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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt

Emergency Hearing Ends Over Trump's Name On Kennedy Center; Trump Traveling To Texas "To Help" Paxton In Senate Race; Just In: Jury Finishes First Day Of Deliberations In Clancy Murder Trial. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired August 27, 2026 - 16:00   ET

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

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: -- Kusama passed away earlier this month at the age of 97.

[16:00:05]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: They had a display for her at the Hirshhorn here in D.C. a couple of years ago. I went. It was unreal, so --

KEILAR: Spectacular.

SANCHEZ: Yeah. Condolences to her family.

KEILAR: Yeah.

THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT starts right now.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Hi, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to THE ARENA. It's wonderful to have you with us on this Thursday.

Right now, in the nation's capital, a key hearing just wrapped up, one that could decide the fate of the Kennedy Center and test the limits of President Donald Trump's influence.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOWARD LUTNICK, COMMERCE SECRETARY: I mean, this is the board classically capturing the greatest fundraiser and greatest builder ever by putting his name on it and saying, okay, okay, you wanted your name. Here it is. When he says, I'm going to raise the money, you know he's going to raise the money. You need to induce him, entice him, get him to agree to wear it and do it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: The Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick today explaining why the Kennedy Center board believes that Donald Trump's name should be added back to the building, carved into the stone this time, Today's emergency hearing is part of Congresswoman Joyce Beatty's lawsuit trying to prevent that from happening.

Congresswoman Beatty is at today's hearing. We're going to have her right here with us later on this hour.

In a filing submitted ahead of today's hearing, lawyers for the center's Trump-appointed board basically threatened to tear it all down, the entire building, if they don't get their way.

Without a renovation overseen by President Trump, they argued, the Kennedy Center will, quote, "deteriorate further into an unsafe, decrepit structure that will be required to be taken down," end quote.

Worth taking a moment to sit with this. The center was authorized by Congress, and it was built as a living memorial to our nation's slain 35th president, John F. Kennedy. The board that Donald Trump picked is saying they'll destroy it, unless, that is, you let the president have his way.

And really, that's what this is to President Trump. It's all just fun.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LUTNICK: The president works all day, every day. And there are two things that he does for enjoyment. He plays golf on the weekend, and he builds. He loves to build.

So, this -- like, why are we talking about this? This is what he enjoys. So late at night, eleven o'clock at night, he calls me and wants to talk about things he's building because it's fun for him.

And the only thing he does during the week that is not work, because everybody works, like if you sat with him, would you have a nice chat with him? No, you'd ask him about Iran, then you'd ask him about this, then you'd ask him about that. Everybody does that.

And the one thing he likes to do during the week is construction. So I am helping him so he can enjoy constructing the Kennedy Center.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: OK, let's get off the sidelines, head into THE ARENA. My panel is going to be here, but we're going to start with CNN Sunlen Serfaty.

Sunlen, so this hearing, it was about two hours. It just wrapped up. What did we learn? What do we know?

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Kasie, the hearing just wrapped up. No ruling from the bench yet. And as you noted, it lasted two hours long. And so much of today's hearing was certainly about this very central issue here at the key of this core issue is if President Trump's name can be added to the side of the building.

Now, you'll recall just two weeks ago, the Kennedy Center board voted in essence a workaround around the judge's last OK, if you won't let us put the name of President Trump on the side of the building, we're going to inscribe it. And in that inscription, it will say renovated and restored by President Donald J. Trump, as well as plans to rename the plaza in his name as well. Now, the plaintiffs, the lawyers for the plaintiffs today argue very

strongly that this move needs to be blocked. They asked the judge to stand in the way of that. They said Congress intended this to be a memorial to President Kennedy and President Kennedy alone. And they say that putting Trump's name there in any way, inscription noting restoration and renovation or not, would be in defiance of that.

They also argue when it comes to renaming of the plaza, they say this is essentially Trump and the board renaming the grounds underneath the building, saying, quote, "It can't be that Congress wrote the statute in that way that would allow the grounds to be renamed after Tesla or Live Nation or whoever the highest bidder is."

The Department of Justice lawyers, on the other hand, they argued, they said that board has not, they believe, taken any steps to rename the building. They say this latest step is essentially in their argument to acknowledge President Trump raising the money to restore the building. They say he should be acknowledged for that.

[16:05:00]

He wants to be recognized for that as a fundraiser. and they want to recognize his ongoing contributions.

Now, Kasie, we do not know what move the judge will make on this or when he will make this. We are still waiting to see what he says. But I do want to note that this was such a packed courtroom today, heavy security. They even had an overflow room because the public was in there.

The president's commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick. He sat in the front row there for the entirety of the hearing. All of this really speaking to the enormity of this moment for this building at the center of president's desire to really remake in his name and his style -- Kasie.

HUNT: Indeed. All right. Sunlen Serfaty for us -- Sunlen, thank you very much for that report.

Our panel's here in THE ARENA. Staff writer at "The Atlantic", Toluse Olorunnipa; the founder of Lift Our Voices and former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson is here. Two former White House communications director, CNN political commentator Kate Bedingfield, who served in the Biden administration, and Mike Dubke, who worked in the first Trump term.

We also have CNN senior legal analyst and former federal and state prosecutor Elie Honig.

Thank you all for being here. Really appreciate it.

Elie, let me start with you just on the legal side of this. I mean, this -- the Kennedy Center, this is about Congress, right? Congress named the Kennedy Center. And then you have added to this overall debate, which we've been having for a while, this filing from the feds that is-- it's almost written like the way the president writes his Truth Social posts. I'm interested to hear your thoughts on that, but they basically threatened to like take their toys and go home, right? When they said, well, if we can't have what we want, we're just going to demolish the entire building and start over.

What is the legitimacy of this?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kasie, first of all, our laws sometimes can be vague or ambiguous, but not here. There is a specific law passed by Congress in 1964, just months after the JFK assassination, that says specifically this building will be called the John F Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, it will be the only monument to JFK within D.C., the only official monument and there are to be no other plaques or memorials or inscriptions within the building that go to the contrary with an exception for a specific area where names of donors and gifts can be stated.

So, the law here is on point. If you want to change the name you have to go to Congress and you have to change the law. That applies to the name of the place and that applies to all other end runs, inscriptions, memorials, plaques, whatever you want to call it. So, I think it should be a fairly straightforward call on the law itself.

With respect to the threats, we'll see if those are idle or not. But if you look at the way the Trump administration approached the East Wing, there was no going to Congress. There was no going to the regulatory bodies. They just sledgehammered that thing and then forced other parties to scramble and try to sue after the fact.

So, if I was the plaintiff here, I would be asking for an order from the judge, A, I'm right, I would argue, if I was the plaintiff, that you cannot add his name, and B, I want an order that they can't destroy this thing in the meantime.

HUNT: I hadn't thought of that, but your point -- your point is well- taken.

Gretchen Carlson, I mean --

GRETCHEN CARLSON, FORMER FOX NEWS HOST: Look, I almost became a lawyer, but I'm glad Ellie's here to be the real expert on this. I was just going to say this is disrespectful. This is repugnant.

I mean, the American people are completely tired of these shenanigans. He didn't build this, first of all. Sorry to say Howard Lutnick's not telling the truth, but Donald Trump did not build this. And he's not going to tear it down because the American people will have an insurrection over that.

And number three, The American people, I'm sure, love the fact that Howard Lutnick says that during the week, all Trump does is talk about building stuff. We've got a war in Iran that is not solved. He's now naming Lake Ontario "Lake America". He's saying vandalism for the reflecting pool. He's not talking about the economy.

I mean, the American people at some point are going to have to show the frustration that I am showing right now. HUNT: I do think we should be a little careful with the word insurrection just because it does imply violence that right now no one's implying, but that aside, Howard Lutnick --

(CROSSTALK)

KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I was going to say, I'm not sure Howard Lutnick intended to articulate one of Trump's biggest political problems in his effort to defend his boss, but he did. He put his finger on exactly why so many Americans are so frustrated with Trump. They feel like he's not focused on doing anything to help them. He's not paying attention to the war, which is causing their gas prices to go up. He's not bringing down prices in the way he said he would.

And instead, he's focused on what fundamentally amounts to a vanity project, which is putting his name on a building that he hopes is going to outlast him and his legacy. So, if you are a Republican who is running for reelection in these midterms, that's not a helpful argument, but it is a very astute political assessment of what Donald Trump's political problem is.

HUNT: Well, and if you read "Regime Change" by our colleague, Maggie Haberman, and her colleague Jonathan Swan, they report that essentially, I think, 70 percent was the number of the president's headspace is consumed with things like this.

And look, let's watch, too. I mean, this is something -- what Lutnick said is true that the president enjoys. All you got to do is look back at his previous comments. I do think some of these previous comments are kind of interesting, though, in light of this threat to demolish it. Because if you listen to what the president had said previously, he actually had quite a few nice things to say about the majestic building that is currently standing as the Kennedy Center. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: As you look at the marble, look at the quality of the marble. You look at the columns outside, the seats, the decor. Whether it's marble or whatever, the beautiful white statuary marble, the bones are so good.

I mentioned the word bones before. The bones here, the bones, we have the greatest bones. We're fixing broken marble. You had some of those columns on the outside that were painted a fake gold. Now we painted them a beautiful white color, beautiful cream-white.

The marble is being rejuvenated. I always say you could take a hundredth of an inch off of a piece of marble, and you have a brand- new piece of marble, but nobody does that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: I mean, Mike Dubke, he seems to love this building. Why does he want to tear it down?

MIKE DUBKE, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: What are the rules here? Do I get a pass?

(LAUGHTER)

DUBKE: I think the bottom line here is, and I have no idea what the secretary of commerce was trying to accomplish with that press conference. He showed a lot of enthusiasm, but I'm not sure what he was trying to accomplish. But what are we arguing about here?

Because on the one hand, on the one hand, I totally understand exactly what you were saying, Gretchen, about this and the naming of the Kennedy Center and trying to rename it. But as we listen to that report, we can't put a "renovated by"? I see that on federal buildings all over the city and all over the country. We can't rename the plaza.

I mean, if we are raising money for this and if the president has been instrumental in bringing more money to a building that does need some level of renovation, why not recognize that? It seems to me that both sides have just decided we are going to go as far apart as we possibly can, and we're going to make this judge decide.

HUNT: Well, let's watch -- to try to answer that, let's watch what Rory Kennedy had to say yesterday because Mike is making a point that, OK, maybe this doesn't hurt anything. But I think it's important to remember that this is a living memorial to a fallen person who was both the president for all Americans and also part of a family. This is a member of that family talking about it. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RORY KENNEDY, DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKER: This was something that Congress put in his name really as a memorial, not unlike the Lincoln Memorial, but it wanted to be an active memorial. But it was really meant to celebrate and to recognize the love in this country for this pretty spectacular fallen president.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: So that, of course, is why the Kennedy Center came into being. And of course, if you remember back to that time, the way the country was mourning collectively, if you talk to people who were alive then who remember that period of time, they will say, I remember exactly where I was when I learned that John F. Kennedy was shot.

And now, of course, you contrast that with Let's show a little bit more of Howard Lutnick explaining things today, because it does seem to underscore the president that we have now, what it all means to him, because it does present a contrast, shall we say, to the spirit of what brought the Kennedy Center into being. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LUTNICK: If they don't agree to let him close and renovate it because the court steps in, what do you want the guy to do? He's only a president for two and a half years. He's going to step away. As correctly, you would think he would, because he's not going to be here, he's not going to do a third of the renovation. And eventually, this building's going to fall into horrible disrepair and be very dangerous, and that's what's going to happen. Ultimately, it needs to be renovated, and we all know it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: I mean, Toluse, if it's not about Donald Trump, why would Donald Trump do anything to help something that, you know, benefits I don't know anyone who goes to see a show there?

TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Of course, there are clearly only two options here either you get to rename this thing after the president, or it falls into disrepair. There's no middle ground. There's no --

HUNT: Literally falls into the Potomac.

OLORUNNIPA: Clearly, no other sort of reasonable outcome here I think what Howard Lutnick was trying to do was take people's attention off of the fact that the reason that Trump is so focused on putting his name on buildings on renaming things on trying to associate himself with the glory of John F. Kennedy is because he realizes, yes, he only has two and a half years in office, but he's also someone who is looking at his legacy and thinking about himself in that kind of term.

[16:15:05]

He wants people to remember him. He wants to go down in history as one of these larger-than-life presidents that have buildings named after them. And he's not sure that that's going to happen because of all of the polarization around his presidency, because of all of the things that have led his approval rating to be where it is right now.

He's worried about being one of the forgotten presidents, one of the people that is not seen as a president for all Americans. And that's part of the reason why he's putting his name on all of these various buildings and focusing on all these vanity projects. And Lutnick does not want to talk about that. He wants to talk about this as being the president's way of letting off steam, the way the president gets to have a little bit of break from all the work that he's doing.

One of the things that made the clip of Jon Ossoff speaking a couple of weeks ago, so viral, yes, he talked about Natalie Harp, but he also said the president doesn't want to do the job. He doesn't want to do his real job. He wants to focus on all these other legacy things that are vanity projects for him.

And that is a really cutting message for these midterms that Democrats are going to be pushing for the next several weeks.

HUNT: In some ways, he's never stopped being the kid from Queens that wanted his name on that building in Midtown with all the other elites.

All right. Elie Honig, thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Always great to have you.

Everyone else is going to stand by. Coming up next year in THE ARENA, the lawmaker at the heart of the

lawsuit against the president's attempts to overhaul the Kennedy Center will be here live. Congresswoman Joyce Beatty was in court today and will join us this hour.

But first, the president on defense ahead of the midterms, what he's saying today about Republican worries about the economy as he prepares to go all in in a key Senate race.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We have a very good candidate, Ken Paxton, and he's running against Talafreako, they call him, because he is a little freaky. And that's not a man that represents the value of Texas.

So, I'm going to help Ken Paxton, and I'm going to spend a lot of time in Texas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:21:25]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We're working very hard. We want to win that race. He's running against a man who should never be. We have a very good candidate, Ken Paxton, and he's running against Talafreako, they call him, because he is a little freaky. And that's not a man that represents the value of Texas.

So, I'm going to help Ken Paxton, and I'm going to spend a lot of time in Texas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: President Trump heading to Texas today to headline a fundraiser with Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton as new polling shows that race is incredibly close. The president's trip also coming as some Republicans have gotten frustrated and concerned that the president's escalating trade war with Canada is going to further harm the GOP's midterm hopes. Trump's newest escalation, signing an order to officially rename Lake Ontario, "Lake America".

The president dismissing the idea that the tariff fight could impact his party in November.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Ultimately, it's going to be very good for us because we're losing -- when you talk about affordability, we're losing 62 billion a year on average with Canada and if you really look at it we're losing more than that. It's too much. It's too much. We can't lose that we don't want to lose that. We don't want to lose it anymore.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: CNN senior White House correspondent Kristen Holmes joins me now with more.

Kristen, what more did we hear on this today?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, so let's start with Texas. It is clear to anyone, any Republican, anybody looking at the race that Paxton needs help. He's floundering a little.

Do they think that he's not going to win? Not really. There is an overall belief among Republicans and in this White House that it would take a huge movement to actually turn Texas blue. But are they willing to take that chance? Absolutely not.

So, you're likely going to see President Trump down there more than just And one thing to keep an eye on is how much money MAGA Inc., the PAC that has $400 million, is going to put into that race.

Now, that, of course, is going to irk quite a few Republicans who think this all could have been avoided if President Trump had either one, stayed out of the race, or two, endorsed John Cornyn, who, of course, now is a lame duck senator. That, we'll table, we'll see how that goes. We're obviously still months out from the midterms.

On the other part of this, there's a lot of frustration among Republicans who don't understand what the White House is doing here, particularly when it comes to this kind of goading of Canada.

One thing to keep in mind, the naming of Lake America and taking out Lake Ontario, this is straight out of every single Trump playbook that we have ever seen. It's part of how he needles people. He tries to get people to the negotiating table. He's often kind of this big bully when it comes to these kind of negotiations and that is what we're seeing here.

I mean, he is -- he is ordering this to happen and in fact taking a step further it's not just about you know some kind of generic name change he's actually trying to have or directing -- not trying to have -- directing Doug Burgum to go through and basically delete any mentions of Lake Ontario in the geographic name information system and then re-put in Lake of America. So he's taking an extra step here.

Why is this such an issue? Well, why is President Trump focusing on, one, tariffs, which nobody seems to like? Two, tariffs with an ally. And three, an ally that is our northern neighbor that actually will impact probably three of the most consequential Senate races that are currently on the table for Republicans, Maine, New Hampshire, and Michigan.

[16:25:02]

They really believe they can pick up Michigan. They believe that they could win in New Hampshire. They need Susan Collins to keep her seat in Maine. All of those states are directly impacted by this. They are probably

the first line of defense of people who do regular business with our neighbors to the north.

So, what you're seeing now is a lot of Republicans really hoping that this goes away, that before September 8th, some kind of deal is going to be struck before Canada issues their retaliatory tariffs as well. So, it's unclear what the strategy is here, but President Trump is doubling down. We'll see where it goes.

HUNT: Indeed, we will.

All right. Kristen Holmes for us at the White House -- Kristen, thank you.

Mike Dubke, not to -- you know, sorry, it's one of those days. Why is he doing all this like right now? I mean, and Michigan, Michigan's a good point. I mean, I've got. How's the family of Michigan? If you get in the wrong lane going in the tunnel in Detroit, you're going to accidentally end up in Canada. That's how close it is.

Like, why screw around with it?

DUBKE: Again, what are the rules here?

(LAUGHTER)

DUBKE: Listen, I think on this, it's one of these things that has gotten a bit out of control again, and the president's taking it to the nth degree with this Lake America renaming. But we're going to -- we're playing a high stakes game.

From a Republican point of view, the biggest, and thank God she didn't say Alaska, because that's another Senate race that we -- of a state that borders Canada that we should talk about. And there is a lot of trade, and we talked about tourism.

I mean, the number of Canadian tourists coming to the United States, especially to Florida, is way down. So, we are seeing an economic impact from this fight, so it's not just this, oh, you can't bring your hockey sticks here anymore. There is an economic impact to this.

I think this may be part of a backlash against the -- well, I'll show you, I can still do tariffs. That's one. I think there is a dislike of the way the Canadian government has been treating the United States government. It's maybe an outgrowth of the speech that the prime minister gave in Davos several months ago.

I mean, there's a number of things to point at, but for a Republican that is running in a very competitive state, whether it be Michigan or Maine or New Hampshire, this is not what they want to be talking about right now, and that's the detrimental thing.

HUNT: Kate, what's your sense of where Democrats are right now? I mean, what's the sort of zeitgeist, the thinking in the party about whether they can take back the Senate? BEDINGFIELD: I think there's a lot of optimism and a lot of enthusiasm. I think if you go race by race, you look at the fact that President Trump is spending time in Texas, which should by all accounts see if it's easy for Republicans to defend. They're having to spend money and spend the president's time in Texas. That tells you something, broadly speaking, about where the map is and where the environment is for Democrats.

There is a lot of enthusiasm about candidates who are running -- I won't say, I won't say nontraditional, but are running smartly outside of Democratic Washington. You've got a candidate in Iowa, obviously, Roy Cooper in North Carolina. You have Democratic candidates who are really seizing the opportunity to talk about their states to be sort of divorced from separated from the party in Washington and are being very smart about it.

And I think there's there is a lot of opportunity here that feels like Democrats are seizing and. Trump is helping them out.

The one thing I would say, if to the extent there's political strategy behind what Trump is doing here with tariffs, it may be an admission of sorts that the only way that they're going to have a good November is by riling up the MAGA base, who by numbers are still fairly with Trump. And so maybe there's a world where they're saying, look, by Trump being Trump, we're energizing people that we need to come out. I think that's an incredibly --

(CROSSTALK)

CARLSON: But only 15 percent of MAGA right now in the latest poll is strongly behind President Trump. So, we are also seeing that number waning.

BEDINGFIELD: Yes.

CARLSON: Mainstream Republicans are leaving in droves.

DUBKE: But there are other issues. We had historic tax cuts. We've got no tax on tips.

CARLSON: But they don't talk about that.

DUBKE: No tax -- I know.

CARLSON: They don't talk about that.

(LAUGHTER)

CARLSON: Rile them up.

DUBKE: We've got great messages for this base, and we're not using them.

CARLSON: But the president doesn't talk about that. I was going to bring up those exact things.

DUBKE: Trump accounts.

CARLSON: The Republicans have had victories for the economy and especially for the working people.

DUBKE: Yes.

CARLSON: But they are not talking about that at all, and it starts at the top. I would also just mention something that I think is incredibly important about galvanizing the MAGA base. Voting in primaries is completely different from voting in the midterm elections. You have small numbers of people that come out to vote in the primaries, unfortunately.

But in that sense, you can galvanize the MAGA base to vote then. Getting them to come back out in the midterms when you're actually up against the Republican versus the Democrat, it's a totally different ballgame. And I wouldn't be surprised to see a bunch of Trump endorsees not win in the midterm elections as a result of that.

[16:30:03]

BEDINGFIELD: Yeah, it's also true that a midterm electorate tends to be a more Democratic electorate, period. They tend to be voters with college degrees, for example. They tend to be higher information voters who, over the last 15, 20 years, have really realigned to the Democratic Party.

And, so, you know, it is also true that just the number of voters who come out, the type of voter who tends to come out in a midterm.

HUNT: Well -- and one of the things too that we have seen is that there is a difference from when Trump is on the ballot and when he's not on the ballot. In terms of some of these lower propensity voters, he does seem to galvanize people who otherwise simply don't show up for reasons. You know, sometimes pollsters understand it, some of them they don't fully.

Toluse, I want to play this for you. The president has done an interview with Fox News. The whole thing is set to air on Sunday, but here's a piece of it where he, again, is trying to convince Republicans that he is on the ballot. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: There's a theory that I get the vote. I see it all the time that when Trump's on the ballot, they win. When he's out of the ballot, the people don't go to vote, and I'm asking the people through your brilliant show, number one show, I'm asking the people to get out and vote, pretend I'm on the ballot.

If they go out and vote, we're going to win. And if we don't, our country's going to be in sad shape because we're going to go through a lot of things.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Toluse?

OLORUNNIPA: There's a question about how much Trump actually cares about the results from this midterm, how much work he's going to put into it. In the earlier clip, he talked about how he's going to be spending a lot of time in Texas.

We'll see over the next 10 weeks whether he goes to these very competitive states over and over again. He's 80 years old. He's someone who would rather be spending his time talking about ballrooms and building things like Howard Lutnick said.

So, I would be surprised if we actually see the president trying to make this a race about himself in a really personal way by actually going to some of these.

DUBKE: I think we're going to have 400 million reasons that he's going to make this race about himself. And to be intellectually consistent here, I will say this -- when we look at '18 and 2022, when Trump wasn't on the ballot, Republicans suffered. When he was on the ballot, low propensity voters who turn out for Donald Trump came out in '16 and '20 and '24.

I think this White House has made a decision that we are going to put Trump front and center, for better or worse, they think for better, in order to get these low propensity voters to come out, because the Democrats have shown that they are coming out in all the special elections. And now if we can get these low-propensity Trump voters out, Republicans have a chance.

OLORUNNIPA: Will Trump travel? That's the question, whether it'll actually put in the work to make that strategy work.

HUNT: He's going to Texas. I guess we'll find out.

All right, coming up next here in THE ARENA, day one of verdict watch. In that major murder trial, we're going to get a live report from outside court as a jury deliberates the fate of Lindsay Clancy.

Plus, Congresswoman Joyce Beatty is here live. She's fresh from the federal court, where a judge is weighing her lawsuit that's trying to keep Donald Trump's name off the Kennedy Center.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:37:27]

HUNT: All right. Welcome back.

Just moments ago, an emergency hearing over the White House's newest attempt to add Trump's name to the Kennedy Center has wrapped up.

Joining me now in THE ARENA is the lawmaker who requested the emergency order to stop Trump from putting his name on the building. Democratic Congresswoman Joyce Beatty of Ohio. She is also an ex officio member of the Kennedy Center.

Congresswoman, thank you so much for being here.

Can you walk us through, what were the top lines? What stood out to you most in what you heard from the judge during this hearing.

REP. JOYCE BEATTY, EX-OFFICIO BOARD MEMBER, THE KENNEDY CENTER: Well, I think the judge again asked a lot of relevant questions because here we are again back in court on much of what we've discussed before. As my lawyer brought to his attention, we think that they're trying to circumvent the law. We know it's unlawful. The judge ruled in our favor to put Donald Trump's name on the Kennedy Center.

Now, they're trying to split hairs between putting it in script, saying in past tense for the future that it was endowed or renovated, monies that he raised. Now, hold on to that point. The judge then made it very clear in saying, and how many dollars have been raised? Zero dollars. And we know that much of the reason that we're here is because we need to talk about programming. We need to talk about if we're going to continue with the Kennedy Center.

But Donald Trump and his hand-picked board members ran it into the ground. They put its name up, unlawful. People then started not coming to the Kennedy Center because they didn't want to be in this political battle. They didn't want to be there because they know it's the only living memorial that we have.

So, there was a lot of back and forth about the board meeting. Clearly, we brought it to the judges' attention that there was a lot of questions. Think about it. The board meeting was a little over two hours. And to have a president get on a board meeting when we're at war, when people are trying to decide whether they can pay their bills, buy groceries, or put gas in the car. And he only offered suggestions about himself and made some snide remarks about me and a couple other board members.

We also talked about the fund, the foundation, and clearly his lawyers couldn't articulate enough about what the difference between the fund and the foundation.

[16:40:04]

So, we spent a lot of time going over much of what we had discussed before, and for Trump's lawyers to try to convince the judge that they would be in a position lawfully to put an inscription on or to talk about naming the plaza after him. So, they spent a lot of time on that. And, of course, our lawyers are asking for discovery.

There was also an emergency date of September the 8th, and the judge asked a very pointed question to Trump's lawyers. Why September the 8th? What's magical, his exact words, and the lawyer couldn't answer it.

So, there was a lot that went unanswered, unaddressed, but the judge listened carefully and certainly will take into account and review everything that was presented. But here we are again, dealing with something that's unlawful. And Donald Trump, as we all know, this is another one of his vanity

projects. But it was also very clear that I don't trust him. This is the same president that told us we were going to get a remodeled, renovated ballroom. And he demolished the entire East Wing, the Rose Garden, over-budgeted and unfinished.

So, his latest remarks that he would, my lawyer opened with, Donald Trump most recently said, He could tear it down and make it in some type of arena venue. Sounds like a spoiled kid not getting his way.

HUNT: Do you think there should be an order that explicitly prevents him from doing it? Are you concerned that he might up and demolish the Kennedy Center before the court has a chance to act?

BEATTY: I think the court has acted in a very responsible way with the previous decisions from all of the courts. But I can't predict what this president would do because he has been so unpredictable. But what we know we can count on, he will do something that is very unreasonable and something that doesn't make sense.

And that's why we continue to fight. That's why we continue to go to court. And I want all of the supporters who were there for the Kennedy Center to know that we're fighting against justice. I will not stop fighting. Donald Trump likes to wear you down. Well, he picked the wrong person.

HUNT: So, Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, was at this hearing and spoke at length to reporters, including he offered this TikTok, if you will, of what he says were communications between himself and you in what he describes as an attempt to resolve the issues at hand.

I want to play what Lutnick said, and then I'd love to if his version of events lines up with your version of events. Let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LUTNICK: I expected to meet Representative Beatty. Instead, the next day I got a letter -- not a letter -- I got a call from her lawyers who said, we only want to work with lawyers. We're not going to talk to each other. So, I texted her and said, come on, let's just sit down and talk. We can do it with your lawyers, without your lawyers. Come on, we can just work this out.

And she came back, I'm more comfortable if you just do it with lawyers. And there's no such thing as just doing it with lawyers or you end up in the courtroom where the lawyers get paid, okay? Right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Is that how it happened?

BEATTY: No, there's a lot that's inaccurate about that.

First, Secretary Lutnick should know that my name is Beatty, not Beatty. Secondly, I didn't send him an email or a letter nor on the phone. He sent me a text and asked, could we get together and meet? I said, Yes, but I'd like to meet with your and my lawyers and he said fine.

And then the next thing I hear, the district of -- the DOJ says that I'm refusing to meet with him without my lawyers, and he agreed for us to meet and said fine if we wanted to bring our lawyers. And then he cherry-picks my words.

I mean this is a man that sits in a board meeting. He's not in any official capacity other than Donald Trump told us he would be sitting at the head of the table. And keep in mind his wife is also on the Kennedy Center board. So a lot of conflicts a lot of confusions and that's what I would say back Secretary Lutnick, get it accurate if you're going to quote me in what I've said.

HUNT: All right. Congresswoman Joyce Beatty, thank you very much for your time, ma'am. I really appreciate it.

All right.

BEATTY: Thank you.

HUNT: Of course.

Ahead here in THE ARENA, a live report from outside court in Massachusetts where a jury today started deliberations in the murder trial of Lindsay Clency.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:49:24]

HUNT: All right. Welcome back.

Jurors have just finished their first day of deliberations in the major murder trial of Lindsay Clancy. She is charged with three counts of first-degree murder. She doesn't dispute fatally strangling her three children, who were all under the age of six. Her defense says she was experiencing postpartum psychosis, extreme mental illness, and argues she was a dedicated mother until doctors started overprescribing her medication.

Here is part of the defense's closing argument.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEVIN REDDINGTON, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: This young lady is not guilty of the killing of her children because she was suffering from a disease and defect, as His Honor instructed you.

[16:50:08]

And they're not going to be able to prove otherwise. And it's their burden, not us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Prosecutors challenged that argument in their closing statement.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHANAN BUCKINGHAM, ASSISTANT DISTRICT ATTORNEY: She had more access to treatment and care and support than a lot of people do. This wasn't a woman suffering from a lack of care, a lack of resources. She had an abundance of help, an abundance of care. She had all of that and more.

So why did she specifically do it? She was depressed. She was exhausted. She was done. She didn't want to try anymore. She felt damaged.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right, joining me now in THE ARENA to discuss this case, CNN's Jean Casares, who's outside the courthouse, and civil rights attorney Areva Martin.

Jean, let me start with you. Walk us through what you saw in court today and what the mood is like as we await this verdict.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, I think what we saw in court today was different styles, different theories.

The defense started out by saying that this prosecution has ripped the soul out of Lindsay Clancy, talking about that the issue is completely the medication and lousy medical care. They would just say, take a pill, and you'll be fine. Focused on the seriousness of her mental illness, but also focused on that she never did anything wrong, Kevin Reddington argued.

She was a wife, she was a daughter, she was a labor and delivery nurse, and she was a wonderful, wonderful mother. But she was seriously mentally ill. And when she slit her wrist and cut her throat, she wanted to commit suicide. It was very serious.

And the anxiety had become postpartum depression, which became bipolar, never diagnosed, which ended up being psychosis. And that is when the voice called to her that day that she had to kill her children, and she had to do it now.

Prosecution completely different, focusing in on January 24th of 2023, talking about the decisive action she made all day from taking her daughter to the doctors, building a snowman in the snow, playing with her children with Play-Doh, and then at four o'clock researching very, very intently on where her husband should get takeout for dinner, what CVS he should go to, plotted the times, plotted the distance, and then once he left one by one taking the children down into the basement.

Why the basement? Because that's where the exercise bands were. And that's where she wrapped each and every one individually. She could have stopped at any time, the prosecution said. Her husband called her. The timeline the prosecution presented, they believed, right after she had strangled her children.

And she called him back. She was lucid. That's Patrick Clancy's testimony. prosecution tried to show she knew right from wrong, she made the actions. Why? Because she wanted to commit suicide, but she loved her children, and a child should not be without their mother. So, she killed the children so they all could be together in another place.

HUNT: Devastating.

Areva, there are nine women on this jury that is now deliberating. How could that be a factor here?

AREVA MARTIN, CIVIL RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Well, definitely women may take a different approach to this case. We've seen a lot of women online. A lot of women on social media express empathy for Lindsay Clancy. Talk about the way that this country deals so poorly with postpartum depression, postpartum illnesses that developed in the way that we've heard about so vividly in this case, those women may be of the same belief as some of the women we've seen online talking about this case.

At the end of the day, Kasie, there's no dispute that Lindsay Clancy killed her children. The question that these jurors have to grapple with is whether she is criminally liable, criminally responsible. And that's going to be a heavy lift, I think, for the prosecution, given all of the expert testimony about her postpartum psychosis and the poor medical treatment that she got.

And I think the testimony of her mother-in-law was so powerful in this case about how she was crying out for help. And her condition was deteriorating, and yet nothing was being done by the medical professionals.

HUNT: Indeed. Certainly something that the country is waiting to see the outcome as we, of course, head into another day of deliberations here. Jean Casares, Areva Martin, thank you both very much.

[16:55:00]

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HUNT: All right, thanks to my panel. Really appreciate all of you being here today.

And thanks to you at home for joining us as well. Don't forget, you can now stream THE ARENA Live. You can catch up whenever you want to. It's all in the CNN app. You can scan that QR code on your screen below.

You can also catch up by listening to THE ARENA's podcast. You can follow the show on X and Instagram, we are @TheArenaCNN.

But for now, don't go anywhere. "THE LEAD" anchored by Phil Mattingly today starts right now.