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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Trump Speaks At White House Correspondents' Dinner; White House Orders Warning Sign On Smithsonian Museum; Iranian Threat To Air Force One Prompted Trump Plane Swap; Ex-Platner Campaign Director Rips Morris Katz For Failed Vetting; Jake Tapper Interviews Ben Sasse. Aired 11p-12a ET
Aired July 24, 2026 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[23:00:00]
HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: We saw it last year in Virginia and New Jersey. We've seen it in the special elections with Democrats outperforming. We just know that through history, when the President's approval rating is anywhere close to where Donald Trump is, let's say he's five points higher and somehow into the mid-40s, that's still really low heading into a midterm election.
ARTHUR AIDALA, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I mean, is it? I don't know.
ENTEN: The only presidents who were able to actually gain seats with their party in the House of Representatives were Bill Clinton in 1998 and George W. Bush in 2002.
AIDALA: 1998? Not 1994?
ENTEN: No, not 1998. And their approval ratings were north of 60 percent.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR AND SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: All right. It is the top of the hour. I'm Abby Phillip in New York. And tonight, for the first time as president, Donald Trump spoke at the White House Correspondents' Dinner in Washington, and it was a little strange, to say the least. He started off talking about the attacks at April's dinner, which had to be rescheduled to tonight.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Tonight, we come back together to answer that heinous attack with unwavering resolve, and every one of us here this evening, to show that in America, we do not yield to political violence. We don't. We can't do that.
(APPLAUSE)
Can't do it. So, in this country, we believe in freedom of speech. We settle our differences not with bullets, but with open and vigorous debate. And no deranged loser with a gun will ever change that. (END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: And then he got to the jokes, most of which did not land in the room.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Everyone is looking really good tonight, and I know it was not easy finding shoes to go along with your bulletproof vest, which many people didn't want to wear because they'd rather die than look 20 pounds heavier. You know that, right?
(APPLAUSE)
We have that. A lot. They put one on me. I said, are you sure? I'm not wearing this.
(LAUGHTER)
No, you look exactly 20. They say, sir, it's about 21 pounds. I said, not good.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: He then attacked some familiar enemies, including, of course, the press.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: But Karoline may have one of the hardest jobs in the White House. She has to deal with all of you, all of the time, and you can be very difficult. You can be very, very difficult people. But I'm probably being a little bit oversensitive. Sometimes, I really do think that some of you don't like me.
(LAUGHTER)
In fact, I read a report, I get 93 percent negative publicity. Ninety- three. I said, how the hell did I win the election by so much? Think of it. I don't think that's true. I can't believe it's 93. In the 80s, maybe, but not 93.
(LAUGHTER)
But this place is really the largest group of Trump derangement syndrome people ever put together at one time, I suspect.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Our panel is back here. And, you know, there were a lot of other attacks on the press that were much harsher and nastier and undignified. But I actually think, you know, because, Arthur, you brought this up about his press coverage being very negative in his perception.
He acknowledges that even in spite of that, he won the election. And then at another point, he actually talked about how often he talks to reporters. He gives them his number freely. They call him. And he does that because his philosophy is, well, if you talk to them, you have at least a slim chance of getting your POV in. AIDALA: And he got a round of applause from the press.
PHILLIP: That's the truest thing ever spoken tonight, I think, perhaps.
AIDALA: And that is true. And it's true even for me when I handle cases. The media wants to call me and talk about my case, and I have to be very careful. But yes, you have a much better shot when you cooperate and try to at least move the boundaries a little bit.
But, I mean, we all said something tonight about Trump not being as funny as he could be. But one of my buddies from Hollywood who's watching, he has been there six decades in Hollywood, he said all of the best comedy writers who write these speeches for every president, they refuse to work for Trump. He said -- they're all Democrats.
PHILLIP: There's got to be somebody.
AIDALA: They're all Democrats. OK, maybe. Well, there was somebody. They didn't do a really great job. Whoever did, it didn't do a great job.
PHILLIP: Yes.
CHUCK ROCHA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST, FORMER SENIOR ADVISER FOR BERNIE SANDERS'S 2016 AND 2020 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGNS: Yes.
AIDALA: But, look, even Donald Trump said, who wrote these things? Like, he was bumming out about the quality of the jokes. I mean --
PHILLIP: Yes.
AIDALA: I think Trump, if he just tried to be himself a little bit more, may have been funnier than trying to follow a script.
PHILLIP: You know, look, I agree with you because it's obvious that, you know, the SNL writers are not clamoring to work with Donald Trump, right?
(LAUGHTER)
AIDALA: Thank you.
PHILLIP: But you got -- I mean, you got -- there's got to be somebody who would write a speech for him.
ROCHA: I don't know if you all know, if you all been on the bromosphere.
[23:05:00]
There's a whole group of comics out there that worship at the altar of Donald Trump.
PHILLIP: Yes.
ROCHA: Where were they tonight?
ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes.
ROCHA: Where was the bro jokes tonight? Where was Joe Rogan tonight? Where was that big white boy that likes to do the Donald Trump impressions? They're funny. I watch their stuff. As a Mexican redneck, I think they're funny as a Democrat. Why not write just a couple of jokes for him?
And the other thing I give the president credit for, and I disagree with everything that he says, is that he does give them unlimited access to his ass. I mean, these -- if -- you've never even seen a Democrat do this, almost to a fault.
AIDALA: -- to his butt?
ROCHA: No.
(LAUGHTER)
ALLISON: Yes, he did.
AIDALA: I'm sorry. OK.
PHILLIP: I'm going to let that one go.
ROCHA: Sometimes I get carried away. That access, I agree with that. I think that the reporter should have access. I give him credit for going to that, even though I thought it was a boring-ass speech.
ALLISON: You know, I was watching this, and it made me think of being at like a friend's dinner. And that one guy at the table has to be the funniest person. And they just keep saying it and saying it over and over. And no one is listening. Everyone is drinking their wine, like, I wish he would shut up. Like, when is he going to leave? They try to change the subject. And then he goes back and tells the same joke over and over.
You know what I mean? You know what I mean? Yeah, we know what you mean, and it's not funny. It's not funny.
AIDALA: You promised you weren't going to tell that story on T.V. You promised you weren't going to give me up.
PHILLIP: He talked a little bit about term limits tonight, and jokingly said he supported term limits. I have to say, watching this speech, it -- I remember watching Donald Trump. I was in the room when he gave the Al Smith dinner speech. And it was a roast and it was actually really funny. And that Donald Trump versus today's Donald Trump is a night and day difference. And it really does highlight. I mean, obviously, the presidency ages everyone who is in it, but, man, he really seemed like a shadow of his former self.
ENTEN: It has been a decade. And, you know, the American people, for the first time, you know, have said essentially that Trump doesn't necessarily have the physical health in order to carry on and be president of the United States or be an effective president, which is very different from what we have generally seen.
And, you know, yes, the thing to me about the speech wasn't just that it was unfunny but, you know, there was that time in which he kept trying to explain the joke over and over again.
ALLISON: Yes. Like, we get it. You can't go up the stairs and make love, we get it.
ENTEN: We get it. We get it, bro. We get it, Mr. President. And if he truly understood what was going on, he would have gotten off the stage. It's one thing to be unfunny for 30 minutes. It's another thing to be unfunny for over an hour and make the rest of us suffer. I mean, what did the American audience do to deserve an hour and four minutes of that?
AIDALA: It wasn't that bad. Relax.
ENTEN: It was pretty bad, man.
AIDALA: I mean, it was okay.
ALLISON: Let me just say, I'm about to tell on you, Arthur.
AIDALA: I thought I was screwed.
ALLISON: You weren't even paying attention. You were on TikTok. I watched you.
AIDALA: I don't know what TikTok is.
ALLISON: I was trying to -- whatever. The real, you were not paying attention.
AIDALA: Twice you gave me up tonight. Jokes at the table, the squabbling on the phone.
PHILLIP: OK. Let me play --
ALLISON: He's, like, who's he talking about?
PHILLIP: Let me play. This is Trump talking about former President Biden and cracking a joke at his expense. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Just remember, before I came along, if you wanted to see someone lose consciousness on the South Lawn of the White House, all you had to do is ask Joe Biden a question. They'd remember that.
(LAUGHTER)
Oh, you think I'm kidding.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Now, it's interesting because I won't say that he was sleeping on the dais there, but his eyes were closed on several occasions for long periods of time tonight. So, there's that. But, I mean, again, old jokes, well-worn territory, not hugely funny.
ALLISON: Yes. I don't think he was doing that for anybody, to Chuck's point. But, his base -- I also -- like, he just appears to be somebody who really, really wants to be liked, and it's just not going to change. It's not like -- people have their opinions about Hillary Clinton. They don't change. And people have their opinions about Donald Trump, and they're not going to change. And he would have to have dramatic behavioral changes, which just doesn't happen at his age.
PHILLIP: Is there -- is there a world in which this dinner tonight was good for him to see what sort of normal, collegial interactions look like? Because every other president has been able to go through this. They've been sitting on that dais when awards are given to journalists who report about their scandals. They have had to deal with tough reporting, and then shake those same people's hands. And he's never subjected himself to that until tonight. And I actually wonder if there's a part of him that just actually had a new experience tonight that is to his benefit.
ROCHA: It's very uncommon for him to have that experience. And I also won't say that he was sleeping on stage, but I'd call it aggressively resting.
[23:10:01]
ALLISON: Resting his eyes.
PHILLIP: Resting his eyes.
ROCHA: Resting his eyes. Right. But to your point, when you're a person like Donald Trump, and I'm not singling out Donald Trump because he's rich, but I've been around a lot of rich folks who thought they could run for office, and they don't like to be told that they're not popular, that they're not funny or that they're wrong. And that's what you saw tonight, is he don't like to be challenged because he has won elections. Again, I give him credit for that.
But do you point to have to sit there? When can you remember another time when he had to sit there and watch people get awards for stuff they had said about him? That was --
PHILLIP: Yes. Let's not forget, I mean, it is not -- there -- I think there are certainly other presidents, particularly Obama, who prosecuted the press more than Trump did. But Trump has attacked the press viciously, verbally.
ALLISON: How old is Donald Trump?
PHILLIP: Seventy-nine.
ALLISON: Seventy-nine. OK, 79 or 80, what is the difference? The point is don't wait to be 79 for the first time you be in a room and somebody tell you that you're wrong. Don't do that. Don't let your children go through life like that. That is a terrible way to live life, to never be challenged until you're 79. And that was not even a challenging tonight. He's still got an hour to make his case.
AIDALA: He has been getting challenges. He said, I'm going to run for president. So that's 69. He's the math guy, but it has been a while.
ENTEN: He ran in 2015. He was born in 1946. So, it was 69, yes.
ALLISON: The numbers guy.
AIDALA: There we go. PHILLIP: Yes.
ENTEN: But look, here's at least for me the bottom line is. This speech doesn't change anything. He went into this spiel, unpopular overall, but still very popular with his Republican base.
ALLISON: Yes.
ENTEN: The House is still very much in jeopardy, most likely going to flip to Democrats. The Senate, more likely than not to be held by Republicans, but still a chance to Democrats. By Monday, we're going to go through a hundred more news cycles --
ALLISON: Yes.
ENTEN: -- and this will be yesterday's news.
ALLISON: And also, a lot of people didn't even know what's happening tonight.
AIDALA: We do the same thing in New York City. It's called the inner circle. It's the mayor and all the press. And it's just like they basically shake hands for one night before they beat each other up. It's like the Supreme Court justices, right? Before they take the bench, Justice Alito or Justice Kagan on operative ends, they shake hands, and then they go out there and they do battle. Maybe that was a little bit tonight.
ALLISON: Arthur, they argue on the matter of the law. They don't call each other fat.
PHILLIP: That's a fair point. The nature of --
(LAUGHTER)
AIDALA: OK.
PHILLIP: She is coming for you tonight.
ALLISON: I'm sorry, buddy.
AIDALA: Release Cari Champion. OK.
ALLISON: Friend.
AIDALA: Thank you.
PHILLIP: All right, everyone. Next for us, if Trump can't change history inside the Smithsonian, apparently, he's going to post his own outside of the building. We'll discuss his push to put warning signs near the American Museum of American History. Plus, new details as the president's abrupt plane swapped during his trip to NATO, and it has to do with a threat, a credible threat, from Iran. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:15:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: The Trump administration is escalating its feud with the Smithsonian. It's slapping warning labels on the National Museum of American History. Those signs will warn about -- quote -- "ideological capture at America's museum," and it will tell visitors that exhibits should be renovated. Earlier this month, the White House claimed in a report that the museum was erasing American heritage, not preserving it. The Smithsonian hasn't commented on those warning labels but, previously, its leaders said that the White House had mischaracterized the museum.
We have some new faces at the table, Sara Fischer, Sabrina Singh, and Katie Frost. The first thing that really comes to mind when I hear about something like this is, isn't this what they do in tin-pot dictatorships where they try to control the history and the information that people learn and try to steer them toward a version of history that they would prefer?
KATIE FROST, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, it's very important that we have an accurate representation of history. Unfortunately, history is increasingly becoming politicized. You have one side who wants to tell their version of history and another side has an alternative way of framing the history. But we should be able to ground some basic facts. And if things are being framed in a negative light that reflects poorly in the United States the opinion of the Trump administration, I understand why they would think that --
PHILLIP: That's a beef. That's not about facts. That's a beef about you want a positive portrayal, whereas the other version has information that you may not like, that may be negative, but it's not inaccurate. I mean, I have yet to see any examples that they've pointed out to any inaccuracies.
FROST: Well, I've seen them --
PHILLIP: Shouldn't that matter?
FROST: Facts matter, but the way they're framing it is also an important element. I mean, we're all political here. We understand how, yes, when you're arguing the facts, but how do you frame it? How do you share it?
(CROSSTALK)
SABRINA SINGH, CNN POLITICAL AND GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR, FORMER DEPUTY PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: What do you find factually inaccurate about what's at the American History Museum?
FROST: Well, I will go ahead and acknowledge. I do not spend a lot of time at the American History Museum. I don't think a lot of us do go to the museum that often.
SINGH: I think a majority of the people -- when you go to that museum and what -- the problem here is what -- the Trump administration's argument about putting up these signs is, like, give me the argument of what is wrong. Like, what is displayed here that is factually inaccurate or a mistelling of the history? Because I'm willing to take your point that everyone has a side of how to tell a version of their history.
[23:20:00]
But a museum is a museum. It's meant to preserve the facts of our nation. And to Abby's point, I mean, you see this in countries around the world, to try and rewrite their history, to paint it in a different light for the person who's in power. So, I take your point, but I would ask you, of all the displays in that museum, and there are many, hundreds, point out one that is inaccurate.
ALLISON: And they're not new displays.
SINGH: Correct.
ALLISON: Were just written.
SINGH: They are not.
ALLISON: The Smithsonian, these are experts that are historians, archeologists who have gone -- who have spent their careers studying the history of this country. And I would actually argue most are not political beings. They are --
PETER MEIJER, FORMER MICHIGAN REPRESENTATIVE: I was in anthropology major. I mean, there's a lot of ideological --
SINGH: Yes, I get that.
MEIJER: That's why we're working in the field today. But I think the point I'd like to make is, 10 top dictatorships would gather up all the history books, put them in a pile, and burn them.
ALLISON: Yes, they're banning them. They're just banning them right now.
SARA FISCHER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST, MEDIA CORRESPONDENT FOR AXIOS: The problem with the warning label as I see it is that --
ALLISON: No, they're banning books.
MEIJER: I don't like it, but it's like --
FISCHER: The warning label, from my perspective, is meant to sow distrust in the Smithsonian as an institution. If you're having people go to the Smithsonian and you have warning labels saying you can't trust what is here, this is not an accurate representation, that is sending a signal that you can't trust any of the historical institutions or museums in the United States, which is a soft power move by the administration to help sort of rewrite history the way that they want it to.
It doesn't seem that different to me, quite frankly, to what they're doing at the Kennedy Center. It's all about just creating an environment where people don't necessarily trust the art institutions, the history institutions, the culture institutions that have for long been bipartisan.
MEIJER: I would actually argue it's a lot more of, hey, it's your point, we don't know the exact exhibits that are under question or being able to argue that point, but having somebody say, hey, if I'm going to write the descriptor of this, you need to be able to defend that to a Republican and to a Democrat. That can be a hard thing to do. But putting that through the idea of, I don't just want this to be a jury of my peers --
ALLISON: We do know some of them.
(CROSSTALK)
SINGH: Trump didn't have an issue with this. Bush didn't have an issue with this. Reagan didn't have an issue with this. George H.W. Bush didn't have an issue with this.
MEIJER: What I'm saying is, if your idea is, I'm writing this for the approval of people who are within my same thought group, you are going to inherently not be trying to understand how somebody else may react to that.
PHILLIP: Can I just ask, I mean, on that point, because I actually think you are right in the sense that these exhibits do need to speak to a wide array of people. But I think that actually is exactly the thing that Trump doesn't like the most. One of the things that these exhibits do that I think they dislike is that it includes the perspectives of other individuals.
ALLISON: Yes.
PHILLIP: Black Americans who are descendants of slaves, indigenous people who experience the other side of the creation of this nation. It includes a lot of different perspectives that to Trump is negative.
ALLISON: Yes.
PHILLIP: It's a negative portrayal. So, I actually think that that's -- what you're suggesting is exactly what the museum is trying to do, which is to say, there are a lot of different ways of looking at how this went down. And if you were Black -- ALLISON: Yes.
PHILLIP: -- at the creation of this nation, this is what it looked like for you.
ALLISON: Yes.
PHILLIP: If you were indigenous, this is what it looked like for you. And to Trump, that is, according to him in a 2025 post, an out-of- control Smithsonian where everything discussed is how horrible the country was, how bad slavery was, how unaccomplished and downtrodden it was. Nothing about success, nothing about brightness, nothing about future. That is =-- what Trump wants is the perspective of just one person.
ALLISON: Yes.
PHILLIP: The white man.
ALLISON: The white man. Exactly. And that's why we don't know all of the exhibits in question, but we do know many of them, particularly the African-American Museum, was one of the first to go under attack because it told the true story of Black people in this country.
MEIJER: They also put out the elements of white culture being punctuality.
PHILLIP: That was not, just to be clear, not in the African-American History Museum. That was a different --
MEIJER: But it was propagated by the Smithsonian. Maybe not created by them. It was something implicitly endorsed by them that I found just incredibly offensive at what that implied.
ALLISON: You know what? I also think --
PHILLIP: I think we can acknowledge, though, that there are things like that, that for sure went too far. That's different from --
ALLISON: Taking down exhibits about slavery because you're like, why are we showing the badness? Because it happened. And it was bad. And it was bad. And it should never happen again.
MEIJER: A hundred percent.
ALLISON: And would we ever want to take down the things that happened in the Holocaust? I would hope not. We should not want to take down the things about the Trail of Tears. We should not want to take down the things that happened in slavery. And we have to be honest. And if we are not honest, we are potentially destined to repeat them. That is why you teach history in a non-political way.
[23:25:00]
Because what Donald Trump actually thinks he's doing is trying to lay breadcrumbs so his history is also told through his lens and not through truth. And that could be problematic.
FROST: Well, I also respectfully say that when we're talking about this is what happens in dictatorships, if this truly is what was happening in America, you would not have seen the White House Correspondents' Dinner tonight, you would not see the leader go there and stand there and applaud and smile and shake hands with people who are receiving awards for writing very negative and critical things.
(CROSSTALK)
FISCHER: That's a very selective view of what happens. President Trump also spends a lot of time bashing reporters that he didn't like, calling them names, targeting people for his weight, criticizing his opponents, saying that the press relies on him. So, I hear you, but at the same time, this was a moment in America's 250th anniversary to praise freedom of speech as a foundation of our country and that did not happen tonight.
I think the one thing here, you cannot take what's happening at the Smithsonian in a vacuum. We've seen other instances in other institutions where military officers who were people of color, their photos were removed from the walls. So, we now understand that this is something that the administration does. So, even though we don't know the exact parts of the Smithsonian that are being targeted, we can't say, oh, this in a vacuum, we have no idea of what this could be because we kind of do have --
SINGH: I think Sara is right to that point. This is not just Trump, it's like his administration trying to rewrite and whitewash so many of the accomplishments of people of color that have contributed to our nation's history, but also trying to downplay the horridness that our nation was founded on. To Ashley's point, that's what the museum is for.
ALLISON: I don't understand why. You know, it is such an easy thing to just be, like, it is horrible. Let's always call it horrible and let's commit to never do it again. That is a very easy posture to have. And you don't need to get rid of it to be able to do that.
PHILLIP: This is interesting because you brought up the Holocaust. I mean, there are some elements of the right who have actually said that about modern-day Germany, that they spend too much time dwelling on the horrors of the Holocaust and it has been allowed to override the long history of the German people.
MEIJER: Transition to Graham Platner right now.
PHILLIP: No, no, no. I'm talking about people like Elon Musk. I mean, he said that explicitly. There is a viewpoint that there is an overemphasis on the bad parts of history in general. But, I mean, I think that we would take that idea about Germany and we'd say, that's insane, that's ridiculous.
SINGH: That's crazy.
PHILLIP: Paper over the Holocaust. I don't understand why it's even OK to have the conversation about papering over slavery in this country.
MEIJER: I disagree that any of this is papering over. I think it's about striking the balance between -- part of the story of slavery is the horrendous conditions, the inhumanity of it. Part of it is a story of emancipation in a country striving to live out its ideals.
SINGH: Which took so much blood --
MEIJER: Exactly.
SINGH: -- sweat, and tears to even get for. People still don't --
ALLISON: There are people who still fly the flag, who didn't want us to emancipate.
SINGH: I understand where you're trying to go, but I don't think that's right. I just --
ALLISON: There are people who still fly that fly that don't want us emancipate. In my lifetime, as an adult, that flag was still the state flag of South Carolina. So, we can tell the story of emancipation.
MEIJER: I'm from the north. We were victorious in this battle.
ALLISON: We can tell the story of emancipation, but as somebody whose lineage comes from those who emancipated, I want the whole story told.
MEIJER: Our future is informed by our past, the failures that led up to our ideals, the places where we did. But the fact that we're striving towards it and striking a balance between the failures, the successes, and where we want to go, that's what we should be doing.
PHILLIP: All right. We're going to leave it there. An alarming report from "The New York Times" reveals new details behind Trump's abrupt swap of his plane, Air Force One, earlier this month in Turkey, including a specific and credible threat from Iranian proxies. We're going to discuss that, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:30:00]
PHILLIP: Tonight, alarming new details from "The New York Times" about Donald Trump's abrupt plane swap earlier this month as he left the NATO summit in Turkey aboard an old Air Force One plane. The Times reports that Trump switched aircraft after what officials determined to be a specific, credible threat from Iranian proxies inside of Turkey targeting Trump and Air Force One. The threat emerged as the president attended the summit after he had flown to Ankara aboard the new Qatari-gifted 747.
Now, the Times had previously reported that the new plane lacks key defensive countermeasures, and after assessing that threat, the Secret Service reportedly urged Trump to go ahead and change planes.
And I should note that just yesterday, the DOJ dropped their subpoenas against Times reporters for basically doing this reporting which, in my view, is extremely important to know.
FISCHER: By the way, it's an admission that the reporting was accurate, A. And B, it comes to show how much this is getting on Donald Trump's nerves, this reporting about this plane, because you wouldn't be using this as a scare tactic, putting out subpoenas to reporters, unless you actually really cared about what was being reported.
[23:35:03]
I don't know -- I'm just being candid. I don't know why Donald Trump is so sensitive to the fact that this plane lacks some of those counter-defensive measures simply because nothing, you know, it's gifted to you from a foreign government, is going to have the necessary national security equipment, but it's clearly struck a chord with him that he went that far.
WEIJER: I think he can be very sensitive to people talking about specific security measures that pertain to your personal safety, and we should all care about the sensitivity of the information surrounding the president's security.
SINGH: Sure. I just don't get -- I don't buy that that's the issue. What Sara is saying is, I think, the issue is that he was embarrassed. He got this jet. The Air Force spent hundreds of millions of dollars to retrofit a gift. You know, Air Force One has incredible defensive measures in place. That was not something that this Qatari jet had. And he wanted to show it off. He got to the NATO summit. The Secret Service and the military did their job and said, you cannot fly home on this new Air Force One, it doesn't -- it's not safe. And I think he was embarrassed by that and lashed out with going after "The New York Times". And I think, to Sara's point, it was an absolute admission that they had to drop the --
PHILLIP: Obvious signs that there were -- there were things that were awry on the day that this decision was made. And President Trump was asked about it by reporters. Let me just remind you of what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNKNOWN (voice-over): You're saying there wasn't a security concern?
TRUMP: No, no.
UNKNOWN (voice-over): Do you know why they had us close our window blinds? That was not usual.
TRUMP: Yes. Because you're, you know, probably on a dangerous flight, because of the sleaze bags that we have to deal with.
UNKNOWN (voice-over): Do you think that Iran was possibly thinking --
TRUMP: Well, I mean, if they asked you to close your windows, probably they'd feel that way. They didn't ask me to close mine, but if they did, I would have done it.
UNKNOWN (voice-over): Were you aware of any credible threat by Iran against Air Force One?
TRUMP: Well, I have a threat all the time. I'm number one on their list, before you. But if I go, you go, right? So, perhaps, someday, you want to change profession.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So, you can see him really thinking about what to say there, right? Because the reporters know what they're talking about. When they go to really dangerous places, Iraq and Afghanistan, that type of place, that's the protocol. You close the blinds. You create a dark environment around the plane.
Again, you're saying this is about revealing details about his security. I actually think what it's about is pointing out that in the rush to get this plane out there, they compromised his security, which is not OK.
ALLISON: Also, the original story about this plane is that many Americans didn't like the fact that he was being gifted something by a foreign -- another country. And then on top of that -- but, you know, people defended it. And then on top of that, the plane was compromised. And so, it is pie in his face, and he didn't like it. Nobody likes to be -- nobody likes to be proven wrong.
FROST: I do not say this is about him being embarrassed. This is about the security of the president of the United States, which is incredibly important. By the way, the entire --
(CROSSTALK)
-- press crew that was traveling with him as well.
MEIJER: The current Air Force One security measures are classified. The difference between the current Air Force One and the bridge are classified. We're operating off a lot of assumptions.
SINGH: But there wasn't classified material in "The New York Times" reporting.
MEIJER: We're talking about several different subjects. I'm talking about this plane. The analogy that I think is appropriate is the new Qatari-gifted plane, the VC-25 bridge, that -- I think it's akin to a ballistic, you know, windows. It can protect you from somebody shooting an AK-47. But if somebody fires an RPG --
SINGH: A ballistic missile from Iran --
MEIJER: -- you're not getting that --
SINGH: And that's maybe why the president can't fly on it.
MEIJER: Because some of those, at least according to some speculation I've seen from very credible aviation folks, the current system of defensive countermeasures, they're upgrading that because of all hosts of new threats. (CROSSTALK)
ALLISON: I just want -- because you might be able to answer it. When we got the plane, when he got the plane, I was told that this was just going to sit in his museum, too. That was also the story.
(CROSSTALK)
SINGH: I just want to say, what Peter said is that -- I just want to make the point that our Air Force did everything possible to make this plane available to the president on a very rushed timeline. They did not have the time they needed to install every single counter- defensive measure that Air Force One needs.
So, that's why the president is so upset. He rushed it. He wanted this gift. He couldn't fly home on it. And at the end of the day, it was just not a safe aircraft for him. And the military made that call.
PHILLIP: All right. Next for us, Graham Platner's campaign manager is talking about the red flags that they knew about the candidate's past and why they tried to push past them.
[23:40:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: For months, established Democrats cautioned that Graham Platner, the political outsider backed by the party's left wing, presented a major risk to a critical Senate race. Now, with Platner's campaign suspended following serious allegations of sexual assault, allegations that Platner vehemently denies, the progressive strategist who discovered him is finally speaking out.
[23:45:05]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MORRIS KATZ, FORMER LEAD STRATEGIST, PLATNER CAMPAIGN: In hindsight, knowing what we know now, the Reddit posts alone probably should have been enough or should have been enough. The tattoos should have been enough. The initial New York Times story on troubling behavior should have been enough. There was a constant weighing of, like, how much is too much? And, you know, what is the red line? And I think, obviously, I did not see it soon enough.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: What you think --
FISHER: Understatement --
PHILLIP: Yes.
SINGH: Everyone is in an agreement now.
FISCHER: His main argue in this podcast is that we were kind of blinded towards all of these red flags because we were so excited to have a candidate that we thought would fit perfectly. And the lesson there is that it doesn't matter how perfect the candidate is. You can't bypass these red flags anymore.
ALLISON: As per Donald Trump.
FROST: It is like you're going down and looking at a checklist of, oh, he has a beard and he speaks with a gravelly voice. Oh, he is going to appeal to working class voters. This is perfect to run in a state like Maine. And it is not just not going to happen.
And now, look at what is happening. We now are going to go through this convention process instead of the primary to get the new nominee for the Democratic Party. It doesn't sound like a very democratic process because you have 216,000 people voting in that primary and 601 delegates are going to ultimately be choosing the next Senate nominee for the Democratic Party. I did the math. That is 0.27 percent. The people showed up in the primary. This is ridiculous.
ALLISON: I'm going to take a different approach to this. I don't think they went to a checklist. I think that Graham Platner actually did excite a part of main voters that had not really been -- maybe since they are getting in and he was talking to a segment of voters that actually probably would resonate it across the country. That is true. That has happened. That is why he won the primary.
But what is also true is that he had red flags before that happened. And some of those voters also knew those red flags. But they should not have been accepted. That is actually the issue. It is not whether he was a checklist. He did appeal to voters. But he had things that were unacceptable and should have been enough, but they lost sight of it.
PHILLIP: I also think this really illustrates the power of these strategists in finding these candidates. I mean, you should listen to the whole podcast because they really kind of go into it, how they interviewed him. People have been asking Platner to run. Platner actually had to be convinced to do it.
And here's Morris Katz basically saying -- he's kind of trying to have it both ways. He says it should have been enough but then, at the same time, oh, we didn't really know the extent of some of these allegations. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KATZ: There is no standard vetting process that would have found the credible allegation that ended the campaign. The kind of area we were in of the things we knew were sexting, Reddit, tattoo land. And I think, to your point, none of those things alone in the vacuum was necessarily disqualifying.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: OK, Peter, he just said the tattoo was disqualifying. So, it's either disqualifying or it's not. But you as a former politician yourself, is it really true that they couldn't have interviewed the ex-girlfriends, that they wouldn't even be attempted to find out about the nature of these relationships, especially if they already knew that there was a sexting problem?
MEIJER: What -- I think he has a very narrow point that I agree with, that that is probably a level of due diligence that goes a little bit beyond. But when you have all these indications, this guy is kind of a sleazy scumbag of low character, consistently lying -- I mean, the fact that he's sexting other women, this is not something --
ALLISON: Newly married.
MEIJER: -- that happened a decade ago.
ALLISON: Right. We could be talking about Donald Trump right now. I just -- I just find it -- this is -- this is the thing --
MEIJER: Come on.
ALLISON: Oh. Say I'm wrong. Cheated on his wife while -- after she just had a baby, while she was pregnant --
PHILLIP: As we pointed out, you think that's disqualifying for Donald Trump. Should it not be disqualifying for Graham Platner?
ALLISON: Yes. And when I found those things out, I have never come on this network and said it wasn't disqualifying. I'm very clear. I think it's hypocritical though for you to want to be sitting there and not saying --
(CROSSTALK)
That's the problem. Do you think Donald Trump has done sleazy things?
FROST: I think every single politician has done something they probably would not agree -- here's what I will say --
ALLISON: Do you think cheating on his wife should have been disqualifying?
FROST: There should have been more women involved in this because any one of us, if that guy showed up to go on a date with one of our girlfriends --
(CROSSTALK)
-- to go with our girlfriends, we would have gone, no, that guy's a problem.
PHILLIP: And I just have to say, there was a woman on the campaign who raised the red flag.
MEIJER: Yes.
PHILLIP: She was there.
MEIJER: Genevieve McDonald.
ALLISON: And she was sidelined.
PHILLIP: Next for us, former Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse revealed a life lesson after being diagnosed with terminal cancer. CNN's Jake Tapper joins me next to discuss his emotional sit-down interview.
[23:50:02]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: Former Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse found out last December that he had Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Doctors gave him just months to live as the disease spread throughout his body. Sasse recently sat down with CNN's Jake Tapper for an emotional interview on his life and death.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BEN SASSE, FORMER NEBRASKA SENATOR: I didn't have a plan for the fact that I don't want to raise my kids in Washington, D.C., and yet I don't like the idea of being gone all weeknights. And so, I didn't think it through enough.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN LEAD WASHINGTON ANCHOR: And it's also what you spent your time doing in the Senate. That was also a problem when it came to thinking about how much you missed your family, right?
SASSE: Yes. I mean, I want to say it delicately because I've been too harsh about the Senate sometimes and how I say it.
[23:54:59]
On weeks when 40 percent of my hours would go to intel and national security stuff, I would think it was often worth it, to go through some of the costs at home. But on weeks when intel would only be 10 or 15 percent, then I was -- like most of the rest of this stuff is theater.
Like -- I want to be clear, lots of good and well-meaning people in the Senate, but it's not an institution that works. And there are lots and lots of people who want to pretend that being a senator is really cool and it's a great title and you're powerful, and that doesn't mean we're doing enough work for the American people.
And then when you're missing dinner with your kids and you realize, like, I would look at my kids and I felt like they had a chain around their neck with an hourglass, and I was watching the years, the months or the years or the dinners we had left as a family, and I'd look at my kids and I'd see the sand through the hourglass. Like, what the hell was I doing instead of being with you?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Wow! Jake Tapper, anchor of "The Lead" and State of the Union, joins me now. So, Jake, when you hear that, do you get the sense that he felt like that time was ultimately worth it? I mean, I would think that he's the type of public servant that a lot of people might want more of in Washington --
JAKE TAPPER, CNN LEAD WASHINGTON ANCHOR: Yes.
PHILLIP: -- but, at the same time, that's a really honest assessment of the costs.
TAPPER: Yes. I mean, I think that, you know, as he approaches the end of his life, he is realizing even more than he already did. And this was a guy who always had seemed to have pretty good priorities in terms of family and faith first, community, and politics all, you know, down to like 15 or something. I mean, he always says one year for politics.
But as he, you know, comes to the end, he thinks about how much he's going to miss his family. Although his faith -- you know, he's very -- his faith is admirable. He's very confident he will see his family again and maybe he's going to a better place.
But I think the regret he has is something that we all experience when it comes to not spending as much time with our kids as we wish we did. You know, your baby is only five and you have another one on the way. But like, when my daughter went away to college, you know, I came home after dropping her off, I wept, and all I thought about was all the time when I wasn't at home because I was traveling for work.
PHILLIP: Yes, it really puts everything very much into perspective. And Jake, last quick thing, anything that really surprised you in this interview?
TAPPER: Well, he was -- I mean, I guess his generosity because we went to the College World Series with him. His 15-year-old son, Breck, was there with him. I got to talk to Breck. I sat by the river in his house in Fremont and talked to him and his wife. I was shocked at how much they opened up to me and opened up their home and their lives and their souls during these times.
But I think it's important for them to like try to remind people to embrace the time you have left because we all have a death sentence one way or another, he says, and he's right, and to embrace that time and spend it with the people you love and maybe not focus so much on the things just of this earth.
PHILLIP: Yes. And I know that, as you pointed out, I mean, his time is very limited. How is he doing? Is the treatment helping at all?
TAPPER: Yes. I mean, he was he was diagnosed last December. The doctors told him he probably only had three or four months to live. And here we are in July. So, this miracle medicine, as he calls it, this pancreatic cancer that he's in, he's in an experimental treatment, is doing well. It's reducing tumors, it's helping him, it's extending his life. But, ultimately, it is not a cure. You know, whatever this medicine ends up being in five years or 10 years, it is not that yet. So, he is helping people in the future, and he is enjoying the days he has left. Every day is kind of a gift. We were at the College World Series. One of the players for West Virginia, the Mountaineers, did something that's very rare in baseball, which is he stole home. And I kind of thought of that when I was thinking about Ben because I was like he kind of stole something, too. He kind of stole some extra time at home with his loved ones. That was a nice little moment although I didn't talk about it with him.
PHILLIP: And you know what? In the process, giving us all actually something of a gift, you know.
TAPPER: Totally.
PHILLIP: I think it's important to have people who remind you of what life is supposed to be about. So --
TAPPER: A hundred percent. I mean, when is the last time any of us talked about this on T.V., about the important -- how ephemeral life is and how the reaper comes for us all and how we should spend time with our children and our loved ones. Ben is giving that gift to all of us.
PHILLIP: Yes. Well, Jake, thank you very much for sharing that conversation with us. You can watch his conversation with Ben Sasse and his wife and their sons.
[23:59:59]
It's featured on this weekend's episode of "The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper." You can look for that on Sunday night at 8 p.m. right here on CNN, and then the next day on the CNN app.
Thank you for watching "NewsNight." Tomorrow morning, be sure to catch "Table for Five" at 10 a.m. Eastern time right here on CNN. In the meantime, "The Story with Elex Michaelson" is next.
