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Trump to Announce Sweeping New Tariffs at White House; CNN Projects Liberal Judge Wins in Wisconsin, GOP Holds Florida Seats; Film Star Val Kilmer Dead at 65. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired April 02, 2025 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Today is the day President Trump set to announce his sweeping tariff plan, a plan that's still a mystery, but one the White House says will take effect immediately. What world leaders and U.S. consumers are now bracing for.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Democrats get a jolt, a boost, if you will, in Wisconsin. Republicans win in deep red Florida District, but with a warning, details on President Trump's first big test at the polls.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And from Batman to Iceman with Jim Morrison in between. Val Kilmer, a brilliant and complicated actor, has passed away at the age of 65.

I'm John Berman with Sara Sidner and Kate Bolduan. This is CNN News Central.

BOLDUAN: Liberation day is upon us, or at least that is what President Trump is calling it. No matter the name, the point is this. Today, he is preparing to escalate his trade war in a big way, unveiling aggressive new tariffs on countries around the world. The markets, well, already reacting, futures down once again. One top investor saying this quote, I'm not sure we're going to be liberated from all the uncertainty.

We know where and when this will be happening. Trump will be making the announcement this afternoon at the White House in what is actually going to be the first Rose Garden news conference of his second term.

But beyond that is pretty much still a mystery. How steep are the tariffs going to be? Don't know. What countries will be hit with them? Don't know what products and industries will be impacted? You get the point. And, remember, on top of this, the president also plans to impose a 25 percent tariff on all foreign-made cars and car parts beginning tomorrow.

On top of this, let's add some more. This morning, a critical election in Wisconsin still being dissected, giving the president a tough reality check, and giving Democrats a reason to celebrate after liberals maintained their narrow majority on that swing state Supreme Court, despite the millions of dollars that Elon Musk and affiliated groups poured into the race. CNN's Alayna Treene joining us now from the White House, and there's a lot that is about to be going down at the White House today. What are you preparing for?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Well, look, we know that yesterday the president spent much of that day with his top policy advisers, really huddled with them, working out and perfecting, as the White House called it, the final announcement for these tariffs.

Now, you noted that it's going to be in the Rose Garden, that it's going to come with a kind of pomp and circumstance. We know that the president really wants this event to have. It's notable that this is the first Rose Garden event that he is doing. That is, of course, by design, as is some of the questions around what this is actually going to look like.

Part of it is, again, they were working up until the 11th hour, and also the president was continuing to receive pitches. I was told up until the 11th hour, really, on this plan, but then also they want it to be kind of unveiled in secrecy until he makes that announcement.

Now, one other thing about that, a Rose Garden ceremony today, is that it was actually previously scheduled to be around 3:00 P.M. The White House had pushed it back to 4:00 P.M. That's a notable change because that means it is now going to be made when the markets are closed. So, one thing to, you know, keep in mind there.

But, look, the thing with these tariffs is there's a couple things that I've heard floated from different Trump administration officials. One is, could it be on individual countries? Could it be a universal across the board tariff? We've heard even as high as 20 percent. I mean, what we are going to learn today could really, Kate, reshape not only U.S. economy, but global economies.

Now, one of the key criticisms I've heard and really what the White House has struggled to articulate when it comes to these tariffs is what is the endgame, what is the big, you know, policy, strategy that the president is looking at. We've heard this now from people on Capitol Hill, Republicans and Democrats alike, economists, financial experts, trading partners, of course, really trying to figure out what the long-term strategy here is.

And we heard really the White House, again, kind of struggle to answer that, what they've said. And we heard White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, go through this yesterday, his point to his past term, his first administration, and said, you should trust him, that is the justification for this, but not really giving a lot of the clarity that I think a lot of people are looking for, as we continue to see a lot of this uncertainty.

[07:05:08]

All to say we are going to see this announcement later today. We'll see how the president moves forward.

One thing as well to keep in mind is he wants to move forward with these and put these into effect, but he has left the door open, as have other White House officials, to potentially renegotiating them down the line.

So, again, we will see what this announcement is, but it may not actually hold moving forward. Kate?

BOLDUAN: Which only adds to the lack of clarity that you're saying people are seeking, are looking so much for.

Alayna, thank you so much. Sara?

SIDNER: All right. I am joined now by CNN's Anchor and Business Reporter and our friend Rahal Solomon. There is a lot still up in the air, as we heard from Alayna Treene. Can you give us a sense of what the options are that Donald Trump has at this point?

RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN ANCHOR AND BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes. So, the two big questions heading into this, to follow up on what Alayna said there, is who will be hit by this and by how much. So, the who of it all is there are two real scenarios that we're talking about. So, one is sort of the Dirty 15, a phrase that we've heard from some of the administration, and this could include perhaps the 15 countries that we have the largest trade imbalances with. They didn't name them specifically, but they're the countries that we've spoken a lot about in the last few weeks, the last few months.

The other option is maybe perhaps a universal tariff on all imports. That's the scenario that has economists more worried. We would be talking about essentially $3.3 trillion in imports. So, this is the one that has sort of set off the most alarm bells.

The other part of this is by how much. That's the other big question heading into this event. So, one scenario is maybe we see reciprocal tariffs, so essentially what you charge me to sell my products in your country, I'm going to charge you to sell your products in my country, or maybe we see a flat tariff.

I will say, heading into this event, we could see one of these scenarios, we could see a mix of these scenarios, or we could see something else entirely because we just might.

SIDNER: It hasn't been made clear.

SOLOMON: Exactly, exactly.

SIDNER: The markets have been reacted basically ever since Donald Trump put this out there, that there were going to be more tariffs coming. What are you seeing?

SOLOMON: Yes. So, futures this morning, and I will say we've been watching this since. 4:00 A.M. and futures have been --

SIDNER: That's brutal.

SOLOMON: Yes, solidly lower this morning, which is sort of a continuation of what we have pretty much seen all year long. Despite the enthusiasm we saw after Trump was elected, that has pretty much all evaporated in terms of the market gains. It's been a rough start to the year. The markets are solidly lower, maybe not as low as you would expect in one theory is perhaps some of this has already been baked into stock prices, right, some of this tariff news.

I will say that economists, in addition to Wall Street, are themselves concerned about what this means, not just for the markets, but what this means for the real economy and what this will ultimately mean for the real economy really depends on which of those scenarios we're talking about, who will be impacted, by how much, and, by the way, what response do we see from those nations to us?

So, so much in the -- so much sort of up in limbo, but it sort of explains why there's so much anticipation, so much suspense heading up to 4:00 P.M. today, which, by the way, is after the markets close.

SIDNER: There's a reason it's at 4:00 P.M., just saying.

We just want to quickly say that we have debuted something here on CNN that hasn't happened yet, not even on your own show the baby bump.

SOLOMON: Thank you.

SIDNER: Congratulations to you. We are super excited. Yes, I can't wait. We're going to ask for the baby to come on and debut here as well, just saying. John Berman?

BERMAN: Awesome to have Early Start Anchor Rahel Solomon here with us this morning.

All right, this morning, what political calls a message to Musk, Axios calls it MAGA's, brutal jolt. Special election results give small glimmers of hope to Democrats.

At five days after the earthquake that killed thousands, a man has pulled from the rubble alive. We've got new reporting on how he survived.

And an enigmatic and just awesome, Val Kilmer, Iceman, passes away at 65.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VAL KILMER: You guys really are cowboys.

TOM CRUISE: What's your problem, Kazansky?

VAL KILMER: You're everyone's problem. That's because every time you go up in the air, you're unsafe. I don't like you because you're dangerous.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:10:00] BERMAN: All right. The big political story this morning, margins, Musk and messaging, on all of it, Democrats see glimmers of hope. In Wisconsin, the Democratic-backed candidate for state Supreme Court won the most expensive judicial race in history. Elon Musk spent a fortune there and even visited the state. It did not work, maybe even backfired at a state that's been decided by less than a point in three straight presidential elections. The Musk-backed candidate lost by ten.

In Florida as well, insiders are looking at the margins and two special elections for House seats. Now, Republicans won both, which will help them in the narrowly divided house. But in both races, there were huge swings from the presidential race. President Trump won both districts by more than 30 points less than five months ago. This time, the margins were cut in half or worse.

Let's get right to CNN Senior Political Analyst Mark Preston is with us. Let's start in Wisconsin. Again, Wisconsin, we're used to razor thin races. Here, the Democratic-backed candidate won by ten. It's a bad showing for Elon Musk, Mark.

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Bad showing for Elon Musk, but it also shows us that the only thing that Trump's money in politics is anger.

[07:15:00]

And Democrats right now are incredibly angry, not only at Elon Musk, but at their own party.

So, as they look ahead, John, to see what their message is going to be as they try to take on Trump over the next couple years, try to take back Congress in the midterms and, of course, try to take back the presidency in four years, it is, can they be united? And that is what is going to keep the Democratic Party together. We'll see a big fight between liberals and centrists about the control of the party, the direction of the party. But the reality is, Democrats, if they are to win, they got to stay united. We saw that in Wisconsin.

BERMAN: Now, in Florida, Republicans were able to hang on to two House seats there. That was expected, but Democrats really cut in to the Republican margins there.

PRESTON: Yes, they certainly did. And let's go back to what I just said about anger. There's a lot of anger out there, of course, now in the Democratic Party. But what's interesting about Florida, though, specifically in the race that we're all paying close attention to, which was on the East Coast, is that Republicans didn't have a great candidate.

And we've seen this in the past where Republicans will go out and they will bring people into the fold and they will endorse candidates that don't necessarily fit the district, might be too conservative, may say inflammatory things. Well, in the case of this candidate, John, he wasn't even really fundraising and he was hoping just to kind of draft his way in, was under a lot of criticism. Republicans do have to focus on who they put into these seats.

But having said that, yes, alarm bells going across right now, not only for Donald Trump, but think about all the Democrats, rather, Republicans that are going to face these Democrats in the midterm elections. Donald Trump isn't on the ballot but he is on the ballot in the midterms, John.

BERMAN: Yes, swings of 15 or 16 points would certainly be enough to help Democrats take back the house in a year-and-a-half.

And just, I want to note, the other Florida race did not get the national attention. It swung perhaps even bigger, and that may be seen as the more generic ballot test here, right, because national resources didn't pour in at the last minute.

PRESTON: Absolutely right, right there, and especially in that district two, which is incredibly conservative up there on the panhandle of Florida, Matt Gaetz's seat, for God's sake. So, yes, Republicans right now are certainly worried.

Those here in Washington who were charged with trying to keep the Republican majority in the House and Senate, trust, me this morning, they're trying to figure out how to keep the House and Senate, John.

BERMAN: Yes. Although a small consolation prize, their margins in the house just got substantially bigger, which will help Mike Johnson going forward.

All right. Mark Preston, thank you very much. Sara?

SIDNER: All right. A breaking overnight, China launches live fire military exercises near Taiwan just days after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth vowed to counter China's aggression.

And brand new billionaires, Forbes out with their new roundup of this year's wealthiest people. And let me tell you, you will be surprised about who made that list. Those stories and more ahead.

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[07:20:00]

SIDNER: Breaking overnight, Actor Val Kilmer, who starred in the Top Gun movies, The Doors and Batman Forever, has died at age 65. Kilmer had survived the long battle with cancer, but his daughter, Mercedes, said he died from pneumonia.

CNN's Stephanie Elam takes a look back at his incredible career.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): From a quirky spy in the 1984 cult classic, Top Secret --

VAL KILMER (Top Gun): You guys really are cowboys.

ELAM: -- to the Intense fighter pilot in Top Gun --

VAL KILMER (Top Gun): You're everyone's problem. That's because every time you go up in the air, you're unsafe.

ELAM: -- Val Kilmer's film career took flight in the big 80s. But the slick performer trained at Julliard honed his acting chops on the stage and saw his craft as a serious means of exploration.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you ever turned down something you regretted?

VAL KILMER: No, I don't. I don't really think that way. I just look forward. And also what, you know, in a personal way, what it gained from acting with the opportunity to experience things that certainly you'd never do in your own life.

ELAM: In the 1990s, Kilmer explored the mind of Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors. Critics praised him for nailing both the look and the sound of the late singer,

VAL KILMER (Tombstone): I'm your Huckleberry.

ELAM: Two years later, he played the pasty yet poised gun slinger, Doc Holiday, in Tombstone, and later a desperate construction engineer hunting lion in The Ghost and The Darkness.

Along the way, Kilmer co-starred with some of Hollywood's heavyweights, like Al Pacino and Robert De Niro, in the bank robbery movie, Heat, and played the superhero --

VAL KILMER (Batman): It's the car, right? Chicks love the car.

ELAM: -- as Batman in 1995. But it was an earlier collaboration on the set of the 1988 movie Willow, where Kilmer met co-star Joanne Whalley. They were married almost eight years and had two children.

Later in his career, Kilmer returned to the stage playing Moses in the 10 Commandments The Musical. He also wrote and performed the one man show, Citizen Twain, taking on the persona of the great American storyteller.

But under the makeup, the actor was dealing with grave health concerns. Kilmer downplayed cancer rumors, but then later said he had beaten the disease, which required a tracheotomy and left him with a raspy voice.

In 2022, he reprised his role as Iceman in the Top Gun sequel, Maverick.

VAL KILMER (Maverick): Who's the better pilot? You or me?

TOM CRUISE (Maverick): This is a nice moment. Let's not ruin it.

ELAM: Like the actor himself, his once boisterous flyboy character subdued by illness still commanded respect and even awe on the silver screen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[07:25:00]

SIDNER: We will always have those movies. Wow. Stephanie Elam, thanks to you. Kate?

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. Coming up for us, President Trump preparing to unveil his big tariff plan today. What are world leaders and world markets now preparing for? We have a wrap of that for you.

And Senator Corey Booker breaking the long-held record for the longest ever Senate floor speech, standing and speaking for over 25 hours. Why he did it and how he managed to pull it off.

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