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Sen. Cornyn Speaks Ahead of Blanche Attorney General Vote; Nearly 65,000 Evacuated from Fires in Spokane County, Washington; Trump's Negative Net Approval Rating; White House to Meet with Top AI Firms Ahead of Big Regulation Push. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired August 04, 2026 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: John Cornyn, one of the two Republican holdouts that had held up this vote for a week now, and has been complaining for weeks, has now just spoken in committee. Let's listen.

SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R-TX): This is history. A contractor of Boe's Hamilton got the job at the IRS for the express purpose of leaking tax returns, private tax returns, of people he thought the public needed to know about. That is a violation of the criminal law, and the contractor is currently serving a five-year term in the federal penitentiary for that.

Initially, when the president filed suit, he sought $10 billion in damages. That is nowhere to be found in the final settlement. The settlement documents also created a roughly $1.8 billion weaponization fund. That is no longer part of the settlement. I've been very clear, as others have, that in order to support Mr. Blanche's nomination, I needed specific assurances in writing about a release signed by the acting Attorney General last May. I asked for written assurances that clarifies the scope of the parties to the IRS audit agreement and permanently ends the weaponization fund.

While this may sound like nitpicking to some, it's critically important not only to me, but to other members of the Senate. What Mr. Blanche said under oath in his nomination hearing on these topics was important. He said under oath, subject to the penalties of perjury, that the release he signed only applies to the IRS and the Treasury and only the parties who were defendants and the plaintiffs.

And he also said once more that the weaponization fund was dead. This past Sunday, Senator Tillis and I came to an agreement after numerous meetings with the Department of Justice and Mr. Blanche on an agency interpretative guidance document that reaffirms what Mr. Blanche said in his sworn testimony in front of the committee. This document will help limit the substance and scope of the audit protection to the defendants in the lawsuit, the IRS, and the Treasury.

And it limits it to the parties to the audit settlement. It limits the parties to the audit settlement to the plaintiffs, the people who brought the lawsuit, and no one else. And importantly, it was retroactive, stated to be retroactive, not prospective, doesn't apply to future audits, but does settle all claims that were subject to the lawsuit and those that could have been brought in that lawsuit.

And again, importantly, it ends the weaponization fund. The DOJ has repeatedly said that this is their legal position and interpretation, including filings in the Floyd v. Department of Justice in the Eastern District of Virginia, and Dunn v. Trump and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington v. Trump in the District of Columbia. They've been consistent about their assertion on behalf of the United States of America that the weaponization fund is dead.

And of course, I expect them to live up to that in any future litigation.

Given this agreement with Mr. Blanche, I expect the department to live up to this in future litigation, and I will vote to advance him out of the committee today. But my vote to advance Mr. Blanche's nomination goes beyond this document. We need a stabilizing force at the Department of Justice, and Mr. Blanche deserves the opportunity to provide that as opposed to continuing to serve in an acting capacity and as the deputy attorney general. The Department of Justice does not ...

BOLDUAN: All right, and listening there to an important voice in all of this and the kind of the back and forth, will he or won't he get the job when it comes to Todd Blanche? That being John Cornyn talking about the assurances that he said he received with that memo that Todd Blanche put out late Sunday night.

And he said that he -- that he with this agreement, he will vote to advance him. So you had John Cornyn giving his reasoning for why he is now, in his view, he has seen enough and he is comfortable and he will be supporting the nomination of Todd Blanche to be the permanent attorney general. So now you have that, we'll continue to watch that debate, and of course, then the vote that will be following.

[09:35:00]

At the same time this morning, the wildfires are still growing and spreading in Washington state. Authorities have now arrested a man on an arson charge for one of the three fires that have just been tearing through the Spokane area. According to witnesses, the 37-year-old suspect was seen bending down near a grassy area close to where the fire started. And then smoke was seen shortly after that.

As of right now, nearly 65,000 people have been evacuated from the fire zone. And overnight, these fires grew to more than 10,000 acres, more than 700 structures so far destroyed. And right now it is not contained.

Zero percent containment -- Sara.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, thank you so much, Kate.

Joining me now is Dave Upthegrove. He's the Washington State Commissioner of Public Lands.

Thank you for joining us. There are several fires burning at this hour in Spokane. There is extensive damage, loss of more than 700 buildings at this hour.

I do want to ask you what the status is right now of all the different areas that are on fire, how difficult it is to fight these, and how long you think this might go on.

DAVE UPTHEGROVE, WASHINGTON STATE COMMISSIONER OF PUBLIC LANDS: Well, good morning. I've spent the last couple of days on the ground in the city of Spokane talking with firefighters on the frontline, meeting with families. And you are correct, the devastation just breaks your heart. Hundreds of families have lost their homes, tens of thousands of people have been displaced. Firefighters are continuing to work around the clock.

Overall, in the state of Washington, more than half a million acres have burned. We have 250,000 acres on fire right now with 17 major fires.

But what has struck me most is this is ultimately a story about people. Behind every one of those burned homes is a family trying to rebuild their lives. Behind every one of those dramatic images we see is a young, exhausted firefighter who's risking everything to keep people safe. So, the struggles continue here in Washington.

SIDNER: You, as I understand it, spoke with President Trump about what is going on here and you're having ongoing conversations. Can you give me some sense about whether or not he has pledged help in any way?

UPTHEGROVE: Well, as State Lands Commissioner, I'm not the one communicating directly with the president. Our Governor Bob Ferguson spoke with the president on Sunday to communicate the need for an emergency declaration and for assistance from FEMA. The president was, to my knowledge, gracious, understands the situation on the ground and we look forward to working together with the federal administration.

SIDNER: Give me some sense of how this is compared to other fires that you have seen in your state over time. Is this the worst thing that you have seen when it comes to what's happening in Spokane at this time? Is this historically just the worst fires you've ever seen there?

UPTHEGROVE: The three fires that continue to burn near the city of Spokane, which is the second largest city in Washington State after Seattle, represent one of the largest tragedies in terms of impacting homes and the destruction of structures.

But it is worth putting it in context. Those three fires are only three of 17 fires, major fires burning in this state. Those fires represent 10,000 acres burning. We have 250,000 acres on fire as we speak this morning.

But one thing I would like to say is that it's moments like this really test everything that you've built before the smoke ever appears. You know, before fire season we built a well-trained firefighting force. We pre-positioned equipment. We entered into mutual aid agreements with other states and invested in forest health.

And we can't stop every fire, but preparation absolutely changes the outcome. But this is a summer unlike any we've seen in recent memory.

SIDNER: Just lastly, you know, fires are burning hotter. They are starting earlier. They are bigger across the West. And now we're seeing similar images out of Europe as well. Do you have what you need? What you need to deal with the change in the climate, especially when it comes to these fires?

UPTHEGROVE: Well, climate is part of the story. There is no doubt that climate change is contributing to increase fire risk. It's creating forest health problems in Washington State. And the scientists are pretty clear that it's impacting weather patterns.

I do have hope that we have what it takes.

[09:40:00]

You know, despite all the heartbreak, what gives me hope is the people, you know, disasters have a way of really reminding us what really matters.

I see firefighters, emergency managers, volunteers, utility crews, neighbors showing up every single day to help complete strangers. You know, that's the story I'm seeing on the ground.

So, I want people to remember that while these fires are dominating the headlines, there are thousands of people working through the night to protect communities they've never even lived in. They don't ask who you voted for. They don't ask where you came from. They simply show up because someone needs help and help keeps showing up. And that gives me hope.

We have 5,000 people fighting these fires, equipment and personnel from more than a dozen states, from Alaska to Florida. So, I'm -- we ought to be really proud of these first responders in Washington State.

SIDNER: Absolutely. Dave Upthegrove, thank you so much for talking us through all that. Appreciate it. And good luck to you -- John.

BERMAN: All right, executives from the world's top AI companies will be at the White House today after several AI test models went rogue and hacked into other companies. [09:45:00]

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BERMAN: So President Trump has been claiming that his poll numbers are good. Not only is that not true, his polls are low. They are historically low.

Eye-poppingly low -- if that's a word. With us now, CNN chief data analyst, Harry Enten, you know, low polling is not news for Donald Trump, but this low really is.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: Yes, if President Trump thinks his own polls are good, he is simply put not on planet Earth. He is on some planet far, far, far away. And a galaxy far, far, far away.

I mean, just look at this. It has been a steady decline, like a slide going into the sea. You know, you go back January 2025, plus 6.

May of 2025, minus 7. September of 2025, minus 8. December of 2025, minus 13.

April of 2026, minus 17. And now, in an average of polls, he is 21 points underwater. This is the lowest he has been in term number two.

The bottom line is this. Trump is at record lows for himself in term number two. He is very much underwater, despite whatever he is claiming up in his head of his.

BERMAN: A slide going into the sea. Evocative imagery there from Harry. When did this slide begin?

ENTEN: When did this slide begin? When did Trump's slide into the sea begin? I mean, just take a look here. I mean, you know, it would be one thing, again, if we were talking about just one poll.

But we're talking about the average polls. But when we're talking about one poll, is there any poll that has Trump anywhere close to positive territory? Take a look here.

Trump's negative net approval rating. Every single poll that meets CNN standards for publication has had Donald Trump underwater in the negative since March 29th of 2025. Days in a row, it is 494, nearly 500 days in which Donald Trump has had a negative net approval rating.

He's not anywhere close to positive.

BERMAN: He's the Lou Gehrig of presidents.

ENTEN: He is the Lou Gehrig, the Cal Ripken of negative ratings.

BERMAN: But people would say, hey, look, you know, the president had low approval ratings in his first term also.

ENTEN: Not this low. Not this low. Take a look here.

Trump's net approval rating at this point. In term one at this point, he was 12 points underwater. He is now broken the 20-point barrier in the negative, minus 20 points.

And you know I always love a little nugget here. Goes from minus 8 to minus 47 points with independents who are driving this.

BERMAN: And what do the prediction markets say this means about his chances of maintaining control of the House?

ENTEN: Yes, OK. If you have a negative 21 net approval rating, no way your party controls the House if this holds until Election Day. Chance to win the House.

Democrats now up to an 84 percent chance, up from 73 percent just a few months ago. Republicans now with just a 16 percent chance, according to the Kalshi prediction markets. Trump's negative net approval rating is driving this.

BERMAN: Harry Enten, the viewers will never know how hard you had to work to get this on the screen at the last minute. Programming the data right before we came on air. We appreciate you.

ENTEN: Thank you, John.

BERMAN: We have a lot of news this morning. We'll be right back.

[09:50:00]

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SIDNER: Some of the most influential names and companies ushering in the AI era will be at the White House today. Executives from Meta, Anthropic, Google, and OpenAI, and going to sit down with the Trump administration to talk about a framework for testing the capabilities of advanced AI models.

The government will get access before they're released to the public, is the plan. CNN's Hadas Gold is here with me now. I mean, what are we expecting from this?

Obviously, after these two incidents with two AI companies where it went basically off the rails, something's got to happen.

HADAS GOLD, CNN AI CORRESPONDENT: Yes, so this is based off of the executive order Donald Trump signed in June about frontier AI models, the government getting review. But it is the first step towards regulations that we have coming out of this administration. The administration doesn't want to call it a regulation.

It's a voluntary framework where these AI companies are being asked to submit their most advanced models to government review up to 30 days before they are released publicly. It gives the government a chance to see their capabilities, if they have any concerns about them, prepare their own government infrastructure. And this is really important because, as you know, we've had quite a few incidents in the last few months where we have, you know, huge capabilities from models like Anthropic Mythos.

We have AI agentic models breaking out of their test environments, hacking into other companies. So this is an important moment because it's the first time we're seeing from the administration some sort of action. The details are not even clear to the AI companies.

My sources have told me that even in the day, you know, these final days, they don't know exactly what it's going to look like. What is this framework going to look like? Even who is going to be handling it within the administration?

[09:55:00]

They're going to find all of this out today in these meetings with the White House. The details also will not be published publicly. But it is something that the industry has been begging for.

OpenAI's Chris Lehane, he's the chief of global affairs. He says, "The administration's expected action this week on frontier AI could be an important step toward closing the gap between innovation and governance, a clear, credible national framework for evaluating the most advanced AI systems with defined criteria, timelines, and a process that allows them to be deployed safely and quickly."

Again, this is a voluntary system, but it is an important first step to see what the government is willing to do when it comes to regulating these systems that, as we're seeing, are having some real- world effects and, in some cases, harms on critical infrastructure.

SIDNER: Yes, asking the government to step in, but also the government doesn't understand it as well as they do. And they could actually regulate themselves as well. There's that possibility.

GOLD: They're having a big influence on these conversations, but it's an important conversation to have.

SIDNER: It is. All right. Hadas, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

BOLDUAN: And thank you all so much for joining us. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL. "THE SITUATION ROOM" is up next.

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