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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
House Republican To CNN: "Trump Is Dragging The Party Down"; Feds Search Rep. Ilhan Omar's Home As Part Of Criminal Probe; Talarico Back On Trail After Recovering From The Flu. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired October 12, 2026 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[16:00:00]
ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: They're A.I. generated.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Yeah.
HILL: I'm telling you what showed up in the feed. Not the last we've heard of this.
SANCHEZ: I wonder what Molly thinks of all this.
Lisa Respers France, thank you so much for bringing us this important report.
And thank you for joining us this afternoon.
Erica, great to be with you as well.
HILL: Great to have you. Maybe tomorrow Molly will be here.
SANCHEZ: We'll find out. "THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT" starts right now.
(MUSIC)
KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Hi, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to THE ARENA. It's great to have you with us on this Monday.
Right now, Election Day just about three weeks away. Some Republicans are warning President Trump is hurting their efforts to hold on to Congress. One House Republican running for reelection telling CNN this, quote, "Trump is dragging the party down," end quote.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And in this election, I'm asking you to do me a favor, pretend, just pretend that I'm running, because you know, when I run, we get 48 percent more votes, 48 percent. And in a way, we are running. So, pretend that I'm running and go out. You got to get out of the vote.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: President Donald Trump in Tennessee over the weekend making that now familiar plea. Expect to hear a similar message when he speaks tonight in Ohio. Early voting data there suggests Democrats have made gains even in the areas where Trump won big just two years ago.
Here's how former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie sees his party's message to voters right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLP)
CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), FORMER NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR: Here is the Republican argument for the last three weeks: it's okay to sell -- to buy oil from a thug KGB dictator in Russia that will use it to kill free Ukrainians. The American people don't get the fact that the economy is great. And so, when they have to pay all they have to pay at the grocery store and at the gas station, they just don't get it. And by the way, it's okay to livestream a murder by the United States government executing on the death penalty. Those are our three closing arguments.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Despite all that, Republicans have had one big advantage over Democrats this cycle. That is money. We learned today that Elon Musk has given at least a quarter of a billion dollars to Republicans just since July, making the world's wealthiest man once again the GOP's largest donor.
But will it be enough? And if it isn't, if Democrats take control of Congress for the remainder of Donald Trump's second term, who do you think the president will blame?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: If we don't win The midterms, they're going to blame me. You know that. If we do win them, I will get no credit whatsoever. It's true, I won't get any. But I'm working my ass off. You better get out there and vote. You think this is easy?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. Let's get off the sidelines, head into THE ARENA. My panel is here.
CNN contributor, host of "The New York Times", "The Interview", Lulu Garcia Navarro; CNN political director, Washington bureau chief David Chalian; CNN political commentator, former Biden White House communications director Kate Bedingfield, and the former chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence, Marc Short.
We are also joined by the creator of Showtime's "The Circus", Mark McKinnon.
Welcome to all of you. Thank you so much for being here.
David Chalian, let me start with you to just set the table here because we had some new data here. Lots reporting on where some of this money is going. Three weeks out, what is your -- when you cast your eye across the map, what are you thinking about first and foremost? DAVID CHALIAN, CNN WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF: Three weeks out, I'm watching where the money is moving in this final stretch and it seems that there are some decisions being made when you talk to Republicans that they may be attempting to sort of triage on the House side, which many Republicans that you talk to think may be gone at this point, and lean with the money and muscle and the president where they think he could be helpful into doing everything they can to try and salvage the Senate since that seems to be more of the toss-up equation right now.
And so, I think when you look at that, you can watch the Republican dollars perhaps starting to come out of some races they were investing on the House side and watch them pour more and more and look at where the president's going tonight and where he's been into places like Ohio and Alaska and Iowa doing everything they can to try and shore up some of these red states to help them keep control of the Senate.
HUNT: Yeah. So, Mark McKinnon, I mean, it really does feel like the Senate, as David outlines here, is turning into potentially the story. It's a huge prize for Democrats. The implications of a Democratically held Senate and the possibility of unified control of Congress now and maybe even unified government were Democrats to win in 2028 is just absolutely enormous. What do you think the likelihood is of that sitting here today, and which of these races are you feeling like, thinking about, looking at, that Democrats might pick up?
MARK MCKINNON, FORMER ADVISER TO GEORGE W. BUSH & JOHN MCCAIN: Well, Kasie, this is the period that reminds me of the great Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour's observation. It's that point in the campaign where good gets better and bad gets worse. It's really hard to turn things around at this point. The good campaigns just get better and the bad ones just start getting desperate.
I mean, when we're talking about a Kansas Senate race being in play for Democrats first time since 1932, when we see Republicans spending $150 million Texas to hold on to Texas when they shouldn't be spending a dime there.
[16:05:12]
By the way, that's more money than we spent on the George W. Bush presidential campaign doing the media. I did the media then for the entire country.
HUNT: Wow.
MCKINNON: So, I mean, that's just a real clear signal that they're spending money in South Carolina to hang on to the Graham seat. It's all defense. There's just no offense on the Republican side anymore, and that's a bad sign.
HUNT: So, let's watch a little bit, actually, of you mentioned South Carolina at Darline Graham, of course, at Lindsey Graham's the late Lindsey Graham's sister now running for that seat.
Here was a little bit of the debate that she had with her Democratic opponent over the weekend. Watch. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNIE ANDREWS (D), SOUTH CAROLINA SENATE CANDIDATE: She had the audacity to walk out onto this stage and admit that national security isn't really her thing. South Carolina, if your surgeon said that appendectomies aren't really his thing, would you still hand him a scalpel? No. So why would we hand Darline Graham a full term in the U.S. Senate?
SEN. DARLINE GRAHAM (R-SC): At least I'm honest. If I don't know something, I'm glad to say it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Mark, how do you understand why this seat is potentially in play in South Carolina?
MCKINNON: Well, because they took everything for granted. They just assumed it's a Republican state. They assumed it's Lindsey Graham's sister, so that they just didn't have to do any heavy lifting or any investment whatsoever. And it was a big mistake because they ended up nominating somebody with zero political experience in an environment where it's very tough for Republicans.
I mean, to be a successful Republican candidate in this environment, you have to be really good. Because you're on defense. I mean, all you're having to do is defend Iran, defend oil prices, defend gas prices, defend inflation.
So, it takes an extraordinary candidate to buck the tide. And Darline Graham is not an extraordinary candidate whatsoever.
HUNT: Well, and Marc Short, interestingly enough, one of the best candidates Republicans probably have this cycle is Susan Collins in Maine, because it's tough sledding everywhere else.
MARC SHORT, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE: Well, I think that's probably every six years we'd say about Susan Collins. The reality is that we may or may not like her record of voting, but the reality is that she's a good campaigner and she fits that state well.
But I think that -- stepping back, Kasie, typically a midterm cycle we know is not good. Midterm cycle when party's in control we know is not good. We knew the headwinds would be strong, but I think it's rare. I think you look at across states like Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska, Texas, that have been Republican by double digits I think is a story about what this economic agenda is doing.
I think that a lot of voters elected Donald Trump to fix the inflation that they were facing under the Biden administration, and that hasn't been fixed. And for a lot of the farmers across America, they're feeling the impact of the tariffs in this trade war. And I think that's where you see the states that are probably most alarming for Republicans is in ruby-red parts of the heartland.
HUNT: Kate, where are you on how optimistic Democrats should be in some of these heartland places?
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think Democrats should be optimistic. I think the trends are moving in Democrats direction. I think you are seeing people's frustration with Trump. It's not just their frustration with the economy broadly, but specifically with things that Trump has done. They hold Trump accountable for it.
That means that Democrats and these Democratic candidates have an opportunity to really make a case to say Donald Trump has made your life more difficult in these places where people traditionally wouldn't necessarily be open to an argument from a Democratic candidate.
So yes, I think there's absolutely reason to be optimistic. Now I'm a little, I may be a little more bearish than, you know, than the headlines today might suggest because I think there's a lot, there are some tough realities for Democrats. I think redistricting has created races that should have been more genuinely more competitive or now I think less so based on redistricting. It just gives Democrats fewer places to go.
So, you know, the other thing I would also say is, you know, I think Democrats have to be realistic that the Democratic Party also doesn't have the greatest approval rating. And so I think in a midterm race, that's fine. You're, you know, you're hammering the party in power. You're hammering the president. There's a great message there.
Democrats also have to be realistic about where voters are open to hearing their arguments.
LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I think what you're seeing with Trump is actually a good strategy. They need turnout. So what he's -- I know everyone sort of makes fun of him because everyone's like, oh, look at him. he's making it all about himself and look at his approval ratings are terrible.
But if you're going to red districts and your messages come out that's because there are Republican voters who might be dissatisfied with Trump might stay home at a midterm because people vote less in a midterm and that is going to be problematic for them. So they're trying to, you know, essentially hold onto territory that they have already.
[16:10:02]
So I don't think it's a dumb strategy for Trump to go to these places and make it about him because what he's trying to do is really pull in people who might be mad and might just be like, you know what, I'm a Republican, I'm not going to vote for a Democrat, but I'm just going to stay home instead.
CHALIAN: Not only may it not be a dumb strategy, it may be the only available strategy to them. I mean, that's -- you know, that's what -- I'm trying to think, what other lever would they pull to reshape the electorate in a midterm with this kind of bad environment for them? It has to be try to juice the base who may not be reliable in a midterm cycle as much as you possibly can.
HUNT: Yeah.
SHORT: I agree it's the right strategy, partly it's because there's been no distance for the last 20 months. I mean, at this point, if you try to distance, it looks really disingenuous to voters. And so, at this point, you really don't have a choice.
HUNT: Yeah. Mark McKinnon, can we talk about the role of money for a second? Because, you know, this is we can put up Elon Musk's campaign contributions here. He's given $366 million, okay, this cycle. It's a stunning amount of money.
As you pointed out, you spent, what did you say, $150 million on the entire Bush campaign across the country in a presidential year. It's gotten almost silly, but I honestly have been wondering -- this is not the first cycle I've wondered this. We really saw it in 2016 when, frankly, the then-Trump campaign did not spend the kind of money that a winning campaign would normally have spent, especially when you consider super PAC spending from, say, Jeb Bush supporters and others. I mean, it was like you could drop $100 million and it barely made a sound.
How much of a difference does this all make at the end of the day?
MCKINNON: Well, Kasie, in that Bush campaign, I literally came back to Karl Rove and said, listen, I can't spend all this money. I mean, I could spend it, but it's not having any impact. There's just huge diminishing returns, especially on paid media.
Here's the thing. People in America understand what political advertising is. They know there's a First Amendment. It protects politicians. They can say whatever they want to. It doesn't have to be the truth. It rarely is the truth.
So, they start off just saying if it's a political ad, I don't even believe it.
And so, at a certain point -- I mean, it just starts -- it starts, you know, with a very low ceiling because people just say, I'm not going to pay any attention to this because I know it's paid for and it's a partisan message. So, to make them be effective, even to begin with, but then you just when people see tens and hundreds of ads over and over and over again, especially at this point in the cycle. They just turn it off. It's white noise and wallpaper, so it really has a diminishing impact, especially this late in the cycle.
BEDINGFIELD: Can I say on campaigns that I've worked on, we would always say earned beats paid because at the end of the day, to Mark's point, people, there's a certain level at which they kind of tune out paid advertising, but also if the environment, which the one the Republicans are facing right now, is so negative, if people feel so negatively about the candidate they're being to go out and vote for, you can spend all the money on the world trying to convince them that they should feel better about that candidate than they do. It very rarely works. Earned beats paid. GARCIA-NAVARRO: Can I just tell you the mysterious thing, and I've never worked, obviously, on a campaign because I'm a journalist, but the thing that I find very mysterious as I've been watching this whole play out is that everyone talks about, like, it's too early, it's too early, people aren't tuned in yet, and then, like, a hot minute later, it's like, it's too late, it's too late, it's baked in, everyone's already decided.
CHALIAN: It's called the tipping point.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yeah.
(CROSSTALK)
GARCIA-NAVARRO: What is the sliver of time apparently where you can actually influence people? Because it just makes no sense to me.
SHORT: I agree with Kate.
MCKINNON: Well, the reality is --
(CROSSTALK)
SHORT: It's easy to raise money for this.
HUNT: Hold on one second, Mark. Let me go to Marc Short, and then, Mark McKinnon, I'll give you the last word.
SHORT: It's easy to raise money for paid media because donors are susceptible to it. It's like, oh, I'm contributing something I can actually see and feel and touch.
But the reality is that more and more voters tune it out. The only upside of the paid media is when you actually can create an earned media story. If you inject something that people otherwise didn't know about, you create earned media, then there's a big upside to it.
But I think that the money's having less and less impact today because people get their information from so many disparate sources. It used to be that there was a fewer channels.
HUNT: Yeah, for sure. Mark McKinnon, sorry, go ahead. What were you going to say?
MCKINNON: Well, Mark's exactly right on that point. And in fact, a lot of times during those Bush campaigns, we would produce paid media, precisely with the -- hoping that the impact would be to create earned media, which is more impactful. We knew that they pay media wouldn't do much, but if we could get it to create more news in the news cycle, that was much more effective, impactful.
HUNT: Yeah, for sure.
All right, Mark McKinnon, thank you so much for joining. I hope you come by soon and soon again. We missed you.
MCKINNON: I'm coming by soon, Kasie.
HUNT: Great. All right, we'll see you soon. Coming up next here in THE ARENA, what's happening in the Texas Senate race that one candidate is now calling wild? But first, a new escalation against one of the president's most vocal critics in Congress.
Well, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar is now saying after federal agents searched her Washington, D.C. home as part of an ongoing criminal investigation.
[16:15:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM HOMAN, BORDER CZAR: I mean, if someone committed immigration violation, someone committed marriage fraud or anything like that, regardless if they're a congressman or not, no one's above the law. So, I'll leave it at that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HOMAN: Well, I'm not going to get ahead of Todd Blanche on this or Secretary Mullin, but we know this investigation was ongoing for a while. There wasn't a warrant executed this morning. So, I'll leave it at that. In specifics to the investigation, I think I need to turn that over to Todd Blanche or Markwayne Mullin. I don't want to get ahead of them commenting on an ongoing investigation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: This morning, federal officials searched the D.C. home of Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.
[16:20:02]
The Justice Department said that investigators from the Homeland Security Investigations branch of DHS executed a judicially authorized search warrant as part of an ongoing federal criminal investigation. The Congresswoman posted on X, quote, "I'm okay. Make no mistake: this is an attempt to target political enemies. and weaponize federal law enforcement. For 10 years, Trump has targeted me with baseless lies and smear campaigns. This is just the latest escalation in his campaign of political intimidation. I will not be silenced."
It is unusual for the Justice Department to take such an aggressive investigative step toward a candidate on the ballot so close to an election.
CNN crime and justice correspondent Katelyn Polantz is here for us.
So, Katelyn, what more do we know about this investigation? KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kasie, the specifics of the investigation we don't yet have yet have yet. There are no criminal charges that would be filed. But as of right now, we know two important things. One, that this is immigration related. You see there Homeland Security investigations, investigators or police outside of the house. They're the ones that conducted the search.
And then we also know that there's a criminal or a potentially criminal component to this, the Justice Department prosecutors being involved. We also know the top Justice Department leadership signed off on the need to do this search. They would have gone to a federal judge to get a search warrant to go into Representative Ilhan Omar's home in the D.C. area today.
We also have seen with our own cameras there boxes being removed from the home, potentially documents, and that the investigators were there for several hours. All of that pretty typical in a criminal investigation of some sort. What's atypical here is that this is a sitting member of Congress who is running for reelection she's on the ballot as a Democrat in Minnesota running again for her congressional seat this November.
So, we're only a couple weeks away from that and it is very unusual to see the Justice Department take such a obvious investigative step at this time so close to an election there had always has been a longstanding DOJ policy that they shouldn't be taking steps like that within 60 days though all it needs to overcome that is the sign off from Justice Department leadership as we know they have gotten sources have told us that the other thing about being a member of Congress that also requires internal sign off within the Justice Department and there is legislative records that would be blocked off very likely in a criminal investigation.
We will have to see what happens next though, what plays out and what could form the basis of that case that may have been pulled out of the House of Representative Ilham Omar if she is indeed charged at some time -- Kasie.
HUNT: All right. Katelyn Polantz for us -- Katelyn, thank you very much for that.
CNN legal and national security analyst Carrie Cordero is now joining our panel as well.
And, Carrie, I just want to pick up on this question about the proximity to an election for something like this. We're going to dig into, of course, the president has regularly attacked Ilhan Omar for years and years.
But this, of course, is just three weeks before the midterm elections. Now, worth noting, if she were to have a competitive election scenario, it's likely to be in the primary. seat and she's running as a Democrat.
But what does it say to you that they did take this very public step at this particular moment in time? CARRIE CORDERO, CNN LEGAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yeah, it's pretty significant. I mean, within the Justice Department it would be known as what's a sensitive as a sensitive investigative matter. So anytime you have an investigation that involves public official and elected official, particularly, you know, especially a member of Congress, that would heighten the level of sort of scrutiny that goes into determining what investigative steps to take. And then of course the timing only three weeks before the election even puts it into a higher category of scrutiny.
Generally, the policy of the Justice Department has been that they would not want to take an investigative step. Something like this, an overt search warrant that is, you know, visible and that the person targeted is subject to it. You know, that's a very overt investigative step that could potentially have the impact of affecting the election. That's something that historically the Justice Department has shied away from.
So, really, Kasie, the big question that I have today based on the facts that we know so far is what is the new investigative or the more recent investigative information such that it would have led to going to a judge and having a probable cause based warrant to justify not only a search of an elected member of Congress, but a search at this time so close to the election.
HUNT: Right, really interesting.
So, let's big picture here. Donald Trump is, of course, the president has taken on Ilhan Omar many times over the years. We can show you some of them. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: She comes from Somalia. They don't have a government. They don't have police. They don't -- all they have is crime and squalor.
Ilhan Omar is garbage. She's garbage. Her friends are garbage. They come from hell, and they complain and do nothing but (EXPLETIVE DELETED)
I think she should be impeached. I think she's terrible. Is she originally from Somalia?
What is going on with Omar? I've been reading these reports for two years about how corrupt and crooked she is.
She's telling us how to run our country.
(CROWD CHANTING)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: The crowd there, of course, chanting, "Send her back."
Lulu Garcia-Navarro, I mean, what do you see here? Of course, we don't know some of the details on the potential criminal investigation that's ongoing, as Katelyn outlined.
The congresswoman says that this is politically motivated.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: We don't know what is going on. So, I don't want to hazard, I guess, as to what immigration-related things this could be about. There have been a lot of -- there's been a lot of discussion about things to do with Ilhan Omar and members of her family.
That said, the timing of this is certainly suspect simply because, as we heard there, it's very unusual for the Justice Department to take an action like this right before an election. Quite rightly, it creates an environment where people are asking what has materially changed so close to an election that would mean that this action has to be taken.
You know, let's not forget when we had the Hillary Clinton issue with an investigation being launched into her e-mail use right before an election, that was used as massive fodder for a discussion that goes on today about whether or not that was --
HUNT: Part of why no one likes James Comey.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yes, why no one likes James Comey, whether there was election interference or not.
This really does raise that question. She is not, to my knowledge, in a closely contested seat. So therefore --
HUNT: No, she's not.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: You know, it becomes, I think, a little bit less loaded in that sense. But equally, we are three weeks out of an election.
HUNT: And well, David, I mean, Omar has been used and made into a villain by the right since her election, functionally.
CHALIAN: Yeah, and Donald Trump has been at the forefront of that. I mean, you played, I'm so glad you played the clips because this goes deep into his first term. This is not just the recent clips.
And specifically raising questions about her story as a refugee and her immigration story to the United States is something he has spent quite a lot of time on, even in his first term. Yes, her district is not competitive. There is a Senate race in Minnesota that has Democrats a little bit nervous and there has been for the last, you know, two years in Minnesota, this story about fraud and the Somali community broadly that has injected itself into the political environment. And I have no doubt that this is -- this is part of that larger narrative.
BEDINGFIELD: Yeah, that's what I was going to say. To me, it's less about Ilhan Omar herself being in a competitive race and more about her as an avatar for the way Donald Trump wants to paint the Democratic Party about -- it's about the competitive Senate race in Minnesota. You know, again, we -- obviously, we don't know. We don't know what the underlying developments here have been, and so I suppose we'll see.
But Donald Trump is not somebody who has historically shied away from using the Justice Department for political ends. And so, I think it is perfectly reasonable to -- as you know as a layperson to assume that that's what he's doing here and you know obviously that's I that's very troubling.
HUNT: Yeah. "The Washington Post", Marc Short, reported today that this investigation into Omar -- the investigation which has accelerated in recent weeks is viewed as controversial within the administration. Some officials have begun referring to it as World War 11 the senior official says. I don't know if that means anything to you.
SHORT: She made a commentary about World War 11 when she made a mistake and so it's kind of a play on that.
But look, I think the reality is that unfortunately DOJ has been politicized on both sides. And I don't know if the same commentary was here when Mar-a-Lago was raided and there was concern that he was looking to enter the race again and people were concerned about the optics in the same way that their now appears to be concerned about the optics or the timing.
HUNT: This was an argument that President Trump and his lawyers made that it was a problem for him right before an election.
SHORT: Yeah, of course, of course.
HUNT: Right.
SHORT: I just think that if you're going to have concerns on one side, you should have concerns on the other. I think the reality is that there's a lot of swirl around her about -- questions about her marriages, questions about her current husband, I think is still under investigation.
[16:30:02]
The reality, there's been a lot of questions about what's happened with daycare center in Minnesota and what extent she was wrapped up in that. So, there's a lot out there that we don't know about, but we do know that a judge signed off on it, and a D.C. magistrate judge, therefore, they're all Democrats. So, Democrat judge signed off on this warrant and this search.
And so, I think there's a lot potentially here that we aren't really understanding yet.
HUNT: All right. On that note, Carrie Cordero, thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate your time today.
The rest of our panel is going to stand by. Coming up next here in THE ARENA, everything's bigger in Texas, including the conspiracy theories. Yes, we are now at that part of the election season, what James
Talarico and Ken Paxton are both saying about the latest in their Texas Senate race.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES TALARICO (D), TEXAS SENATE CANDIDATE: It's wild that someone can just post something on the internet, and then the media just runs with it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:35:12]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TALARICO: I had the flu, the craziest, craziest thing I've ever heard. It's wild that someone can just post something on the Internet and then the media just runs with it.
You know, I've heard credible reports that Kim Paxton has a serious medical condition that causes clinical levels of cowardice. It's why I haven't heard from him. After 85 days when I first challenged him to a debate, he has asked for proof of life from me. I'm asking for proof of spine from him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico dismissing the rampant online speculation about his multi-day absence from the campaign trail, which he's repeatedly attributed to a bad case of the flu.
His Republican opponent, Ken Paxton, has in recent days seized on the flurry of right-wing theories about Talarico's absence, even at one- point demanding proof of life from the 37-year-old state rep.
Conspiracies reached a fever pitch when one conservative influencer alleged Talarico was receiving mental health treatment in Ohio, an allegation that the supposed facility itself publicly denied.
Talarico, who up until this weekend had not appeared publicly in Texas since September 26th, also posted, quote, "I've never even been to Ohio."
Now back out on the trail, Talarico is attempting to turn the focus back on to Paxton, who has yet to agree to debate him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He called you guys out, said you all should have a debate. Are you working on the details with one, or do you think that doesn't need to happen? KEN PAXTON (R), TEXAS SENATE CANDIDATE: Well, no, look, we've been
working on that for months with him. And of course, we can never quite work out the details because he always wants something we can't do. So reality is the big story is the fact that he was missing from the campaign trail. I know he'd love to change the topic to debates. But big story is two weeks is a long time to be away with the flu. And it's just a very strange time to disappear.
I don't know whether to believe him about the flu or not. I just know that everything that he says, almost everything that he says, has been false since the beginning of this campaign.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. David Chalian, it's true that that's a long time to be off the campaign trail in September and October, and yet this has spiraled out of hand.
CHALIAN: Yeah. I mean, with no evidence to back up like these other claims out there of him being receiving mental health treatment or being out of state as the candidate himself said, he's never been to Ohio.
I mean, I -- it's interesting to hear Ken Paxton say, Oh, he wants to change the subject here. My question is, why, Ken Paxton, do you want this to be the subject? Like, the candidate was sick. He said he had the flu. How is this helping your campaign?
Because it seems far afield from what voters in Texas say is, like, their number one issue and what they are looking to cast their ballot on. It is not about James Talarico's absence from the trail due to the flu.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: People, Americans love a conspiracy theory. Talarico has been a huge focus of interest and hopes and the hopes and dreams. He carries the hopes and dreams.
CHALIAN: You think this is the right closing message for the Paxon campaign?
(CROSSTALK)
GARCIA-NAVARRO: I think this is a gift for the Paxton campaign because they don't have a closing message. He does not want to debate Tallerico. And the fact that Talarico was gone for two weeks has been a gift to the Paxton campaign is what I think.
BEDINGFIELD: I think this is a very online story. This is a good reminder that Twitter, X is not real life.
HUNT: Not real life.
(CROSSTALK)
(LAUGHTER) BEDINGFIELD: Most voters in Texas are not. I mean, the people who are like absorbing this and are living and dying by the Talarico conspiracy theory are the people who are in the right-wing ecosystem echo chamber online. Many of them I'm going to wager, 80 percent of them are not Texas voters.
The people in Texas is kind of to your point, David, but the people in Texas who are deciding how to vote in this race are not thinking about this. So, I agree with you. I think it's odd for Paxton to zero in on this as his big closing message, except that he doesn't have another.
SHORT: Look, I think Republicans have been waiting for traditional Republicans to come home and support Paxton ever since Paxton defeated Cornyn. It's been like 12 polls in a row that have Talarico ahead. I don't doubt that he had the flu, but I also don't think there's an urge for him to get back into this.
The reality was that in the last couple weeks, what have been all the news stories in Texas? It's been about Paxton distancing himself from Trump and all these leaked audios. So, if I was their campaign, I would have said, stay sick, stay in bed, stay out of this, because right now, all the focus is on Paxton, and it hasn't been going well for Republicans.
So, look, I'm not going to bind the conspiracy, but at the same time, maybe there wasn't a hurry to get him back.
HUNT: Donald Trump, the President Trump and Paxton did raise this at the rally that was held in San Antonio on Wednesday.
[16:40:03]
Let's watch that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I hear the guy's disappeared. Nobody knows. You know where he is? He's sick because he's been forced to eat meat for political reasons, and he's throwing up all over the place.
PAXTON: Where do you think they hid that little socialist? I'm going to do one, two, three, and then you say, where is James Talarico? All right, you got it? OK. One, two, three, where is James Talarico? Perfect.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BEDINGFIELD: It doesn't quite roll off the tongue. I don't --
SHORT: There's too many syllables there.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Sorry. I'm sorry. Are we on camera? I'm sorry.
I was just like, oh my god. This is the problem, right? What is that? What are you hitting him with?
You're hitting him with he eats meat. He is, you know, weird. It's -- these aren't really punchy things to be hitting James Talarico.
HUNT: If it's a reference to him not eating meat.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: No, no, I understand being a vegan, being low testosterone, all this stuff, but it's weak sauce. Let's face it.
And so, what they have back to my point is this idea of like, ooh, there's something nefarious. There's something he's hiding. There's something that is going to jump out at you and a jump scare if you vote for this guy.
That's what this is all about. It's about creating this atmosphere that he is untrustworthy in some way.
BEDINGFIELD: Well, they're trying -- I mean, to Mark's point, they are trying to push the focus off of Paxton and Trump and make the race about Talarico and the Democrats. But the problem is that for again, for people living in Texas who are deciding who to vote for and looking at who's going to have a positive impact on my life, this argument is a I mean, to even call it a bank shot is sort of, I mean, what is, to your point, what's the argument you're making here about him?
It's weak sauce, and Talarico and the Democrats just got to keep driving on Trump his major life more expensive, and Ken Paxton is going to do everything he asks in Washington.
CHALIAN: James Talarico may lose this race in Texas. It will not be because Ken Paxton has raised questions about whether or not he had the flu, I guarantee you.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: No, if anyone wins anyone on this, it's because people are just going to be voting partisan lines and there might be --
SHORT: So many weird things out of line with Texas voters. The fact they're focused on this is poor campaigning.
HUNT: Well, I mean, look, obviously Paxton has plenty of liabilities that are not visible in him standing up there and campaigning, but perhaps his inability to command a crowd is part of his political skill set may play a role.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: The scale of not actually having a debate is malpractice. It's political malpractice.
CHALIAN: Ken Paxton did not have a debate in any of his general election races for attorney general three times on the ballot, didn't -- didn't debate in those races.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Right but he's not running those races again he's running a race where he's ostensibly behind and so therefore, I think -- I mean, if he's not doing a debate it's because he thinks it can only hurt him.
HUNT: All right. Speaking of public appearances, debates, et cetera, do please be sure to tune in this Wednesday night. CNN and Jubilee are hosting a town hall with James Talarico. It's going to be right here at 8:00 p.m. on CNN and it's going to be streaming live if you got an all-access subscription. Should be pretty interesting.
All right, ahead here in THE ARENA, new pushback from Republicans to the Pentagon's plan to live stream the execution of the Fort Hood shooter, including from the man second in line to the presidency.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
INTERVIEWER: Where do you come down on this, and will you watch it?
REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: We've got to think through the policy implications of all that. I wouldn't be watching it if it was aired.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:48:05]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: There are two thoughts. Don't show it and show it. I'll make a decision, ultimately. I know what the military would like to do, but we'll make a decision.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: President Trump there saying he will decide whether the execution of the Fort Hood shooter, Nidal Hasan, will be livestreamed. The plan, which was proposed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last week, has been roundly criticized by Democrats and Republicans.
Today, the House Speaker Mike Johnson became the latest Republican lawmaker to express concerns about publicly broadcasting the military's first firing squad execution in decades.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
INTERVIEWER: Where do you come down on this and will you watch it?
JOHNSON: We got to think through the policy implications of all that. I wouldn't be watching it if it was aired. I need to tell the White House what some of my colleagues think about that and not everybody's in favor of the idea.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Lulu Garcia Navarro, I mean, the implications of this are extraordinary. And I want to read from a piece that Admiral William McRaven posted on "The Atlantic" over the weekend. And he put it this way. He says, quote, "Are we so weak, are we so insecure that we must convince the world that we are still powerful by making a public spectacle of an execution? Or maybe Secretary Hegseth and President Trump intend this as a spectacle for the American people, a show of just how much testosterone the two men have surging through their veins."
The concern, or a concern, of course, is that this could, in fact, make a martyr of this man. This was "The Wall Street Journal" editorial board, not known for taking terribly liberal positions. They wrote under this headline, "How to make a jihadist martyr of Nidal Hasan. A public death by firing squad would give Mr. Hasan that publicity in perpetuity. It would assess assist the cult of death promoted by the perversion of Islam, seeking to recruit more suicide attackers.
[16:50:02]
Far from deterring jihadists, it would serve as a YouTube recruiting video."
GARCIA-NAVARRO: It's barbaric. It's horrific. It's un-American.
I spent years of my life in the Middle East where beheading videos and assassination videos were used as recruitment, were used as tools of perverse intimidation. And also, once you put that out onto YouTube, is what, my 13-year-old daughter supposed to have access to that? How do you even control who sees it?
And lastly, what on God's very green Earth is members of this administration thinking that they would need to do that? Do they want to desensitize us to violence? Do they want to make it seem that we are supposed to be celebrating that kind of vicious sort of spectacle, that you want to execute someone and that that is the law of the land, that is one thing. Shoving it into everyone's living room and into everyone's social media feed is something completely different.
HUNT: Marc, do you understand this?
SHORT: Look, I think it's a stupid idea. It's terrible. I understand it. It even violates current U.S. Code of Military Justice. Taking it a step further, I agree with Lulu that it would certainly help recruitment for our enemies. Perhaps it would also help with the potential lone wolf person who says, hey, if I get to have a public execution, it would only encourage that sort of activity.
I would imagine that the president ultimately doesn't go through with this, but it's a terrible idea. And I believe as well -- I think the reality is that this murder, Hassan's murdering 13 people, happened in 2009. If we were actually swift in our justice, he would have been executed long before now.
But I believe he, and it's been reported, he's now in a wheelchair. So, the optics of even seeing that is something I think don't accomplish what even Pete Hegseth had thought he might be accomplishing by this. And so, I think -- I think it's an awful idea, and I would imagine that the president ends up backtracking on this.
HUNT: Yeah, there is a contrast here. McRaven in "The Atlantic" went on to write about what we did, what America did when Osama bin Laden was killed. When Osama bin Laden was killed, President Obama made a point of not releasing photographs of the body. "It's not who we are," he said. "And all of us who were involved in
the operation agreed. Not sharing the pictures was a recognition that we are better than the inhuman beings who do unconscionable things, that there was a difference between the legitimate exercise of government authority and a public display of coercive power. Now, with this announcement, we are lowering ourselves to the ranks of brutal and failing regimes."
And here was President Obama himself back in 2011 explaining why we didn't see pictures of bin Laden after he was killed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: So, there is no doubt that we killed Osama bin Laden. It is important for us to make sure that very graphic photos of somebody who was shot in the head are not floating around as an incitement to additional violence, as a propaganda tool.
That's not who we are. We don't trot out this stuff as trophies. You know, the fact of the matter is, this was somebody who was deserving of the justice that he received.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: So, a contrast there. And David Chalian, I mean, this -- there are, of course, some stories that we talk about at this table that a lot of Americans never really pay attention to. If you look at least my personal anecdata, this actually seems to have broken through in a way with, you know, Americans, everyday Americans, just a couple weeks out from the election.
And it also strikes me that, you know, J.D. Vance had come out and said, you know, I'm not going to watch it. He's a converted Catholic. This is not something, you know, for religious people, especially that is necessarily aligned with their faith, and a lot of them have been Republican voters in recent years.
CHALIAN: Yeah, so you have the Vice President of the United States almost instantaneously coming out and saying, you now have the Speaker of the House, as you just said --.
HUNT: Also a conservative Christian.
CHALIAN: Not only did he say he's not going to watch it, but he needs to inform the White House of many members in his conference who do not think this is a good idea. You just heard Marc sort of give voice to that.
This, to me, as Chris Christie in the clip you played earlier, Kasie, noted, it's like, the fact that this is now part of the closing campaign season topic where Republicans have to yet again distance themselves from something that the administration is floating is not the wisest politics around this, but I think this goes far beyond politics, as you're saying. I think what you heard from the vice president and the speaker shows sort of the moral ground that they're not comfortable with where Hegseth was sort of suggesting they go. HUNT: Yeah.
All right. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HUNT: Thanks very much, my panel. Really appreciate having all of you today.
Thanks to all of you at home for watching as well. Really appreciate you. Don't forget, you can now stream THE ARENA live. You can catch up whenever you want. It's all in the CNN app. Just scan the QR code below. You can also catch up by listening to THE ARENAs podcast.
You can follow us. We are on X and Instagram. We are @TheArenaCNN.
But don't go anywhere. Jake Tapper is standing by for "THE LEAD".
Hi, Jake. Happy Monday.
