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U.S. Launches New Wave of Strikes on Iran; Polling that Worries House Democrats; Trump Says New Air Force One Will be Maxed Out; Andy Burnham Becomes U.K. Prime Minister; Allbirds Rebrands as A.I. Company Mamdani Weighs Netanyahu Arrest. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired July 20, 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]

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Underscore the human cost of this war is exacting. This has been now one of the deadliest stretches of days for American troops since the war began four months ago, ratcheting up the cost. But also, I think, deepening some of the questions for President Trump about where precisely he sees all of this heading.

And the death toll may rise. The military saying that it's still working to identify some of the remains that were found at the attack on that military base in Jordan, which also left two other Americans dead. That's in addition to that incident in northern Iraq, where the military member was working to act -- controlled detonate the unexploded ordinance that had landed. That was an Iranian drone.

So, clearly, I think building up the costs for President Trump, but also underlining that Iran still retains some very significant missile and drone capabilities, despite the presidents claims that it had been militarily decimated. It also appears to be building up its abilities to evade U.S. air defenses.

Of course, this all comes between back-and-forth attacks between the two sides. Yesterday, CENTCOM saying that it had carried out the ninth straight night of attacks. These are going after increasingly civilian targets, including water desalination plants, power facilities.

You've also seen the U.S. military build up and go after sites in southern Iran. I'm told that more American military firepower is heading to the region, including fighter jets and additional deployments of aerial refueling tankers.

John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So, Kevin, I'm told I can't ask you what I was going to ask you. I'm going to let you go, do more reporting. We'll come back to you soon. Thank you.

Bianna.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: So curious what you were going to ask him now. BERMAN: I know it's a deep tease. It's called a deep tease.

GOLODRYGA: Follow up later.

BERMAN: Rapp. That's what I was told right there. So, Bianna, go ahead (ph).

GOLODRYGA: All right, we'll hear more from Kevin later.

Joining me now, CNN's senior military analyst and former NATO supreme allied commander, retired Admiral James Stavridis.

Admiral, always good to see you.

Of course, our thoughts are with the family members of the loved ones of those three young service members who died there protecting this country.

I want to ask you about the options now for the president going forward. Yesterday on "STATE OF THE UNION" you laid out three of them, either walk away, go massive or ramp up and compel. Now we are hearing that F-16s and F-35s are making their way to the region. Which option, given this deployment, do you think the president will pick?

JAMES STAVRIDIS, CNN SENIOR MILITARY ANALYST: I'm going to come to that in a minute, but I do want to just make a point about those two brave servicemen who were just identified. One, a woman from Texas, Isabella Gonzalez, and the other, presumably a white male from Hawaii. One 20, one 19 years old -- 25, one 19 years old. That's a pretty good snapshot of America's military. They're young. They come from all over the country. And they stand for all of us.

So, now let me take on options for the president.

As I talked about yesterday on "STATE OF THE UNION" with Jake Tapper, it's not a great set of options, but I think where we're headed is to compel in order to get them back to the negotiating table. Some have called this escalate to de-escalate. And it would include not only the kind of bombing that Kevin Liptak talked about a moment ago, putting more economic pressure, higher sanctions, perhaps some cyber, perhaps some covert activity, perhaps influencing in that inner circle in a variety of ways. So, I think the administration has cards to play here. But clearly the Iranians are not cooperating, at least at the moment.

GOLODRYGA: We've just gotten word this morning that the Houthis have announced a maritime embargo against Saudi Arabia and Bab-el-Mandab specifically, Bab-el-Mandab, following Saudi attacks against the airport in Sanaa. You got a scenario where perhaps there are now two choke points that we are focused on. A huge impact on the global oil supply, of course, but this is just ratcheting up tensions.

What are the options for the president if, in fact, that is the case, the blockade is back in place at Hormuz?

STAVRIDIS: Yes, let's start with the Iranian options in that regard. And the Houthis tend to do what they're told by the Iranians. They're not quite like Hezbollah, which really is a creature of Tehran. But I think the Houthis will come along if the Iranians unleash them. And it's important for people to understand, we've been very focused, as we should be, on the Strait of Hormuz, which carries, you know, 20 percent of the world's energy, 20 percent of the world's fertilizer.

[08:35:09]

It carries, in total, about eight percent of global trade. Now let's go to the west, to the Suez Canal. Brianna, as you know, that carries somewhere between 10 and 15 percent of the world's trade by value. So, it's a huge, new western front because if you can choke off that Bab- el-Mandeb at the bottom of the Red Sea, in many ways you effectively shut down a lot of the capability of the Suez Canal. So, it's a very profound card for the Iranians to play. I think it has been holding it in reserve. If they unleash it, to answer your question, I think the president has to internationalize this. I think the Europeans would go along with a maritime coalition, they have in the past, that would go down there, much like we did against Somali pirates in the same region, internationalize it, get your allies involved. That's kind of the next step.

GOLODRYGA: All right, retired Admiral James Stavridis, always good to see you. Thank you.

John.

BERMAN: All right, thank you so much, Bianna.

We've been talking about the fact that Democrats might be waking up this morning a wee little bit nervous. Why is that? Well, there's new polling out this weekend which suggests that while they are leading in the so-called generic ballot test, the race for Congress, it's not by much and certainly maybe not by enough.

With us now, CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten.

So, the numbers show what, Harry?

HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: They show a big, uh-oh, worry sign, at least compared to history, because I want to take it back through the history machine and I want to note, OK, House national July CNBC/"Washington Post" poll average midterm years. This is the generic ballot, right? Where were we back in 2006 when, of course, Democrats would go back on to win the House? They're up by 12 in an average of those two polls. How about 2018? They were up by an average of ten in those two polls. Look at where that average is now. Well less than half of either the level of 2018 and 2006, way down there. Yes, they're ahead, but they're ahead -- I have to shrink down on the screen -- they're ahead by only four points, which is significantly less than what we saw in 2018 and 2006, when Democrats took back the House.

So, as I said, this is an uh-oh. This is a warning sign. While, yes, Democrats are ahead, not by anywhere near the margin they were in prior wave years. BERMAN: Because four isn't ten.

ENTEN: No.

BERMAN: And it's not 12.

ENTEN: No, that -- no, they taught me that back in pre-k, that four is not 10 or 12.

BERMAN: And not only that, but four might not be enough with all the redistricting we've seen.

ENTEN: That's exactly right, Johnny B. So, this isn't just, hey, you know what, we want to lead by eight or 10 or 12 because we want an even larger majority. You might not even get the majority at all if, in fact, the House popular vote ends up by four. Because just take a look at this. OK, "The Washington Post"/CNBC poll lead, it's four on average, right? But what about needed to control with redistricting? You need probably a three to four point victory nationwide in the national House vote in order to get a House majority. You are right on the edge with this four-point lead in the average of this CNBC/"Washington Post" poll. Right on the edge of even getting that majority.

And that's why I said, this is a very worrisome sign. This is troublesome for Democrats because, despite all of Donald Trump's unpopularity in the polls, they do not seem to be building an advantage that guarantees them the House or anything close to a guarantee. It's very close, at least if you're listening to CNBC and "Washington Post."

BERMAN: OK. But given that the president is so unpopular, you just brought that up, why is it that Democrats might not be doing better?

ENTEN: Yes, that's called, I think I know what question is coming next, and I'm going to lead right into it.

Why is it? What is going on? Well, just take a look at 2024 for Trump voters in 2026 because I think this is really important. OK, Donald Trump's net approval rating with them is plus 66 points. But how much is the U.S. Gouse margin? Republicans lead amongst these same voters by 87 points. In other words, there is a chunk of 2024 Trump voters who right now aren't so hot to trot on Donald Trump but are still very much in the Republican camp. And that, to me, is the worrisome sign for Democrats because, how do you convince those voters to necessarily go over to you? Because it seems to me that their baseline opinion is I want to vote Republican, even if I don't like Donald Trump. And that's a very tough voter to convert. As opposed to independents, who, you know, could go either way. These are people who have shown an affinity for Republicans in the past and voting for Donald Trump in the past. And right now they're showing that exact same affinity, to vote Republican in the midterms. And that's why this race is much tighter than I think a lot of Democrats would wish it would be given Trump's unpopularity.

BERMAN: It's interesting, they're kind of outrunning Trump among Trump voters right now.

ENTEN: That's exactly -- that's a -- that's a nice -- that's a word full. But, yes, that's exactly what's going on. They are -- House Republicans are outrunning Donald Trump amongst his own voters at this point.

[08:40:00]

BERMAN: All right, we will watch and see if that continues as the summer and then we get into the fall.

All right, Harry Enten, thank you very much for that.

ENTEN: Thank you, my friend.

BERMAN: An interesting new story out this morning on this new Air Force One, gifted by Qatar to President Trump. The president says the $400 million plane will be, quote, "maxed out" after security concerns grounded it early this month. Two sources tell CNN, the newer plane does possess the same capability as the old one to ensure its safety in international settings.

With us now is "Axios" senior contributor Margaret Talev.

Margaret, I want to read to you -- actually, can we put it up on the screen here because I don't have the print out in front of me. I want to read to you reporting from Maggie Haberman from "The New York Times," who was the first to put this out. If you put this up on the screen, I can read it off the screen. Hang on one second, I'm going to dance while we wait. OK, here it is. President Trump says new Air Force One will be taken out of service to be maxed out. "President Trump said on Sunday that the Boeing luxury jet donated by Qatar that he recently took overseas would soon be maxed out, suggesting it could get additional defensive capabilities to match the standards of the older jets used for presidential travel. It was not clear what specific upgrades Mr. Trump was referring to, or whether the time frame he gave of a month until it is ready was realistic."

Now, look, this is interesting because the jet's a little bit of a symbol of a lot of things. Yes, it's a symbol of American power, but it's also a symbol of the president wanting new things, building new things, maybe opulence, and maybe it not being up to the standards that it needs to be. He wasn't able to fly on it overseas after the NATO trip to Turkey because of security concerns, reportedly. So now, is this an admission, Margaret, that it's just not up to snuff?

MARGARET TALEV, SENIOR CONTRIBUTOR, "AXIOS": Yes, John, I think it's clear from the minute that he didn't take that plane home that Secret Service feels strongly that it needs to be equipped with the same sort of defensive equipment that a standard Air Force fleet would be.

I can tell you this, it takes tens or perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars to do this sort of upgrading. And a traditional timeline would certainly be longer than a month. So, I don't know what the timetable will be. And as you know, much of this information is sort of generally known, available in the public. Some of the information around the protocols for Air Force One are tightly guarded and perhaps even classified.

And as you know, the president himself has, and his Justice Department have sought to go after reporters with subpoenas and compel them to talk about how they know the things they know, or to share their sources. So, there are legal elements to this, procurement elements to this and ultimately national security elements to this.

This is -- of course it's a diplomatic symbol. Of course, it's a diplomatic symbol of power and strength and national pride. But beyond that, it is the way you transport the president in the safest way possible around the world when there are security threats from state actors, non-state actors, any number of actors against the president. So, it has to be as safe as possible to travel. This is probably going to take quite a while and cost a lot of money. And the president only has a couple of years left on his term in office. So, we'll see what happens. But, yes, I think he wanted to show off the new plane, but it was not equipped the way a standard fleet would be.

BERMAN: Yes, as you point out, this is just one of those things you have to get right. It has to be completely right. No questions about it.

Margaret, Harry and I were just talking about the generic ballot test and the race for Congress right now. Democrats have a three or four point lead according to the new "Washington Post" polling. It's just not that much. And it's not where I think Democrats want to be. Is there a reckoning inside the party for why?

TALEV: Well, Democrats have had a significant reputational problem for a few years now, and there are a number of elements why. I think sort of the Covid era and some of the social policy debates inside the party is one of those areas. There's a real rift between younger Americans and older Americans who lean left or center left about what the Democratic Party should stand for. And I think you can really see that exemplified in some of the primary battles we're having. And figures like Bernie Sanders and sort of the splits between the progressive wing and what the progressives call the establishment wing, but basically what have been standard Democratic Party policies and stances, you know, for the last number of many decades.

So, I think all of this is coming to bear. The question for Democrats is, what does the Democratic Party stand for? Is it the staunchly pro- Israel party of years past? Is it the party that we saw with the test vote where more than half of the Democratic caucus voted to stop funding Israel?

[08:45:03]

Is it the Medicare for all party, or is it the support private insurance but make sure more people have subsidized coverage party? These are really major splits and rifts. And there are a segment of younger people who won't get excited to vote unless the party pulls more progressive. And there are a segment of older Americans who are not enthusiastic about voting for Democrats if they are pulling further towards the progressive wing. And independents have pulled away from President Trump. They are really anti-Trump and a lot of his policies, but they don't like that progressive wing of the Democratic Party either.

BERMAN: Margaret Talev, thank you very much. Great to see you this morning.

Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: All right, breaking this morning, the U.K.'s newest prime minister, the seventh in ten years, now vowing to bring down the cost of living and create a new national sense of unity. Andy Burnham spoke moments ago from his new home at Ten Downing Street, saying his government will make politics work for Britain.

CNN's Max Foster is outside of Ten Downing Street.

So, he says he's going to be the one to make politics work for Britains. Six prime ministers before him over the last ten years have not been able to deliver. So, what does this former mayor have up his sleeve?

MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're still waiting to hear, if I'm honest. He did acknowledge the problem with British politics right at the top of his speech, saying there's been all this turmoil and how fed up people are with politics and how there needs to be a step change. And he's going to bring that.

So, this is Andy Burnham. He's a very charismatic, very eloquent figure who always says the right thing. But now he's in Downing Street and he's got to start delivering. And they are big promises. He did offer one specific in his speech. He said he's going to try to end homelessness. But we're waiting now for a series of policy announcements.

And around the cabinet is going to be crucial. Who's going to be in his cabinet? His party is desperately split between left and right. So, those top jobs need to be carefully thought about.

And then there's the issue of taking calls from world leaders. And we're very interested to see who he's going to take them from first. There's some discussion here. You know, would it be Europe? Would it be America? What we're hearing is that it would be Donald Trump and perhaps President Zelenskyy. So, that's another indication of Burnham's foreign policy, which we haven't heard anything about throughout this sort of non-campaign because he wasn't elected.

But it was a very positive message. It was, interestingly, without a lectern, he got rid of that, and he ad-libbed the whole speech. But this is a bit of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDY BURNHAM, U.K. PRIME MINISTER: I will give this my all. And I ask you all to pull with me. Let's build a new national sense of unity, of common purpose and positivity. Let us make this the moment when Britain starts to believe again. The moment we bring back hope.

(END VIDEO CLIP) FOSTER: So hope, of course, President Obama's great slogan, wasn't it? He's certainly coming with the right message. We'll wait to see. We have to wait to see, don't we, whether or not he'll actually deliver the policies.

But, you know, it says it all really that some of the betting companies are now offering odds on how long he's going to stay in power.

GOLODRYGA: A lot of turnover in that residence there behind you over the last few years.

Max Foster, thank you.

Well, from shoe company to A.I. startup. We are now hearing from the CEO of the company formerly known as Allbirds.

Plus, a surprise delivery for a couple who didn't even know they were pregnant. What?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:52:41]

BERMAN: All right, this morning, an update on the shoe company that ditched shoes for A.I. Allbirds rebranding into Smartbird, and artificial intelligence firm. It says it wants to provide computing power for companies to run A.I. systems.

CNN business tech reporter Clare Duffy is with us now.

I still own my pair of Allbirds, and they don't do anything for A.I. Not yet at least. But you spoke to the CEO about why he did this and what's going on.

CLARE DUFFY, CNN BUSINESS TECH REPORTER: Well, she --

BERMAN: She, I should say.

DUFFY: Its new CEO, Nadia Carlsten. So, this is really interesting, right? They have sold off all of the shoe assets that were once part of the de facto uniform for Silicon Valley. They have rebranded from Allbirds to Smartbird, and they are hiring almost an entirely new team. This is essentially an A.I. startup, but the benefit of rebranding Allbirds, rather than truly starting from scratch, is that they retain access to the public markets, which could be useful because the A.I. infrastructure business is very expensive to be in. They will also be competing with giants like Amazon and Google and Microsoft, but they want to do things a little bit differently. Rather than building their own data centers and leasing out space, Smartbird wants to provide on premises infrastructure for financial services companies, pharmaceutical companies, that might not want all of their data going to run A.I. systems in the cloud. They might want some things that remain on their own premises.

But we've seen this before, right? We've seen companies that are struggling try to go into these trendy tech spaces. So, I asked new CEO, Nadia Carlsten, who does come from the A.I. infrastructure business, how she would convince people that this is not just a gimmick.

Take a listen to what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NADIA CARLSTEN, CEO, SMARTBIRD: There's a lot backing this up. It's the fact that we have a new company now very much dedicated to A.I. We have a board that is committed. We have leadership, including myself, that has expertise in this space, that is going to be recruiting even more experts in this space. And this is something that I have done before. So, I know that it's a market that exists and something that we can deliver.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DUFFY: So, as you hear though, John, she says this is something she believes they can deliver. I also asked her if she will miss the Allbirds shoes. She said she's always been more of a heels girl herself.

BERMAN: Wow. Well, if she wants to borrow a pair, I still have a pair. They don't smell too bad.

Interesting to see. I mean, from shoes and A.I. Really no correlation there whatsoever. Interesting discussion.

Clare Duffy, thank you very much.

[08:55:00]

DUFFY: Thank you.

BERMAN: Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: I am not a heels girl, even though I'm wearing them now.

All right, new this morning, the FDA appears to be backing away from a key finding in the growing cyclospora outbreak investigation. It turns out that Taylor Farms' lettuce sample tested produced a false positive for that parasite. The FDA figured that out when it re-reviewed the result. Taylor Farms says the agency has apologized, but it doesn't change the company's voluntary recall of its iceberg lettuce. So, at this point, the FDA says there are no confirmed positive sample results in its cyclospora investigation. To be continued.

And a Florida couple was ready to set sail on a cruise to Mexico, but the night they were supposed to leave, the woman went to urgent care experiencing cramps. Well, those cramps turned out to be contractions. The couple said they were shocked because they didn't know she was even pregnant.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And he comes back and he goes, you guys are pregnant. And I'm like, and she -- what? We were both just like -- it's like it's --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Total shock.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not real. Like, you're pinching yourself. And you're like, what are you talking about? Like, this is real? And so the first thing I said to her after he left, I was like, so, I told her, I said, I love you. And then I said, you're going to be OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I had no symptoms at all. Nothing whatsoever. I had no idea there was a human inside of me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GOLODRYGA: OK, that is insane. I have so many questions. After 12 hours, after receiving the life-changing news, their baby son was born. Congratulations to them.

Well, we have new video of a man being pulled from a manhole. It happened in Philadelphia. Police said the man entered the sewer system several blocks away but was not able to find his way out. They said he believed he was being chased by officers, but that was not the case. It took emergency crews more than 30 minutes to get him out.

BERMAN: Could not find his way out of the sewer system. Hate when that happens.

Bianna, thank you very much.

All right, new this morning, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani tells "The New York Times" that he is having, quote, "an active conversation" about potentially arresting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he arrives in New York to attend the U.N. General Assembly in September.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're actively looking to see if you can actually arrest him?

MAYOR ZOHRAN MAMDANI (D), NEW YORK CITY: I think we are looking at all of our legal obligations, and one of them is with regards to the United Nations. But the other part of this is, is we're not talking about a personal assessment of Benjamin Netanyahu. We're talking about the International Criminal Court and the fact that they have a warrant out for this prime minister's arrest.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right, with us now, CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson.

Counselor, what is the law actually say here? What does it allow Mamdani to do? JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: So, corporation counsel, they advise

the mayor. They have got some great attorneys over there. But I think when they look at the law, they will advise the mayor that he does not have the legal ability to enforce this active warrant that was issued by the International Criminal Court, right? We know this -- we have this court. This court has been around for about 24 years or so. They certainly prosecute war crimes, which is their legal right and obligation. But the New York City mayor has no authority. And, in fact, it's illegal for him to do so.

BERMAN: Who does have authority?

JACKSON: So, you have member states and you have non-member states, right? And these member states who are actively involved, they certainly have the authority to do so. Europe is involved. They could certainly do it. You've got countries in Latin America and Africa as well. United Kingdom is a member state here. The United States is not a member state.

BERMAN: That's the key.

JACKSON: Yes, it is. Right.

BERMAN: And even if the United States were a member state, would it be up to a city jurisdiction or would it be more likely a federal case?

JACKSON: So, it would -- it would be federal, but it would be a little bit more complicated. So, here's the reality, right? There are multiple barriers that would prevent a local official from doing it. The first thing, to your question, is, there's something called the pre-emption doctrine. What is that? That means that the federal government has these laws, some of which preempt local law. In this particular circumstance, the federal law would be controlling. And as a result of that, the federal law says not only can you not do it, John, but it's illegal to enforce a mandate of the international community -- International Criminal Court.

In addition to that, you have something called diplomatic immunity, which is absolute. And based upon the diplomatic immunity, you certainly cannot touch Netanyahu when he came here. So, it would be illegal for the mayor to do that.

BERMAN: So, that pretty much sums it up.

JACKSON: Yes.

BERMAN: I mean, you know, and so his legal advice is going to tell him, a, this is actually a non-issue, b, you can't do this. There's no scenario then roughly where New York City police go and take him into custody?

JACKSON: There is no scenario. And, in fact, John, you could be prosecuted for doing that. The law is very clear with respect to immunity. The law is very clear with regard to us not being a member state of the International Criminal Court.

[09:00:01]

The law is very clear, as it relates to not, you know, not being able to touch Netanyahu when he comes to New York.