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Testimony Resumes in Trial of Mom Accused of Killing Her Three Children; Trump Weighs Pirro's Future Over Reflecting Pool Case; Iran Threatens to Strike U.S. Navy if Blockade Continues; FBI Agent Accused of Stealing Nearly $1 Million in Cryptocurrency; Small Plane Makes Emergency Landing on Florida Interstate; Texas Governor Puts Hold on New Data Center Projects. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired August 04, 2026 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00]

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: have to be prolonged witness testifying as to a fact that the prosecution has to prove and remember, the defense in this case is, for all intents and purposes, conceding that Lindsay Clancy killed her three children, the event itself. And so the stipulation was not explained in detail, but the judge had to make sure this was freely and voluntarily given by the client, the defendant. Lindsay Clancy. Listen to the exchange between the judge and the defendant.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE WILLIAM SULLIVAN, 11TH SUBCIRCUIT COURT, COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS: Do you understand by signing or going along with that stipulation, you are basically relieving the commonwealth of its burden to prove those certain facts? Do you understand that?

LINDSAY CLANCY, ACCUSED OF KILLING HER THREE CHILDREN: Yes, your honor.

SULLIVAN: All right. Is that what you want to do at this point?

CLANCY: Yes.

SULLIVAN: All right. Have you gone over this stipulation or the summary of the stipulations with Attorney Reddington?

CLANCY: Yes, I have.

SULLIVAN: All right. Need any more time to do that?

CLANCY: No, thank you.

SULLIVAN: All right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: I do remember at the final pretrial hearing, there was a lot of argument about stipulation. The defense wanted to stipulate to everything, so many things in this trial, and the prosecution was really pushing back.

Defense said, we'll concede, you can stipulate to the mechanics of the homicide, and especially the autopsy photos. He didn't want the jury to see any autopsy photos, and the prosecution said, well, then you tell me. What life doesn't matter here? Does Cora's life not matter? Does Callan's life not matter? Does Dawson's life not matter?

She was very upset about it. So I think there will be some stipulations, but the core elements -- because she said, we have to prove extreme atrocity and cruelty, your honor. It's an element of premeditated murder. I think this will be coming in. We will not, however, the public, see any autopsy photos.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": And jurors were also, Jean, shown photos of blood inside the home, as well as additional pill bottles that were not originally found by police.

CASAREZ: The forensic criminalists took the stand, and they were testifying that they swabbed the blood areas in the home. Now, that's on the windowsill right there, which you're looking at, the window that she ultimately jumped out of. There was blood on the floor.

There was blood on the mirror. There was also some staining on the outside of the window. That's the upstairs window right there. And they did testing on that. That's on the floor. So there was a lot of blood.

But every single doctor that has taken the stand said that it was a superficial wound. And the surgeon explained it today, saying that the cuts on the wrist and the neck, that there was fat coming out, but not muscle or tendon. And that's how they determine what is superficial and what is more serious.

KEILAR: Oh, tough details. Jean Casarez, thank you so much. So not fired, but on thin ice. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro still has a job, even though she dropped charges in the Reflecting Pool vandalism case. We have some new reporting on what went down at her meeting at the White House

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:37:03]

BRIAN ABEL, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Charges have now been dropped against four people accused of vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and President Trump Is furious with his handpicked prosecutor for ending the case, saying she folded like an umbrella. Jeanine Pirro now in the hottest of hot seats despite a friendship with Trump that dates back more than 30 years.

CNN Chief Media Analyst, Brian Stelter is joining us now. And Brian, Pirro is the top prosecutor for the District of Columbia and until last Friday, led this charge against these defendants. Now Trump says she choked. How long does she have?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: Right and it's incredible that you see this schism between Pirro and Trump because even though Trump has stacked his government with loyal figures, Pirro is uniquely loyal. They go back decades. Pirro and Trump supported each other all throughout their various careers in New York City. Pirro was one of Trump's staunchest defenders on Fox News during Trump's first term in office.

They were often in touch behind the scenes, sharing information and giving advice to one another. Trump was obsessed with Pirro's show when she was on Fox News. But now, she's working for him and it seems even Pirro is not immune from Trump's wrath when he feels that she is undermining him.

Now, why is she doing that? Because the facts don't line up with the tall tales that he's been telling and it's all been lined out and laid out now in government filings. But we're in a situation now where everyone's watching to see if Pirro is going to be back to her normal job and actually doing the job day by day, maybe he is deciding for now to keep her in the position. But knowing that out there in the public, she's twisting in the peripheral (ph) wind now that he has publicly criticized her.

But yeah, definitely not any ordinary Trump relationship, it is a long-term long friendship and it's being tested by this Reflecting Pool fixation.

ABEL: And Brian, as he was voicing his frustrations with Pirro, he also mentioned --

STELTER: Yeah.

ABEL: -- Fox News' coverage of the Reflecting Pool. You got a chance to take a look at some of that coverage. What did you see?

STELTER: What stands out to me about this is the lack of attention from Pirro's former network and more broadly from pro-Trump media outlets because, you know, think about this Reflecting Pool mess. We've been talking about it all summer. I've seen some commentators say this is the story of the summer, you know, it's relatively low stakes. It's not about life or death. It's kind of like reality T.V. It's a mystery.

You know, what went wrong there? Whose fault is it? It became a crime saga because of Pirro in her office charging these individuals. Now, the charges dropped, very dramatic in lots of ways, kind of like the story of the summer. Fox was very into the story back in June when there were these arrests and indictments. Fox was pushing hard, promoting the president's apparent lies about the Reflecting Pool.

[13:40:00]

But now that these charges have been dropped, Fox has dropped the story, very intently it seems to me. Fox has only briefly mentioned Pirro's office dropping the charges. It is really not engaged in what has gone wrong here. Fox did show the president's criticism of Pirro yesterday. But now, her former network is not defending her, not backing her up, not really presenting her side of the story in any detail. It seems to me another example of the pro-Trump media not wanting to challenge Trump's fanciful or incredible claims and in this case, it involved that Reflecting Pool.

ABEL: All right, Brian Seltzer for us. Brian, thank you. And still to come for us, a second bison encounter in Yellowstone National Park, this time, the close call was with a child.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:45:21]

KEILAR: Talks to cool tensions between the U.S. and Iran are progressing according to Qatari mediators who said today, that a potential agreement to end the conflict is being circulated, but that hasn't stopped Iran from making its latest threat to strike naval ships if the U.S. blockade continues.

Iran is seeking to control traffic in the Strait of Hormuz and warned that its armed forces will not stand idly by after the U.S. re-imposed its blockade last month after a ceasefire collapsed. U.S. Central Command says under the blockade, it has redirected 44 commercial vessels, disabled two, and boarded two others to ensure compliance.

Let's talk about this with former Air Force Secretary, Frank Kendall. He's the author of "Lethal Autonomy: The Future of Warfare, Whether We Like It or Not." So you have Iran, and thank you so much for joining us in studio, but you have Iran threatening to strike the U.S. Navy if the blockade of Iran's ports continues here. How real is that threat as you see it?

FRANK KENDALL, FORMER AIR FORCE SECRETARY: They have a capacity to strike. It's not an overwhelming capacity, and the Navy can defend itself pretty well. We're playing an interesting game here of trying to get to some kind of a settlement using some level of coercion back and forth, threats of coercion by both sides. It's been in the interest of both parties to cut a deal and to get this thing over with.

Hopefully, I think at this point, I may be cautiously optimistic. We've had so many false hopes before, but I think it's becoming increasingly clear that neither side can really benefit much from continuing this conflict. So hopefully, you can bring it to a close.

KEILAR: Do you see it at this point, as a negotiation to open up traffic in the Strait of Hormuz and the real issue that the president waged war on here, the nuclear capability of Iran, is something that just has to be dealt with another day?

KENDALL: I think that's a great point. I don't think we're anywhere near a settlement on the nuclear program of Iran. I think we may be near a settlement on the Strait and getting the Strait of Hormuz open so traffic can flow normally through it, which it hasn't for several months now.

I don't know that we'll be able to get to a point where Iran doesn't assert some degree of sovereignty over the Strait, which is a net loss from where we started out, but at least we'll be able to have traffic flow through the Strait again.

KEILAR: You said it's a net loss from where it started out. The military operations have been successful, but strategically -- what do you think?

KENDALL: I don't call it a success. We went in there attempting to do regime change, that failed.

KEILAR: Because it didn't satisfy the strategic objectives.

(CROSSTALK)

KENDALL: We went in there trying to -- exactly. We tried to deny them the ability to control the Strait, that failed. They've shown that they can continue to control the Strait despite our best efforts over several months. That's a victory for Iran.

And they may end up in a position that is worse for us than where we started, which was free international waterway, which now, again, some degree of sovereignty is asserted by Iran over that waterway. That's not a gain. That's a loss.

KEILAR: As you see Iran and Oman discussing, right, what this is going to look like, this opening of the Strait, how do you see the U.S. fitting into this, and does the U.S. have leverage here?

KENDALL: I think we have some influence over Oman. We have influence through the other states in the Gulf region. It may be limited at this stage. Everybody wants the Strait open, and some of the other parties that are involved in being affected by the fact that it's closed may be more willing to allow Iran to have a degree of sovereignty than the U.S. would like.

That may be where we end up, though.

KEILAR: Let's talk about military capabilities, munitions supplies at this point. Reuters is reporting that according to three people familiar with the data, the U.S. Army has used up much of its stockpile of these highly accurate long-range missiles during this war. These are primarily those ATACMS and the precision strike missiles. Of those, sources say that the U.S. has virtually all of those type of weapons.

What are your concerns here, and do you think there is enough to go the distance?

KENDALL: We have a pretty good stockpile of munitions, but not the more sophisticated ones. Some types, I think, we may be low on. I'm more concerned about the air defense missiles like Patriot than I am about anything else at this point in time.

They're very important to Ukraine, of course, in their conflict with Russia. They're very important in the Pacific. I think, there are some reports at least that we have drawn that stockpile down considerably. It takes a matter of years to replenish these stockpiles under any circumstances. [13:50:00]

The Pentagon is trying to increase the capacity to produce them. That will take time, and then production itself will take time. So we're not going to recover from this very quickly.

The Army missile you mentioned, the version of ATACMS, which is highly precise, called PRISM, that's only been in production for a relatively short time. So our stockpiles weren't very large to begin with for that. And to the extent that we've drawn that down, we're losing ground there as well.

KEILAR: Really quickly, if the U.S. needs Patriot missiles in another conflict in the near term, and they don't have enough, what does that war look like?

KENDALL: Well, we're unable to defend our bases and critical assets the way we need to against the threats. China, in particular, has been building a vast arsenal of missiles to threaten our bases in the Pacific. I've been concerned about this for about 15 years now. And our stockage of Patriots was less than I'd like to see it be even before this conflict. So now it's even lower.

So we're accepting a lot of risk in other parts of the world. Certainly Ukraine, as I mentioned, really needs Patriots to defend against the Russian ballistic missiles. And we need Patriots in the Pacific to defend against Chinese very large arsenal that they have.

KEILAR: Former Secretary Frank Kendall, thank you so much for the insight. We appreciate it.

KENDALL: Thank you. Good to be with you.

KEILAR: Brian?

ABEL: Now to some of the other headlines we are watching this hour. An FBI agent is accused of stealing more than $900,000 in cryptocurrency. Court documents allege the agent stole the crypto from accounts the agency was monitoring and used his internal access to transfer the holdings into his personal account. The agent was fired and later arrested. The criminal complaint lists charges against him related to interstate transport of stolen goods.

The FAA is investigating after a small plane made an emergency landing on a Florida highway. Look at this, a truck driver's dash cam capturing the moment. You can see that plane gliding under a highway sign, missing it by just feet. The plane was on a training flight and preparing to land at Pensacola's airport when the pilot radioed that he was losing oil pressure and there were fumes in the cockpit. A flight student was also on board. Nobody was hurt.

And new heart-stopping video of a bison charging at a child at Yellowstone National Park.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, go back.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Go back.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Go back.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do not go towards him.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Go back. Go away from him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: People watching certainly knew the danger. Video of this close encounter was captured by a park visitor. The bison was reportedly walking near a pedestrian pathway when a child in the passing group began to run. Thankfully, that bison stopped after a brief chase and the child is alright.

This is the second time in just a month that a dangerous bison run-in at Yellowstone has been caught on camera. In July, a 65-year-old grandfather, remember this, tossed eight feet into the air after a bison charged at him. And he is still recovering.

Still ahead for us, pressing pause. Texas' governor issues a moratorium on new data center projects amid backlash from several communities. We're going to talk about it next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:57:46]

ABEL: The Republican governor of Texas calling for a pause before hooking up new data centers to the state's power grid. In a new letter, Governor Greg Abbott demands state regulators audit each project before it can advance.

The governor warns that the grid operator is now considering approximately 474 gigawatts of requests for new power. 90 percent of those requests are said to be from data centers. How much is 474 gigawatts of energy? Well, the letter says that it is more than five times the state's record for peak electricity demand.

Let's discuss this with CNN's Lisa Eadicicco. And Lisa, what is Governor Abbott doing exactly here?

LISA EADICICCO, CNN BUSINESS TECH EDITOR: So essentially, what he's asking is for these energy and utility regulators to audit these data center projects that are requesting to connect to the grid and make sure they're meeting the necessary requirements. And if they're not, then they should not be granted access to the grid.

He's also asking for more details about whether these data center projects are paying their own way, bringing their own power, bringing their own water, among other details. And he says that this is part of an effort to make sure that the grid remains reliable and stable, saying that, simply put, Texans must come first. Now, this comes as there has been growing backlash against the data center build-out across the United States over a variety of different factors, such as environmental impacts and electricity usage. In fact, Data Center Watch, an organization that tracks these oppositions, says that $130 billion worth of data center projects have been either blocked or delayed in the first quarter of 2026 alone.

So this is definitely a topic that has been on many people's minds and will likely continue to moving forward as well. And this move from Governor Abbott here is the latest example.

ABEL: On many people's minds beyond just Texas, this has happened as a backdrop also to a big meeting at the White House on A.I. What can you tell us about that?

EADICICCO: Yeah, so this meeting that's happening at the White House, there are representatives from top A.I. firms, including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta, and they're discussing a framework that would allow the government to review frontier A.I. models ahead of their public release. Now, this is part of an executive order that was signed by --