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Jane Harman is Interviewed about Iran; Numbers on Trump and Iran; TSA Employees Miss Second Full Paycheck; NTSB Investigation of LaGuardia Collision; Meta and YouTube Found Guilty; Two Years Since Baltimore Bridge Collapse. Aired 8:30-9a ET
Aired March 26, 2026 - 08:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[08:30:00]
ZACHARY COHEN, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: A military operation to seize the island, including, potential U.S. casualties that could climb into very high numbers if a serious number of ground wars are committed.
Now, we know that there are two Marine expeditionary units that are being deployed to the region as we speak. They specialize in amphibious landings, similar to what would likely be used as part of any operation to seize Kharg Island. We also know that about 1,000 U.S. troops from the 82nd Airborne are also being ordered to deploy, with more potentially expected to follow up.
So, the U.S. moving troops, even as Donald Trump is talking about diplomacy here. And as you've been mentioning, that Republicans on The Hill even emerging from a classified briefing yesterday really concerned about the prospect of U.S. boots on the ground in Iran.
ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, absolutely. All right, we'll continue to watch for that.
Zach, appreciate it.
Sara.
SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Joining me now is Jane Harman, the former Democratic congresswoman from California, who served as a top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee in the years after 9/11.
Thank you so much for being here. It is good to see you.
Let's talk about what's happening right now with the war. The White House says talks are moving forward. Iran's foreign minister, however, says there are no negotiations, just messages. In your experience, what's really happening here, what's going on?
JANE HARMAN (D), FORMER U.S. REPRESENTATIVE FOR CALIFORNIA: Well, what's not happening here? Let's start with that. Is Congress is not in the game. Congress is now planning to go on Easter recess. I think the 60-day latitude for the president to wage whatever the name of this is without authorized use of force will expire during the recess. Congress is not funding the action. Congress is not funding TSA. And I am -- my new little phrase is, CACO., Congress always chickens out.
Why does this matter? This matters because this president, unfettered, is deciding he, he can put boots on the ground on Kharg Island. No one thinks this can be done solely by air. And Congress will not have authorized the mission. And we're going to have more U.S. casualties.
There are better options. One of them, of course, is Congress staying and figuring out how to put some guidelines around this operation. It has to end in some better way than it is being conducted now. But also, there's a coalition of the willing in the neighborhood. The Arab states, NATO and other countries are willing to step up as an international force here, including us, and maybe including Iran, to police the Strait of Hormuz, which would free up the oil and, obviously, deal with this very serious worldwide, worldwide economic catastrophe that we are facing with the absence of any oil at any reasonable price.
SIDNER: Yes, let's talk about Kharg Island in particular, where Iran refines most of its oil. Its reinforcing Kharg Island and preparing defenses against a possible U.S. operation. That is our reporting this morning.
HARMAN: Yes.
SIDNER: And, at the same time, Trump, while he's having these discussions with Iran, or as Iran puts it, messaging, he's sending in the Marines. They're there. We're hearing that the 82nd Airborne paratroopers are preparing to deploy. So, what happens here if all of this falls apart and suddenly there are boots on the ground? How difficult will this all be to not only get Kharg Island, but to hold Kharg Island. What are your concerns?
HARMAN: My concerns are that it will be extremely difficult. We've seen bad movies before. We saw Vietnam and did not understand guerrilla tactics. We saw Afghanistan and Iraq and did not understand tribal culture. Now we don't understand this very deep state dispersed organization for the Islamic State of Iran. And what I think will happen is Iran will fight back. And not only fight back on Kharg Island, risking the loss of lives which are sent into harm's way without Congress acting, but also fight back, as we're seeing, across the region and bomb refinery facilities in other countries. And this is, you know, a recipe for the apocalypse if we don't find a better direction.
SIDNER: What is the best case scenario that you see right now? Is it ending the war immediately even without having guarantees for the Strait of Hormuz or how do you see the best case scenario playing out?
HARMAN: Well, I think we need guarantees for the Strait of Hormuz. I think they're in Iran's interest to participate in structuring this. Iran is a terror, you know, a state that sponsors terrorism. It's a bad actor. Let's not pretend that it isn't. It has a form of government that we do not like.
[08:35:02] But we don't always get to choose our friend's governments. I think the least bad option is forming an international coalition, including NATO, the gulf Arab states and others to police the strait, the Strait of Hormuz, doing it under international law. That's what applies. These are international waters. They don't belong to Iran. But Iran is positioned to cause the most mischief there. And doing that immediately. And then structuring, we hope, some new nuclear regime that affects Iran.
I mean the tragedy is, this president threw out the JCPOA, which was not a perfect agreement. It wasn't a treaty. So, he had the ability to do it, but which constrained slowed down Iran's development of a nuclear weapon. And, unfortunately, didn't constrain its missile capacity and other things. But Iran now possesses a huge amount of highly enriched uranium. Speculation is that it could build a number of bombs. And it now has the motivation to do that, obviously, given how it has been -- how this whole matter has been handled.
SIDNER: Now, we know that there are talks amongst NATO, there are talks with the UAE and other partners in the region to see if they can come together.
HARMAN: Yes.
SIDNER: But there's a long way to go. And in the meantime, we're all waiting and wondering to see what happens next.
Former Congresswoman Jane Harman, it is a great pleasure to have you on this morning. I do appreciate your expertise on this.
Erica.
HILL: Well, the president's choice to enter into a war with Iran has not been widely popular with Congress, as Sara was just discussing. It hasn't been popular with the American people either. So, how is it impacting Trump's approval rating? CNN's Harry Enten here now to run the numbers.
So, Harry, Fox was one of the initial polls, right, in terms of showing how the Iran War was sitting. It didn't really show that there was a big issue with it initially. Things are changing this morning in this latest poll that we have out.
HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: That's exactly right. Look, when there was this slew of initial polls that came out, the Fox News poll was the one initial poll that did not show that the war was unpopular. That has changed. Trump has lost his one good poll when it comes to the Iran War, because just take a look here, net approval rating of U.S. military action in Iran. In early March it broke even, right? Zero points. What that essentially means is 50 percent approve, 50 percent disapprove. But down it goes. Look at this now. The net approval rating for the U.S. military action in Iran, negative 16 points, just 42 percent of the American public approve of it, 58 percent disapprove. So now we're looking at basically every single poll in which the clear plurality or majority of Americans disapprove of the U.S. military action in Iran, Trump can no longer point to a poll that actually shows that among the general public at large, that the American public actually approve of this military action.
HILL: So, this is the overwhelming for the Iran war. When it comes to how President Trump is handling Iran in general, what do we see?
ENTEN: Yes. So, you see this negative 16 points, you think that's bad. But look at Trump's handling of it. It's even worse. Oh my. OK. Trump's net approval rating of Iran. Look at this. Overall, 28 points under water. Very, very unpopular Donald Trump's actions are when it comes to Iran.
And look at those in the center of the electorate. Look at independents. Whoo, negative 58 points, 58 points under water Donald Trump is when it comes to Iran.
And, of course, this has been dominating, dominating politics over the last month. And so, what we see here is the U.S. military action in Iran, not popular in a poll. It used to be actually not so bad. And Donald Trump's handling of it, even worse. And those in the center electorate, you can barely find any independents at this point who approve the U.S. military action in Iran.
HILL: So, earlier this week the president's overall approval numbers were not great. I think they had you saying, yikes. Where do they stand in this Fox News poll?
ENTEN: You know, we have been talking about in poll after poll after poll. Look, you can look at one poll and you see, OK, Donald Trump's hit a new all-time low and you go, OK, maybe an outlier. Then you see two. Then you see three. Then you see four. And here, how about number five?
OK, Trump's net approval rating. In March of 2025, according to Fox News, he was at minus two points. Look at where he is now, a term too low, 18 points under water according to Fox News. There is, simply put, no poll you can point to at this point at which Donald Trump is either at or near a record low. And this is yet another one. And he is just struggling mightily. This Iran war is, simply put at this point, a few weeks in, not popular, and it is becoming less popular the longer it goes on.
HILL: Yes. All right, Harry, appreciate it. Thank you.
ENTEN: Thank you, Erica.
HILL: Sara.
SIDNER: All right, thank you, guys. This morning, President Trump is once again calling out Republicans, demanding they get rid of the filibuster and fund Homeland Security as lawmakers remain at an impasse over ending the partial shutdown. The president posting this morning, "terminate the filibuster and get our airports and everything else moving again." Negotiations on Capitol Hill have stalled after Republicans rejected a counteroffer from Democrats who want to include policy changes at ICE as part of the funding bill.
[08:40:02] It comes as major U.S. airports, again, are seeing some long lines at TSA today. And TSA employees are about to miss their second full paycheck. They've gone 41 days without a full paycheck. Some say they're receiving eviction notices now. Their utilities have been shut off. And some are selling their blood and plasma just to get by.
CNN's Ed Lavandera is at the Houston airport.
Ed, this morning we're still seeing craziness out there, although it does look like it is actually moving a bit.
ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it's interesting, the lines actually physically move, but you're just covering a lot of ground and you have to move through virtually every corner of this airport it feels like. We're on the top level of Terminal E here at George Bush Intercontinental Airport. You can see all around me, lines fill out the entire area to get back to the security checkpoints. From back here, it's well over an hour wait. But this line, you know, wraps its way around. It spills outside into the passenger drop off area. Those people, if you look over here off to the right, you see people coming up an escalator. That takes you downstairs. And if you look over from this vantage point, you can see the lines that are -- people are having to deal with underground. And at some point, I haven't had a chance to go down, there's another level below this. So those people could be starting the line down there. Right now the wait times are about three hours according to the airport website.
But what is interesting, Sara, is that people are so worried about missing their flights they're getting here extraordinarily early. We talked to one man who showed up here at 2:00 a.m. to catch a flight at 7:00 a.m. He missed it. I just talked to another gentleman who's been here several hours as well. He's about an hour away from the front of the line, and his flight takes off in 45 minutes. So, you know, the logistical headaches of just having to rebook people, get them on flights after all of this is going to continue to happen here throughout the day, because airport officials tell us that today, tomorrow, into the weekend, Friday and Sunday and Monday are going to be heavy travel days as usual. And so these headaches will only continue.
Airport officials also tell us that ICE agents are in the background training to be able to help TSA agents here on the security lines. But I've just had a quick look of some of the security lines that we could see from our vantage point, Sara, and we don't see any indication that ICE agents are up there at the front checking I.D.s or anything like that at that point. We have seen them kind of on the periphery, helping navigate and direct people on where to go and where to find the very end of this line, which in and of itself is a very difficult task.
Sara.
SIDNER: Ed, I got to tell you, I'm getting so anxious thinking about someone showing up at 2:00 a.m. with a flight at, what did you say, 7:00 a.m. and still missing their flight. That is insane.
Ed Lavandera, it's good to see you out there.
LAVANDERA: Not even close. Like, not even close to making his flight.
SIDNER: Not even close. Oh, this is awful for fliers. Awful.
LAVANDERA: No, it was -- it was after 7:00, and he was already -- still an hour away.
SIDNER: Wow. Ed, thank you so much for bringing us all the heartbreak there in the airport at Houston. And this is happening across the country in some airports. It's rough.
Erica.
HILL: Yes, it certainly is.
We're also closely following developments in the tragedy here in New York at LaGuardia Airport earlier this week. NTSB investigators this morning say they're going to look at whether the heavy workload for air traffic controllers may have played a role in that plane -- in the plane's deadly runway collision with a fire truck at LaGuardia. Two pilots, of course, were killed. Dozens of passengers and two firefighters were injured. That crash Sunday night. At the time, two air traffic controllers were working. They were juggling a number of extra duties, we've learned.
CNN's Pete Muntean has more now on the investigation.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: The investigation into Sunday nights crash is now reaching full steam. And we just received an update from Air Canada, which says that all but four passengers on board that Air Canada regional jet have been released from the hospital. Air Canada also says the plane itself, that CRJ-900, has been released from the NTSB back to the airline. Meaning that Air Canada will now begin the process of taking that plane and the wreckage to a hangar and then remove baggage and personal effects from the plane and begin distributing them to passengers.
The National Transportation Safety Board tells us it spent Wednesday gathering perishable evidence from that runway, taxiway, intersection at LaGuardia Airport, including developing a list of documents they need from the FAA and a list of key and critical interviews for this investigation.
On Tuesday, the NTSB planned to begin interviewing the air traffic controllers, only two of which were in the LaGuardia control tower cab at the time of this crash. The NTSB is also planning on interviewing the firefighters, the two who were on board that specialized airport firefighting truck. They miraculously survived this crash.
Pete Muntean, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[08:45:01]
HILL: Two tech giants found liable in a landmark social media addiction trial. What this could mean for not only future cases, but also the future of those platforms.
And we are heading back to Hogwarts this morning. We have a first look at the revamped TV version of the iconic Harry Potter franchise.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SIDNER: In a landmark decision, a jury ordered Meta and YouTube to pay $6 million to a woman who says she became addicted to social media as a child and that the addiction made her mental health struggles worse. A Los Angeles jury found the companies liable for knowingly creating addictive platforms that harm children. The companies say they are going to appeal. Google said, quote, "this case misunderstands YouTube, which is a responsibly built streaming platform, not a social media site." A spokesperson for Meta added, "teen mental health is profoundly complex and cannot be linked to a single app. We will continue to defend ourselves vigorously as every case is different and we remain confident in our record of protecting teens online."
Joining me now, Sara Fischer, CNN senior media analyst and senior media reporter at "Axios."
[08:50:02]
Despite what they're saying, both Meta and YouTube, this is a huge decision. And it's not the only one that's happened. There was another decision against Meta earlier in the week. What do these mean exactly?
SARA FISCHER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA ANALYST: So, broadly speaking, it means that tech platforms can no longer rely on a certain law called the Communications Decency Act, Section 230, that broadly leaves them not liable for the content others post on their platform. And they've relied on that protection, Sara, to build these massive, multibillion dollar global businesses.
But if you take a look at the two cases, they're a little different.
SIDNER: Yes.
FISCHER: The one from New Mexico earlier this week found Meta liable for not doing enough to stop sort of sexual exploitation content on its platforms, and they were fined much more. $375 million.
SIDNER: Yes.
FISCHER: The case in Los Angeles fined Meta and YouTube both $6 million collectively. But the implications in some ways are even bigger because there are thousands of cases throughout the country that are very similar to this one. And because a new precedent has been set, I think the plaintiffs in those cases probably feel a lot more optimistic about winning.
SIDNER: I mean, in the end, is this going to really open it up to lawsuits, because Congress has not acted on doing anything really to curb social media and curb sort of some of these companies and their ability to do their jobs, whether it's their algorithms or what have you. Does this open the door?
FISCHER: I absolutely think it does for two reasons. One, broadly speaking to your point about Congress passing nothing, so many issues in the United States around companies I cover have all moved to the states because that's where there's a lot more momentum, or they've moved to class action lawsuits from individuals.
What this case is really interesting is that -- why it's interesting is it shows that one individual can successfully sue a major, major company or many major companies, as opposed to having to rely on like state attorneys general to bring state antitrust cases or something like that, which we've seen happen before. And so I think other plaintiffs are going to look at this and be inspired, and they might not be, Sara, people with heavy-handed pockets.
SIDNER: Right.
FISCHER: They can rely on the fact that a new precedent has set to feel confident in moving things forward.
SIDNER: And they have a roadmap now.
FISCHER: Yes.
SIDNER: Because now they've got two different suits they can look at to try and sort of emulate.
I do want to separately ask you about something that we saw at the White House. Melania Trump bringing an A.I. robot to a summit.
Tell me what this is all about. It is a little disconcerting. You're looking at this going, whoa.
FISCHER: Yes, Melania has tried to champion a bunch of different issues that are related to tech, one of which actually being around cyber bullying and kids.
SIDNER: Yes.
FISCHER: She has spoken about A.I. in the past. And so I'm actually not shocked to see her trying to make a splash with the robot walking alongside her. We've seen in other governments around the world, they do tout robots and technologies like this in government.
SIDNER: Yes.
FISCHER: Her husband, Donald Trump, is infamously not Mr. Big Tech. Even though he owns Truth Social, he's not somebody that is reading the web on his iPhone or downloading mobile apps. So, she's sort of filled that role and that position. And I will say, this most stark thing about it is that they're almost matching as they walk down that corridor.
SIDNER: Yes.
FISCHER: It sends a very striking signal.
SIDNER: Yes. It's fascinating to sort of see where this might go. Both alluring and a little creepy seeing this robot do whatever it is doing. But it is fascinating to see where the technology is going to go and the possibilities.
Sara Fischer, do appreciate it. Thank you so much.
FISCHER: Thanks, Sara.
SIDNER: All right, Erica.
HILL: Savannah Guthrie, the host of the today show, opening up about her mother's disappearance in a new interview in which she says her brother, who, of course, spent his career in the military, very quickly realized what he believed had happened to their mother.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SAVANNAH GUTHRIE, "TODAY" SHOW HOST: My siblings are so amazing. My brother, you know, he spent his career in the military and worked in intelligence and was a fighter pilot and is brilliant. And he saw very clearly right away what this was. And even on the phone, when I called him, he knew.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He knew.
GUTHRIE: And he said, I think she's been kidnaped for ransom. And I said, what? Well, why -- what? And then, I mean, it sounds so -- like, how dumb could I be? But I just -- I didn't want to believe. I just said, do you think, because of me? And he said, I'm sorry, sweetie, but, yes, maybe. But I knew that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You did?
GUTHRIE: I hope not. I mean, we still don't know. Honestly, we don't know anything.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
GUTHRIE: We don't know anything.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HILL: So much unknown as you just heard Savannah say there. She is worried her mother may have been kidnaped for ransom. She wonders whether her fame, her public job may have had anything to do with it.
[08:55:02]
Since Nancy Guthrie's disappearance, there have been a number of ransom notes sent to various outlets. Savannah Guthrie says her family responded to two of them. She does believe those notes are real. Nancy Guthrie has now been missing for 54 days. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's not -- he's not breathing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did he choke on anything?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He might be choking on something.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He -- all he was doing was drinking.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was drinking? He's throwing up -- he's just spitting up some blood
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come on, buddy. Come on.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HILL: Troopers in Maryland, they're credited with saving this child's life. You see from the body camera video there, the moment the troopers rush in to help a mother who had been calling out for help, patting the baby's back, as you see there, until he was able to begin breathing again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I told you. You are a normal boy and you're going to start acting like one. You think you're something special. There is nothing special about you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HILL: Oh, how wrong Harry's aunt was, huh? How about that. A little return to Hogwarts. The first trailer for the highly anticipated Harry Potter TV series is out now. And we're getting our first look at Harry's life with the Dursleys. His first time meeting Hagrid, Ron, and Hermione and, of course, Hogwarts. The series covers the first book, "Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone." It debuts Christmas Day on HBO Max, which, of course, is part of the same parent company as CNN.
Today marks two years since the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed in Baltimore, killing six workers. A container ship, the Dali, had lost power, you may recall. It veered into the bridge, triggering the collapse. The bridge had actually stood for decades. It was a really important gateway to the very important Port of Baltimore, one of the longest steel truss bridges in the world.
Well, now, two years later, CNN's Dana Bash returns to that site with Maryland's governor, Wes Moore. And Dana joins us now with some of their interview.
Dana, this is such a critical moment for Baltimore, too, as we look at what has happened over these last two years and what's ahead.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Erica. And let me just say that you really can't get the sense of the scope of this horrible tragedy and what it takes to rebuild this bridge until you're there. And I was invited on a boat with Governor Wes Moore to go out and see it for ourselves.
Here's part of our conversation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: It turned out to be six people who fell how many feet? I mean how high was the bridge?
GOV. WES MOORE (D-MD): A hundred, 170 feet, 180 feet.
BASH: Into these freezing waters?
MOORE: Yes.
BASH: That's just awful. Awful.
MOORE: And that's the thing, it's like, you know, they were -- they were fixing potholes. Literally fixing potholes in the middle of the night while we slept. And the thing about it, where falling into these frigid waters and also falling while you're looking at tons of steel and concrete that are falling in the -- in the water with you.
BASH: Oh. I mean now, being here, just about where the bridge was, you can really see how massive it was.
MOORE: Yes. I mean this --
BASH: Two miles.
MOORE: Two miles long. An incredibly important artery.
But, you know, when -- when we remember where things were that morning, and how much work is now happening. I mean, you know, this is now the fastest moving major project in the country. And our plan is to keep it that way. Now, we want to be able to continue moving at pace, continue moving at speed, continue moving safely.
You know, it -- to your point, it's difficult to understand the enormity of this bridge until you get out here and you --
BASH: Yes.
MOORE: And you see it up close.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: And, Erica, the hope right now is to have the new bridge rebuilt by 2030. Initially, after the bridge collapsed, the estimates were perhaps it could be done by 2028. The financial estimates were about $2 billion. Now that has ballooned to over five.
Governor Moore said it's because the way that they estimated the cost at the beginning and the time that it would take at the beginning, they were doing it based on the original bridge, which was built in 1975, and now they're building a completely different kind of bridge, one that is higher, that can make sure that cargo ships like that and even bigger cargo ships, which is now the reality of the way that these are built, that they can get through that area without having any kind of disruption, without obviously having another tragedy.
But as you said, Erica, coming into me, this is a huge bridge that has been a very important artery for people who live in that area to get across.
[09:00:08]
