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Trump Admin Fires Thousands Of Probationary Federal Workers; 7th Prosecutor Resigns Over DOJ Order To Drop Mayor Adams Case; Rep. Nick LaLota (R-NY) Discusses About His Take On Cutting Staff At SBA; NTSB On Midair Crash: Chopper Crew Likely Wore Night Vision Goggles; NTSB: Chopper Crew May Not Have Heard Some Calls From Control Tower. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired February 14, 2025 - 15:00   ET

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

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: This latest round of termination has targeted probationary workers, those who've been on the job for less than a year or two and have fewer protections than other federal employees. CNN's Rene Marsh is joining us now with more on this story.

Rene, talk to us about these new developments.

RENE MARSH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: So, I will say that this - let's take a step back. So, these firings started happening earlier this week. But now fast forward to Friday and things have certainly ramped up. Each day we hear about a new agency and we're hearing about thousands of more firings and the labor unions themselves, because this is happening so quickly, they're still trying to wrap their arms around exactly what is the full scale and scope of this to get some final numbers.

But here is what we know right now. We know that more than a thousand were fired from Veterans Affairs. We know 2,000 were fired from the Energy Department. Nearly 1,300 from the Centers for Disease Control, 3,400 from U.S. Forest Service.

And then, I'm just getting this now, so bear with me as I read from my phone. Employees at the Interior Department are now beginning to get word in this text message that a staff member received from a colleague, and this is time stamped at 2:39, so not - a short time ago, saying, I've just been notified.

So, this person had been asked to do a project within the agency and now she's informing her colleague, I can't do what you asked me to do because I've just been told that I have been fired. And again, this is what the President has promised, and this is what Elon Musk's DOGE has promised, which is this rapid shrinking of the federal government.

And again, prior to this week, the conversation was about employees being placed on paid administrative leave, and now we're talking about thousands and thousands and thousands of federal employees being fired from their jobs.

And just to give you a sense of the type of jobs that we're seeing people being impacted, U.S. forestry, for example, they are in charge of maintaining grasslands and public forests. We've heard President Trump talk a lot about this during the conversations about wildfires and the need to maintain the floor of the forest in order to get a handle on these wildfires.

Well, I spoke with someone - a source there at the U.S. forestry, and they said, look, without these individuals who usually serve as our reserve, we may likely, when the peak season comes around, have to rely on private contractors, and that's coming at a higher cost.

SANCHEZ: Yes.

MARSH: Making the point that having government workers be your resource as opposed to private contractors is not necessarily more efficient.

Also at the VA, spoke with the union who points me to an employee who was fired, and she served as sort of a customer service agent at one of these vet centers. It's a community-based clinic, which essentially helps these veterans find mental health care. So, that's just a flavor of the type of jobs and the type of employees who we are seeing impacted by this dramatic shrinking of the federal government, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Yes, and it's happening right now. I wouldn't be surprised if you got more text messages as the day progressed.

MARSH: Yes.

SANCHEZ: Rene Marsh, thanks so much for that reporting. Brianna?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Another big story that we're following, turmoil at the Justice Department after a seventh federal prosecutor quits for refusing to follow orders to drop corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams. And now, some of them are calling out DOJ leadership in scathing resignation letters. CNN Senior Justice Correspondent Evan Perez is live with more on this.

Evan, what's this latest attorney who has resigned saying?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, this is a scathing letter, and it really does call into question the leadership of the Justice Department and the entire reason why this is being done this day. This is a spiraling crisis at this hour, and we're still waiting to see which lawyer is going to be willing to put their name on the document to dismiss these charges. That's probably - that needs to happen perhaps in the coming hours.

I'll read you just this letter - a piece of this letter from Hagan Scotten. He's an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York. One of these public corruption prosecutors who has - was on this case and was finally put in a position where he decided to walk out, and he said the following.

He said, "Any assistant U.S. attorney would know that our laws and traditions do not allow using the prosecutorial power to influence other citizens, much less elected officials in this way. If no lawyer within earshot of the President is willing to give him that advice, then I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool, or enough of a coward to file your motion. But it was never going to be me."

Now, Scotten's point here is this: The Justice Department, Emil Bove, who is the acting deputy attorney general, has been going around trying to find someone to dismiss this case. He began with the acting U.S. attorney here in New York at the Southern District.

[15:05:05]

She refused. She resigned. Other people in the office also declined to do this. He moved the case to Washington, to the Public Integrity Section, where three officials last night decided to leave, to resign instead of doing this. And today, we saw Scotten do the same thing.

So now, Brianna, at this point, we don't know who is going to sign this. In the end, what Donald Trump wants is for this case to be dropped because he wants leverage over Eric Adams, the mayor here, to help with immigration. Brianna?

KEILAR: And is there reaction to these federal prosecutors resigning?

PEREZ: Yes. Look, there's a fierce reaction. Just in this past few hours, we know that public integrity lawyers in Washington had a meeting with Emil Bove, again, the acting deputy attorney general, where he told them they needed to find someone. And there was a big discussion where they were trying to decide who - whether they were going to resign or not.

So, at this hour, we don't know whether one of those people is going to step up. But what you're having is essentially a standoff between the leadership, the acting leadership of the Justice Department and the public integrity lawyers in Washington.

KEILAR: All right, really interesting. Evan Perez, thank you for that. Boris?

SANCHEZ: We have a lot to discuss with Republican Congressman Nick LaLota of New York. He's a member of the House Appropriations Committee and the Small Business Committee.

Congressman, thanks so much for being with us.

I want to start there with small businesses. The Small Business Administration is apparently being hit by these layoffs. Did you have an opportunity to advise DOGE on that process and what do you think might come from cutting staff at the SBA?

REP. NICK LALOTA (R-NY): Yes. So, no, while I haven't had any direct conversations with DOGE about this, it doesn't come to anybody's surprise that the Trump administration is looking to downsize the size and scope of our federal government. Of course, now we're spending more money, 25 percent or so, more than we spent as a federal government than we did before the pandemic. The President campaigned on and got overwhelmingly elected on a number of things, border security being at the top of the list, but also reducing the size and scope of government and I expect he'll do more of this. SANCHEZ: We did learn that some of the staff at SBA accidentally received termination notices. Apparently some clerical errors were made there. There have been errors at other places. Do you think this process may just be moving too fast? Should it be handled more carefully to avoid errors like that?

LALOTA: Listen, it's unfortunate those errors didn't in fact happen. There are 3 million federal employees in our system, many of whom are good, hardworking people, patriotic people who want to advance the nation's interests. But time is of the essence, we're a nation that's 2 trillion - that has a $2 trillion deficit, $36 trillion in debt. That's the cause for much of the inflation that American families are feeling and we have to reduce the size and scope of government, and it has to start right now.

SANCHEZ: Congressman, in the Oval Office earlier this week, Elon Musk himself acknowledged that accidents - mistakes are going to happen. How is Congress tracking those mistakes? Do you think there's enough oversight over DOGE? For example, do you know why they need to access these sensitive payment programs that keep millions of Americans' personal financial information?

LALOTA: Yes. So, we're a $7 trillion entity, the United States federal government. We welcome oversight in Congress, especially. We celebrate it. We want to ensure that the executive branch conducts the payments properly, regardless of which party controls Congress or the administration. And we welcome outside help from Musk and others who have a successful track record of building good and strong and efficient companies to help us manage these $7 trillion.

Like I said earlier, we have to get back to basics if we're going to reduce ...

SANCHEZ: Sure.

LALOTA: ... the deficit, reduce the debt and ultimately reduce the inflation that's crushing so many middle-class American families.

SANCHEZ: It sounds, Congressman, like you welcome the oversight. I wonder if you think Elon Musk does. Should he testify before Congress to talk about what he's doing at DOGE?

LALOTA: You know, maybe that day will come for the right - relevant committee, but we should all be on the same page, Republicans and Democrats, with making government more efficient. This ought not to be a one-party priority. One man ought not to be demonized along the way. I realize that some of my friends on the left don't like cutting spending. That's unfortunate, given where we are, a budget that's much bigger than what it was just a small number of years ago. We should have a bipartisan push to reduce the size of government and, yes, to conduct oversight of those who would endeavor to do so.

SANCHEZ: I am curious about how you feel about having the richest man on earth, someone that has business not only with the Pentagon but with even U.S. adversaries, having the power to overrule spending that Congress has already appropriated. [15:10:12]

You sit on the Appropriations Committee. DOGE is attempting to cut off money that's already been allocated. Do you think that DOGE is superseding the authority of Congress?

LALOTA: So, I don't use rich as a negative - the gentleman has earned a lot of success in our great capitalistic economy as a self-made individual. And we should want to, as a federal government, welcome people into that system who want to make this more efficient so that we can have more prosperity as a country, offer more opportunities to our kids and grandkids. We should continue to do so - to do that.

And by the way, plenty of elected officials involved in the process, plenty of Senate-confirmed individuals involved in the process to carry through the will of the American people, by having an advisor who is so savvy at business and has created so much business success, we as a nation should want to welcome that.

SANCHEZ: I am curious about you describing him as an advisor because DOGE attempted to cut off funding for USAID, for example. That was frozen by a federal judge. He's not just advising. And on the note about his wealth, it's not really a question of whether he should be rich or not, that's a separate conversation. And candidly, I don't care, it's more a conversation about the business that he does with foreign governments like China, U.S. adversaries, and whether there's any conflict of interest in him having handle over what these government agencies do, given that some of them are tied to what he's doing with his business. You don't see any concern? You don't see any problem with that?

LALOTA: Well, I don't care that he's rich. I only brought that up because you brought that up in describing him in your first few words with that characteristic, so I don't care about it. I'm happy to hear that now you don't care about it either. However, the water that he's carrying is exactly what the President campaigned upon. This should be no surprise to anybody.

The President of the United States, President Trump, campaigned on, promised and won the popular vote in every swing vote, every swing state's vote, for a lot of different policy priorities, including reducing the size and scope of government. Elon Musk is an ally to that end and nobody ought to be surprised about this.

SANCHEZ: But there's a difference, sir, between electing President Trump to carry out this mission of reducing government waste, one that I think a lot of people would support and having someone who is unelected, who does business at a very high level with, again, the Pentagon and with even U.S. adversaries, guiding what these agencies do, especially how they spend their money. You don't see that, like, maybe having the goal of cutting waste could interfere with having someone at the controls that may have a conflict of interest with how they guide those agencies and where that money goes.

LALOTA: So, I'll say two things in response to that. First, Elon Musk was granted a top-secret clearance in 2022 under the Biden administration, so apparently his trustworthiness was assessed during that time, and a thumbs up was given to him because he got that clearance. But second, I don't think there's a bipartisan consensus on reducing the size and scope of government, as you said, and some of my colleagues on the left have ...

SANCHEZ: I said a lot of people would support it, to be clear. Also, a top-secret security clearance doesn't hand him the ability to freeze funding to federal programs.

LALOTA: If I may - if I may ...

SANCHEZ: I just want to be clear, because you're putting words in my mouth, Congressman.

LALOTA: If I may, there's not a bipartisan - thank you, there's not yet a bipartisan consensus ...

SANCHEZ: I didn't say there was.

LALOTA: ... on reducing the size of federal government. There should be, but I think that the demonization of this one personality is a distraction from the core issue, that we must reduce the size and scope of government if we're going to reduce our deficit, our debt and ultimately the inflation that's crushing Americans' families every day.

The Elon Musk personality thing is a distraction from the main issue on which there should be a bipartisan consensus.

SANCHEZ: Sir, I'm not questioning his personality. It doesn't even have to be Elon Musk himself. It could be just another individual that has the ability to simultaneously conduct business with the Pentagon and with American adversaries, and then guide where spending is going in the U.S. government without seeming to have actual oversight over what he's doing, without testifying before Congress. He was not elected, he was ...

LALOTA: Sure, if your very ...

SANCHEZ: Go ahead.

LALOTA: If very acute inference is that somehow his dealings could lead to a conflict of interest, everybody: Republican, Democrat, Independent should join in rebutting that and ensure there are no bona fide conflict of interest. But the real issue here is those who would oppose spending cuts. And that is the real issue and the distraction that occurs from focusing so much on one individual.

[15:15:04]

SANCHEZ: Congressman Nick LaLota, we have to leave the conversation there. Please keep us posted if you're able to persuade Mr. Musk to testify before Congress.

LALOTA: Will do. Have a good day.

SANCHEZ: Thanks so much.

Still to come, the Pope is hospitalized and being treated for bronchitis. We're going to tell you what the Vatican is now saying about his condition.

Plus, an update on the tragic midair plane collision in Washington, D.C. What the NTSB just revealed to reporters.

And later, the horrifying moment a humpback whale swallows and then spits out a kayaker. That and much more coming up on CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

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[15:20:03]

SANCHEZ: The NTSB says it has now finished the on-scene part of the investigation into that midair crash near Reagan National Airport last month. Officials just gave an update saying that they now believe the crew in the Army helicopter that collided with a passenger jet was wearing night vision goggles. This is just one of several revelations from the briefing.

Remember, all 64 people on board the American Airlines plane and three service members in the chopper were killed. CNN Aviation Correspondent Pete Muntean is live for us at NTSB headquarters, where the briefing just wrapped.

Pete, what did you learn?

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN TRANSPORTATION CORRESPONDENT: Major new detail after major new detail here, Boris, and a really new narrative from National Transportation Safety Board Jennifer Homendy, who gave this first briefing since the week of that January 29th midair collision. And for the first time, we are getting details from the combined voice and data recorder on board that U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter, pretty big headlines here from that recorder.

The biggest thing is that the altimeter, the radar altimeter on board that helicopter, showed the helicopter at 278 feet at the time of that crash. But now investigators are looking into whether the crew on board that helicopter was actually referencing the radar altimeter, which uses a radio beam, bounces it off the ground and back to the helicopter to give the altitude above ground level, or if they were looking at their barometric altimeter, the standard altimeter that pilots use to determine their altitude above sea level. This is a really interesting discrepancy here, and the NTSB says that is something they will look into.

Also, we heard from NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy that this crew, they believe, was wearing night vision goggles. That is key because night vision goggles can actually severely limit the scope of view, which would be a factor in alleviating the impending midair collision that was unfolding in front of them. Also hearing from the National Transportation Safety Board that the instructor pilot on board the Black Hawk helicopter noted to the student who was on a check ride at the time that the altitude earlier in the route, before they reached the point of collision, was at three or four hundred feet.

Remember, the helicopter route that goes through the busy national airport airspace is limited to 200 feet. So a whole new can of worms here that the NTSB is opening up, and they say they are just at the beginning of their investigation. They say it's way too soon to speculate if the crew of the Black Hawk helicopter had the full whole view of whether or not they were at the right or wrong altitude, and now the NTSB is looking into that.

They've also been looking into the wreckage that has been gathered at Reagan National Airport, all of the salvage operation that took place in the Potomac River. They're looking at witness marks now to try and determine the actual angle of the collision. What is clear is that the crew of American Airlines Flight 5342 realized in the last second that this collision was about to happen. The crew pulled back on the control column, deflected the elevator on the tail to near its maximum position, NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy says and tried to avoid this collision. Apparently it was a futile job that they tried to do, and all 67 people perished in this very sad crash.

SANCHEZ: Pete Muntean, thank you so much for the update live from NTSB headquarters. Brianna?

KEILAR: Let's get some expert analysis from CNN Aviation Analyst Peter Goelz. He's a former managing director of the NTSB.

Peter, really interesting here, obviously a strong possibility the Black Hawk crew was wearing night vision goggles, and then there's multiple instances we learned where they may not have heard the full transmission from air traffic control, including when the crew was told to pass behind the passenger jet. Pass behind the - those key words may not have been received by the Black Hawk crew. The instructor pilot telling the pilot flying they believed that air traffic control was asking for the helicopter to move left towards the east bank of the Potomac. Your takeaway from learning those things?

PETER GOELZ, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, Brianna, this press conference was chock full of new information, and information that underscores the complexity of this investigation. This is not going to be an easy task. It's a hard job to figure out how this helicopter was off course. And I think that the tip off early on, Brianna, was where Chairman Homendy indicated that before the key bridge, and a few moments (INAUDIBLE) 300- and 400-foot altitude discrepancy seen within the cockpit.

And it's not clear, you know, whether they were referencing, as Pete indicated, the barometric altitude or the radar beam - radio altitude.

[15:25:05]

Which altitude was triggering the pilot's actions? And the idea that they were wearing the night vision goggles further complicates the situation. You have to be scanning left and right all the time to get peripheral vision, and the goggles can be confusing in a crowded airspace in an urban area where you've got a lot of lighting coming up, so this was a very revealing press conference, which underscored just how tough this investigation is going to be.

KEILAR: And sorry, Peter, you actually cut out there for a moment, but I know really just a moment, but it was a key one where you were saying that at one point - well before, right? I mean, a ways away up the Potomac where the pilot who was flying says they're at 300 feet, the instructor pilot says they're at 400 feet, and neither pilot comments on the discrepancy.

GOELZ: Right.

KEILAR: I mean, can you think of a reason why something like that - like what are the possibilities? Are they not paying attention to each other? Is - are those the two different altimeter readings? I mean, you take us through the possibilities of that discrepancy and then not dealing with the discrepancy are.

GOELZ: Well, prior to the key bridge where this discrepancy was noted, they've got a little bit of leeway, but, you know, it's still a crowded airspace. They may have been distracted, they may have been focused on other issues, but I think she indicated this discrepancy for a reason, that that's where the flight started to go off course.

And well - then, they followed it almost in a tick-tock fashion right up to the collision. But you're right, I mean, that it was not highlighted by the crew is a concerning matter.

KEILAR: And then, Homendy says that 20 seconds before the crash, radio transmission from the air traffic control tower was audible in both the plane and the Black Hawk CVR, the recorder, with what's called a conflict alert playing in the background. Tell us what that means.

GOELZ: Well, I mean, first of all, it underscores a challenge that the flight crews from both planes, the plane and the helicopter could hear the air traffic control, but they couldn't hear the response and that's a concerning issue. And, well, it's not uncommon in crowded airspace to have transmissions what they call stepped on. You know, a person inside the cockpit could be keying the microphone to send out a transmission and that steps on the sound. But what it meant was that the Black Hawk did - might not have heard a key part of the instructions from the controller to pass behind the RJ.

KEILAR: Incredible what we have learned today. Peter Goelz, thank you so much for being with us.

GOELZ: Thank you.

KEILAR: Vice President JD Vance meeting with the President of Ukraine as Volodymyr Zelenskyy urges the U.S. not to make any decisions about Ukraine without Ukraine.

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