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24:05So two different styles, but face to face, the fact that both sides will be here, that's a pretty big deal so far. It's a huge deal, especially as you know, if they actually meet down together, that would be the highest level meeting between the United States and Iran in quite some time. You heard the president's threats coming in. There's often people decide what tone am I going to set to try to influence the talks from President Trump. It's bluster, it's threats. What are you hearing from other parties involved? Yeah, look, what I'm hearing from the region here is that J.D. Vance is an important player in this because the Iranians have lost faith and trust in Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff.

24:40That trust broke down because the previous talks broke down and fell into a war. And the other thing that I'm picking up here is that the vice president is really respected by the negotiators here as somebody who really knows what he's doing diplomatically, is making the right moves at the moment. But I would say the read that this region has about Iran's capabilities right now, military capabilities, and Iran's understanding of what cars it has to play, they do think that Iran still could shoulder more war. That's the perception and the understanding that Iran could go longer in this, that it's still got about a third of its drones left, about half of its ballistic missiles.

25:21So the sense that Iran is on the back foot is not kind of the perception here. So that could cause, obviously, in the negotiations, that perception difference, some pretty tough, tough talks. Busy and important hours ahead for your reporting, Nick Robertson from Islamabad. Nick, thank you very much. And still ahead for us, that close call at LAX that forced the pilots to slam the brakes to Stop their plane from hitting two passing trucks. Hear what a pilot told air traffic control about it next.

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26:47And the stakes couldn't be higher. Time to place your bets. Season premiere, Rock the Block, Monday, April 13th at 8 on HGTV.

26:58In our national lead, another runway tragedy narrowly avoided this week when two trucks pulled in front of an airplane taxiing in Los Angeles International Airport. Thankfully, the pilots were able to break in time to avoid a crash. CNN aviation correspondent Pete Monteen is covering this one. Pete, as the FAA investigates, walk us through what we know so far. What in the world happened? Well, John, this was so close to being a crash that the pilots were captured swearing on the radio. Also an interesting factor here, LAX controllers in the tower could not see the near collision playing out in front of them, all because there was a building blocking their view.

27:34This happened late Wednesday night. Frontier Flight 3216 was taxiing for takeoff when the pilot said two airport ground vehicles cut them off. Here is the exchange that the pilots had with air traffic control. Listen. Hey, Grant, do you see this? No. We had two trucks just cut us off. We had to slam on the brakes and up the hill. It happened so fast. Both others were just like, holy s***, it was slammed on the brakes. I'm going to have to call the flash. I'm going to make sure everybody's all right in the back. It was real close. Close as I've ever seen. Thankfully, nobody was hurt in this incident.

28:06Frontier Airlines credited the pilots for making a good save here. Right now, it's not clear exactly how close this flight came to hitting those vehicles, though it seems likely that this would be classified as the highest level of incident, meaning a very close call with a collision very likely. Begg's mentioning there's no requirement by the FAA for cars, trucks, buses, fire trucks and the like driving on airport runways and taxiways to broadcast their position live using a transponder that is only a recommendation. For now, the Federal Aviation Administration is leading this investigation into what went wrong here.

28:41The National Transportation Safety Board is looking into this incident, though it's not launched an investigation just yet. John. Pete, I know the answer would be every case is different if you ask the FAA, but this seems eerily reminiscent of that Air Canada flight that crashed into the fire truck at LaGuardia recently. Yeah, no doubt. Since that LaGuardia crash, everyone's senses are heightened to a potential collision on the ground. In that case, that incident was on a runway and the airplane had just touched down and was still going about 100 miles an hour. Not much a pilot can do in that case to quickly maneuver to avoid a collision, even if they see it coming.

29:11In this case, the jet was still taxiing, meaning they were going pretty slow. The pilots could stop on the brakes and stop in a short distance. But some of the same questions in both investigations. Why did trucks pull out in front of an oncoming plane? Did they not see it or were they somehow trying to get past it and ran out of time? In both cases, there were no transponders in the trucks making it harder for controllers to really know the full picture of what's going on. Yeah, that transponder is a recommendation thing seems a tad curious, but what do I know? Pete Muntean, thanks very much.

29:44Appreciate that reporting. Only 942 days, 942 days until the 2028 presidential election. Who's counting? Well, she might be. Kamala Harris might be. What she said today about her plans for another presidential campaign. That's next.

30:08Are you going to run again in 28? Listen, I might. I might. I'm thinking about it. That's the former Vice President Kamala Harris confirming right there, you saw it, that she may, she might, she's thinking about it, might run again for president in 2028. Her comments today at the National Action Network Convention and against mounting speculation about what she might do next with her political career. let's discuss with our CNN commentators, Karen Finney and sure, Michael Singleton. So for all the people I encounter who say, oh, my God, please don't. She shouldn't run again because she lost. I say to them, well, who can beat her in the current field?

30:45There's someone who's raised a billion dollars. Yes, made some mistakes in the campaign, without a doubt, but also was trying to do something near impossible in 110 days. Yeah. Should she run? I think everybody and anybody who wants to run should say they might be running right now. That is the advice that I give to all the candidates when they come through. Look, this is an environment where it is about getting your name out there. It is about seeing what kind of energy you get from whether it's from audiences, whether it's from donors, whether it's from leaders like Al Sharpton. So, you know, that's been my advice to people is, look, if your name is in the is in the running, keep it out there.

31:20Because it all, as you know, John, until we get to the point where we see who actually makes it onto the primary debate stage, anybody is a viable candidate for the most part. So my biggest question for her would be, has she learned? You lose a race. Have you learned what you did right? Emphasize that. Double down on it. What you did wrong, maybe learn from it. Listen to this, Shermichael. She's talking about how she says she understands the job. She knows what it takes. And she seems to sound like she is learning. The status quo is not working and hasn't been working for a lot of people for a long time.

31:56And part of the issue is the need to get rid of some of the bureaucracy in government. Interesting for a Democrat, a liberal Democrat to say that. That would be interesting if she tried to sell that message. She would be doing so somewhat, these are my words, not hers, but as a sinner, right? She served in the status quo not that long ago. So people have been mad at the status quo for a long time. That includes her. And she was a part of the status quo. And I would imagine other Democrats would say, well, why didn't you fix it when you were vice president? From the learning part, can you spin it to your favor?

32:31Maybe. Look, you never underestimate a candidate. The vice president did get more votes than, what, any other Democrat in history, Karen, if I remember correctly? So, look, I wouldn't discount her ability. It's a matter of what does the operations look like. She clearly can raise the money, so I'm not going to discount that. But can she bring forth the right level, a number of advisors to help her figure out how do you target those young men? How do you target Hispanics? How do you speak to sort of that middle ground where I think she struggled with before? And before you before you jump in, some of it's also we were talking about this before we came on camera.

33:01Some of it's also what's the climate? Yeah, that's right. Right. Even the best candidates sometimes get whooshed by a climate and some of the sometimes weak candidates get carried along by a climate. And so another potential candidate is the Democratic Senator Alyssa Slotkin in Michigan. She's been visiting states that President Trump won, going around saying, let's check out these, which is a smart way for any candidate, whether you've run before or not. When asked by Politico Playbook if the nominee should be a Democrat who did not serve in the Biden administration, Harrison Buttigieg were mentioned there.

33:27I think there's a lot of baggage there. I don't know if it's insurmountable, but I know that the strongest feeling I get from a room like this, from being in Columbus, being in Iowa, being in Wisconsin, Idaho, Kansas, is that people want something new. And that, to my mind, is going to be the most important thing for Democrats for 2028. I think 2020 is going to be a real turning point for this country. It has got to be about really the future. And we always say elections are about the future, but it's going to be a big picture future election. If you think about what's happening with AI, if you think about what's happening with the global economy, there will be big challenges and big questions that we need to be asking that are going to change our lives in pretty dramatic ways.

34:08And so, look, I think that being said, someone like Slotkin, it kind of goes to what I said before. If her name is in the mix, that is good for her, right? That gives her a little bit of cachet within the party. And I do think you see people like her and that sort of level of sort of these newer, younger Democrats who want to be part of shaping where the party goes between now and really into 2027 to set the table for what that presidential will look like. And so the midterms will set the table for what the climate is and then the economy and things like that. But so if you're if Republicans are sitting around having an early conversation about who we worried about, who we not worried about.

34:46We saw Harris. We know that former Mayor of Secretary Buttigieg is moving around. Senator Slotkin, as you mentioned, also showing up at with Al Sharpton at the National Action Convention this week, the Pennsylvania governor, Josh Shapiro, the Maryland governor, Wes Moore, California Congressman Ro Khanna, the Illinois governor, J.B. Pritzker, Arizona Senator Ruben Gallego. When Republicans are sitting around, you know, thinking we might have Vance, we might have Rubio, maybe we'll have something new, too. But does anybody on that list, do you look at anybody on that list and say that one is head and shoulders better or more fearful to us?

35:15No, but I do look at Pritzker because of his ability to self-fund. I mean, this all comes down to money. You have to build an operations and it's expensive to do so. Pritzker comes from a very wealthy family. He's wealthy himself. So if he could throw in a couple hundred million dollars to give him a head start that no other Democrat, quite frankly, would have. The other candidates I'm not really worried about. But as a strategist, he's the guy I'm looking at. He represents a state where I think some of his messaging could potentially be palatable to Hispanics in the South. I'll be curious to see how he moves forward with targeting Latinos in the country.

35:48But the money thing is going to be big, in my opinion, John. And he's someone that immediately has a head start. And so if we talk about the here and now, between now and November, about seven months, the inflation report today was not good for the Republicans. Most of that's because of the Iran war. We'll see if it dissipates, but inflation is persistent. A data point I always look at, the University of Michigan consumer sentiment, way down. The worst. Record down. Worse than the pandemic. Worse than the 2008 financial crisis. So if you're a Republican today, you should be nervous about this climate.

36:18Let me ask, flip it for you. Do you see a Democrat? You mentioned, and you mentioned the AI challenge, which I think is a Democrat. a big thing out there. People don't have any politician they trust to give them a North Star. Where are we going in this environment that I'm nervous about? Do you see anybody? So I will say, and I have also said this to candidates, I think governors have a little bit of an advantage on this because they're already having to deal with that in terms of workforce development. They're already seeing what is that doing to your state, both from the perspective of state government, but from the perspective of the industries within your state.

36:50So I do think they have a little bit more experience with saying, and here's what I put in place to make sure we're ready for it. And I think that's going to be part of deciding what that North Star is going to look like. But I would just remind us, we were in a very different place in 2020 than we are 2024. And right in terms of covid, in terms of all the things we're having. So I think we also got it. Let's let the people lead us a little bit where they are. But who can help lead them or at least give them confidence? You see any Republican? President Trump doesn't talk about this stuff. Do you see any Republican talking about AI, economic challenges to the future?

37:23No, I mean, there are some congressmen, but in terms of a leader, not really. And Kieran and I have talked about this a lot in the green room. You need to have people who can talk to younger voters, and Kieran has pointed this out to me a lot, younger men in particular, on this AI issue. And I don't see anyone really speaking to that. The candidates who can do that will have a decisive lead come 2028. Well, thank you both. We'll keep an eye on it. If you see anybody, give us a shot. Don't give Jake a shot. Okay, we'll let Jake a shot. Astronaut Reed Weissman is the commander of Artemis II, which is coming in for landing right now.

37:54His family will join us ahead on the lead. Plus, from bedtimes to gravity, we're paging Dr. Sanjay Gupta to answer your viewers, your questions, our viewers' questions about the health of the astronauts while in space and when they get back.

38:11Don't let tax refund worries hold you back. File now with TurboTax on Intuit Credit Karma. They'll find every credit and deduction to help you get every refund dollar you deserve or your money back. Start filing today in the Credit Karma app. We're paging Dr. Gupta in the health lead today. He's embracing the space theme this week and taking your questions on the Artemis II mission and the health of the astronauts. All right, Sanjay, a grandma from Canada wrote in on behalf of her seven-year-old grandson, Cami, who wonders about sleep or bedtimes, as most kids do, asking if there's a schedule and do you feel rested?

38:50I love the fact that we're getting seven-year-olds writing into the show. That's amazing. Expanding the demographic. And I think Cammie, exactly. Cammie will be happy to know that maybe the astronauts are being treated exactly like Cammie is because NASA is essentially telling them when to go to bed and when to wake up. And also, John, those astronauts are probably getting more sleep than you or I Because it's very important, according to NASA, for these astronauts to get at least eight hours of sleep a night. Important because they have cognitively challenging, important things to do, and sleep is a big part of that.

39:21So they get really granular on this. First night, they actually had to split up their sleep into two chunks, because partway through the night they had to essentially activate the rockets, pointing them towards the moon. But after that, it's eight hours of sleep. They all sleep around the same time. I think we have images of what the sleeping bags look like. The sleeping bags are attached to the wall. They're still floating, but that sort of at least attaching it to the wall keeps them relatively stable. They got noise and light and vibration to sort of contend with, but they're collecting a lot of data about sleep, John.

39:54They wear these wristbands that are monitoring their movements and their sleep, which is important information for future missions. I got to get one of those bags for the long election nights hanging against the wall over there. That would be actually quite helpful. This one from Brenda in New Jersey. Since water's heavy, I wonder how they get the essential nutrient up there with them. How do they continue to keep up with their daily intake amount to avoid dehydration? Yeah, great question and a challenging sort of thing for Nassau. Water. They send it up and they send up 425 gallon tanks. Sorry, 125 pound tanks, I should say.

40:29So that's about 15 gallon tanks, four of them. And then they have these lines, and they're sort of embedded into the capsule. And then they have these lines that essentially create a dispenser of water. And you can go there and get your water. They have enough, they say, for the entire mission. But in addition to hydration, a lot of the food goes up freeze-dried, John. So they have to rehydrate it. They freeze-dry it to save space. Then they rehydrate it up in space. So they need water for hydration, but also to rehydrate their food. They do take up some other drinks, coffee, green tea, lemonade, and I'm told peach mango smoothies as well.

41:09So a few treats in there. A few treats in there. And finally, Sanjay, you clearly have someone who watches you closely, knows her from Texas, definitely saw your segment yesterday because she wrote in asking, okay, can you explain more on the hot sauce?

41:24So this is really interesting. And just for context, you know, you're sending a craft 23 ,000 miles away from Earth. You have limited space. one of the things they decide to send up is five different types of hot sauce. And there's a rationale for this. The rationale is because you have all these changes that are happening in the body, fluid is migrating from the lower body closer to the head. It affects taste. It affects the taste buds, but also affects the sinuses. You feel congested. You can't smell as well. Food doesn't taste good. These astronauts need to eat, though. and that's where the hot sauce comes in.

42:02So they got five different types of hot sauce to try and flavor the food so they get enough calories. What you're looking at there on the screen though is from 2023 where these astronauts essentially tasted food, determined which foods they'd like to take up with them on this mission. This was three years ago. And again, that just gives you some idea of just how granular, how detail focused they are on things like sleep we talked about, water and then obviously food. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you.

42:43Welcome to The Lead. I'm John King. In for Jake Tapper. We're following breaking news tonight. It's final preparations underway right now with the crew of Artemis II set to splash down and return to Earth in just about two hours. The Orion capsule carrying the four astronauts is scheduled to land off the coast of San Diego just after 8 p.m. Eastern. They finished reconfiguring the inside of the capsule for reentry and moved through their reentry checklist, putting on their launch in entry suits. The Artemis II team has made history, traveling the furthest ever distance from Earth with their flyby of the far side of the moon.

43:17But today's reentry is the riskiest part of this mission yet. They'll come roaring back toward Earth more than 30 times the speed of sound towards a Navy crew, family to friends waiting to receive them. CNN's Randy Kay monitoring the latest at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, where Mission Control, of course, is located. Randy, what's happening up in space right now and with the NASA team ahead of tonight? Well, John, the astronauts have put on their spacesuits, so they are ready to go. These are the suits that they wore for the launch, and they will put them on. They have put them on again now for reentry.

43:52Mission Control is ready to go as well. Up in the capsule, they did one more burn to try and make sure that their trajectory and their path is correct for reentry towards the Pacific Ocean, where they will land just after 8 p.m. Eastern time. Of course, the heat shield still lingering questions about that. That is the bottom of the spacecraft that is expected to keep the astronauts and the Orion capsule from dealing with this extreme heat. It's going to be about 5 ,000 degrees outside that capsule. They've actually changed the trajectory for the Artemis II capsule coming in. That is because, John, you may recall with Artemis I, the heat shield actually came back pockmarked and big chunks of it had fallen off.

44:35So this time they've changed the trajectory and they're hoping, NASA is hoping, that this will prevent any major damage or major cracking in the heat shield. Now, when they reenter the atmosphere at about 400 ,000 feet above us, they will have about 13 minutes until they splash down. And NASA says that they expect to lose contact with the astronauts for about six minutes during those 13 minutes between reentry and splashdown. They're not concerned about that, but they are expecting that. And then we should note also that the families of the astronauts, John, will be here at Mission Control. There's an observation deck in the back of Mission Control.

45:12We actually got to visit there earlier this week, and you can see the Orion spacecraft and its travel. So the families will be there. They'll be able to see how it crosses the continents, the altitude that it's at, the distance it is from splashdown. So this is very exciting, but also, I'm sure, very nerve-wracking. Mission Control will be calm as can be, but I'm sure it'll be something for the families to watch, John. And that is always something fascinating to watch, calm as can be, even though maybe on the inside, like you and me, a little bit nervous and excited. Randy Kaye at the Johnson Space Center.

45:40Randy, thanks so much. Let's dig into those 13 critical minutes. And it's Tom Foreman here at the Magic Wall to walk us through just what it's going to look like. Tom, much has been made of the intense heat as Orion enters the atmosphere. How has NASA adjusted the procedure to try to ease the pressure on that heat shield? Well, what they've done is what some people would call a skip approach. Now, bear in mind, when this starts coming back into the atmosphere, when it begins way up there, it's going to be going well over 30 times the speed of sound. That's really fast. That's why you have this compression of the air in front of it that creates that plasma and that intense heat.

46:16So what they're doing to ease the pressure on that heat seal is something they call a lofted entry. So they start way up here coming down, and as they come in here, the atmosphere starts slowing them down. That heat starts building, and right down here, they're going to do a little maneuver where they just kind of pitch it up a tiny bit with the aerodynamics of the ship itself. that will take off some of the most intense G-forces on the crew and on the ship itself. It will also take off some of the most intense heating and, in theory, gives them a little bit better targeting for their landing area.

46:50But everything starts moving really fast at that point because now you've already gone in this process by atmosphere alone from this more than 30 times the speed of sound. you're going to get somewhere down here to 300 to 400 miles an hour just from all of that resistance from the atmosphere. They're still just falling, though, John. And that's still very fast at that point. So how high will it be, and how does it reach a safe speed by splashdown? Yeah, once they get to that zone, that's when we're going to move into the parachute part of this. There are 11 different parachutes. The first one is just carry away a cover here.

47:24Then they have these drogue chutes that come out here. Their purpose is to kind of stabilize it a little bit, make it slow down beginning to. And this is all happening, I will point out, sort of around the area where you would fly in an airline if you were up there flying. And then some more parachutes come out that pull out the big main chutes. These will be fully operational and it will be on its way down at about 1 ,500 feet. So you're getting pretty close to the water. This is all happening very rapidly here. And by the way, I should point out, it is designed such that if they lost a parachute on two, it can still safely land there.

47:59And if all goes properly, it's in the water, these upwriting systems inflate automatically to make sure that if it's sideways or upside down, and there was a time when testing showed about half of them would be sideways or upside down when we did space missions, this forces it to sit back upright. And that's when the race is on, John. As fast as they came in, that's as fast as these boats and helicopters and the supporting ships will all be racing to the site. They have to clear it out for the splashdown, and then they all have to race into it to get those astronauts out and welcome them home.

48:32That is one awesome preview. Looking forward to watching this play out live. Tom Foreman, grateful for that. Thank you so much in joining me now to help us get through this. Bill Wiseman, he's the brother of Artemis II Commander. Reid Wiseman, Bill, thank you for your time. I know it's an incredibly important moment for you and the family. How are you feeling? Nervous, excited, all of the above? Oh, are you kidding me? I'm thrilled. I'm super excited for these guys, for the whole crew. I mean, it's been literally almost a flawless mission. They've done everything they wanted to do. They've done it with humility.

49:08They've done it with levity. I think they charmed the world on the way down, on the way around the moon. And they're on an awesome trajectory to get back here. if I channel my nieces or if I channel my father, they're nervous as hell. And they can't wait for this to be over. But yeah, everybody's got their own perspective. So you know the business, your brother's in, you've been through this before. But like NASA says, oh, yeah, we're going to lose contact for six minutes or so. That's OK. We know that's going to happen. Are you as chill about that as they are? I wouldn't say I'm chill about it.

49:48I bought my dad a box of pencils so he can chew on them during that time. But it's going to be some sweating minutes. And especially, you know, if you look at some of the past Apollo missions, some of those went well beyond the window to get folks coming back on the radio. So it's certainly going to be a knot in everybody's stomach, I think. Medical tests obviously happen first. But at some point, hopefully in the hours ahead, days ahead, you're going to get a chance to shake your brother's hand, give him a big hug. What's the first thing you want to say?

50:26It's great to have you back. No question about it. It's going to be great to see you with your daughters again because this has been tough on them. It's going to be great to see him with my dad again. It's been tough on him. But I would say, hey, you guys did an amazing job. You gave the world a lot of hope and you gave the world, you know, and frankly, Americans a lot of pride and Canadians at a time where we needed that. And I thought they did it. They did it with competence. They did it with humility. They did it with levity and they had fun doing it, which was which was an amazing thing to do.

51:01I would say they also ignited passion again for exploration and lunar science. And how are they going to use that? You know, it took three years, I think, roughly three years to go from the Artemis 1 launch to Artemis 2. How are we going to keep that cadence up? Because we've got momentum. We've got to use it. Amen to all of that, especially the humility and the humor and the camaraderie that we've all gotten to see. And you're right. We can use some of that in these times right now. You also mentioned Reed's daughters. The whole team shared a message with their children Thursday night. And here's what Reed said to his daughters, Ellie and Katie.

51:39I just want to look at my daughters, Eileen, Katie, and just say I love you. And their support has been unbelievable. I don't think they knew what this mission really meant when we launched, but they have learned through the outpouring of public support, their friends' support and family support, really the world has come together. We have seen it, and we have seen it through their eyes too. And it has been a very proud moment for me as their father. How are they doing ahead of this big moment? uh i i think they're outwardly completely chill i think they're inwardly very nervous um and they can't wait for this to be over um i've talked to ellie i haven't been able to talk to katie this week um and i would say uh we we vacation with them you know once or twice a year and uh i i outwardly i see the same uh young women that i've seen for years uh but i i know it's just it's tough on them on the inside.

52:35But it's it's great to see Reed being able to communicate with them. I know he's had a video conference with them over the on the way back from the moon. It's great that he gets to communicate with them as much as he does. I think that next vacation is going to be extra cool. Bill Weissman, really grateful for your time. Thank you so much. Thank you, Jake. And much more in our breaking news in moments as the crew of Artemis 2 prepares to splash down on Earth tonight after their historic mission around the the moon. Plus, new data out today shows just how much Americans are struggling financially amid the war with Iran.

53:08But is the Trump administration paying enough attention?

53:20In our money lead, you can blame the Iran war for inflation hitting its highest level in nearly two years. New data out today puts the annual inflation rate at 3.3 percent in March. That increased largely due to the record 21.2 % jump in gasoline prices. Separately, the University of Michigan's latest consumer sentiment survey is out today and lower than anything in the post-World War II era, including the Great Recession, the pandemic downturn, and the historic inflation surge afterwards. The charts and graphs only tell part of the story. Jolene Reeson is an Iowa corn farmer. Jolene, grateful for your time.

53:56It's planting season. You're getting hit now. Higher fuel prices, whether that's gas for a truck or diesel for farm equipment. Fertilizer prices skyrocketed. Other amendments, the prices for those on a farm have skyrocketed. Tell us about your bottom line now, as if we were having this conversation, say, a month or two ago.

54:16Well, to be honest with you, my bottom line for crop-wise that I would be selling, it's up a little bit. So last month, my corn would have been$4 a bushel for me in order to break even on a corn bean rotation. According to Iowa State, I need$4.37. So as you can see, I'm not even there. Yesterday, I sold some corn,$4.17. So we're not breaking even yet. So prices are not where you need them to be. and what about your costs of getting through day to day just for running your equipment, keeping the soil and all that? Those costs are up, right?

55:00The fuel price is up, yes. Yes. So it takes about a gallon of fuel an acre. So this year I'll have 500 acres of corn. And so if you do the math, yeah, it's more than what I've been spending in the past. So the hope is, as I look at out months, the price of corn is going up and hopefully with the war, you know, getting through and done, hopefully our fuel price will be coming down. I was on a farm, a small farm in North Carolina just a little over a week ago. The owner there was worried, worried about the year ahead. How about you? Any hope of making a profit this year?

55:47Well, well, you know, that, and then that, that all comes down to what my corn's going to yield. So if I'm, you know, and I, and I use the Iowa State's Ag Decision Maker to help me, uh, figure out what my break evens and stuff are. And that's, um, 200 bushel. And if I can do 230, 240, uh, due to which I have done in the, and you know, before that makes a huge difference. But Mother Nature always has a hand in what I do, and I can't always trust her to do the right thing for me. How long has this farm been in your family?

56:23Probably about 85 years. Going back from my, it would have been my husband's father's dad. Originally came and bought this ground when he came over from Germany. I asked the question because I come through your part of the country quite a bit. Just this morning at the gym, I had my my my explorers shirt on for the independent baseball league. Now, there you go. Not far from where you're from. And I just I know the city explorers. I know the pride that the smaller family farmers take in their land, especially when they're surrounded by the big corporate farms and how hard it is sometimes just to keep your optimism, knowing that the math keeps getting harder.

57:04If you could have a second with President Trump or your second with Senator Grassley, what could Washington, Senator Ernst, what could Washington do to help you today and tomorrow? Anything? Well, I guess I would ask that, you know, the collusion, the antitrust that is going on, the fertilizer industry and the packer industry, that maybe President Trump could be that first president to actually pursue a lawsuit against, you know, the bigger fertilizer company. You know, there's four fertilizer companies in the United States, and two of them pretty much have a stranglehold on phosphate and potash, two critical nutrients that we have to have in order to grow corn.

57:53And there's a countervailing duty on any fertilizer that is brought in from Morocco, which would certainly help out as far as for a shortage on fertilizer here in the United States. But there's countervailing duties, and so then that makes it too high. So need to get rid of that. The DOJ to step up and pursue antitrust lawsuits that need to happen. I mean, this fertilizer thing, it just didn't happen because we had the war. This has probably been 10 years that we've been having this issue. And now as our margins are incredibly tight, repairs are very expensive. Equipment is expensive. A new combine is the price of what somebody would buy a house for.

58:46And I only use it once a year. so there's all those things to take in consideration it's a long list but I hope they listen to some of it Jolie, grateful for your time today hopefully you'll let me stop by next time I'm out in that area I get out there quite a bit, I love it out there thank you so much for your time today you just do that I will, you can put me to work for free okay, you know where the galva ethanol plant is you can find my own style and there I am you can come see me anytime I promise I will find you. Appreciate it very much. All right. Sounds good. The Crew of Artemis II is almost home after their historic journey around the moon.

59:25Splash down just after 8 p.m., and we're tracking every major moment in the lead-up. Stay with us.

59:42We're back with our breaking news coverage. The crew of Artemis II set to splash down back on Earth in just over an hour and a half. It's one of the most dangerous parts of this mission, given how fast the capsule will go and how hot the exterior will get. We're talking up to 5 ,000 degrees Fahrenheit. CNN's Jackie Wattles is down at Johnson Space Center for us. Jackie, how confident is NASA in the heat shield on that Orion capsule holding up? Yeah, well, NASA says they're very confident. They spent quite a while convincing the press and the public of that fact. But there are naysayers. There is a group of ex-NASA engineers, including a former NASA astronaut, that have their concerns.

1:00:21They say that this mission shouldn't have been flown with astronauts on board. And that is all because of this heat shield. Really, the issue here goes back to 2022 during an uncrewed test flight called Artemis 1. After that mission, which sent the capsule without astronauts around the moon, it came back. And during the reentry process, we saw uneven cracking and pockmarking on that heat shield. And that deeply concerned NASA. It's not supposed to behave that way. It's supposed to char and erode away very evenly. So they spent about a year investigating what went wrong. And they found out the issue was that the heat shield wasn't permeable enough.

1:00:56That allowed gases to build up in the interior, and it caused chunks of it to pop off, right? But the problem was, by the time they figured that out, the heat shield was already installed on this spacecraft. So it's flying with the suboptimal spacecraft. I remember an astronaut who was involved in the investigation telling me this isn't the heat shield that NASA would want to give its astronauts, but we're confident that it's safe. NASA highlights that even if astronauts were on Artemis 1, they would have survived and that capsule came back intact. And for this mission, they're doing some mitigation measures where they're altering that reentry trajectory, trying to make more favorable heating conditions, hoping that heat shield stays intact and does its job here.

1:01:36So I know mission controllers are anxiously awaiting the results here. As we all are. Jackie Waddles for us live at the Johnson Space Center. Jackie, thank you so much. She's in Houston. The crew expected to splash down off the coast of San Diego. Crews there are standing by Navy crews to take them onto a Navy ship and then to shore. That's where we find CNN's Alex Michelson at the Naval Base San Diego. Alex, that's a nice backdrop. That's about as good as you can get. Walk us through how this retrieval mission will unfold tonight. Well, it's about as nice a day as you can get, John, which is really important for this retrieval mission.

1:02:13So they're going to splash down into the ocean. It's about 50 miles off the coast. There's a big ship called the Mirtha that is out there waiting for them. First, though, there's going to be smaller ships that go out to meet them, make sure they're okay. Then they'll helicopter them onto the Mirtha. We shot some video aboard the USS Mirtha a little earlier. Part of the reason they chose this ship is because it has space for helicopters, which are going to be part of this, and an ability to bring the capsule back onto it. We talked about this with the head of the Navy who is running this whole operation.

1:02:51Here's some of what he told us. The hatch door opens. Your team meets the astronauts. What are they looking for? What does that first initial assessment look like? They're looking for obvious signs of trauma. They're looking to make sure that they're conscious. They're making sure that they're able to articulate, to understand where they're at. That Navy dive medical officer has experience, whether operationally or also on a daily basis, working at our military medical treatment facilities, what does emergency medical care look like? It's an amphibious ship. So what that means, it's got a couple core capabilities.

1:03:30One, to be able to launch and recover aircraft. We can put four helicopters on this, which is the requirement for the mission. And then amphibious also means that it can take craft into and out of the ship itself. So the ship can drop its back gate down, it's called the stern gate, take on some water, and then we can actually float the capsule right in to the ship, secure it, and then bring it back home safely. So the capsule itself is expected right back here tomorrow. But the astronauts themselves, they're going to be coming back to San Diego later tonight and then heading back to Houston perhaps even later tonight.

1:04:11But everybody here is very excited and honored for the opportunity to go see those astronauts pretty soon, John. Remarkable few hours ahead for you. Alex Michelson for us in San Diego, California. Thank you so much. And we're following every big moment as the Artemis capsule prepares to splash down here back on Earth. CNN has special coverage all night as the crew makes its way back home. Please stick with us.

1:04:41New tonight, CNN with exclusive reporting about Congressman Eric Swalwell. The California Democrat has ascended in the governor's race there, and he's faced recent rumors on social media about sexual misconduct that he has denied. CNN's Pamela Brown and her team have spoken with four accusers, including a former staffer who went on camera to share her story. Pam, tell us what our investigators team have learned. Well, John, we have spoken with four women who have various kinds of sexual misconduct claims against Congressman Swalwell, ranging from inappropriate messages and pictures to unwanted kissing and touching, and in one case, rape from a woman we spoke to on camera in shadow to protect her identity due to fear of professional retaliation.

1:05:25She is a former Swalwell staffer, and she says it began when she was 21 years old. There were two very serious sexual assault allegations she made, one in 2019 as a staffer, and the other from 2024 when she had left his office. She also described inappropriate messages and nude images with the congressman using Snapchat with disappearing messages. Now, after the first incident, where she said she woke up in his hotel room as a staffer, naked, after a night of heavy drinking. She told us about what she says happened several years later in 2024 after she had left his office. I want to warn you, what you are about to hear is graphic and disturbing.

1:06:08I decided to ask him to meet me for a drink. And I did this because I was so far removed from what had happened in 2019. I felt safe because I was established. I had a partner. I felt more secure that I could have a strictly professional relationship with this person. After that bar closed, we went to another. I went to the bathroom and I don't remember anything after that. You don't remember anything? I remember the next day. I can see flashes of that evening of him on top of me, me pushing him off, him grabbing me. It was a lot more aggressive. It was aggressive. Did you say no? Yes. I said no.

1:07:02I said I in my flash that I can recall I was pushing him off of me saying no. And what did he do? He didn't stop. He didn't stop. And you woke up the next morning. I woke up the next morning naked, alone, in his hotel room. I, for a moment, didn't even know I was in his hotel room. That's how intoxicated I was. And I called my mom, the only person I could think that could help me. And we were able to corroborate that by speaking with friends and family she confided in, reviewing photos and screenshots of contemporaneous text messages. And we also reviewed a message from her medical provider the week after she received the pregnancy and STD tests, calling her a, quote, survivor.

1:07:55Now, the Swalwell campaign released a statement from Congressman Swalwell saying, quote, These allegations are false and come on the eve of an election against the frontrunner for governor. For nearly 20 years, I have served the public as a prosecutor and a congressman and have always protected women. I will defend myself with the facts and, where necessary, bring legal action. My focus in the coming days is to be with my wife and children and defend our decades of service against these lies. It's remarkable reporting. As you note there, the congressman fiercely denies this and notes that it's coming in close proximity to the California primary.

1:08:35Why are these women willing to speak now? It's a fair question, John. All the women we spoke with believed that they were alone in their interactions with the congressman. And then after seeing chatter from social media influencers, they realized that they were not alone and they felt more compelled to speak out. In fact, two of the women have since received seize and desist letters from Swalwell's lawyer. but those women stand by their statements to us, John. And obviously this does come at a big moment in the campaign. What are you hearing about the campaign? Yeah, well, I can tell you that we have been in touch with them over the last few days.

1:09:10We've reached out this afternoon with some very specific details of these allegations and some specific questions. And sources have told us that members of Swalwell's team have left. One staffer told CNN they left after receiving information about these allegations. and we also learned a key co-chair has left. I want to note for our full investigative report with my colleagues, Allie Gordon, Isabel Chapman, and Casey Tolan, you can go to CNN.com to learn more. John. Pamela Brown, important reporting to you and your team. Thank you very much, and we'll be right back.

1:09:50We're back with more of our Out of This World lead, standing by for the Artemis 2's re-entry in Splashdown in just over an hour. My panel here with me, former astronauts, Scott Scooter-Altman, Joan Higginbotham, and Andrew Feustel. Scott, so I just mentioned the time, right? Almost the final hour before Splashdown. So if you're up there, what are you looking for right now? Well, you're watching your displays, looking at the trajectory, trying to make sure everything's going the way you expect, getting ready to come back. It's an exciting time. And, Joan, describe the feeling. you're coming home, you're looking forward to that, but you're hurtling toward Earth at this enormous speed.

1:10:30What does that feel like? You know, it's funny, since you're moving with a vehicle, you don't really have a sense of how fast you're going. Unless you're, of course, looking out the window and kind of see things. But besides that, you're traveling with the vehicle and you're not feeling those forces until you hit entry interface. And at which point, you know, gravity starts to take over and things get pretty heavy and you have all the superheated gases and so forth. But as far as actually feeling the velocity, you can't really tell that you're going that fast. And Andrew, I don't know if you could hear in the last segment, our correspondent out in San Diego says NASA and the Navy all say they're thrilled because the weather conditions are so great right now.

1:11:11They think it's about ideal for the splashdown. How much can that, just simply the weather here on Earth, influence how well things go? uh well it has a huge influence they wouldn't be coming home if they didn't have a good uh good hold on the weather forecast i've been watching the feed the weather looks good the wave height looks about right you know that's something that stopped several of us from coming home in the past weather conditions that keep you in space for longer than you want to be but you know they had to execute uh you know basically they executed the burn the translunar injection burn several days ago that put them on this path to land today.

1:11:46So in some sense, we're lucky the weather has still held for them, but I think they had a good understanding what the weather patterns were looking like, and so we look forward to a calm night for them once they get down. And this is familiar to all of you, but Scott, the Orion capsule we lay people learn, supported by an attachment at the base, it's called the service module, and we've also learned there's a leak in the propulsion system, which affects the engines in that module. Now, NASA says it has fail safes. Could this impact the re-entry process? Well, not really. I mean, the system's designed with some blowdown capability.

1:12:21There's helium there. The leak is small enough that it's not going to be a problem with that. And, of course, they get rid of the service module before they re-enter. It just was there, really, to give them a boost to get back and protect the entry heat shield until you let go of that. And so as the mission plays out, Andrew, we all get fascinated by it. They sleep in bags attached to the wall. And how do they get hydration up here? Well, the service module is not the only piece of equipment involved. It's had a bit of some difficulties during the 10-day mission. The crew had to troubleshoot the toilet, issues with the toilet.

1:12:54And NASA put out a video explainer on that today. Let's listen. Urine is stored in a tank and then vented overboard each day by the crew. and it does sound like there was a bit of an issue there. It's kind of a complex engineering issue when you expose a liquid to vacuum. It's a pretty chaotic environment and there's a lot of theory and textbook work done when you assume it's pure water, but when you introduce the variable of it being wastewater, there's other complex phenomena that we don't quite yet understand. I mean, they have gone more distance than anyone has gone before. There's enormous scientific gains coming back from this.

1:13:35But we all get fascinated by the thing that when I'm getting off the set here and I got to walk by the men's room on the way out, how does this work in space? How does it work? And, you know, have you had issues in the past when you've been up there? Well, I have not flown on the space. Was that for me? I haven't flown on a spacecraft that's had issues, but it's not unusual for this to happen. We know of other spacecraft that have gone to orbit and had challenges with their bathroom systems. They talked about a few things during this mission. I think the fan was one of them. Dumping the urine over the side of the vehicle was another one.

1:14:08The space shuttle used to have some challenges like that as well. Trying to dump fluids over the side can be problematic, especially if there's mineralization or minerals in the fluids like there is in urine. So this is not a new problem. Fortunately, there's enough contingency capture devices available to them that they can overcome this. And for a short day mission, you know, at least it's not broken for six months, which, you know, can happen for longer flights. Oh, it happens in this building. Trust me. You know, you must laugh. You all must laugh, given your expertise, when the lay people ask these ridiculous questions.

1:14:39But it's like, oh, that's pretty cool. They have the same problems up there that we have down here. Joan, when you've returned in the past from a space mission, what's the most difficult part about adjusting back to Earth? And does that come in, you know, hour one, two, and three, or is that down the road a bit? For me, it came right away when I was trying to get off of the shuttle. I didn't have my land legs, and I stood up to exit the vehicle, and I just plopped back down in my seat, took off the chute, which had, you know, a couple of pounds on it, stood up and fell right back down. So it took a little while to get my land legs back, as I call it, And I just made it a point when we got on the crew vehicle to just walk very gingerly up and down the corridor until I kind of felt somewhat normal again.

1:15:23But it'll take a bit of an adaptation period, but they'll be fine. It's only been 10 days. Andrew, how about you?

1:15:32Yeah, I mean, coming home is always challenging. I had the good fortune of spending about six and a half months on ISS, and that was a lot harder than, you know, the two-week missions on space shuttle. So I think it depends on the duration. It took me about three or four weeks before I felt like I was really walking the way I did before I went to space after that long mission. So, Scooter, I'm going to close this conversation by asking you this. So the first meal they say they want when they get back is Uncrustable Sandwiches. So as I was joking earlier, my teenager somehow snuck up there on that thing.

1:16:06What is when you're coming back down? Obviously, you can't have breadcrumbs to get in the equipment and mess everything up. Is that what you're thinking about when you're coming back or you have too much business to do? It's certainly in the back of your mind. It was not at the forefront of my mind because to land the shuttle, you had to act hands on the controls to land. But we had a plan to get together and have pizza as a crew once we got back. So that was always a fun thing to do, to have that. Get back to normal food and be able to sit down and eat with your family. Well, it's just been a remarkable, remarkable mission.

1:16:39And grateful. Scooter Altman, Joan Higginbotham, Andrew Foystel, really appreciate your time helping us get to these final hours here. And coming up Sunday on State of the Union, you don't want to miss this former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, Democratic Senator Mark Moran of Virginia. That's Sunday, 9 a.m. Eastern and noon, right here on CNN. And our breaking coverage of the Artemis 2 Splashdown continues right now with CNN's Erin Burnett.

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