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Tops U.S. Diplomats Arrive in Saudi Arabia For Peace Talks With Russia; Ukraine Won't Accept Deal Made "Behind Our Backs"; DOGE Team Seeks Access to Personal Taxpayer Data at IRS. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired February 17, 2025 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:01:18]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: We are on the cusp of critical talks happening to end the war in Ukraine, but Ukraine isn't at the table. U.S. officials in Saudi Arabia will sit down with Russian officials just hours from now. We'll talk about what we know regarding this meeting and the U.S. Strategy ahead.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: And Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency wants access to incredibly sensitive taxpayer information at the IRS. A source telling CNN, that access is imminent. But what will Musk and his team do with that personal data once they get it? We're following the very latest.

And on the brink of eruption, right now, experts are keeping their eye on a volcano in Alaska after signs of unrest, as they put it. They say there's a 50-50 chance that it erupts.

We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN News Central.

SANCHEZ: We are now just hours away from the start of face to face meetings between U.S. and Russian officials aimed at ending the war in Ukraine. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and key negotiators are already on the ground in Saudi Arabia.

And today, they met briefly with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the Royal palace in Riyadh ahead of tomorrow's talks. It's important to point out though, who is not at the table, who isn't there as Ukraine, the country that was invaded by Russia, hasn't been invited. Europeans are also being excluded from these talks, prompting them to hold an emergency summit today in Paris. We're going to have more on that meeting a bit later.

Let's begin with CNN's Alex Marquardt in Saudi Arabia. Alex, please set the scene for us. What are you hearing ahead of these talks?

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Boris, we have not seen a meeting like this between the Russians and the Americans for three years now since this war in Ukraine began. So it is going to be remarkable to watch. There's been a fair bit of criticism of the Trump administration, essentially for bringing the Russians in from the cold after they have been shunned by the west, by Europe, by the United States for the past few years.

The defense from the Trump admin is that in order to get to a peace deal, you can't only talk to your friends, you need to talk to adversaries as well. But Boris, I think you're absolutely right. This is about -- as much about who will be at the table as who is not. It is going to be the U.S. and the Russians, along with the Saudis mediating. Of course, most notably, Ukrainians will not be there. We heard from a very frustrated President Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier today saying that he didn't even know about this and saying that he will never agree to anything about Ukraine unless Ukraine has a say.

And then there's the question of Europeans. After all, this war is taking place on the European continent. And Trump's envoy for Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, saying over the weekend very clearly that the Europeans will not have a place at the table. He said, this is going to be between Ukraine and Russia, with the U.S. moderating that discussion. But the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, softened that a little bit on Sunday, saying that the Russians will, or the -- excuse me, the Europeans will have a role. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARCO RUBIO, SECRETARY OF STATE: If it's real negotiations and we're not there yet. But if that were to happen, Ukraine will have to be involved because they're the one that were invaded. And the Europeans will have to be involved because they have sanctions on Putin and Russia as well, and they've contributed to this effort. We're just not there yet.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARQUARDT: The Europeans would say, absolutely, they did contribute to this effort. In fact, the European Union contributed more to Ukraine than the United States has. But the U.S. has consistently said that they will take into consideration all the positions and stances of the Europeans. But this is going to be an effort that is spearheaded by the Americans as this unfolds in the coming days.

[14:05:05]

It's going to be very interesting to see what discussions take place.

But at the same time, we have heard the Secretary of State saying it is going to be several weeks before they know whether the Russians are serious about these conversations. This is not something that we're going to expect to be solved immediately, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Alex Marquardt, live for us in Riyadh. Alex, thanks so much for the update.

Let's pivot and take you to the White House now with White House reporter Kevin Liptak. It seems that President Trump, Kevin, is in a hurry to expedite the end of this war. Is that at the expense potentially of the Europeans and Ukrainians?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yeah, there's no question that President Trump wants to see this ended. And you'll remember, Boris, he actually promised to end the Ukraine war within 24 hours of taking office. Of course, that deadline came and went. But it is very evident that he is in a rush to sit down with President Putin. You heard them talk on the phone for 90 minutes last week. And now, he seems intent on thawing relations with Moscow. And that is generating an enormous amount of concern in Europe.

And just the setting for these talks, I think illustrates that alone. You know, American presidents have sat down with their Russian counterparts in Vienna, in Geneva, in Iceland, but never before in Saudi Arabia, a place that's sort of separate and apart from the European continent.

And I think that illustrates sort of the concerns that Russians had about hosting this meeting in the very continent where the conflict is unfolding. And I think it just illustrates sort of the intent of -- by President Trump to come to a solution that he thinks can end this conflict. But when you listen to President Zelenskyy, the real concern is what security guarantees will Ukraine get out of these negotiations?

You've already seen the United States offer up this proposal whereby they would receive some of Ukraine's rare earth minerals, but they didn't come along with the security guarantees that Zelenskyy was necessarily hoping for. So I think there are a lot of questions going forward about how exactly does the United States and how does President Trump bring Zelenskyy along in these negotiations to secure a lasting peace.

Similarly, in Europe, the United States expects the Europeans to play a role in the post war Ukraine. But at this point, they aren't at the table to actually determine what that settlement will look like.

And I think that's part of the reason why you see the French President, Emmanuel Macron, bringing together European leaders in Paris today at this emergency summit to try and ascertain where exactly they stand.

Now, we do understand that Macron spoke to Trump for about 20 minutes before convening those meetings. We also are now learning that the British Prime Minister will be at the White House in the coming week to talk to the president as they all try and get on the same page on this conflict and ending it as soon as possible.

SANCHEZ: Really significant details there about communication between European officials and the White House. Kevin Liptak, thank you so much.

Let's get the latest on this emergency summit in Paris. That's where we find CNN's Melissa Bell. And Melissa, you just spoke with NATO Secretary General. What did he share with you?

MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, he was coming out of this very hastily convened meeting. Clearly, Europeans were blindsided by what they heard over the course of the weekend, met here to try and figure out how they're going to continue to weigh not just on the negotiations by the future of Ukraine, but European security generally.

And what Mark Rutte, who's the Secretary General, just told us as he came out, said, in fact, the meeting had been very positive. Europeans are agreed on the fact that they need to increase in line with what President Trump has been asking for many years now, their defense spending as a proportion, their GDP. He suggested they need to get to 5%. Many of them are determined to do so.

But the real question, the heart this meeting was how can they continue to be relevant to this fight for Ukraine? What the secretary General said was that he believes that whilst it is important that these negotiations get underway initially between the United States and Russia, ultimately it will be important that Ukrainians find themselves around that table. And the table after all that will be deciding on the future, not just of the 6 million Ukrainians, Boris, currently living under Russian occupation, but the entire country and its future.

I asked him also about the U.S. Defense Secretary's comments in Brussels last week, the fact that he did not see Ukraine's future in nature. Remember that this was not only the position of the former American administration, but also considered one of the key pieces of leverage that Ukrainians might have going into negotiations about their future. What the secretary General had to say was that the American position is now that that should not be a part of the negotiations of a peace deal, but it does not mean that Ukraine will not be joining NATO ultimately. He believes that it will in that process is well underway, Boris?

[14:10:03]

SANCHEZ: Melissa Bell reporting for us live from Paris. Thank you so much, Melissa. Brianna?

KEILAR: With us now to talk more about these developments, we have Jeffrey Edmonds. He's a former director for Russia at the National Security Council. He served under both the Obama and Trump administrations. He's also a senior fellow at the center for a New American Security.

Jeff, thank you so much for being with us. How are you seeing this? Is the U.S. reading this right, having talks without Ukraine?

JEFFREY EDMONDS, FORMER DIRECTOR FOR RUSSIA, NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL: I don't think they are. I think that Ukraine -- I mean, Ukraine has a vote in this. I think there's this misperception that we can just stop things or that we're in complete control of the situation.

But like I said, Ukraine has a vote. But what I think is more important is that I don't think that anything meaningful is going to come out of these negotiations or any negotiations as long as Putin believes that he's winning and that he can achieve his goals.

As long as that's the case, he's going to use these as a distraction and going to continue to push in the East. SANCHEZ: So talk a little bit more about what you would expect to see

then. So how does he actually view these talks?

EDMONDS: Well, I think Putin, you know, if we're talking about Putin, he views these talks as a way of getting out of isolation. This weakens the, you know, the basically the coalition or the group of countries that have come together to oppose Russia. It weakens that to a degree.

And so I think he thinks these are wonderful. And I -- Putin's always willing to talk, right? It's whether or not he's actually willing to do anything. And I think he's going to use it as a distraction as long as he thinks he can achieve the goals he set out in the beginning. And that's a Ukraine that is not oriented towards the West. It's oriented towards Russia.

SANCHEZ: When Putin hears Trump say that basically legitimizing their concerns about NATO expansion or NATO on their doorstep, saying that they should be able to rejoin the G8, and he hears, initially at least, Defense Secretary Hegseth taking NATO membership off the table in these talks, along with other important potentially bargaining chips. How does Putin read that kind of rhetoric coming from the U.S.?

EDMONDS: I mean, I think he wants to take advantage of it. These are all the things -- this is the narrative that, you know, has been coming out of the Kremlin for decades, that NATO expansion has been a threat to Russia, even though it's not. And that the only reason this is happening is because of NATO's actions. And that's just simply not true. So I think he's going to take advantage of these as much as he can.

But again, as long as he believes he can get what he wants the way that he wants to get it, he's going to keep pushing in the East.

KEILAR: So Ukrainian President Zelenskyy is -- he's making no bones about it. He's very unhappy with how this is going down. And he's saying, they're not going to agree to anything brokered about Ukraine without Ukraine. How are you reading that? I mean, is he really in a position to say, no, I'm not going along with anything you guys come up with?

EDMONDS: Right. I think he is. I mean, clearly, Ukraine is dependent on U.S. and European aid. But that doesn't mean that if that stops or it gets diminished, that they have to stop fighting. They can still continue to fight. But I also think it's important to realize that, you know, our aid, Europeans aid, that's necessary but not necessarily sufficient.

I mean, the Ukrainians themselves have to bring more troops to the front and have to really dig deeper when it comes to this war because it's a really competition over manpower at this point. So there's a lot that plays into this. But I -- again, I mean, he has a vote on whether or not Ukraine listens to Trump or listens to Putin. And I don't think the Ukrainians are in a place where they feel like capitulating to Putin.

SANCHEZ: So how do you see this playing out?

EDMONDS: I think that we're going to continue to give aid. I think that the Ukrainians, again, need to bolster the front line and survive. It's not clear -- the real driver here is the fact that the Russians are still making incremental progress at tremendous cost. What's unclear to most is how long Russia can continue to do this.

I mean, I'm hesitant to say that's going to, you know, they can stop, you know, they'll have to stop within months. I don't know that. I think sometime during 2025, they're going to have to pause given the rate at which they're losing troops. But I think -- for now, anyway --

KEILAR: And why is it -- is there no -- you think there's no appetite inside of Russia for that with the economy? What is your calculus for why there's -- there may not be an appetite for that?

EDMONDS: I think there's -- Russia has a pretty deep bench when it comes to personnel, and it's deeper than the Ukrainians. And I think that the Kremlin and, you know, Putin and his, you know, the leadership in Russia believe that they can outlast Ukraine. And the Russian people have now, you know, in large part, bought into this narrative that is not their fault and that they need to follow through on this war with Ukraine. So there's no real opposition in Russia to this even you know, the tremendous number of personnel that have been lost.

KEILAR: Well, we're at a very interesting point. Jeff, thank you so much. We really appreciate you. Jeff Edmonds, thank you.

EDMONDS: Thank you.

KEILAR: Still to come, some news CNN reporting about how Elon Musk's DOGE team is expected to get imminent access to some very sensitive information at the IRS. What this could mean for you? Plus, doctors giving an update on the health of Pope Francis, why his treatment plan had to be changed?

We'll have that and much more coming up on CNN News Central.

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[14:19:38]

SANCHEZ: Elon Musk's government efficiency team might soon be able to see the personal and financial information of millions of Americans by accessing a critical data system at the IRS. And we're told that access is expected to be granted imminently. The system holds data so sensitive that punishment for improper use could lead to prison time.

KEILAR: CNN Chief National Affairs Correspondent Jeff Zeleny is with us now on this story.

[14:20:01]

All right, Jeff, just walk us through so we can understand what this system is, the kind of information that it contains? And why DOGE wants to get into it?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, as President Trump spends his President's Day here in Mar-A-Lago, his team is still working in various factions of the government. And the IRS is only the latest example of the agencies that this Department of Government Efficiency have gone into to look at the programs and to access some of the software. But the reason, of course, the IRS is more sensitive than other programs is because it contains so much personal information, so much personal data from Americans as they file their tax returns.

Now, the White House is pushing back on the criticism here that this information should not be available to the DOGE people. White House Spokesman Harrison Fields is telling CNN this. He said, "Waste, fraud, and abuse have been deeply entrenched in our broken system for far too long. It takes direct access to the system to identify and to fix it." So of course, that's the White House pushing back on this. But there are Democratic senators who are sounding the alarm on this. This could be one more example of a legal case here. But if the access is granted, the question is what happens with that?

So what we're speaking about here is really just a variety of things, but it's a particular software that the IRS has that has access to the IRS filings, access to the data that Americans have. It also allows access to adjustment of transaction data. It automatically generates notices, collection documents and other outputs.

So translating all of that into English, it has the information that Americans have when they send in to the IRS. Many people right now are likely filing their taxes. The April 15th deadline is just less than a couple months away. So that's why this is particularly sensitive to so many people here. So we will see if access is granted. And we have limited sort of view into the IRS.

It's one of those agencies where we really don't have a lot of a vision into what's going on there. But we are hearing from some IRS employees and others who are very concerned about this. So once again, one more example here of DOGE and Elon Musk going inside these agencies for better or worse. Boris and Brianna?

SANCHEZ: Jeff Zeleny live for us in West Palm Beach. Thank you so much.

As DOGE eyes the IRS, we're learning a second federal judge has now declined to block Musk's team from potentially accessing government data. This after federal employees sued over the server that was used to send out government wide emails to offer so called buyout packages to thousands of workers. Musk's efforts to access sensitive government systems have faced a slew of legal challenges on privacy grounds. Let's discuss with former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Tom Dupree.

Tom, thank you so much for being with us. So we've learned that Judge Randolph Moss, he's the second federal judge. And he declined to block DOGE potentially accessing this government data. Just right off the bat, what's the standard for blocking or limiting DOGE access to these sensitive systems?

TOM DUPREE, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: Sure. Well, what the challengers to DOGE have to show is, number one, that they're likely to win on their legal claims, namely to show that Musk and his team are violating federal law. And the other thing they need to show is they need to show some sort of irreparable harm that they will suffer if they don't get an immediate order stopping Musk. And it's that second point that's tripped up some of the challenges that we've seen in that there are federal judges, some of whom are Biden appointees, not conservatives by any stretch, and they seem generally sympathetic to the arguments that are being made against Musk. But where they're getting hung up is on what they see as the challenger's failure to show that they're about to suffer some sort of irreparable permanent injury in if they don't get an emergency order shutting down Elon Musk.

SANCHEZ: What have the arguments been from these folks about the damage that could be caused? In other words, what is their argument to prove standing in a case like this?

DUPREE: Sure, it depends on the case. But generally speaking, they fall into certain categories. One is some of the challengers are arguing that Trump is basically dismantling federal agencies, he's firing federal workers on mass, and that as a practical matter, you just can't reconstitute an agency. You can't get it back up and running. You can't bring all the workers back in and have them just pick up their jobs like nothing ever happened. The other type of harm people are claiming is the disclosure of private information.

I suspect that's going to be a key challenge if one is forthcoming on the IRS issue that we just discussed.

[14:25:04]

That's the other angle that people are saying is that they're saying Musk is a private citizen. He doesn't have the right to access this highly confidential information without getting some sort of official government position or at least express permission to access it.

SANCHEZ: So at this point, at least one of these efforts, this test of Trump's power to fire federal employees, is headed to the Supreme Court. Trump is now trying to remove this Biden appointed special counsel. How do you think the court is going to rule?

DUPREE: Yeah. You know, Trump may get a sympathetic audience at the United States Supreme Court in this particular case. This concerns whether or not Congress can basically place limits on a president's ability to fire these high ranking political appointees. It's an issue that the Supreme Court, frankly, has been wrestled with over the decades. It's been settled law that you can place certain limits, but presidents have always chafed at those restrictions. And the tide may be turning a bit. And it wouldn't surprise me if we see at least some justices, maybe, maybe not a majority, but there are going to be some justices on the Supreme Court who I think are going to be sympathetic to Trump's argument that he does have (inaudible) the senior political appointees. SANCHEZ: Tom, I think there's also a question of the executive's

relationship with the legislative branch. And it has to do with this issue of impoundment, right? It's going to be central to Trump's attempts to block funding to agencies and programs that Congress has already allocated money for. So if you could help us understand the Impoundment Act, and I wonder if you think Trump can somehow find a way to work around it.

DUPREE: Yeah. Well, this question actually really gets at the heart of our Constitution, and specifically the separation of powers. Congress, under our Constitution, has powers of the purse, meaning the ability to spend money and say certain funds have to be spent on certain activities.

On the other hand, of course, it's the executive branch, the President, who is constitutionally tasked with actually executing and carrying out these laws. And so what we're seeing now in this debate over impoundment is whether if Congress says, we want to spend money on something, here's what it's used for. Does the President really have any discretion simply to say, you know, I'm not going to spend the money that way, I'm not going to carry out those programs, you want me to carry out? I think what we're going to see is a whole flurry of legal challenges, basically saying the President is not discharging his duty to carry out the laws enacted by Congress. The President is going to come back and say, under the Constitution, I have the power to decide what I want to enforce and what I don't want to enforce. There are going to be lots of battles. And ultimately, this is going to get channeled up to the Supreme Court of the United States for resolution.

SANCHEZ: We're going to have a lot to talk about, I suspect, in the near future. Tom Dupree, thanks so much for joining us.

DUPREE: Thank you.

SANCHEZ: Still ahead, Pope Francis set to remain in the hospital longer than expected. We have new details on the pontiff's condition during a live report. We'll take you to Rome next.

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