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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Trump Rejects Regulation Of A.I. Despite Industry's Warnings; GOP Senator's Perjury Trap For Jack Smith Backfires; J.D. Vance Wants Illegals Deported To Solve Problems; Jasmine Crockett Leaves James Talarico's Endorsement. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired September 29, 2026 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN HOST (voice over): Tonight, as the A.I. CEOs issue new warnings, the president insists the industry doesn't need regulation, just new branding.
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: It's been officially changed to super intelligence.
PHILLIP: Plus, they insulted him.
SEN. ERIC SCHMITT (R-MO): You will go down as a total dirt bag.
PHILLIP: They lectured him.
SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): Javert from Les Mis would look at you with astonishment.
PHILLIP: But did their circus show that Republicans don't have anything on Jack Smith?
SEN. CORY BOOKER (D-NJ): Right before an election, this is what they want to spend their time on.
PHILLIP: Also, as Americans feel worse about the economy than at any point in modern history, J.D. Vance has a cure.
J.D. VANCE, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: A lot of the problems that exist in American society would be solved, not all of them, but just by deporting illegal aliens.
PHILLIP: And it's one of the biggest midterm races in America, so why is Jasmine Crockett sitting on the sidelines?
Live at the table, Keith Boykin, Caroline Sunshine, Christopher Hahn, Elizabeth Pipko, and Philip Bump.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEOTAPE) PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Will today live for infamy in generations to come? Because the future of artificial intelligence and its power seem to have been determined behind closed doors at the White House. As Americans and the very people creating A.I. are growing more concerned about that technology, President Trump hosted the most powerful men behind it, and they signed a voluntary pledge to self-police the industry.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Is it the belief of everybody that you're meeting with today that no guardrails, no regulation of A.I., super intelligence, as you call it, is necessary?
TRUMP: Well, there's a belief that there should be tremendous self- regulation, and we automatically have regulation with the Department of Justice, the FBI, all of that. But the self-regulation's very important.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: The White House released the four steps that were agreed to, which included both internal and external independent reviews of A.I. models to ensure that any issues are detected and fixed. But will anyone enforce it? Here's what Trump said about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Is this accord that everybody signed, is it binding in any way?
TRUMP: I think it's morally binding, yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: He was asked again about the safety concerns, and he took a page out of The Beatles playbook.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Mr. President, tell us why the world should not be concerned about A.I., why there shouldn't be guardrails?
TRUMP: Because we have people that love our country and love the world a lot.
REPORTER: But it requires more than love, doesn't it, sir?
TRUMP: No, it requires this, and they're the smartest people in the world.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So, when asked about the legal repercussions of a company's A.I. model, for example, breaking the law, Trump quickly changed the subject to his new branding effort.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Who should be held accountable when the A.I. agents committed a crime like --
TRUMP: It's not A.I. It's S.I. That's the other thing. We've changed the name officially today.
It's been officially changed to super intelligence or S.I.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Before we open it up to the table here, we invite you at home to join the debate. Head to cnn.com/abby, weigh in there. We'll get to some of your comments as we go throughout the show.
So, Philip, it looks like President Trump's strategy and the White House's strategy is basically let them deal with it. And the president also characteristically is very concerned about what we call A.I. and not so much concerned about the details of what the challenges are and why this industry, unlike pretty much any other industry, gets to basically do whatever they want and self-police themselves, and we don't really allow that anywhere else in our economy.
[22:05:02]
PHILIP BUMP, SENIOR EDITOR, HEARST CONNECTICUT: Yes. I mean, it's sort of amazing he didn't change it to America intelligence given the pattern.
PHILLIP: Right, exactly. That is the big surprise of today.
BUMP: You know, I think that one of the fundamental issues here is that President Trump and the staff and the administration understand A.I. is underpinning a significant part of the economy right now. A lot of the economy depends on building out A.I., on spending on A.I., and the back and forth wash of money between A.I. companies and NVIDIA and chipmakers and things like this. And I think that he understands that trying to put his foot on the brake in terms of that is going to be bad news.
But it's also the case that even the A.I. companies themselves are not able to effectively, in real time, understand what the A.I. is always doing, right? We see it break out of sandboxes, we see it do these things that they are not anticipating and that they do not know about until after the fact. So, allowing them to self-police it means allowing them to do -- keep doing the path that they've already done and proven to be effective.
CHRISTOPHER HAHN, PODCAST HOST, AGGRESSIVE PROGRESSIVE: I'm dubious if they don't know this. I think some of what they're saying is a marketing strategy to get people to pay attention to A.I. They are not making money right now, and they want more investment. They want their stock to grow. So does the president, by the way, who owns a significant amount of A.I. stock. Do I think they're going to self-regulate? Absolutely not. Nobody ever does. This country's going to at some point elect a Congress that will impose regulations on it. This president now is on the wrong side of another 80/20 issue in this country, and it is going to cost him and his party this November.
ELIZABETH PIPKO, FORMER RNC NATIONAL SPOKESPERSON: What's another 80/20 issue that he's on the wrong side of?
HAHN: Data centers, I mean, the same issue somewhat, the war in Iran. It's like they're -- you know, gas prices are okay. That's like a 90/10 issue.
PIPKO: I don't think he's ever said they're okay.
HAHN: Oh, he's said people are paying --
PIPKO: I've been on this show many times, and every time I'm here, I remind people he doesn't say that they're okay.
BUMP: He says they're a small price to pay.
PIPKO: They are, in fact, a price to pay.
BUMP: Okay.
PHILLIP: Caroline, well, let me just play what he said about --
BUMP: Keep going with that.
PHILLIP: There are real concerns among Americans about A.I. but the president has described it as basically like climate change, which he says is a hoax. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: You've also indicated that Democrats are talking about concerns about A.I. as a hoax. Do you believe that after meeting with all these A.I. executives?
TRUMP: Yes, I do. I think they would love to see it shut down, just like it was a hoax the 12 years for global warming, which they train, it's changed right now to climate change.
BUMP: Yes.
PHILLIP: I mean, to Chris' point, this is basically an 80/20 issue. 82 percent of Americans say they are very or somewhat concerned about A.I. 87 percent say they are very or somewhat concerned about data centers in their communities. This is -- even if some of this is overblown, the president isn't even acknowledging that the concerns are real.
CAROLINE SUNSHINE, FORMER PRESS AIDE, TRUMP 2024 CAMPAIGN: I understand the concerns of where the American people are at with A.I. because it's human nature to be skeptical of the new. That's just how our brains work as humans. But as Americans, we also are a people and a nation that expanded our continent westward, and we got to the moon first. And that's also part of who we are.
And I think the president has an apt analogy with climate change because the United States self-inflicted, put enormous regulations on our own country. Europe did the same thing in regards to climate change. But you know who didn't? China. And as a result, what has happened is maybe the U.S. has capped our emissions, maybe Europe has, but the globe is not better for it. Because you know who didn't cap their emissions? China. And the president is aware of that.
Right now, A.I. isn't just happening --
PHILLIP: Okay. Philip is fact-checking you. He says that they did.
SUNSHINE: It's happening. It missed a race with China, where China and us are neck and neck. And the fact is, A.I. is here and it's here to stay. And either China is going to lead on it or the U.S. is going to lead on it. And we want to be the leaders on it, not just running it.
HAHN: I loved you in Shake It Up. My daughter's 19, big fan. Now, I'm going to disagree with everything you just said. Okay, so here's the thing, okay?
SUNSHINE: As if that makes it more okay?
HAHN: China regulates what side of the street you can walk on. Do you think that they're allowing somebody in a lab to develop a super intelligence that's going to tell all the people what's really going on in China and overthrow their totalitarian government? Of course they're not. They have incredibly tight regulations on A.I. And I'm not saying we need to stop production of A.I. I didn't think we needed to stop production of a lot of things. We don't want to stop production of airplanes in this country, but we regulate that. We don't want to stop production of cars, but we regulate that.
We can regulate this. It just takes a Congress and an administration that is going to work on it properly to make sure that we could regulate it and still have growth.
SUNSHINE: But what I would counter is we have a Congress that won't even regulate itself on stock trading.
HAHN: They should.
SUNSHINE: That's who we're going to trust to regulate A.I.?
HAHN: That is who the people trust.
SUNSHINE: We have a Congress that picks Congressional hearings and we get Chuck Grassley up there saying that he thinks that Facebook runs on a floppy disk.
HAHN: But here's the thing.
SUNSHINE: And that's who we want regulating A.I.? HAHN: Here's the thing. As a political strategy, right, because I look at this politically, that's the only way I look at things.
SUNSHINE: I look at it from what's good for the country --
HAHN: Okay. If I was a Republican running for office this year and seeing what the president said today on that 80/20 issue, I would be petrified. He is allowing them to be on the wrong side of this issue and he's --
[22:10:02]
SUNSHINE: Because he's not thinking about politics.
HAHN: Oh, my God.
SUNSHINE: He's thinking about the future.
HAHN: He's not thinking about anything.
SUNSHINE: Which is what his job is as president of the United States and leader of the free world. He's thinking beyond politics.
KEITH BOYKIN, FORMER CLINTON WHITE HOUSE AIDE: I think Chris is exactly right about this. I mean, this is not only morally irresponsible for Trump just to dismiss this, but it's also politically reckless. It's politically tone deaf for the president of the United States, the leader of his party, to gather a group of billionaires and one trillionaire at the White House and tell them, you know, Americans, just suck it up. A.I.'s not so bad. Data centers aren't so bad. While people are struggling with gas prices and groceries, this guy is sitting there trying to tell them, you have nothing to complain about.
I just think if you want to use that as a strategy in 2026 in the midterms 35 days before the election, I welcome you to go do it, because as we see from the polls, it's not working, and it's not going to work.
PIPKO: As Caroline said, I don't think we have to be here and talk about the polls every night. I think you can want what's best for America and not look at things politically, and I think we're all on the same page. We want Congress to do the right thing. We always do. They never do the right thing, or at least they rarely ever do the right thing. And I think if we're going to wait for them to do that in a race that we just entered at which we don't know what speed we have to compete in, we're only going to hurt ourselves.
PHILLIP: So, let me just -- this is a somewhat separate issue, but it's related. The White House today also launched their own A.I. chatbot. And actually, you know, I mean, I think the idea that they're -- that's behind some of the website is fine, they want to modernize dealing with the government.
But this chatbot, you can ask it whatever you want, and so Democrats have. They've asked it things, like did Trump lose the 2020 election? The chatbot says, yes. Did Trump drive up gas prices? The chatbot says, yes. Did Trump -- is affordability a hoax, as the president says. The chatbot says, no.
So, all of these questions, it actually is kind of comical to me because the same president who is very much behind A.I. probably doesn't realize that A.I. is going to tell the truth and might actually be his worst enemy in terms of fact-checkers who he doesn't like very much.
BUMP: Yes. I mean, A.I. tells the truth because so far it has been modeled on the corpus of human knowledge, right? And that is reality and that's why A.I. does that. But it is also the case, and one of the reasons that China's very interested in A.I. is because you can shape it. You can change how it answers. And China wants to be able to control that and wants to have people ask questions of its A.I. so that it can give it the answer it wants. The White House wants to do the same thing.
The White House wants you to go there. All of those fixes, I'm sure fixes, will be done by the time the sun rises tomorrow. They will have changed all these things so that it gives some sort of non-answer. It doesn't reflect reality because that's the entire point of this. The point of the White House doing this is in part, yes, efficiency, right?
And you're right, I agree. There is a lot of room using A.I. for efficiency in government, but it is also to be able to have the White -- have the American people believe the things the White House believes.
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: Well, let me just correct myself because I actually -- I said the A.I.'s going to tell the truth. And the truth is sometimes the A.I. really doesn't tell the truth.
HAHN: Right.
BOYKIN: I was going to say, that's it.
PHILLIP: If you've used the chatbots, sometimes they really will straight up lie to you. But at the same time, an A.I. that they clearly didn't tweak to fit their ideological narrative gave answers that are known to be generally true in the world that we all live in.
HAHN: Yes. Look, I think that we don't have to worry too much because I think he got the A.I. chatbot from the same guy he bought the pool liner from, so we'll be okay in America. But here's the thing the White House is afraid of. They are afraid of people understanding the truth. They are afraid of voters who have been fooled twice.
I think this is the, you know, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me election for this president and the Republican Party. And I don't know how many chatbots making his own lies he could put into play right now that's going to save them from what's coming this November. PHILLIP: All right. Let's -- next for us, we're going to call it an air ball. A Republican senator tries setting a perjury trap for Jack Smith, but it backfires in a spectacular, cringe-worthy way. Does it show that they have nothing on him?
Plus, J.D. Vance claims that most America's problems can be solved by simply deporting illegal immigrants, even housing prices. We'll debate that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:15:00]
PHILLIP: Tonight, an embarrassing moment for the Republicans who were hoping to catch former special counsel Jack Smith in a lie. Smith testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, where things took a combative and even bizarre turn. GOP lawmakers pressed him on his investigations into President Trump. They called him names. They accused him of perjury, but ultimately failed to land a definitive blow.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCHMITT: You may think you're a hero in this story, but let me tell you something. You're the villain.
You will go down as a total dirt bag.
SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R-IA): Mr. Smith's operation was a partisan weapon that broke the rules.
CRUZ: Javert from Les Mis would look at you with astonishment.
SEN. JOHN KENNEDY (R-LA): Do you believe in the tooth fairy?
SMITH: I do not.
KENNEDY: How about the Easter Bunny?
SMITH: I no longer believe in the Easter Bunny.
KENNEDY: You make me want to throw up in my mouth.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Smith was defiant. He defended his actions thoroughly.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SMITH: I stand by my decisions as special counsel, including my decision to bring charges against President Trump.
[22:20:00]
I made those decisions without regard to President Trump's political association, activities, beliefs, or candidacy in the 2024 presidential election. Our investigation developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in serious crimes against our nation.
I will not be silenced by continued threats of prosecution from the president or others.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, Les Mis, what was the point of this hearing for Republicans? I'm not sure they got much out of it.
SUNSHINE: Well, Jack Smith should be behind bars. He shouldn't even be at that hearing. Oh, here we go. Jack Smith should absolutely be behind bars because he committed one of the gravest sins in recent years of American politics, which he weaponized the Justice Department.
BOYKIN: Oh, my God.
HAHN: Is that a crime, though?
SUNSHINE: And you don't have to take my word for it, because both the cases --
PHILLIP: You see, I noticed you called it a sin. Is it a crime?
SUNSHINE: Both the cases -- that's going to be hopefully for a grand jury to decide, because both of his cases that he brought were dismissed, first by the Supreme Court and second by a federal judge, who also ruled that he was appointed to the position unlawfully and unconstitutionally.
HAHN: You know what I can tell you?
SUNSHINE: And, frankly, I don't know why the White House hasn't been more on top of this. This is something that we can't have happen again, and I don't know why the chief of staff --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: They had a whole hearing today.
SUNSHINE: Susie Wiles seems to be really busy having lobbyists come into the White House instead of executing the president's wishes, which is to make sure that Jack Smith, via the DOJ, is behind bars. We can't do this to the country again.
PHILLIP: That's a lot of words, Caroline, but I still didn't hear --
BOYKIN: A lot of words to say they got nothing.
PHILLIP: I didn't hear anything about what they uncovered today.
BOYKIN: The Republican Party basically took a swing at the defenses and they got absolutely nothing today. They struck out. And, you know, when I first heard they were doing this, I asked myself, why are they doing -- why are they holding a hearing about -- with Jack Smith a month before the election? Like, what? That's going to hurt them. I don't understand why they would do that.
And then I saw all these scripted lines they had with Ted Cruz and John Kennedy and everybody, and I realized, oh, it was all an ambush. They were trying to ambush him because Donald Trump wants to distract his base from the gas prices, distract his base from the Iran war, distract his base from the Epstein files, so they -- let me finish -- so they can focus on some other red meat to get them worried about that. Get mad about Jack Smith. Get mad about CNN. Get mad about something other than this election. And they accomplished nothing for doing this.
PHILLIP: Let me play -- this was the moment of the hearing. And the context here is that Senator Eric Schmitt wanted to insinuate that Jack Smith had gone down to Georgia to maybe collaborate with Fani Willis or what have you. So, he tried to lay that, lay out a perjury trap. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCHMITT: What would you say if I had a series of text messages from your team that said you were in Atlanta at a Warrior Hawks game on February 3rd, 2024, the day after Willis and Wade announced their affair?
I don't think you know that we have this stuff. So, I'll give you a second to process it so you don't, you know, perjure yourself.
SMITH: You just took it down really quick. If I could look at that again?
I recall going to a University of Maryland basketball game.
It was Maryland playing Iowa, I think, February of 2024. But, again, that's -- you could check that out if that's what we're talking about.
SEN. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D-MN): Could it then be that University of Iowa is the Hawkeyes? Could that be it?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Yes.
HAHN: You know what I miss in politics?
PHILLIP: That's not it.
HAHN: You know what I miss in politics? Shame. There used to be a time when you were a senator and you did a stunt like that, you went back to your office, you closed your door, you worked on your resume, and you didn't run for re-election.
In this environment, since Donald Trump came down the escalator, shame does not exist in our politics anymore. That senator, Senator Schmitt, should not be running for office ever again, and everybody should be making fun of him like we're doing here.
I can't wait to watch Saturday Night Live this weekend. He doesn't know the difference between the Hawkeyes and the Hawks. Good job, Senator.
SUNSHIHNE: Well, it was a really fun episode of Veep to watch, and it's probably evidenced more as to why you probably don't want these people regulating A.I. But I do agree with you, that it should not be happening in the month before an election.
(CROSSTALKS)
SUNSHINE: It should have already happened.
BUMP: Okay, here's the point.
SUNSHINE: I agree. Why have we waited this long to prosecute Jack Smith? This should have happened a year ago.
BUMP: The point is that Schmitt thought that if he could get into the attention economy, there's an attention economy that Donald Trump has created in which if you are able to get a ding on Jack Smith, then you win.
You got a point earlier, congratulations on that. That's the attention economy. They're all playing to --
SUNSHINE: I want Jack Smith behind bars --
(CROSSTALKS)
BUMP: Donald Trump attempted to overturn the results of 2020 election. He stoked the sentiment that led to the riot at the Capitol.
[22:25:00]
He took classified documents down to Florida.
HAHN: Yes.
BUMP: These are incontrovertible truths.
SUNSHINE: Then why were both his cases dismissed?
BUMP: Because they had a hacked judge in Aileen Cannon --
SUNSHINE: And, oh, so federal judges are hacks now? Because when they agree with you --
(CROSSTALKS)
BUMP: Because Jack Smith withdrew the prosecution.
SUNSHINE: It's because you disagree. BUMP: No, because, I mean, because there is an objective reality in the world which you refuse to acknowledge. The fact is that Donald Trump --
SUNSHINE: The judge acknowledged reality as well.
BUMP: Donald Trump developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt. There is proof beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in serious crimes against our nation. We know what those crimes are. Jack Smith was the avatar for them because he was in that role. And now people like you and people like Donald Trump --
SUNSHINE: Unlawfully appointed into that role.
BOYKIN: Oh my God.
BUMP: Okay, great. You know what? The idea that you are going to say that Donald Trump is going to stand up to weaponization of government is laughable.
BOYKIN: Yes.
HAHN: It's what he's doing all day.
BUMP: Laughable.
BOYKIN: He's weaponizing government.
PHILLIP: So, I mean, there's been a lot of talking against Jack Smith at this table, but mostly by Caroline.
PIPKO: I haven't started yet.
PHILLIP: Elizabeth hasn't spoken yet. I still -- I think the issue with today is that Republicans are taking issue with Jack Smith using legal, and, honestly, just normal investigative tools to investigate a case that he was given, and they have not provided any evidence that he did anything at all that was unlawful.
PIPKO: Well, I'd like to see the evidence, right? We all want to see it. I want to see what this turns into. I 100 percent agree they could be doing more. This stunt didn't help anybody.
BUMP: But the judge is not letting us see it.
HAHN: What more they've been doing? I mean, look, this just --
PHILLIP: Let me just let Elizabeth finish. She was --
PIPKO: I have to say, I don't wish what friends of mine, even family of mine experienced at the hands of Jack Smith on anyone at this table. I don't wish it on any of my worst enemies. That's how bad things were.
And when he was investigating Donald Trump, he reached so far past what I think was in his legal purview. He ended up obtaining the kind of information that no one should have on thousands of Americans on members of Congress. It's all going to come out.
PHILLIP: Like what?
PIPKO: Donor information. There are things that --
BUMP: That's publicly available.
PIPKO: That's not --
PHILLIP: What are you -- what are we talking about here?
PIPKO: We're talking about the fact that he went too far.
HAHN: On what? How? How?
PIPKO: I haven't finished talking. We have an Oversight Committee to literally do this. This is their job. I would hope that if the president of the United States was ever investigated like this in the future, Democrat or Republican. We would all agree --
PHILLIP: And the reason why I'm asking you how is because we can't even evaluate what you're saying, because you're not providing any evidence of the claims that you're making. What is it that he did that went too far, in your mind?
PIPKO: The people that he targeted and how much information he got on them illegally. I'm not going to name names. They're personally related to me. That's how much I know about this compared to everyone at this table. I'm telling you right now.
HAHN: There was a hearing today.
BOYKIN: Donald Trump targeted Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, two Fulton County, Georgia election workers who had nothing to do with this election except doing their job. Donald Trump took these two people, dragged them through the wringer just so he could make a political point.
PIPKO: Jack Smith didn't drag anyone through the wringer?
BOYKIN: And they're private citizens. Donald Trump, the president of the United States --
PIPKO: Jack Smith didn't drag any private citizens through the wringer?
BOYKIN: So, Donald Trump -- and you -- this is the reason why Jack Smith was leading this investigation. Yes, it was extraordinary, but you know why it was extraordinary? Because we have never, in my lifetime or anybody else's lifetime, had a president of the United States lead an insurrection, an insurrection against the United States government, and then to deny the election results.
(CROSSTALKS)
Guys, one second. Hold on. PIPKO: The American people still elected him, so they clearly disagree with all of you and Jack Smith.
HAHN: And that's -- and, look, I used to work in the U.S. Senate. And when I worked in the U.S. Senate back in the early part of the 2000s, when there was a hearing, you learned something, right? What did we learn today other than that Jack Smith likes women's basketball?
PIPKO: We're on the same page.
HAHN: Nothing. We didn't learn anything. So, if all of these -- but here's my point to both of you.
PHILLIP: Hold on, guys.
HAHN: My point to both of you is all of -- if all of these things happened, and we had senators with massive staffs and massive research, resources to research into it, we learned nothing today from them. They came up with ungats (ph), right? That is ridiculous.
SUNSHINE: Which is --
HAHN: And in the Senate, look, the Senate, I worked there, okay, they have the ability to find a lot of things out, to ask the agencies, to find out and really put them through the wringer. They tried, but they didn't.
PHILLIP: And I will say, and I will just add to that, we're talking about this in the context of an administration that is being run by Donald Trump. If there were profound misdeeds by Jack Smith in the FBI, in the DOJ, we would know about it by now. Because guess what? Donald Trump runs those agencies.
SUNSHINE: No, he doesn't.
PHILLIP: And so -- oh, no, he doesn't?
SUNSHINE: Honestly, I really believe --
BUMP: He doesn't.
PHILLIP: He doesn't?
SUNSHINE: I believe that the president, unfortunately, has -- the president has so much on his plate. Unfortunately, the chief of staff and the White House should be on top of this --
HAHN: He's decorating the Oval Office day and night.
BUMP: He's played golf all the time.
SUNSHINE: That is the role of the chief of staff, to make sure the president has made it clear this is what he wants.
PHILLIP: That is an unbelievable thing that you just said. And when I say, unbelievable, I mean nobody believes that. SUNSHINE: And it is the role of the chief of staff to make sure that the DOJ opens up a prosecution so that we can go through the discovery process.
PHILLIP: Hold on, Caroline.
[22:30:00]
The President has made it explicitly clear that he wants Jack Smith prosecuted.
CAROLINE SUNSHINE, FORMER PRESS AIDE, TRUMP'S 2024 CAMPAIGN: Yes, so why hasn't it happened?
PHILLIP: I don't think there's anybody in his government that takes that seriously.
SUNSHINE: No, I think his own administration is obstructing it.
PHILLIP: They do take it seriously. And if 15 months into this administration we have learned nothing, it might be because there is nothing more.
SUNSHINE: We've learned that his staff actively works against him.
PHILLIP: Alright, next for us, deportations. That is what the Vice President says is going to help make Americans feel great again. We're going to discuss that next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:35:05]
PHILLIP: As Americans grow increasingly pessimistic about the state of the economy, Vice President J.D. Vance is throwing out a solution. Here's what he claims will solve all of the nation's problems.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A lot of the problems that exist in American society would be solved, not all of them, but just by deporting illegal aliens. So, lower housing prices, lower rents, lower violent crime statistics.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: It's an age-old trope for this administration that they are responsible for all of our problems. The problem is that there's not a lot of evidence to actually support what he's saying there, but it does make sense that they would try to do this, although they've been saying it for a while, but re-up this message right before an election.
KEITH BOYKIN, FORMER CLINTON WHITE HOUSE AIDE, AND AUTHOR, "WHY DOES EVERYTHING HAVE TO BE ABOUT RACE?": It's factually untrue and it's politically ineffective. It's factually untrue because we know from data that immigrants who come here actually commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans. It's factually untrue because we know that actually deporting immigrants creates a housing crisis because a quarter of all construction workers are immigrants in this country.
So, if you take them away, then you have a problem with, you're going to actually raise labor costs and you raise the cost of housing. So, it's counterproductive, but it's also politically ineffective because we are in a situation now where people, every time they go to the gas station, they see $4.50 gas, $6.50 diesel, and this guy is talking about, oh, well, let's just deport more immigrants. They said that two years ago.
They said that two years ago. The economy still hasn't gotten better. I don't care about your language.
We're not talking about superintelligence. We're not talking about language and all that stuff. We're talking about reality.
You can use all of the instructions you want for your base, Caroline, but the American people, the people who are paying attention to their gas prices, paying attention to their grocery prices, paying attention to their beef prices, they don't care about this nonsense. It only plays to Donald Trump's base, and that's not enough to win an election.
SUNSHINE: I notice you're not using the word illegal, and I just want to know why.
BOYKIN: Who cares, Caroline? That's a distraction.
SUNSHINE: A lot of people care.
BOYKIN: I don't want to get caught up in your silly distractions.
SUNSHINE: I'm not using the word illegal to describe the reality that is.
BOYKIN: Thank you.
SUNSHINE: Is there not a difference? Who cares?
PHILLIP: I thought that that was something that liberals did. And that Republicans were opposed to --
SUNSHINE: There is a difference. Is there not a difference?
BOYKIN: Because she wants to distract the conversation.
SUNSHINE: There's two different things. There's people who come to our country lawfully who are immigrants, and there are people who come to our country, and thank you for giving me the chance to explain this, there are people who come to our country illegally who are illegal immigrants.
PHILLIP BUMP, COLUMNIST, HEARST CONNECTICUT: That doesn't detract from his points. BOYKIN: What does it have to do with anything you have to say?
PHILLIP: In terms of the issues that we're discussing, housing, crime, et cetera, what's the distinction?
SUNSHINE: The distinction is if you look at housing prices in the U.S., the Federal Reserve came out with a study showing that housing and rent prices have gone down 20 to 30 percent in some areas because of deportation.
PHILLIP: That's not what the study said. The labor market is the best it's been in decades for people without a college degree because of mass deportations.
PHILLIP: Let me just --
SUNSHINE: If you support illegal immigration, you're no better than slave owners in plantations in the 18th century.
BOYKIN: Caroline, what are you talking about? Stop spilling this information on national television, Caroline.
Caroline, where is the sunshine?
PHILLIP: Everybody just stop for a second, including you, Caroline. Let's just deal with the things that you just said, which are not true.
That study that you're talking about doesn't say that immigrants caused housing prices to go up. It doesn't say that either, 30 percent on home prices and 20 percent on rent. It equates to an increase of 6.6 percent in home prices and 4.3 percent in rent, not 30 percent. That's according to the "Wall Street Journal" that read that op-ed.
And you know what that coincides to? On rents, it's about $5 a month.
So what you're saying is it's misdirection to the point of just not even being relevant for the conversation. There is no evidence that immigrants are causing housing prices to go up.
SUNSHINE: Do you deny that the Biden administration allowed in 10 million illegal immigrants?
PHILLIP: I didn't say anything about that.
SUNSHINE: Do you deny that? Did that happen?
No, that did not happen. What you just said is false.
SUNSHINE: I think it was more than 10 million.
(CROSSTALK)
I'm looking at the polls.
PHILLIP: Caroline, and on top of that, even during that time, guess what happened to housing prices and rent? They went down, not up. So you don't have the facts on your side.
So now we have to talk about all kinds of different things.
BUMP: This is called a gish gal. You can't make your point, so you make a different point.
Your point about building housing, construction workers, about farm workers. Are there people who are here illegally who are working in those fields? Absolutely.
Are they doing important work that the economy needs? Absolutely.
[22:40:07]
SUNSHINE: It's slave labor. It's modern slave labor. And if you support that, you're no better than a plantation owner in the 1860s.
BOYKIN: As a black man, I'm offended that you would even go there. So let's just please not even go with the slave labor thing.
SUNSHINE: It's modern slave labor.
(CROSSTALK)
BUMP: My thought is simply that what J.D. Vance said is demagoguery. That's all it is.
It is demagoguery. It is exactly what he's talking about in 2024.
PHILLIP: Elizabeth, tell them that you have work then.
ELIZABETH PIPKO, FORMER RNC NATIONAL SPOKESPERSON, AND FORMER TRUMP 2016 CAMPAIGN AIDE: I'm genuinely just surprised that we all think it's okay to conflate immigrants and illegal immigrants. Genuinely baffled if you had done this in any election three, four, whatever years ago.
I have to get this out. I talked to my dad earlier today who told me that he got more paperwork earlier today on the death of his father at the hands of the KGB as he was trying to escape.
The people that come to this country who go through hell and back to respect our laws and do it the right way deserve to be treated better than those who break the law.
BOYKIN: You know who conflates it? ICE does.
CHRISTOPHER HAHN, FORMER AIDE TO SENATE DEMOCRATIC LEADER CHUCK SCHUMER, AND PODCAST HOST, "AGGRESSIVE PROGRESSIVE": And that is why Latinos and other immigrants are leaving.
The reason why Texas is in play, Florida is in play somewhat, is because Latinos who had voted for Trump who are here legally or American citizens are leaving in droves because ICE, not only do they not distinguish between illegal and legal immigrants, but anybody who's Latino who's here, they are suspicious of. And they are not voting for Republicans this year. And it is all this stuff about Paxton and Talarico.
It is Latinos in Texas who have left the Republican Party, who had voted for Trump just a year and a half ago, who will not do that this year, which is what's going to cost the Republicans.
PHILLIP: The other thing, Elizabeth, that is relevant to your point is that I think it's also a fallacy about this administration that they are only targeting illegal immigrants. They have severely restricted the legal immigration process to the point where it is almost non- functional for a lot of immigrants.
They take people's money in applications and refuse to process their applications. They take people who are in the legal process and then arrest them as they are getting on airplanes while they are waiting for their cases to be adjudicated. It is not true that they are only targeting illegal immigrants.
And that's one of the reasons why I think this has become such a politically toxic problem for this administration. Imagine this, that Trump comes into office and he is trusted more on immigration, trusted more on the border.
Today as we sit here, 52 percent of Americans say they trust Democrats more on immigration. That can only happen because Trump has lost the plot.
I just read a quote from Jim Justice in West Virginia complaining about ICE picking up immigrants. He's talking about illegal immigrants in his state and ripping them out of their communities. It is not popular.
BUMP: An 80-20 issue here is that Americans think that people who have been living in the country regardless of immigration status for 10 plus years, grown families, have jobs, that those people should be allowed to stay in the United States, those people are being removed from the United States by this administration. They need a process.
PHILLIP: All right. Next for us, Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett isn't adding James Talarico's name to her PAC's list of endorsements. That's after she said that she'd support him when he beat her in the primary.
So what's behind the snap? We'll debate.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:45:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAURA COATES, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: Will you campaign with him?
REP. JASMINE CROCKETT (D-TX): I will be campaigning down ballot. For me, I think that making sure that people that maybe are getting overshadowed because it seems like it's only about one big race.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: That was Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett last month saying that she would not campaign for James Talarico, the Texas state candidate, Senate candidate, who bested her in the Democratic primary. But not campaigning for him is very different from not endorsing him.
Her leadership PAC released a list of new endorsements in Texas on Monday, and noticeably missing from that list, again, was Talarico. Crockett responded to that report by calling her critics corny and accusing the news media of peddling tabloids. She also reposted her tweet from March congratulating Talarico and her call for unity and to rally around all Democratic nominees.
Keith, I wonder what you think is going on here because there's what she said in that tweet after the primary and what she's said ever since, which is she doesn't think there's energy there, she's going to campaign down ballot, she doesn't have time to appear with Talarico. What's going on?
BOYKIN: Well, I think she says she's already endorsed him. Talarico says that she's already endorsed him, Talarico says he doesn't have a problem with her. She says she doesn't have a problem with him.
She's not going to go out and campaign for him, but she's already said she's supporting him. I don't really see that it is an issue, as long as the two of them are cool with it. I don't have anything else to say.
PHILLIP: You acknowledge that she's not campaigning with him. She's choosing not to do that, which is typically, that's not typically what inside the White House is doing.
BOYKIN: I get that, and I understand, I don't know what her motivation is, and I don't really necessarily think it matters. I'll tell you this, I've been in Texas all year, and at the beginning of the year, and through the primary, I didn't think this party was going to come together.
I thought there was no way. And even after the primary, I thought it was going to be two fractures.
[22:50:08]
But I've seen in the past month or so, the energy in Texas is coming together. They're focused on Donald Trump, they're focused on Ken Paxton, they're focused on Greg Abbott, and getting rid of those three, and they're focused on gas prices and immigration and ICE. They don't care about what Jasmine Crockett is doing.
I'm telling you, Texas is in play because they're upset about Trump and his policies and what the Republicans have done in that state for the past decade.
HAHN: I've been on the losing side of a primary. It stinks. You do not want to go near the person you want. They're more family battles. It's worse.
You have an easier time going and saying to the other party, congratulations, I'll work with you, than you do with your own party. It's a family battle when that happens.
On the other hand, I don't think endorsements matter at all. Unless it's like President Trump in a Republican primary, it really matters at all.
So, what Jasmine Crockett does or doesn't do, doesn't matter. I don't expect her to go out there and be waving the Talarico flag.
She wanted to be the Senator. He has a chance of being Senator now. So, what she said is, look, I said it.
What else do you want me to do?
SUNSHINE: I love it. And I respect Jasmine Crockett so much for doing it because she is a star. And I will never take another lecture from the Democrat Party on racism because they had a black woman with riz and aura. And they pushed her aside for a bland white guy who looks like a political consultant's idea of what a normal white guy looks like cooked in a lab.
So, Jasmine Crockett is completely right on this. You go, petty queen.
BOYKIN: Okay, so let me just say this. I love the way you dissed her there, talking about you like her.
But, you know, I supported Jasmine Crockett in the primary. And I support James Talarico.
SUNSHINE: Why did you support her getting pushed aside?
BOYKIN: Let me tell you. Do you ever let anyone speak, Caroline Sunshine? Do you ever let anyone speak, Caroline Sunshine?
It doesn't sound very sunshine-y to me.
BUMP: You've got to steal her sunshine.
PHILLIP: It's called an election.
BOYKIN: I was there in the primary and the general process. I supported Jasmine, I support Talarico.
Now, I don't have a problem with this whole thing that's going on. I think it's interesting that people in Caroline, Republican Party, want to create this controversy. But I'll tell you, the Democrats in Texas don't give a damn.
They're focused on Trump, Paxton, and Abbott. And they're focused on those gas prices and immigration and ICE. That's what they care about. PHILLIP: But isn't that part of the problem here is that if Republicans wanted to drive a wedge, she's making it easier for them to do it. Let me just play what she said in August, because this is where she talks about the lack of energy that she said she was seeing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CROCKETT: And in my mind, the best way that I can help the people of Texas is if I go in and I help out on these down-ballot races, because typically people rely on the top of the ticket to drag people in.
I personally don't feel like the excitement necessarily exists within the black community right now. But I do have some amazing black candidates that are running for office in some of the largest counties. So if I can introduce black folk to them, that may excite them and get them to the polls.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BUMP: I think two things can be true. One is that it does make more sense to put more resources down-ballot, because there's a ton of money going to Talarico's race. The other is that she doesn't seem to have handled the election very well.
I will say, though, that the Texas Politics Project has measured, or measured in June, enthusiasm among black voters. Talarico has a much bigger lead now among black voters than did Collin Allred in 2024 or Beto O'Rourke in 2018. So it is not the case that there is this lasting fissure within the Democratic Party, to your point.
I appreciate Ms. Sunshine being the avatar for racial politics in Texas.
SUNSHINE: My party wasn't the one that pushed a black woman aside.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: We're not taking the bait on that one.
Next for us, Christopher. We'll react to your feedback from cnn.com/abby.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:55:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: And now some viewer feedback from cnn.com/abby.
Elizabeth, this one's for you. It says, imagine Elizabeth's dad trying to come to America now. Do you think he would be able to, given that they've shut down, for example, asylum, refugee status, things like that?
PIPKO: If we had longer right now, I would get to tell you the story of what he went through to get here. I think it actually was more difficult then than it would have been now. He went through hell and back to give me this life.
And more importantly, I think he would have loved to come here now just as much as he did then and risked it all once again.
BOYKIN: If he's not a white South African, he wouldn't come to Minnesota this year. Those are the only people that Trump is allowing in as refugees right now.
PHILLIP: All right, we've got one more from a viewer that says, I'll pledge to self-regulate too. No need to enforce the laws on me, to be fair. What are laws, even?
HAHN: I'll self-regulate my driving on the expressway, please.
PHILLIP: Right, everyone would take that.
SUNSHINE: No one's saying that we don't have laws that we have to abide by, but yes, self-governance, hell yes, that is an American.
BUMP: Anarchy.
SUNSHINE: We are a people that say, listen, there's something very American about that. We're a nation of laws, but we have some independence. People don't love that either, by the way.
BUMP: You know what, we've got some crazy ideas, but I do love that show.
[23:00:03]
PHILLIP: All right, we've got one more.
Wow, Abby, I'm surprised tonight hasn't thrown you into labor.
I mean, if that were a risk, I would probably have been in labor months. There you go.
BUMP: Thank you.
PHILLIP: All right, before you go, you can stream the show live or watch on demand anytime with an all-access subscription. Scan that Q.R. code at the bottom of your screen. Go to cnn.com/watch to learn more.
And thank you very much for watching "NewsNight." "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
