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Trump: Smithsonian Focuses Too Much On "How Bad Slavery Was"; Russian Foreign Minister: Discussing Ukraine's Security Without Moscow Is "Path To Nowhere"; Prosecutor Investigating Letitia James Photographed Outside Her Home. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired August 20, 2025 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

MICHAEL YOSHIDA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And they're hearing oh, well Erin is well offshore. It's not going to make landfall, it's sunny, it's hot. We want to get in the water.

When in reality these rip currents happening at an unprecedented level, according to Ocean Rescue. They're also powerful and also very wide at times -- a block or two blocks wide. So you're impacting not just one or two swimmers but six, seven, eight at a time when they're having to go in and make those rescues. Now that's led them to do a no-swimming advisory here.

This morning, again, you can see some people on the beach but unfortunately, we also have people out in the water. We saw this yesterday as well. You can see some surfers there behind me. Officials saying obviously this is not what they want to see. The message is clear; the danger is real. Stay out of the water if you can.

Along with these dangerous rip currents also a big concern for beach erosion.

We know in the Outer Banks here in North Carolina some focus on several homes there. That's an area where we've seen some homes washed away over the last few years. And again, with this storm and its impacts a big focus there as well.

Officials saying hopefully these conditions only last for the next few days. The no-swimming advisory here in Wrightsville Beach set to last potentially through Friday, though officials say they could extend that, and they could shorten it depending on what happens.

But again, a lot of focus on these waves, these rip currents. And like you said at the top here, the message is clear. Stay out of the water while these conditions persist -- John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Yeah. Those people behind you not heeding those warnings that they're getting from officials. The problem is you can't see rip currents from the shore.

YOSHIDA: Yeah.

BERMAN: You don't know they're there until it's too late.

Michael Yoshida, thanks so much for being there for us. Keep us posted -- Kate.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: So President Trump is escalating his attacks on the Smithsonian Institution and its museums as he takes his push to reshape American culture and even American history -- how American history is on display at these revered institutions to a whole new level.

The president declaring on social media now that the Smithsonian is "out of control." And as you can see there, he says it's too focused on "how horrible our country is and how bad slavery was."

The White House already ordered a review last week, you'll remember, of the Smithsonian exhibitions. Where is he taking this now though?

CNN's Brian Stelter joins us right now with more on this. Brian, on this point -- his new declaration -- what are historians saying in response?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: Yeah, and indeed, one thing they're saying very loudly and clearly is that yes, slavery was that bad. Slavery was very, very bad.

But seriously, Kate, we are -- we are hearing from groups of museum curators, groups of historians, experts in this field who frankly have been bracing for this fight. Who have been preparing for this fight. It is not a fight that the museum community wants to have. They're not trying to get into a tiff with the President of the United States.

But there was an executive order back in March that disparaged the Smithsonian and that was a signal of what was going to happen this summer. So even back in March we saw some of these organizations preparing for this fight that is now underway.

And here is a new statement from the American Alliance of Museums. This is a group that represents not just Smithsonian-type institutions but also local museums you might have in your community.

They say, "People trust museums because they rely on independent scholarship and research. When any directive dictates what should or should not be displayed, it risks narrowing the public's window into evidence, ideas, and a full range of perspectives."

Now the alliance went on to say that it believes a chilling effect is happening -- is occurring where this threat against the Smithsonian is also affecting other institutions. And we have heard stories in recent months since Trump returned to the White House about some museums, some art galleries hesitating or sometimes holding off on certain exhibits or certain art because of concern about political backlash and political reaction.

So this is not happening in a vacuum and, in some cases and in some ways, this is an argument that's gone back decades between liberals and conservatives about how to represent America in its fullness, whether you hear oftentimes the liberal argument is about hearing the full history of America, including the abuses and the egregious sins. Conservatives have tended to argue that America's exceptionalism should be emphasized.

So in many ways Trump is just leaning into that old tug-of-war between the liberals and conservatives that's been going on for a long time.

BOLDUAN: And one thing that can be seen at these museums is all of that, and that's the point of what you get from these independent scholars --

STELTER: Yeah, all of them.

BOLDUAN: -- and researchers, right? You get all of it.

The president said in this message that he's --

STELTER: You get all of it.

BOLDUAN: -- instructed his lawyers to go through the museums and start, as he put it, the exact same process that's been done with colleges and universities. And he has been somewhat successful in getting universities to bend to his demands. I wonder if he's likely to have equal success here.

STELTER: Yes, and he is revealing the playbook by referring to the colleges and universities. He's also acknowledging and admitting that some of this has to do with race. By bringing up slavery in that post yesterday, in some ways he's giving up the game.

[07:35:08]

I talked a lot during Trump's first term in office about white identity politics. About the concept of whiteness and Trump centering whiteness and helping white people feel comfortable in a changing multicultural America. Well, when I see him referring to slavery in that way and basically bemoaning how much these museums emphasize the negatives about history, what I hear him saying is he is trying to center whiteness in that context once again.

When it -- when it comes to this current battle with the Smithsonian, he has appointed three people to go and do this review. And we don't know exactly how cooperative the Smithsonian is going to be. You know, there are eight museums being targeted at first. Technically they're not a part of the executive branch but they do receive federal funding. So like the colleges and universities, it remains to be seen how the Smithsonian exactly is going to engage.

In the meantime, though, I don't think it's entirely a bad thing that we're having this public dialogue about the purpose of museums, and the purpose of researchers, and the purpose of independent expertise.

We heard from the American Historical Association, for example, with dozens of groups signing onto a letter saying hey, it's important to grapple with the less proud and more painful aspects of history. It's a part of our shared past. We need to learn from that past. So having that argument out there in public, I don't think that's entirely a bad thing.

We are also seeing in MAGA media some people try to set up an intellectual scaffolding in support of Trump's efforts here, saying that when they go to museums -- you know, I'm seeing commentators and columnists saying they don't like going to museums and seeing the negatives. Seeing exhibits that they feel don't make them proud of America.

So the argument very much happening and alive and well right now. And I think for people who go to the Smithsonian now for the next months and years to come they're going to wonder has a MAGA editor been involved. Has this content been evaluated? Has it been changed in some way? I'm not sure that's a good thing for the Smithsonian in the shorter-medium term.

BOLDUAN: No. It gets to the trust level that is being -- distrust that's being injected into all of it.

STELTER: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: Brian, thank you. Great to see you -- John.

BERMAN: All right, we do have some breaking news. So discussing Ukraine's security without Moscow is a path to nowhere. Those are comments that were just made by the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov just moments ago. He said that questions of security guarantees cannot be resolved without Russia's participation in talks.

Overnight there were new Russian attacks across Ukraine, including a drone strike in the south that caused a huge fire at a gas distribution facility -- a fuel center.

This comes as President Trump now says planning is underway to get Russian leader Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Zelenskyy to meet face-to-face without him. However, Russia and Sergey Lavrov, specifically -- the man we just quoted before -- keeps on suggesting that there is still some time before meetings like that will take place -- refusing to say they have committed to them.

Let's get right to CNN's Clare Sebastian for the latest on this. Sergey Lavrov with a bit of a different view of the environment coming out of all these talks I think than we're hearing from the White House.

CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. Look, John, I think this is Russia feeling pretty emboldened at this point. Lavrov saying today that Russia will firmly and harshly push for its legitimate interest.

Look, they've already got a lot of what they wanted. They got the grand welcome in Alaska. They got the ceasefire first -- the idea of having a ceasefire before a peace settlement basically taken off the table by Trump. There are no new sanctions coming imminently. Trump is waiting on that.

So Russia feels the momentum in its favor, and I think that's why Sergey Lavrov felt that he could essentially set another condition today as we see the momentum building. The Europeans and the U.S. now involved in intense work to try to come up with these post-war security guarantees, saying that doing this without Russia would be, in his words, "a utopia" and "a road to nowhere." So they are essentially trying to force through more conditions.

And I think, look, the issue of security guarantees is one that Europe and the U.S. can go alone with. They are, as I say, holding talks and trying to make progress. This was the one big deliverable that came out of the talks in the White House on Monday that the U.S. would now be involved in this. So Russia obviously trying to get its sort of position clear on that.

I think on the issue of direct talks between Putin and Zelenskyy, while Russia does see, as I said, momentum in its favor it doesn't have enough at this point for Putin to agree with that meeting from Zelenskyy because, of course, Zelenskyy has ruled out giving up territory. Russia is also insisting that he would say he'd never join NATO. There are numerous of these maximalists demands.

And certainly, experts that I have been speaking to have said that until Putin has a really strong idea that his key demands would at least be discussed by Zelenskyy he's not going to go for this meeting. So that's why we continue to see Moscow obfuscating and avoiding that whole issue even, of course, as these attacks overnight -- Odesa and Sumy up in the north -- are continuing.

[07:40:05]

BERMAN: Clare Sebastian for us covering this. Thank you very much, Clare.

With us now Congressman Warren Davidson, a Republican from Ohio. He is a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Congressman, great to see you this morning.

President Trump has ruled out boots on the ground inside Ukraine as part of some kind of security force or security arrangement, but he has left the door open to U.S. air involvement.

What level of air involvement would you support?

REP. WARREN DAVIDSON (R-OH) (via Webex by Cisco): I don't support any involvement, frankly, whatsoever.

I mean, look, President Trump is trying to accomplish the mission that he set out, which is to restore peace between Ukraine and Russia. We should be crystal clear this not our war to fight or to fund, but I think Americans want to see peace there. They want to see resolution. And frankly, everyone feels that it's unjust that Ukraine should have to give up any of their land.

Nevertheless, I haven't found constituents that want to deploy themselves. They don't want their sons and daughters to deploy. And so I think we need to be cautious and learn the lesson from World War I. Security guarantees are an easy way to escalate a world war. BERMAN: Let me just make sure I fully understand. You don't support any U.S. air support. That would be no air missions delivery equipment inside Ukraine. No U.S. air assets positioned outside Ukraine providing them security. Nothing.

DAVIDSON: No. We've done what we -- what we can at this point. We've got bases all around. We've supplied a lot of resources. We've been operational in the Black Sea. We've provide intelligence. And what the president agreed to is to sell $90 billion worth of equipment to Ukraine so that Ukraine could continue to provide security. And that's the Coalition of the Willing that's taking place now is what are the Europeans going to do with respect to security guarantees.

BERMAN: Understood. Again, but the president leaving the door open for the possible U.S. involvement -- at least on the margins.

I do want to ask you about something the president said about the beginning of this conflict -- listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Ukraine is going to get their life back. They're going to stop having people killed all over the place, and they're going to get a lot of land. But this was war and Russia is a powerful military nation, you know. Whether people like it or not, it's a powerful nation. It's a much bigger nation.

It's not a war that should have been started. You don't do that. You don't take -- you don't take on a nation that's 10 times your size and --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: You don't take on a nation that 10 -- that is 10 times your size.

Congressman, what should Ukraine have done when Russia rolled tanks over the border and invaded, and it was rushing toward Kyiv?

DAVIDSON: Well, once the tanks are rolling diplomacy failed. And what they should have done is -- going back to 2013-2014 -- is they should have been clear that they want to maintain a friendly relationship with Russia, that they're not posing a threat to Russia, and they would never let Europeans or Americans pose a threat to Russia. Russia feels threatened by a lot of things and including the internal domestic affairs of Ukraine.

So Eastern Ukraine -- the Donbas east of the Dnieper River -- heavily Russian-speaking. They want to maintain Russian culture.

And a friend of mine from there said hey, it's a lot like maybe for American if you think of Quebec. They want to speak French. They want this French culture and heritage recognized. They're content to be part of Canada. But until you come in and say well, you can't speak French anymore and we're not going to recognize that and we're going to purge every reference to what you view as your culture. That's the kinds of things that were going on in the internal affairs of Ukraine that Russia continued to try to address with Ukraine. That's not an excuse for the invasion or war but there was no diplomacy that was de-escalatory. In fact, everything was escalatory.

And so I think, look, if you go back to maybe some days in a -- in a -- imagine a bar. Everybody might get a little loud and mouthy until, like, the defensive end guy stands up and he's six-five and about 280 and clearly really fit. And every time I've seen that happen somebody gets really diplomatic really quick. And I think that's what President Trump is talking about. You didn't give enough weight to diplomacy.

BERMAN: Well -- I mean, the other way of looking at it is sometimes you do have to stand up to bullies. And you talk about the lessons of World War I. There were a lot of people who --

DAVIDSON: You sure do. And if you lived in Ukraine, I think that would be great. You can go ahead.

BERMAN: I'm not saying that. I'm saying -- I'm just talking about the other side of what you're saying. And you were talking about the lessons of World War I. There are people who talk about the lessons of World War II and Munich, and concessions right there. But it does sound like you're putting some responsibility on Ukraine for this conflict.

[07:45:00]

Quickly, sir, I do want to ask you about what the president has said about the Smithsonian. How much -- how important do you personally think slavery was in U.S. history, particularly 19th century U.S. history?

DAVIDSON: Look, I was a U.S. history major at West Point at the United States Military Academy. And, you know, like, they had a great saying in the department at West Point -- much of the history we teach was made by people we taught. And you look at both sides of that war had leaders that were trained at West Point.

And if you really question what particular state right that the confederacy was protecting, go back and read the state constitutions. They were protecting the right to own people. It was abhorrent and it's hard to believe that it was a deal that was ever struck in the founding of our nation.

So in the Declaration of Independence I think people got through that and said we need to unite against Britain. But it's a healthy debate to say did it make sense for them to even do that in the constitution? And that is a sin that the United States and Britain were the first in the world to address. And in some places in the world they still haven't addressed it.

So I think the president is rightly saying look, we addressed this when lots of the world did not.

And, you know, you continue to want to see people divide and tear down America instead of heal America, and I think that's the question. And you can cover the same topic in a way that unites and heals, or you can cover it that keeps old wounds open.

BERMAN: But you agree that it was bad because the president is saying there's too much focus on how bad it was.

DAVIDSON: Yeah. I don't think you could confuse what I just said with not agreeing that slavery was bad and should have never happened.

BERMAN: Yeah.

Congressman Warren Davidson, thanks so much for being with us this morning -- appreciate it -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: There is new video coming into CNN showing a Justice Department prosecutor posing for photos outside of the home of the New York attorney general as he is involved in investigating her. Her attorney is now speaking out about it.

And who will be crowned champion? We're going to take you to the "2025 Mom Calling Contest."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mom!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mom! Mom!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mama, the corncob took my teeth.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL)

[07:51:32]

BERMAN: A town hall in St. Louis with Democratic Congressman Wesley Bell erupted overnight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. WESLEY BELL (D-WI): Are you ready? You going to listen? I'm going to talk.

(Booing)

You asked the questions, and I will try and answer it. What it seems like is perhaps you don't really want the answers because then you've got to grapple with some really complicated issues.

(Booing)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: There were shouts of boos throughout the event. Many of the complaints focused on the Israel-Hamas war. This morning new surveillance video -- disturbing -- has been released for the moment. A man went on a stabbing rampage in a Michigan Walmart in July. Eleven people were injured. They all survived. The man has been charged with one count of terrorism and 11 counts of assault with intent to murder. He has pleaded not guilty on all the charges.

Three firefighters injured after a gas line explosion in Wilmington, North Carolina. Officials say a car crashed into gas lines at a veterinary center that was under construction. The driver left the scene before first responders arrived. He was later arrested, and police say there were signs that he was impaired.

New this morning the White House launched its own official TikTok account.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Every day I wake up determined to deliver a better life for the people all across this nation. I am your voice.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Now, what's notable here is that you remember that in a bipartisan vote, Congress voted to ban TikTok, and it was signed into law. But President Trump has repeatedly extended that deadline, which is now September 17. The last time he signed it was in June. Now, the law was passed over concerns that TikTok's Chinese ownership poses a threat to national security.

So a pretty creative contest at the Iowa State Fair.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mom!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mom! Mom!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mama, the corncob took my teeth.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right, this contest is called "Mom Calling." Kids were encouraged to let out their loudest wail for their mothers. I have to say I've heard louder -- like, much louder by degrees of like 1,000.

BOLDUAN: I mean, those are just --

BERMAN: And you've probably heard louder than that.

BOLDUAN: I'm just saying that's like Iowa nice.

BERMAN: Yeah, yeah, exactly.

BOLDUAN: Like, that is some sweet, sweet Iowa Sicilian Delphine in their awesome New York City-ness would just be ripping it up. Like, they don't even need a microphone. BERMAN: Yeah -- no. You know, nice try, guys. You all get a participation trophy.

BOLDUAN: Everyone gets a --

BERMAN: Right? That's the important thing. Maybe we don't do those anymore. I can't keep track.

BOLDUAN: You know how I feel about it.

BERMAN: All right.

BOLDUAN: OK, let's turn to this.

New video obtained by CNN shows the federal prosecutor who is investigating New York Attorney General Letitia James posing for pictures outside of the AG's home. This investigating of the New York AG is one of several that the Justice Department has launched into the president's perceived enemies.

Now, the Attorney General James, you will remember, brought civil fraud charges against Trump, his adult sons, and the Trump Organization, and the result was a nearly half-billion-dollar judgment.

[07:55:00]

CNN's Kara Scannell has much more on this and she's joining us now. What is going on with this video? Tell me more.

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, Kate. As you can see in this video that we obtained there is Ed Martin in a trench coat outside of New York Attorney General Letitia James' home, and he's posing for a photo there with one of his colleagues at the Justice Department. Also with them is someone from the New York Post who also photographed and videoed this whole encounter.

Now this is very unusual since Ed Martin is the director of the Department of Justice's weaponization working group. He is in charge of the investigations into the New York attorney general. And another -- this is just part of a series of actions that he's taken in just the past few weeks.

When he was first put in charge of this just a few days later, he sent a letter to New York Attorney General James' attorney Abbe Lowell saying that he thought that James should resign. Several days after that he was outside of her home.

And then he went on Fox News on Sunday in which he said then that he was going to conduct a full investigation of James not just into the specific areas that he's already looking at, which includes whether any mortgage fraud was committed and also looking into her investigations of Donald Trump and the National Rifle Association -- a lawsuit that she also brought against them.

This is, though, highly unusual. James' lawyer Abbe Lowell said it goes outside the bounds of DOJ and ethics rules.

And other former federal prosecutors I've spoken with have said that this is very unusual. They said it was a stunt and that it could actually help James because it's something that her lawyers could use to argue, if there ever is an indictment, that this was selective prosecution, that it was politically motivated, and that it potentially could taint the jury pool because of these activities.

Now, Ed Martin did not respond to us through the Department of Justice though he did say on Fox News that he was going there because he wanted to see -- lay eyes on the house himself. He said he was in New York and New Jersey for meetings, and he wanted to get a sense of what is at stake.

Now interesting this morning, we've already seen that Ed Martin is posting a photo that was taken of him outside James' home on Twitter, saying, "Good morning." So certainly, something that he is not backing down from -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: That seems very clear.

Kara, thank you so much for your reporting -- John.

BERMAN: With us now, CNN legal analyst and former state and federal prosecutor Elie Honig. Counselor, great to see you.

So Ed Martin actually posting this morning. He's clearly flaunting this. What's your take?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK: Well, John, this is amateur hour. Ed Martin has never been a prosecutor at any level until he got his current high-ranking job with DOJ a few months ago, and it shows. What he has done here is completely inappropriate.

So first of all, to do a stunt like this -- to create a public spectacle -- a photo op at the home of a person who has not been charged and not been convicted of anything, is under investigation -- it violates DOJ policy. It violates every prosecutorial ethic.

And by the way, I should note I was critical of Letitia James when she publicly grandstanded about Donald Trump, and I think the same thing absolutely applies here.

The other thing -- as Kara noted, I was one of those former prosecutors who she spoke with. This will give Letitia James and her lawyers ammo if there comes a day when she's indicted. They are going to allege that this type of stunt undermined her right to a fair jury pool and that it prejudiced her in the general public. And they're going to argue this evidence that this is selective or vindictive prosecution.

So maybe Ed Martin is getting a couple of social media posts out of this now but he's going to regret this. BERMAN: You know, one of the things he said -- I think I read in the papers correctly -- I'm paraphrasing here -- is that he said in certain cases, even if there aren't charges, he's OK shaming people.

Again, is that the job of federal prosecutors? And what do statements like that -- how might they affect investigations and prosecutions?

HONIG: God help us if that was the job of prosecutor. No -- you are not in the public shaming business.

I mean, look, in every case you do you will find information that may be damaging or embarrassing about other people. If you charge them, fine. Put it in your indictment and back it up in court. But if you don't charge them, it is not your job at all -- it is the opposite of the job of the prosecutor to engage in public shaming or photo ops, or what have you.

So Ed Martin is just 180 degrees wrong here.

BERMAN: Very quickly, James Comer, chair of the House Oversight Committee, says that the Department of Justice will begin handing over some Epstein files on Friday. One thing to note here -- they missed the deadline, which was yesterday. So what he's actually saying is they're not turning it over at the time that they were subpoenaed for.

But what do you expect here? What do you read into what he's saying?

HONIG: Gosh, I don't know. There's two big variables here. A) how much of the documents does DOJ actually turn over? Are they going to do a complete document dump or are they going to give some narrow subset? And then b) how much of those get through Congress to us? But I think it's important to manage expectations, John.

The FBI itself has said in a memo back in July, and other people around this case have said there is no smoking gun "client list."