal across the finish line so that a ceasefire can take place. And we want that to take place again as early as this weekend.

TAPPER: On another matter, the Pentagon's inspector General released a report yesterday stating that the Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin's hospitalizations in late 2023 and early 2024, which he did not disclose to the public or to the President at the time, that those hospitalizations meant, quote, "the risks to our national defense were increased unnecessarily," unquote. The watchdog also says Austin was in, quote, "severe condition" during one procedure, did not transfer his authorities to his deputy for several hours. Pretty alarming. What's your reaction?

KIRBY: Well, the President has spoken at length with Secretary Austin about this incident. He's grateful that it was fully investigated. That's what IGs do. And he's confident that the Pentagon and leadership will take the recommendations and conclusions on board. I would note that Secretary Austin has already implemented procedural changes so that this kind of situation can't happen again.

And as he said then, he says today, of course, he has full trust and confidence in Secretary Austin's leadership and the tremendous job that he's done over at the Defense Department.

TAPPER: Did he give, Secretary Austin, give an excuse, give a reason for why he didn't tell the White House? Why he didn't do the basic procedure? He's going on, you know, he's being operated on. He transfers his duties to the deputy. I mean, I know when President Biden had a colonoscopy in 2021, he had to alert Congress. Kamala Harris was acting president for 85 minutes. Why wouldn't the Secretary of Defense do that?

KIRBY: Secretary Austin admitted privately, of course, to the President, but also publicly, that he knows he could have handled this better, that he could have been more transparent. He should have been more transparent. And he put in procedures in place there at the Pentagon so that this kind of situation can't happen again. He was very -- he was very honest, very transparent about his own shortcomings here and how he was going to fix it.

TAPPER: All right. Admiral John Kirby, good to see you, sir. If this is the last time we talk until you leave the White House, thank you so much for coming and answering our questions. Really appreciate it.

KIRBY: Thank you, Jake. Good to be with you. TAPPER: So what is the reality on the ground in Gaza and why is this ceasefire so desperately needed? CNN's Jomana Karadsheh puts the devastation and desperate need into perspective for us. We do want to warn you, some of the images we're about to show you here are disturbing.

[17:10:03]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Joy and relief with the announcement of a deal. Finally, the moment they've been longing for.

We want to go back home. We just want to go back to school and learn, she says. This is the most amazing day. At least that's what it seemed. But the bombs didn't stop.

Shortly after the agreement was reached on Wednesday, another round of Israeli strikes. The military says it's still going after Hamas targets, continuing a war that began after Hamas's horrific October 7 attacks on Israel that killed more than a thousand people and 251 others taken hostage, a war that has since claimed more than 46,000 Palestinian lives, according to the Health Ministry, and left Gaza uninhabitable.

The ceasefire is set to begin on Sunday, and so many in Gaza fear the days before that will only bring more horror. And when the guns do fall silent, if they do, it will be the start of a new, difficult and painful chapter for those who survived the bombs, the bullets, the siege and starvation as they begin to pick up the pieces of life left shattered beyond recognition, homes gone and loved ones who didn't live to see this day.

I don't know how I'll go back to Gaza City to continue living without my children, Mahmed (ph) says. I dreamt of the day of going back with them by my side, playing. They were gone in the blink of an eye. Halla (ph) was four, Ahmad (ph) two, killed in an Israeli strike in the first month of the war, two of nearly 18,000 Palestinian children killed. A ceasefire only means the killing will stop, their mother says, and she will finally have the chance to grieve.

Jomana Karadsheh, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TAPPER: And our thanks to Jomana Karadsheh for that report.

He's made a lot of promises for his day one agenda. So what do we expect to see from President-elect Trump in the first hours after his inauguration? One of the best source Trump reporters will join us next.

Plus, how will investigators figure out what caused the deadly wildfires in Los Angeles? Could any of this fire has been started by arson? What about downed power lines or issues with electrical equipment? We're going to talk to the head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, which is investigating on the ground in California next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:16:40]

TAPPER: We're just over 90 hours away from Donald Trump taking the oath office here in the nation's capitol. A brand new CNN poll gives us some insight into how Americans are feeling about his return to the White House. Look at his favorability. It's at its highest in four years. It's at 46 percent, still underwater, but better than it's been.

When you ask Americans the question, will the United States be better off in four years from now? Well, more than half of those polled say yes. CNN political analyst Maggie Haberman joins me now.

And Maggie, Trump is getting something of the honeymoon that his supporters would argue he was denied eight years ago.

MAGGIE HABERMAN, SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Yes, I mean, there's no question. Look, when he came into office in 2017, he had just been briefed by the intel chiefs who were under President Obama about Russian interference in the 2016 election. And then privately by James Comey about this discredited ultimately dossier that had all kinds of lurid allegations about Trump and that set the tone for what was coming. And that is how Trump saw the world he was entering into. And it was a job that he didn't know and a city he really didn't know.

He now is -- and there was immense opposition to him. I expect, Jake, there will be eventually. I don't think this honeymoon is going to stay the way it is now. But so far, Democrats have been pretty sapped of energy and a lot of corporate America is parading down to Mar-a- Lago to make nice with Donald Trump and giving enormous amounts of money to his inaugural and his Super PAC.

TAPPER: And we should know that dossier, we should note that dossier was paid for by lawyers for Hillary Clinton --

HABERMAN: Correct.

TAPPER: -- which we did not learn until --

HABERMAN: Correct.

TAPPER: -- later in 2017.

HABERMAN: Correct. And filled with all kinds of things that have been debunked. So.

TAPPER: Yes. Kind of interesting. Anyway, our poll also asked how likely it is that Trump will make good on his policies, including divisive ones like implementing tariffs, carrying out mass deportations. About three quarters of those polls say that they think the deportations are going to happen. You're well sourced in the Trump world. Which are these do you think he's really going to fulfill as much as he promised he would?

HABERMAN: I think tariffs and deportations are going to be very high on the --

TAPPER: With 20 million people deported?

HABERMAN: I can't put a number on it. I think he's going to try to do as many as he is going to, as he can. And he said that in 2016, too, that he was going to do the largest mass deportation effort in U.S. history. That did not happen.

TAPPER: Right.

HABERMAN: I think that his team has learned. I think that they are more prepared. I think that Stephen Miller, who is his policy chief, Jonathan Swan and Charlie Savage and David Fahrenthold and I just wrote a big story about how much expansive power he has now. This is going to look very different. Stephen Miller is the one person who really learned both in the White House last time and in the four years since.

And so I do think that they are going to move faster and likely more effectively. Do I think it will necessarily hit the goals that Trump talked about? Possibly not. But I do think that the Overton window has shifted --

TAPPER: Oh, yes.

HABERMAN: -- specifically on immigration.

TAPPER: Yes.

HABERMAN: I think on tariffs to some extent, too. So what the public is willing tolerate on this is very different than in, say, 2017.

TAPPER: Trump's pick for attorney general, Pam Bondi, told senators on Wednesday that there will be no enemies list. But then Trump posted on social media just a few hours later, naming 11 people who, I guess, he feels have wronged him, that if you worked for them, you can't work in his administration. Including a number of people who worked for him in the last administration, including Mark Milley and James Mattis and Mark Esper.

[17:20:03]

HABERMAN: Yes.

TAPPER: I mean, does that undermine the no enemies list? That looks like something of an enemies list.

HABERMAN: I think there's a difference between we're not going to hire certain people and we're going to prosecute certain people.

TAPPER: OK. HABERMAN: And I think that is the distinction there. I also would argue that Trump missed a few people who we know were on that list of his personally. It becomes unrealistic at a certain point to say, I'm not going to hire anybody who ever might have had an interaction with certain people or said certain things. But the Trump team has made loyalty, in their terms, a pretty top mind focus as they are doing these hires. That is different than here is a list of people we are going to prosecute.

Now, what the incoming attorney general, assuming she gets confirmed, said was we're not targeting people just because of their political party. That gives her a little bit of room on what exactly that might look like. I also don't think that Pam Bondi or Todd Blanche or Emil Bove, who -- all of whom have worked for Trump privately in some capacity, need to, or as a lawyer, need a list. They don't need to be handed something. I mean, he posts things like this so people know what he wants, but I don't think those two things are the same.

TAPPER: Yes, but there's also we're not going to do it for their political beliefs. But for instance --

HABERMAN: Correct.

TAPPER: -- just to throw an example out there, Donald Trump feels wrong --

HABERMAN: Exactly.

TAPPER: -- by the Special Counsel Jack Smith.

HABERMAN: Correct. So we're saying the same thing.

TAPPER: Yes.

HABERMAN: And I think that the political belief thing is a bit of a way of --

TAPPER: It's a wiggle.

HABERMAN: -- being question. Exactly.

TAPPER: Yes.

HABERMAN: And so it may not because people are, you know, registered to a certain political party, but who they are looking at in some cases is likely to relate to their interactions with Donald Trump.

TAPPER: Who -- you said he would miss some people. Who did he miss?

HABERMAN: I think Mike Pompeo was one of the people. I was surprised.

TAPPER: Oh, really?

HABERMAN: There's people he's been very angry at. I don't think he considers him an enemy, but he's been -- he's generally not been embracing of him and made a point of saying that he was not rejoining the administration.

HABERMAN: Maggie Haberman, Happy New Year. Always good to have you. Thank you so much for being here.

Republicans seem confident that every single one of Donald Trump's Cabinet picks are sailing towards confirmation. What are Democrats hearing about the possibility of any Republican defections over the most controversial nominees? We'll talk to a top Democratic lawmaker next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:26:29]

TAPPER: In our politics lead, a crucial week for a crucial Trump cabinet pick. Pam Bondi, who could run the U.S. Justice Department, received high praise from every Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee but faced off in heated exchanges with Democrats on the committee. One of them joins me now, Senator Adam Schiff, Democrat of California.

Senator, you had some tense moments with Pam Bondi yesterday. Let's take a listen first to this moment when you were asking if she would pursue the prosecution of special counsel Jack Smith.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): A summary by the president or his decision desire to investigate Jack Smith would not be enough for you to open an investigation of Jack Smith, is that right?

PAM BONDI, ATTORNEY GENERAL NOMINEE: I will look at the facts and evidence in any case. You know --

SCHIFF: And sitting here --

BONDI: -- 72 percent --

SCHIFF: Sitting here today --

BONDI: Excuse me, Senator, 72 percent of Americans --

SCHIFF: Please, I only have seven minutes.

BONDI: -- have lost faith --

SCHIFF: Sitting here --

BONDI: -- in the Department of Justice.

SCHIFF: -- sitting here today, are you --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Well, what was your take on her answer there? And just to touch base, touch on what something she said there about 72 percent of the American people losing faith in the Justice Department. Do you think Democrats bear any responsibility for that?

SCHIFF: I think the responsibility goes to those who've been trashing the Justice Department and that's what the Republicans have been doing ever since the investigation of Donald Trump by the Justice Department began. They wanted to discredit the FBI, discredit the Justice Department.

No, I think Jack Smith did what he should do, which was follow the facts. Indeed, if there's a criticism I have the department, it was that they took too long to follow those facts where they led. That is also a criticism I have of the courts that willingly allowed President Trump to delay. But in terms of Bondi's testimony, the concern I had, and you got a sense of it there is her unwillingness to answer very simple questions. The question I was asking her there is, are you aware of any factual predicate to open an investigation of Jack Smith?

It should have been the answer, easy answer, no. I similarly asked, are you willing to commit to not destroying evidence in his January 6th investigation? Unwilling to even make that commitment. Unwilling really to say anything she thought might offend Donald Trump's sensibilities. And if she can't answer those simple questions for that fear, then what are we to assume she will do when Trump asks her to do something immoral, unethical or unlawful?

TAPPER: President Biden gave a pretty harsh assessment of the investigation into his son Hunter. He basically threw the Justice Department under the bus there for those investigations. And Democrats, including you, were relentlessly harsh against Special Counsel Robert Hur for making an observation that proved pretty accurate about how Joe Biden might appear to a jury as a well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.

SCHIFF: I was critical of that for good reason. And that is you don't put gratuitous personal observations like that in a prosecutorial memo. You just don't. And it was done for a political reason.

So it's not that, you know, everyone, including special counsels necessarily follow DOJ policy the way I believe they should. And when they don't, I call it out. And as indeed I did, I disagreed with the President's comments about the prosecution of his own son. But nevertheless, I think the discredit that has been brought on the Justice Department has been the product of a multiyear campaign to discredit the Department as some kind of warfare lawfare vehicle, as some kind of deep state, which is deeply damaging nonsense. So I think that's what's really discredited the hard working people in the Justice Department. Now they're going to have one of the leading conspiracy theorists of the deep state, Kash Patel, potentially running the FBI if he's confirmed. And all I could say is God help us if that's the case.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: I think just to -- we can move on. But I -- I think Robert Hur would say he needed to explain why he wasn't going to prosecute President Biden for what he thought was a violation of the law. But -- but let's move on from that subject. Do you think any of Trump's picks are not going to be confirmed? SCHIFF: I really don't know. I think probably those that are on the bubble are people like Kash Patel, Tulsi Gabbard. Those are -- probably those that are in the most potential peril. But they could also be confirmed and maybe confirmed unanimously. There is, I think, a lot of Republican fealty to Donald Trump. We'll see whether anything raises sufficient questions or doubts to break that.

But at the moment, I don't have a lot of optimism, at least from the questions I'm hearing in committee. I don't hear a lot of hard questions coming from the other side of the aisle that would give me confidence that any of these nominees will be subject to the kind of vetting that I believe they should.

TAPPER: Your home state of California, particularly the Los Angeles area where you're from, is still reeling from these horrible fires. What are your priorities as you look to the long road of recovery ahead?

SCHIFF: Several priorities. The first is to get the fires put down. That's the urgent priority. But immediately thereafter, we need to begin the cleanup. We're going to need a lot of help with that, the massive quantities of noxious and hazardous materials. And then we got to speed up the rebuilding process. We can't let this linger for years and years and years.

We're also going to need ultimately a postmortem of what happened here. I favor an independent commission that can look at this objectively from start to finish and make prescriptions for what we need to do to better protect ourselves and make us more resilient against these fires in the future. And of course, overlaying all of that is the reason for these mega fires. And that is climate change. And we can't take our eye off that for a minute.

TAPPER: Senator Adam Schiff from California, thank you so much. Really appreciate it. And let's stay with those fires because as firefighters get some of the California wildfires under control. We're getting a look right now at just how much work is ahead before the rebuilding process can even begin and the massive amount of toxic and hazardous waste the fires left behind. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:36:37]

TAPPER: In our National Lead, today, officials are warning some evacuees of the wildfires that tore through the Los Angeles area that they will not be able to return to their homes for at least another week. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHERIFF ROBERT G. LUNA, LOS ANGELES COUNTY: I'm very empathetic to anyone who wants to get back to their property, but I'm also very empathetic to people who have missing people that they're waiting to find out if they're deceased. It's going to be a while. And it's not going to be in three or four days. I'm going to say at minimum at least another week. And that's an estimate, but I believe it's going to be longer than that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: In addition to searching for the 31 people officials say are reported missing, there's also a vast amount of toxic ash and hazardous household waste that still needs to be cleaned. CNN's Nick Watt is in the Pacific Palisades for us right now. Nick, just a short while ago, the L.A. County Sheriff's Department reopened just a few areas to residents impacted by the fire in Palisades?

NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, not within the burn scar, Jake. These are just the areas surrounding it. You know, there's obviously pressure. People want to get back in, get their stuff, see what's left. But, you know, it's going to take a long time, all of this. You know, we've got 500 EPA workers coming in just to deal with the toxic waste. They're going to have to treat every single lithium ion battery as if it's a piece of unexploded ordnance. They're going to have to deal with the soil. You know, all these toxins that have seeped into the soil.

And then, of course, that's going to take three to six months and then years, frankly, of rebuilding. And meantime, Jake, we're now concerned about potential mudslides. Of course, when all these hillsides get burned, the vegetation goes. You've got a lot of water. I mean, look at that. That's the Santa Monica Mountains behind me, just charred black. So if those slide, that's also an issue. And then we've just heard there's some more heavy wind forecast for next week. But weather forecasts are often wrong, so we'll just put some hope in the fact that forecast is wrong. Jake?

TAPPER: And where does the investigation stand into what caused the Palisades fire specifically?

WATT: Well, were up at the investigation site just yesterday. ATF agents on the ground going, just looking at every single blade of grass and pebble, trying to narrow down the ignition point. They also have apparently 150 leads from homeowners, from witnesses that they're working through. And they're also looking a lot of video. You know, the videos that were taken by hikers up there, also those static cameras that are up there in the mountains, they're looking at all of that. And it's a process of elimination.

So that also, Jake, is going to take a long time. Arson, of course, on the table. Sparks from power lines, of course on the table. They're not saying that they're zeroing in on anything yet. They're very careful about that. They say it's a long process and a process of elimination until we figure out exactly why this started. Jake?

TAPPER: Nick Watt in Pacific Palisades, California, thanks so much.

Let's bring in ATF Director Steven Dettelbach to discuss. Steven, thanks so much for joining us. What evidence has the ATF collected so far in the investigations into what caused either the Palisades fire or the Eaton fire? And is there any sort of working theory?

STEVE DETTELBACH, DIRECTOR, BUREAU OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO, FIREARMS AND EXPLOSIVES: So, not surprisingly, the lead in was accurate. We just have to be very careful. This is an ongoing investigation. What we've done is we deployed ATF's National Response Team. It's the same people who went to Maui. They're trained in wildland fires. These are certified fire investigators. They're -- they're criminal investigators who investigate leads that arise from it. They're forensic specialists. They're people who look at video. There's chemists. A whole array of specialists are out there.

[17:40:14]

The first thing I have to say though is there's still a fire and a pretty serious fire. So, you know, you can imagine that obviously that is the first priority for the first responders that are out there. And that does make it, you know, a little bit harder and takes a little bit longer to get going on the investigation. There's a tremendous amount of information. You heard about some of it in a normal case. These are the people who responded on New Year's Day also to New Orleans because there was a fire, an arson in New Orleans.

We responded to a barge fire in Newark harbor of a massive cargo ship where firefighters lost their lives. So there's a method to this, which is first, obviously you have to make sure that public safety and public health are protected, which is what the first responders do. Then they call us in. If they call us in, we can go and then we'll -- we'll start gathering the evidence we can gather. And you heard some of those things. There's forensic evidence, there's -- there's literally what's on the ground, on the scene.

And then in addition, there'll be leads. And we bring a team of people who -- who -- who follow those leads. They might just be old fashioned investigative or forensic leads. And then, you know, it will take a long time because you can tell already 26,000 acres destroyed. I think we're up to almost a tragedy, like 3,000 structures destroyed. The fire is still raging. The scope of the evidence and the scope of the information is going to be vast. And it will, I warn people, it will take a long time. The most important thing for ATF is to get it right.

TAPPER: So what evidence indicates whether a fire is caused by an accident, like a -- like a person or -- or equipment making a mistake or power lines, or if it was a deliberate act of arson?

DETTELBACH: Well, there's usually four different conclusions that can be reached. One of them is incendiary fire. That's an arson. The second one is accidental fire, right? The third one is natural causes. And the fourth one is indeterminate. You just can't tell from all the evidence. And what we're asked to do as an initial matter is we bring these -- these best experts in the world to come in from ATF and they'll just -- they'll determine the cause and origin of the fire. So understanding, using their expertise, where the fire started, then focusing in on that area. It might be one area. And sometimes there's more than one area where a fire starts.

And -- and using both forensic analysis, in other words, the actual burn patterns and things that occur in the fire, and also the other evidence ring cameras, as you pointed out. And -- and there might be other stationary cameras, there might be dynamic cameras. Putting that all together to try to figure out as best you can where it starts. So each case is different, Jake.

TAPPER: So one of the questions we've heard from many Angelenos who want to go home, but they've been told they can't because it's a possible crime scene. Is -- is that a real thing? Like they can't go to their homes if their homes survive because it's a potential crime scene?

DETTELBACH: Well, right now there is an involved fire. And I assume the number one reason that's preventing people from going home, although I don't know this, because I haven't spoken with the chief out there since they requested us, is that it's not safe for a variety of different reasons. And there are a lot of reasons beyond fire, right, why one of these places might be unsafe. Fire could change. There could be toxins in the air. There could be all sorts of things going on.

If you're in an area like a contained area, let's say there was an arson. We had an arson out there that we sent people to a few years ago as a shoe store, right? That -- that's a -- that's a defined crime scene.

TAPPER: Right.

DETTELBACH: Right. I don't -- I don't know whether the same things --

TAPPER: Yes.

DETTELBACH: -- apply to, you know, a vast swath of Southern California --

TAPPER: Right. That makes sense.

DETTELBACH: -- might apply to a defined crime scene, but there might be some areas --

TAPPER: Right.

DETTELBACH: -- what -- that might be different than other areas.

TAPPER: All right, ATF Director Steven Dettelbach, thank you so much for being here. Really appreciate it.

[17:44:03]

CNN's getting an excuse -- exclusive look at a project aiming to preserve a crucial piece of history. And that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: In our World Lead, January 27th will mark 80 years since the liberation of Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp in Poland where more than 1 million people, most of them Jews, were killed at the hands of the Nazis.

Ahead of that somber date, a new project is preserving an important piece of history that you might recognize from a recent film. The 2023 movie "The Zone of Interest" was inspired by a home right next to that concentration camp where Commandant Rudolf Hoss and his wife raised children and lived a comfortable life while he orchestrated some of the acts of mass murder at Auschwitz.

The house has been privately owned since Auschwitz was liberated. But now, with the help of the counter extremism project, the home is being opened to the public. And CNN's Melissa Bell got an exclusive look inside.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: The blocks of Auschwitz, a view that's now grimly familiar but from a house that until now had never been open to the public before. The home of the camp's longest serving commander, Rudolf Hoss, who lived here with his family. His wife, Hedwig, described it as a paradise in which they were able to raise their five children with a well-tended garden, manicured flower beds, a pool, and a sauna.

[17:50:13]

It's a massive house. And you get a sense of just how comfortable they would have been, the presents, the toys, the domestic joy. Inside, a lot of effort was put into protecting the family from the horrors outside, including frosting on the windows.

JACEK PORSKI, SENIOR ADVISER, COUNTER EXTREMISM PROJECT: So the Hoss family has left couple of those things. One of the most important things that we have found are those trousers that belong to the prisoner, probably a person that died here in this -- in this -- in this place. Yes, you can see the red triangle, which means it was a Jewish political prisoner. But next to this, you can also see this wire that was probably actually a way to be able to wear it for a person that was -- that was starving here.

BELL: The only hint of anything out of the ordinary in this house is down here in the cellar, where this tunnel allowed the commander to go from his idyllic family life to the slaughter he was organizing next door.

BELL (voice-over): Just a couple of hundred yards from the house. Inside the camp, what Rudolf Hoss did was refine the techniques of mass killing. He felt they were too inefficient at Treblinka, so he took the gas chambers and scaled them up here to an industrial level.

BELL: It's really only when you're inside the gas chamber that you get a sense of the horror of this place. More than a million people were killed here, but 900,000 of them died on the very first day that they arrived/.

Back inside the property, everything was done to obscure the sights and the sounds of what was happening just next door. So trees had been grown along the wall so that no one inside the house had to see or understand or know about the horror next door. The point of the house now, though, is going to be to shed light. MARK WALLACE, CEO, COUNTER EXTREMISM PROJECT: We're standing in an ordinary house, quite warm, I might add, while the -- while those that suffered over there froze in a winter like this. The ordinary cannot be extreme. We want to take this place and make sure that extremism is no longer ordinary. The first thing that we did was, OK, we have to open this house to everyone. And symbolically, we said, what can we do?

And we thought putting a mezuzah on the door was the way to do that. It was symbolic that it was fully open to everyone. It's almost as if it's a mezuzah of humanity.

BELL: This month, the world will mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the camp. But by the time this footage was shot by the liberating troops, Rudolf Hoss was on the run. But he was then captured, taken to Nuremberg and then brought back here, where he was hanged from these gallows within sight of his home, that paradise from where he'd run hell.

Melissa Bell, CNN, Auschwitz-Birkenau.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[17:53:52]

TAPPER: And our thanks to Melissa Bell for that powerful story. Our last leads are next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: We have some breaking news. In our last leads, moments ago, SpaceX launched its seventh test flight of Starship. There it is, taking off. And the booster also stuck the landing for the second time. SpaceX successfully guided the booster back to the launch site, catching it between two extended arms, or what they call chopsticks, on the tower. But then -- then there was a problem. The rocket was supposed to orbit and land in the Indian Ocean in the next hour, but something happened. What happened? SpaceX so far has not yet said, and all the data has been lost. We're waiting to learn what went wrong. CNN will have more information on that as it develops.

Meanwhile, Blue Origin, the space company owned by Jeff Bezos, successfully launched its rocket New Glenn into orbit on its maiden flight, a contender to SpaceX. New Glenn carried technology to space to test out communications for Blue Origin's future spacecraft. NASA intends to use that rocket to launch two orbiters to Mars later this spring.

And our Pop Culture Lead today, David Lynch, the visionary director, has died at the age of 78. Known for his surreal and experimental films and T.V., Lynch carved out a unique style with hits such as "Blue Velvet" and "Mulholland Drive" and on T.V. with 'Twin Peaks." Lynch's death was confirmed by his family, who wrote, quote, there's a big hole in the world now that he's no longer with us. But as he would say, keep your eye on the doughnut and not on the hole. May his memory be a blessing. Join me on Monday as the 45th president becomes the 47th president. CNN's live coverage of the inauguration of Donald J. Trump starts at 8:00 a.m. Eastern. I'm going to be joined by our team of reporters and analysts to follow every moment of this historic day. That's again Monday, starting at 8:00 a.m. Eastern right here on CNN.

[18:00:09]

You can follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, and on the TikTok at JakeTapper. You can follow the show on X at TheLeadCNN. If you ever miss an episode of The Lead, you can listen to the show once you get your podcasts.

The news continues now on CNN with Wolf Blitzer right next door in a place I like to call The Situation Room. I'll see you tomorrow.