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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Outrage After ICE Detains Five-Year-Old Boy in Minneapolis; White House Alters Arrest Picture of Anti-ICE Protester; Feds Begin Arresting Anti-ICE Protesters Who Entered Churc. Arrests Made on Anti- ICE Protesters at St. Paul Church; Nancy Pelosi Scolds Fellow Democrats For Voting To Hold Clintons In Contempt Over Epstein Files. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired January 22, 2026 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Tonight, the feds began arresting protesters who rushed a Minnesota church while the White House alters pictures of a suspect.
Plus, did ICE use a preschooler as bait?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You can't tell me that this child is going to be classified as a violent criminal.
PHILLIP: Outraged tonight after agents detain a five-year-old, the latest student in ICE custody.
PHILLIP: Also --
REP. JARED MOSKOWITZ (D-FL): I mean, we're definitely not in a court of law today. Half the (BLEEP) wouldn't come in if we were. Good God.
PHILLIP: -- Donald Trump publicly tells his attorney general to target the man who charged him as Jack Smith sounds the alarm.
JACK SMITH, FORMER SPECIAL COUNSEL: If we do not hold the most powerful people in our society to the same standards of the rule of law, it can be catastrophic.
PHILLIP: And Nancy Pelosi scolds Democrats behind closed doors for voting to hold the Clintons in contempt over the Epstein file.
Live at the table, Van Lathan, Jim Schultz, Ashley Allison, Brianna Lyman, and Judge Shira Scheindlin.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Good evening. I'm Abby Philip in New York. Let's get right to what America's talking about, outrage in Minneapolis over this image. This is Liam Conejo Ramos. He's a five- year-old boy. And after returning home from preschool, ICE agents detained his father and then took him as well.
Now, their lawyers say that the family came to the southern border from Ecuador in 2024, and they entered the country after making an appointment through the CBP One app to apply for asylum. Now, the lawyer also says that they aren't illegal aliens. They came to the U.S. through a legal process and had attended all court hearings and check-ins that were a part of that process.
The school district also released this video of ICE putting Liam in one of their vehicles. You can see there the little boy dressed in his backpack and blue coat.
Now, the accounts of what happened just before this vary with some witnesses saying that ICE rebuffed pleas to not take the child, but the administration appears to be on the same page. ICE responding to its critics writing on X, ICE did not and has never used a child as bait, and then they claimed that the child was abandoned. Homeland Security insisting that ICE did not target a child. The vice president also weighed in on this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J.D. VANCE, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: I'm a father of a five-year-old, actually, a five year-old little boy, and I think to myself, oh my God, this is terrible. How did we arrest a five-year-old? Well, I do a little bit more follow-up research and what I find is that the five- year-old was not arrested, that his dad was an illegal alien. And then they went -- when they went to arrest his illegal alien father, the father ran. So, the story is that ICE detained a five-year-old, well, what are they supposed to do? Are they supposed to let a five-year-old child freeze to death?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: DHS is also accusing the child's mother who was actually inside of the house. They're accusing her of refusing to take the child and that the father wanted the child to remain with him. Now, they added that in these cases, ICE would place the children with a safe person that the parent designates. But school officials who were there say, that is not what happened.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARY GRANDLUND, CHAIR OF SCHOOL BOARD, COLUMBIA HEIGHTS PUBLIC SCHOOLS: As I got out of my car and came around the corner, I heard, what are you doing? Don't take the child. His mom -- like there are people here that can take him. There was another adult who lived in the home that was there saying, I will take the child. I will take the child. Somebody else was yelling. They saw that I was there and said, school is here. They can take the child. You don't have to take them. And there were -- there was ample opportunity to be able to safely hand that child off to adults. REPORTER: Are you accusing ICE of using children as bait?
GRANDLUND: Yes. I mean, that it's very clear from the pictures, from the videos from firsthand accounts. I was there. This is what happened.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Now, this is not just an isolated incident. According to the school district, they say that four students have been taken by ICE in recent weeks, including this 4-year-old -- this 5-year-old, a 17-year- old as well. Another 17-year-old was taken with their mother, and a 10-year-old was taken two weeks ago while walking with their mother.
And, Van, this story has become a big deal because that image is very hard to get out of your mind.
VAN LATHAN, PODCAST CO-HOST, HIGHER LEARNING: Yes, I mean, it should be. I mean, you know, it -- hold on, how can I not be a nihilist about all of this? ICE is a hammer. It doesn't really matter how cute the nail is, right? Like, to me, I don't think that if you're paying attention to how things are being conducted and how things are going, that that should surprise you at all.
Like forget about the worst things that we can talk about, which is, of course, the killing of Renee Good. Just think about the way ICE conducts itself in communities. Think about the lack of humanity it treats people with. The thing about the superiority in which it treats the people that are inside of these communities as if they are something to be cast aside so they can go do whatever they're supposed to do.
Like, I mean, greater than that even is if anyone thinks that the endangerment of a child is going to stop what's happening from ICE, I don't know why they would think that. Like it -- when I look and I see a whole political party of this country that is anti-child to me. Like in my opinion, it's like these are people who don't want to feed the child and the children in schools, children get slaughtered in schools, we can't have a conversation about it. There's just -- to me, everything is more important to me than the safety of children like across the board. I've seen this in many different things. I'm not surprised with this happening at all.
PHILLIP: There's also that dispute, Judge, about the characterization of this man and perhaps the child as illegal. We've seen this a lot with the Trump administration where they are saying that people who came through a process in the previous administration are subject to deportation, perhaps because, in their eyes, that process was not legitimate. But it seems to threaten -- I mean, are there rights for these immigrants who --
SHIRA SCHEINDLIN, RETIRED U.S. DISTRICT COURT JUDGE: Well, of course, there are rights for these immigrants.
PHILLIP: -- who came over on CBP One apps and they've been told do X, Y, and Z, and now they're being told they can be deported for that? SCHEINDLIN: Here's the point. Of course, they have rights, so they may be deportable, but there's no reason to arrest them, put them in a car, fly them to Texas, keep them in custody. You can do it with process. You can say, we're going to have a hearing, we're going to have process. If after the evidence is proved, you're not here legally, or you shouldn't be here at all, then we can deport you. So, there's a way to do it without all this violence and arrests and putting little children in cars. This was all unnecessary.
The point here I want to pick up on what you were saying is ICE operating with no real legal controls, no rules. They sort of do whatever they think needs to be done. They're sort of making up the rules for themselves as they go along, and that's a dangerous thing. And that's been the problem with ICE's behavior in these cities throughout these weeks and months. And the judges have pointed that out.
PHILLIP: Yes, a lot, several of them have.
SCHEINDLIN: Yes.
JIM SCHULTZ, CNN LEGAL COMMENTATOR: So, there is a process in place, and this is a terrible situation where a young person ends up being detained. They're detained in a family facility in Texas where there he would be with his father in that facility.
The issue is this. If they're going to make those arrests, when they make those arrests, they have to make them and follow the rules of the -- that are -- the rules that are set forth for them. Those include, you know, did he attend all those court hearings? Was there any other criminal activity? Did they file within one year? There are a number of different things that they -- that person becomes deportable if they don't follow the process.
We don't know what happened here, whether they followed the process or not. And it really is up to the parent to make the determination to whether the child goes or stays. But I would take issue with what the school officials said there was that there's just some adult in the community that would have taken the child. That's not how it works.
PHILLIP: The child's mother was --
SCHULTZ: It's got to be a parent --
PHILLIP: -- in the house.
SCHULTZ: One of the two parents. That's right.
PHILLIP: The child's mother was in the house.
SCHULTZ: And there's an allegation that the parent didn't -- that the mother didn't want the child to come into that house.
PHILLIP: Well, look, I think that --
SCHULTZ: I think whether that's true or not. PHILLIP: I think that it's worthwhile for people to remember that any government statement, you ought to take it with a degree of skepticism, but particularly this DHS, which has repeatedly in court, by the way, been proven to have lied and misled in their public statements about these incidents. And so, yes, they're saying that.
But here's what the lawyer is saying about whether this man had -- the lawyer says he doesn't have a criminal record. Here's what he said about how he got to Minnesota.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARC PROKOSCH, ATTORNEY FOR LIAM CONEJO RAMOS' FAMILY: Liam and his dad did enter the United States at a port of entry to seek asylum through the CBP One app at the Brownsville border crossing.
[22:10:11]
So, they did everything right when they came in. They used the app, they made an appointment, they came to the border and presented themselves to Customs and Border Patrol. They've shared all of their information with the government and they were following the process.
These are not illegal aliens. They came properly, they came legally and are pursuing a legal pathway.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCHEINDLIN: Can I just add, they came to all their court appearances that were required, all the required reporting. That's in the evidence in this case. So, they haven't missed any appointments.
ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Like this can't be a debate we have to have in this country. It just can't. Like we can't be here, and, sadly, we are. The plot has been lost. And we have -- we are finding ourselves being governed by people who hate a group of folks so much that they have lost sight of the policy that they say they want to enact, and they would do that to a five-year-old child.
When you have to try and send the vice president out to correct the record and make -- you've missed it you can come to a higher point. There is a place where you can come to a higher point and say, we've gone too far. That is what you have to do in leadership.
Now, I understand elections have consequences, and I think most people at this table agree, we want rapists, we want criminals, we want them out of this country. But when you take a five-year-old child, I don't care if the mother was in the house, I don't care if there was a teacher there, I don't actually care. You don't do that to a child and then send them to Texas. We have lost the plot and we are about to cross a line that is too far to come back. And people have to wake up. This is not about Republicans and this is not about Democrats. This is about simple morality.
PHILLIP: There is a question, I think, of decency here. And I know that there are some people who want all immigrants out of this country, but there are many people like this man who are being detained who did all the things right. They're showing up to their court appearances. Yesterday, we played the sound of a senator who had gone to a facility in San Antonio and ICE officials told them that they were being directed to just arrest everybody in that courthouse, including people who were following the rules.
And then when a child gets swept up in that, I think that also seems to people to be unnecessary cruelty, that rather than just shoving that kid in the car, shouldn't the ICE officers have done everything in their power to try to figure out where that child can go outside of detention?
BRIANNA LYMAN, REPORTER, THE FEDERALIST: Right, and they did. They tried to give the child back to the mother who reportedly refused. They also didn't shove the child into the car. That child was abandoned by his parents and they treated him with --
PHILLIP: A lot of this -- a lot of what you're saying is --
LYMAN: How come when I talk, I keep getting cut off? They treated him with decency.
Second of all, even though they came here, visa the -- or, you know, vis-a-vis the asylum process, according to the Legal Aid Society, federal immigration law permits the arrests and detention of most on (ph) citizens, including those who are actively seeking asylum. So, it's not like this is some kind of like random policy they're putting in.
And you said that we're being governed by people who don't or who hate a certain group of people. We're being governed by a government that actually loves the people of America. It loves her sovereignty. We are a nation of laws. Our immigration laws were duly enacted by Republicans and Democrats. If you don't like them, that's okay. But then you should go out and either elect a different representative to change those laws, or you should go and petition your government at the office.
PHILLIP: I think what I have for you though is about decency. You just said you can arrest anybody, including people claiming asylum.
LYMAN: Well, that's what the law says.
PHILLIP: Is it right in your view to do that when I think most Americans agree that they want criminals, whoever it is, who have criminal records to be taken? Is it right to snatch people off the street, who have done all the things that they were asked to do, have, according to their attorneys, committed no crimes? Is that right?
LYMAN: Are we talking about someone who came through like the CBP One app, for example?
PHILLIP: Yes, which is a legal process.
LYMAN: Right. And the legal process also says that even if they're actively seeking asylum, they can be detained as well. PHILLIP: Sure. I was asking -- I'm not asking you about -- I'm asking you about your view of this from a moral perspective, because I think --
LYMAN: Oh, that's the -- I can answer that.
PHILLIP: That's the way that actually most Americans are going to look at this.
LYMAN: Okay, sure.
PHILLIP: They're going to ask the question, should we really be doing that?
LYMAN: Should parents really be abandoning their children and all letting them in the house? No.
SCHEINDLIN: I think the question is, you say, can they be arrested? Yes, they can be. But should they be arrested? That's the correct question, because let me finish for a minute, should they be? There's a safer way to have moved forward with deportation here. There was no reason for an arrest on the street of the father or the child.
[22:15:03]
This could have gone through process. And when the time came, if there was an order of deportation, I think these people would have surrendered themselves and left because they have been law-abiding. They've been law abiding.
LYMAN: Right. So, what you're saying though -- Judge, what you're saying though is that you wanted to go through the legal process.
SCHEINDLIN: Yes.
LYMAN: But according to the left wing Legal Aid Society, part of the process does say that even if you are actively seeking asylum, you could still be --
(CROSSTALKS)
SCHEINDLIN: No. You can be arrested or detained if you commit a crime, for example, while you're going through the process.
LYMAN: Even if he was seeking asylum?
SCHEINDLIN: No.
LYMAN: You'd still be detained.
(CROSSTALKS)
SCHEINDLIN: Can be, should be. Can be is not saying, in every case, that's what should be done. It's not saying that. It's saying that is a possibility. But you're supposed to use judgment. That's the word I've come to live with. LATHAN: I have a question for you guys too.
SCHEINDLIN: And the judgment here is not to do it.
LATHAN: Seriously. I feel like we're having a pretty decent, non- charged conversation about this. Is this all worth it?
LYMAN: What is worth it?
LATHAN: So, Trump wanted to deport 10 million people. Like, obviously, that's a pipe dream. That's not going to happen.
LYMAN: Sure.
LATHAN: So, it's not going to happen. So, you're going to get, I don't know, 200,000, 300,000, 400,000 people doing it the way they're doing it right now. A woman dead in Minnesota.
LYMAN: Because she charged an ICE officer with her car.
ALLISON: Oh my goodness.
LATHAN: Okay. We can differ about that.
ALLISON: I think the answer is yes.
LATHAN: The question is, is all of this worth it? This type of --
LYMAN: Yes. Our sovereignty is worth it every single day.
LATHAN: Our sovereignty isn't under the attack.
ALLISON: Yes.
LYMAN: We had literally like millions of people cross under Biden. That's called attacking. That's an invasion. I understand that you don't care about borders, but some Americans --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: Hold on a second.
SCHULTZ: I think the Republicans are losing the argument here because of the way it's being conducted on the streets.
ALLISON: Yes.
SCHULTZ: No doubt about it.
Now, you know, if I was giving political advice to this administration, I'd say that's where we're losing this battle.
People did -- you know, people voted for President Trump to rein in the criminals that came into this country, who were in this country, that need to get out of this country. And there is a certain amount of compassion that has to go along with it for folks who are in this country that were allowed to come in who are raising families here, that are here illegally, but there is a way to do it in a compassionate manner.
As it relates to the legal process, there are also some -- there's also an agreement with Ecuador, they come from Ecuador, that they have to go to another country first, right before they come to the U.S. to seek asylum. There are a number of legal arguments can be made.
To the judge's point, how that's handled is very, very important, and I think that's why the Republicans are losing the narrative.
PHILLIP: Let me just leave you with this before we go to break. The family -- the child and the father are going to a facility in Texas, and here's what CNN's reporting said about that facility, that families tell us that their children are weak, faint, pale, and often crying because they are so hungry. They have been reportedly denied medical care. Worms have been found, mold in food, et cetera. So, perhaps that is what is awaiting this five-year-old as they head to Texas.
Next for us, as the feds begin to arrest the anti-ICE protesters who entered that church in Minneapolis, the White House alters a picture to make it look like one of them was crying.
Plus Donald Trump's supporters say that he's not weaponizing the Justice Department, but yet again he has publicly ordering his attorney general to prosecute one of his foes.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
PHILLIP: Tonight, the White House promises more trolling after doctoring an image that they posted to social media. Now, the feds arresting three anti-ICE protesters who interrupted a St. Paul church service on Sunday. One of them was Nekima Levy Armstrong. She was one of the organizers. Kristi Noem posted this picture of her arrest this morning, nothing out of the ordinary there. But half an hour later, the White House posted this doctored image, clearly not real with no mention that it had been altered.
Now, you can remember a time when something like this would have been out of bounds, unthinkable coming from the White House, the White House. But here we are, the White House doubling down on that post, one official saying of the doctored image quote, enforcement of the law will continue and the memes will continue.
I guess it's all just a joke. It's bizarre, seemingly also pretty unnecessary. But I guess it tells you everything you need to know about how they're approaching, not just the immigration enforcement situation in Minnesota, but just the law enforcement in general right now.
ALLISON: Yes, a couple of things. One on the meme piece is that this is an intentional tactic, so you don't know what to believe and what not to believe. Because if you're going to post that from the official count of the White House, and it is literally a fake document, when they actually put fake documents out, potentially we won't know if it's real or not, right? So, this is a tactic that we should not take lightly.
PHILLIP: Well, at the very least, I think it calls into question everything.
ALLISON: Everything, right? Because what is truthful then if not a photo of an actual arrest?
The other thing I'll say is that I understand that there is a lot of debate on whether or not folks should have gone into the church and protested but we do live in a country where we have a First Amendment right and we have the ability to protest.
LYMAN: And practice religion freely.
ALLISON: Yes. They were -- she was actually a pastor, so she was actually there.
LYMAN: She was harassing and terrorizing Christians in the church.
[22:25:00]
ALLISON: No, stop it.
LYMAN: Yes, she was.
ALLISON: She is a Christian.
SCHULTZ: It doesn't matter. She went through those doors. She interrupted a church service in a place of worship. It's a very clear violation of the FACE Act what went on there, certainly enough to bring charges, and, you know, that should not be taken lightly. Folks storming into a church, disrupting the church service, I don't care what church service it is, going in and doing that in this day and age where churches have been under attack from time to time, from folks going in and shooting up the churches is certainly a danger that we need to protect. And this has to be very serious.
(CROSSTALKS)
SCHEINDLIN: There was no threat. There was no threat of force here. There was no use of violence. There was no physical obstruction.
SCHULTZ: But it's not required under law, Judge. You know that.
SCHEINDLIN: No, I don't know that. Actually, you tend to intimidate is going to be one of the key issues in the case.
SCHULTZ: You don't believe they were going in intimidating? They went in there because they didn't like that pastor. They didn't believe that was pastor --
SCHEINDLIN: Excuse me. I think they were --
SCHULTZ: And tried to disrupt that church service.
SCHEINDLIN: I think they were there to send their message that their pastor was the head of the ICE operation in that town.
SCHULTZ: Send a message to the church service?
SCHEINDLIN: Yes. He was standing in front of their pastor.
SCHULTZ: That's not intimidating the church service?
SCHEINDLIN: No, sir, that is not intimidating.
ALLISON: You actually know who else did that? Jesus. Jesus went into the temple and flipped tables when he felt like they were -- it was a den of robbers and thieves, when they felt like injustice was there. They were doing what they thought was their moral --
SCHULTZ: What they thought was moral and right crossed the Rubicon that likely broke the law.
ALLISON: Yes, (INAUDIBLE) the Romans too.
SCHEINDLIN: Folks in that church who did not know, who did not know who their pastor was, they did not know his position with ICE. They were very opposed to what he was doing.
SCHULTZ: So, do it outside.
SCHEINDLIN: Excuse me, one of the parishioners said, I had no idea. Now, that I know, I'm very upset because I'm upset with what ICE is doing. I didn't know who this pastor was. Now, I know. Thank you.
SCHULTZ: And what about the other -- was that all --
(CROSSTALKS)
SCHEINDLIN: I didn't say that.
LATHAN: I'll say this. I've been disciplined for laughing too loud in church, so I'm not going to tell anybody to --
SCHULTZ: Me too.
LATHAN: Well, yes, exactly. I'm not going to tell anybody how they should feel about what goes on in the church, whether or not I can't. If you looked at that and you were offended, that's fine. The church is a sacred place to a lot of people.
I will say this though, America has a long and clear history of protest and civil disobedience regardless of the law. There were a lot of people in the 60s that felt like something was so morally repugnant that they had to protest it regardless of the laws that were on the books. And those people took the responsibility to do that. They also, a lot of times, were arrested. They had to spend time in jail. But what they wanted to do was secure their communities. This whole thing, you guys are big time patriots, right? The guys threw the tea into the -- you can't do that to tea. That was that. And so the entire theme was based upon people saying, this is the type of world I want to live in. Sometimes you have to go --
SCHULTZ: So, they took the risk of potentially breaking a law.
LATHAN: They absolutely did.
SCHULTZ: And they went in and did it, and now they're now being prosecuted.
PHILLIP: I got to asked the judge a question real quick, though.
SCHEINDLIN: Yes.
PHILLIP: The magistrate judge rejected their attempts to charge Don Lemon.
SCHEINDLIN: Right.
PHILLIP: Stephen Miller responds to that by saying that far left prosecutors, magistrate judges, juries are unhesitatingly shielding their violent activists and gleefully imprisoning their political opponents. He says, unrigging the system is necessary for the survival of the republic.
SCHEINDLIN: All I can say is this whole conversation is very rich. If you compare this to what happened on January 6th, just a year or two ago, my goodness, talking about protesters going in and being violent and breaking the law, and we are told those are heroes and patriots.
LATHAN: What if you compare to what happened to this January?
SCHEINDLIN: Well, wait a minute. I'm still -- I'm focusing on that one. I can't help myself because those are heroes and patriots, not lawbreakers. So, it's a very interesting comparison to think about these peaceful people in the church trying to tell the parishioners who their pastor is and that's all they did, but people storming the Capitol who are pardoned and are told they are heroes. Just compare the two.
PHILLIP: It continues to be difficult for Trump to have credibility on any issue like this when he issued those blanket pardons.
But I also want to make one quick point. Trump's handling of immigration is unpopular in this country right now, but The New York Times/Siena poll that's out today, it takes a deeper look at a big component of his base, which is white non-college educated, working class, basically white voters. 51 percent disapprove of his handling of -- or of ICE's handling of its job, so pretty specific, ICE. That also seems to me to be a pretty big red flag about how all of this is playing for Trump politically.
LYMAN: Well, I would say that what is always right is not necessarily always going to be popular. And I know people at this table disagree with me, but our sovereignty is important.
[22:30:01]
And we were talking about people who violated the law and are here illegally, then I am of the belief that we should absolutely deport them.
Now, to the meme --
Jjjj
[22:30:00]
BRIANNA LYMAN, "THE FEDERALIST" REPORTER: But our sovereignty is important and we were talking about people who violated the law and are here illegally, then I am of the belief that we should absolutely deport them. Now, to the meme that you played earlier, she absolutely should be crying for what she did when she did terrorize and harass those Christian children and worshipers who were trying to hear the good word of the Lord.
And honestly, at this point, we're sitting here talking about a meme tonight and saying that maybe it's going to jeopardize the accountability or the credibility of the White House. When Joe Biden's administration edited out a line of the official transcript when he called people like me garbage, there was not a peep said about whether that was going to damage the White House's credibility. But a meme is going to? I come on, guys.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR: Actually, that was robustly covered by the media. It was called out by the press who was there. That's completely untrue. But let me just go back to one other thing that you said. You said that, you know, doing the right thing might not be popular. You want people who are here illegally to be deported.
LYMAN: Yes.
PHILLIP: What about people who are here legally?
LYMAN: Why would they be deported if they're here legally? If they're citizens --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: I'm talking about people who are in the country legally.
(CROSSTALK)
LYMAN: Oh, oh. Hold on, hold on. You mean people who are currently seeking asylum right now, which their asylum claim could end up being --
PHILLIP: Which is a legal process. LYMAN: They came on illegal process. That doesn't mean that they are
necessarily, indefinitely here legally. Their asylum process might be rejected.
PHILLIP: If they are here under a legal process, their case is open and being adjudicated, are you okay with those people being deported -- or detained?
LYMAN: Those people that we're talking about tonight have been detained, which is legal.
PHILLIP: Why? Why are you okay with that?
LYMAN: Because I am involved in a social compact with the rest of my fellow Americans and we decided to elect representatives who passed these laws. So yes, I'm okay with that.
PHILLIP: So, you're fine with people who are here legally being detained and deported who did nothing wrong?
LYMAN: No, not deported. Detained is what we're talking about right now.
PHILLIP: So, you want them to be detained indefinitely?
LYMAN: No, not indefinitely.
PHILLIP: So then, what's the point of detention then?
LYMAN: Well, I don't know the specifics of why they decided that they specifically wanted to detain these individuals. They haven't released any information about that. Neither has a school board.
VAN LATHAN, "HIGHER LEARNING" PODCAST CO-HOST: I'll tell you why they did. They did it because what is essentially an issue has been framed as attack on the American way of life. When you say that our sovereignty is under attack, what people think is this is D-Day. What people think is, well, not D-Day, that's actually this is Pearl Harbor. What people think is this is something that is so existential to who we are --
LYMAN: It is. Yes.
LATHAN: -- that we're going to wake up, but it's not.
LYMAN: But how is it not? Because you're sitting right here.
LATHAN: Like when you frame it like in the us or them way that you frame it, what it leads to is this extremism to where people get all girded up and then ICE gets to do whatever it is -- now we're talking about not what we should do, not what we could do. And that's not really who are. The social compact that we have is, to me, due process and the rule of law. To me, that's the social compact.
LYMAN: The rule of law says that they could be detained.
LATHAN: Well, the rule of law says that they also have a right to go through the process and --
(CROSSTALK)
LYMAN: Right. This is part of the process.
ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: The rule of law also said that I could be a slave if I was born in a certain time period. So, sometimes the law gets it wrong, my friend.
PHILLIP: Well, look, I mean there are lots of things on the books. So, you jaywalk, you know, you could get a ticket. Most of us jaywalk and don't get tickets for doing that.
(CROSSTALK)
LYMAN: Sure, but ticket and jaywalking and breaking into the country is very, very different.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: There are plenty of -- well --
(CROSSTALK)
ALLISON: They didn't break into the country.
LYMAN: But some people did.
PHILLIP: When they come into the country legally, that is not breaking the law. It's not even jaywalking because it's actually not a violation at all. So in fact, jaywalking is probably more of a transgression than coming into the country through --
(CROSSTALK)
ALLISON: But Abby, this is actually, can I just say, this is what I was trying to say earlier in the show, is that no matter what you say, there are some people that it is always going to be okay to treat this community of people the way they are currently being treated.
LYMAN: How dare you? It's a treat people who are either illegal or again -
(CROSSTALK)
ALLISON: You don't know that. You do not know that.
LYMAN: We do know there are millions of illegal people here.
LATHAN: There are also millions of people here who have overstayed visas, right?
LYMAN: Yes.
LATHAN: There are millions of people, but you know what I don't see? I don't see people going -- (CROSSTALK)
SHIRA SCHEINDLIN, RETIRED U.S. DISTRICT COURT JUDGE: ISIS sweeping so broadly they have picked up United States citizens. They're just sweeping people in.
ALLISON: They lost the plot, Judge.
SCHEINDLIN: Well, I'm telling you, that's what they're done -- they've done.
PHILLIP: Next for us, Jack Smith is making his case to lawmakers and he's issuing a catastrophic warning. And Donald Trump demands that he be prosecuted.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:38:57]
PHILLIP: President Trump is calling for Jack Smith to be prosecuted. After the former special counsel testified today during a combative hearing on Capitol Hill, Trump is now demanding that his attorney general, Pam Bondi, go after Smith. And he claims that Smith committed large-scale perjury.
He testified for hours defending his investigations into Trump for his role in attempting to overturn the 2020 election and for his handling of classified documents. Now, both cases were ultimately dropped because Trump was elected. Now today, Smith had a warning for the American people and for our democracy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JACK SMITH, FORMER SPECIAL COUNSEL: If we do not hold the most powerful people in our society to the same standards of the rule of law, it can be catastrophic.
[22:40:00]
If we don't hold people to account when they commit crimes in this context, it can endanger our election process. It can endanger election workers, and ultimately our democracy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So, here is a prosecutor who was given a case, told to prosecute it to the best of their ability. Now, the sitting president who he was charged with investigating is saying he should just go to jail just for the fact of the investigation. Judge, what does this mean for justice in America in this moment?
SCHEINDLIN: Well, it's an attack on the rule of law. But the rule of law means that we are a country governed by laws and not by men. We don't have an autocratic leader. We have an elected leader. Our founders knew that and they were afraid that someday there may be a slip in the rule of law and we would then become not a democracy. And I'm fearful about that right now.
So, I think the remarks of the president are not helpful. Directing the attorney general to prosecute somebody has never been the case. There's always been daylight at least since the Nixon administration between the White House and the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice has been independent and it has done what it thought it should do.
It has investigated a case, brought a case if it was warranted. And lately we've seen that cases presented to the grand jurors, they haven't been willing to indict. So the thought here that there would actually be an indictment of Jack Smith for doing his job is mind boggling to me.
PHILLIP: How does that square, Brianna, with the concerns that apparently conservatives have about the weaponization of justice in this country?
LYMAN: Well, I would say that Biden got us the ball rolling. So, on March, 2023 "New York Times" article said that Joe Biden wanted attorney general America Garland to quote, "Stop acting like a ponderous judge and to take decisive action" when it referred to President Donald Trump, who Biden said was a quote, "threat to democracy".
Then you have another article from "The New York Times" entitled "Garland Faces Growing Pressure As Jan Six Investigation Widens". It says, "Mr. Biden confided to his inner circle that he believed former President Donald Trump was a threat to democracy and should be prosecuted."
PHILLIP: So, continue reading the article where it says that that was never conveyed to Merrick Garland. And also the whole fact of the article. Let me just make this point. The whole fact of the article is that Merrick Garland actually was not doing the thing
ALLISON: That's right.
PHILLIP: -- that the President wanted him to do.
LYMAN: And who said Pam-Bondi's going to?
PHILLIP: So, two things. One, the President never said those things to Merrick Garland publicly or privately. It's in the same article that you just read. And two, Merrick Garland did not respond to the pressure, which -- the article is referring to pressure -- that was from the public, from liberals.
ALLISON: Yes.
PHILLIP: He didn't respond to the pressure. So again, how does it square with your concern about the weaponization of justice to have the President say we should prosecute a DOJ employee for doing his job?
LYMAN: So again, regardless of whether Merrick Garland knew of Joe Biden's ideas or thoughts, we have no idea --
PHILLIP: Are you going to answer the question?
LYMAN: I am trying to, but you keep cutting me off. Pam Bondi --
PHILLIP: Does it have anything to do with Merrick Garland and Joe Biden?
(CROSSTALK)
LYMAN: Let me answer the question.
PHILLIP: This is question about whether -- let me just simplify it. What's the charge? What does Donald Trump want to prosecute Jack Smith for?
LYMAN: I said I think he said in his tweet, or his Truth Social post, they want Pam Bondi to look into it and whether or not Jack Smith was weaponized. We know that his appointment was unconstitutional.
PHILLIP: So, why --
(CROSSTALK)
LYMAN: We know that there was something going on.
PHILLIP: So, why would that involve prosecuting Jack Smith?
LYMAN: He said to look into it. He didn't necessarily say to go prosecute.
SCHEINDLIN: No, he said for perjury. He said -- his whole testimony --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: He did say prosecute.
SCHEINDLIN: No, he said his testimony was perjurious. He should be prosecuted for perjury.
LYMAN: Okay, and if Pam Bondi is as good as an attorney general as Trump thinks she is, then she will decide that that is not a reasonable choice.
SCHEINDLIN: Well, that could be nice. That could be nice.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Listen, he also said he should be prosecuted. That's a fact. Yes.
JIM SCHULTZ, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE ATTORNEY: But to the point, I didn't agree with it when Joe Biden did it. I don't agree with it when President Trump does it. When I say when Joe Biden did it, we could parse this. You can't parse this one. He publicly stated and then apologized for it that he thought that Trump aides who wouldn't testify for the Jan Six Committee were -- committed contempt and should be prosecuted.
UNKNOWN: Oh yes?
SCHULTZ: He said that publicly and then took it back later on. He also said publicly that the -- and criticized Donald Trump's handling of the documents during the documents case, you know, alluding to the fact that Donald Trump should be prosecuted for that. He did it on numerous occasions. I didn't agree with him. I don't agree with the President this time.
LATHAN: Is there a possibility though that I n the situations that we're talking about with Donald Trump as it relates to the election or the classified documents case. In those cases, Donald Trump had actually broken the law, right? And what we're talking about now, if it's this --
(CROSSTALK)
SCHULTZ: I thought we were talking about the separation of the Justice Department and the presidency. I thought that's what we're talking about.
LATHAN: What I'm talking about --what we're talking about now is, if it's Powell, if it's Letitia James, if it's any of these things.
[22:45:01]
We're talking about retribution because someone has their feelings hurt, right? So to me, the abuse of power --
(CROSSTALK)
SCHULTZ: Are you talking about Letitia James' abuse of her office? Is that what we're talking about?
LATHAN: What we're talking about right now is Donald Trump saying, hey, I don't like the interest rate. Let's look into this guy.
ALLISON: Right.
LATHAN: Donald Trump's saying, hey, this guy investigated me. Let's get this guy. All of this right here to me is a very distinct and direct consolidation of power based around who the President thinks should be working in the government or able to say whatever.
ALLISON: I agree with -- I don't like -- whenever people have to say like, it's okay that Donald Trump did it because Joe Biden did it, you know, the argument is flawed, right? Like, so I agree if Joe Biden did it, that was wrong. Donald Trump doing it, it's wrong. I think it is so interesting that Republicans think having a January 6th hearing is actually a communications win for them.
From -- I sit at this table so many times whenever I bring up January 6th, it's like, oh, you guys love to go back to this. It's like, Donald Trump should let this go. This is -- that is not a day that most Americans want to remember. And when they do remember it, I don't think Donald Trump is remembered in great favor.
PHILLIP: Yes.
SCHEINDLIN: There was a real issue whether they should allow Jack Smith to testify at a public hearing so the whole nation could hear him eloquently defend his work. And they walked right into it. They walked right into it and let him explain the basis for this prosecution, the evidence in this prosecution.
(CROSSTALK)
LATHAN: There was nothing --
SCHEINDLIN: This was a political mistake.
PHILLIP: But listen. I mean that was -- this is on Republicans for wanting to hear. But I just want to remind people that, you know, when Donald Trump was impeached for his actions around the 2020 election, Republicans said that the remedy was not impeachment, but was criminal prosecution. So when that criminal prosecution then happened, now they're saying that that was the weaponization of justice. Both things cannot be true. Judge, thank you very much for being here with us.
Next for us, Nancy Pelosi scolds Democrats behind closed doors for voting to hold the Clintons in contempt over the Epstein files. We'll discuss.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:51:44]
PHILLIP: Tonight, Nancy Pelosi is scolding her fellow Democrats for voting to hold the Clintons in contempt over the Epstein files. Nearly half of Democrats on the House Oversight Committee voted with Republicans this week, and Pelosi insisted that the subpoenas shouldn't move forward until after the complete release of the files.
And while the Clintons were still in talks with Republicans for an interview, I do kind of wonder, I have to say, if Nancy Pelosi were Speaker, if things would have turned out that way. Because I think that's kind of what she's saying here is that if I were in charge, you all would not have been allowed to do this.
SCHULTZ: I guess she didn't believe what Jack Smith said today about being above the law.
PHILLIP: I mean, look. I think this is actually a legit debate because if Democrats are arguing that the Epstein files are just as important to them because it's not about party, how do you then not --
(CROSSTALK)
ALLISON: I don't disagree and I think that I try and stay above the fray and not just play just strictly partisan politics. But here's the one reason why I think she also probably came out and said that is because it does feel like there is aggressive targeting towards the Clintons because of political reasons.
There's a lot of people that probably should be subpoenaed in the Epstein's files, but it's the Clintons because Republicans and the Clintons, we know that story. So yes, I don't think -- I think Democrats are fine. If they wanted to vote that way, I think it's a comment that could have gone without being said.
PHILLIP: Ro Khanna says, "The only person we should be holding in contempt right now is Pam Bondi, who is refusing to release the files. The Clintons have called for the full release of the files. Bill Clinton should testify after the files are released with Donald Trump. But for Comer to threaten them with jail now is pure political theater."
LATHAN: Maybe. I'll tell you this, though. I don't care. I don't. The Democrats should be very, very careful here. If anyone, anyone expects a certain group of society to put their integrity and how they want to protect people in this country who are without power against this cabal of pedophiles that was acting with impunity, if they think that the legacy of Bill Clinton or the legacy of Hillary Clinton or any Democrat is worth that, it's not. It's not for me. It's not for anyone.
What they need to do is get their House in order and deal with the fact that there are a lot of questions about the relationship between Bill Clinton and Jeffrey Epstein. The Democrats, it's up to them to win the political match of who's going to be targeted and who's not going to be targeted.
But if you think that for a solid year now, we are going to criticize the Trump administration for the brazen way in which they are protecting pedophiles, it's true. And then at the same time, give a pass to anybody because of fuzzy warm feelings we had about them in the nineties. It's not going to happen.
LYMAN: Well, I would again, I would counter. And again, it doesn't matter how they've been released at the end of the day. More Epstein files have been released under the Trump administration. I do think it's interesting. I mean, it's true. Did Biden release any? Did Biden release any Epstein files?
LATHAN: You know what's funny to me? What's funny to me --
[22:55:00]
LYMAN: No, didn't. But let me continue my answer, actually. The problem -- no, no. I actually -- I think you had a point. There is bipartisan curiosity about what's been going on, about what happened with Epstein.
LATHAN: Yes.
LYMAN: Do I necessarily think the Clintons were involved in something egregious? Probably not, right? But all they had to do was testify. Now, in terms of contempt of Congress, look, Steve Bannon, Peter Navarro went to jail because they also defied a subpoena. So you can't have one set of rules for one people and not another set of rules or a different set of rules for another.
PHILLIP: Van, a quick response.
LATHAN: Have you seen the way the President has responded to people trying to release the Epstein files?
LYMAN: At the end of the day, President Trump has released more Epstein files than any President.
LATHAN: Just humor me for a second. Let's pretend that at every step of the way he's trying to stop it. If he did that, would you say that he in fact was protecting them? Like, these are women that were being abused. You don't think they--
PHILLIP: I'll let her answer and then we got to go.
LYMAN: Absolutely not. President Trump has released more Epstein files than any sitting president. I agree. Release more of them. Release anything else you got. Anything else you got.
PHILLIP: He's done it because he's required to do it by law. Everyone, thank you very much for being here. We'll be back in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:00:11]
PHILLIP: This Saturday, comedian Andy Richter and influential media journalist Janice Min join "Have I Got News for You" at 9 P.M. on CNN and the next day on the CNN app. Thank you very much for watching "NewsNight". "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
