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Supreme Court Backs, For Now, Trump's Order To Curb Mail Ballots; Lindsay Clancy Trial Judge Denies Mistrial Request; United Airlines Announces 10 New Global Destinations For 2027. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired August 25, 2026 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

JOHN FRITZE, CNN SUPREME COURT REPORTER: And I think because of that this case is likely to get back to the Supreme Court very, very quickly, potentially by the end of this week, maybe next week.

As we sit here, a federal court in Massachusetts is poised potentially as soon as today to rule again. The judge in that court has already ruled before that she thinks this order from President Trump is illegal. And so if she follows that path -- if she rules the same way, that's going to cue up a series of fast-track appeals that will bring it back to the nation's highest court.

Now, it's important to note that President Trump has never defended the actual legality of this order; only this technical timing issue. That potentially has signaled that even the administration knows that it has much harder row on the second on the second round.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: So interesting. And when you talk about fast-track, this is like super fast-track when it comes to the Supreme Court -- what we could be looking at.

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. New overnight, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries posted a video confirming and also defending his meeting with the president's son-in-law, Jared Kushner -- a meeting that had been criticized by some on the left.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. HAKEEM JEFFRIES (D-NY): He asked for a meeting, and I took it to discuss the affordability crisis that exists that is not a hoax. At the same period of time I shouldn't have to say it but I am. No one is going to get a pass. We're going to hold every single member of the Trump cartel accountable.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right. With us now, White House correspondent for USA Today, Francesca Chambers. And CNN political analyst and White House correspondent for The New York Times, Zolan Kanno-Youngs. And Zolan, this was in your paper -- Maggie Haberman and Annie Karni

-- the other day. And it is notable that the minority leader, you know, confirmed it on the record. No small thing when no one, you know, had put their name to a confirmation of the meeting. Now the minority leader has.

What do you think of the fact that he felt the need to post that video wearing the green Yankees hat?

ZOLAN KANNO-YOUNGS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORK TIMES: It really just shows just the -- how Hakeem Jeffries, at this point, is jostling between these different factions in the Democratic Party. There -- it definitely was noticeable after this story -- the reaction from some in the progressive movement who saw it as a sign that potentially there wouldn't be the accountability they've been pushing for, for the Trump administration. The fact that Jeffries took this meeting with the president's son-in-law to reportedly try to find some sort of common ground here.

Also, you could imagine that the senior Democrat in this case is aware of the likely possibility that you're going to have a flood of antiestablishment Democrats coming into Congress after this midterm where the Democrats are expected to make gains. We've seen many of those candidates running, calling for more investigations and accountability of the Trump administration here.

So this video seemed like a move to also sort of address some of those rising concerns coming from that flank of the party.

BERMAN: And Francesca, the video was filled with words like affordability, but also corruption. It was almost, it seemed, like a roadmap for what the minority leader wants Democrats to be running on.

FRANCESCA CHAMBERS, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, USA TODAY (via Webex by Cisco): Yeah. And to pick up on where Zolan left off there, you know, he did come under scrutiny from some Democrats with other Democrats saying look, you know, if we take back the House of Representatives, if you want to get legislation passed, we're going to have to find a way to work with the White House on these things.

I think from the White House perspective on this and Republicans' perspective on this, you know, you had the current Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, you know, trying to distance Republicans from it a little bit, saying that Jared doesn't hold an official role in the White House. And while that's technically true, I mean, he is the president's lead negotiator when it comes to big foreign policy ticket items, including negotiating with Iran right now to try and end that conflict.

And so for Republicans, it's being seen also negatively by some of them as an admission, potentially, by the Trump White House that they could lose the House of Representatives, and they may need to work with Democrats.

BERMAN: So this just in if both of you have been checking your social media feeds. President Trump just posted a few minutes ago, Francesca. This has to do with the trade war with Canada. He said, "The United States is giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America in that we don't expect to be doing much business with Ontario any longer."

All right. Interesting that he goes there so quickly in this battle, Francesca.

[07:35:00]

CHAMBERS: Well, you may recall that he, you know, previously changed the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America as part of his dispute with our neighbor to the south, Mexico. So certainly, this follows the same playbook that he's applied to some of these other conflicts that he's had with U.S. allies that are nearby.

But with respect to the actual trade dispute with Canada right now -- I mean, we're seeing this escalate, as you just pointed out there, very quickly with these tit-for-tat tariffs. And the question now is whether or not these are just negotiating tactics that leave both sides to come back to the table and make a deal or is this going to be an extended trade war between the two nations at a time when prices are already higher leading into the midterm elections. That's something that has some Republicans on the ballot and some Republicans off the ballot concerned this year.

BERMAN: Yeah.

Zolan, shifting quickly to South Carolina where there is this runoff today. People are voting whether to, you know, send Darline Graham to be the nominee for the Republicans to fill the Senate seat permanently of Lindsey Graham or Ralph Norman.

The president's PAC, MAGA Inc., has now spent $800,000 there in the get out the vote effort. How important is this for the president -- for Darline Graham -- whom he has supported to win?

KANNO-YOUNGS: Well, it seems to be very important -- I mean, compared to some of the other primaries that we've seen. He's really, you know, leaning into this race and actually trying to support Darline Graham here.

The question is going to be, like it is with each of these primaries, does the president still have the juice when it comes to his endorsement in these kinds of primaries. For Senate, thus far, he has -- but we have seen some mixed results when it comes to some of these House races too.

Also, look, this race is kind of complicated, right? Yes, you've got the president as a factor. You've also got a tight schedule, right, obviously. Darline Graham also had that answer at the last debate about foreign policy and will that also impact voters. Lindsey Graham as well. The late Lindsey Graham did have, at times, a complicated relationship with voters in South Carolina because of his previous support for immigration reform as well.

So all of this will come to a head, you know, later today as we see this primary come.

BERMAN: And as Kate points out, these people have to go back and vote again and again and again in this race.

KANNO-YOUNGS: That's right.

BERMAN: It'll be interesting to see tonight as it evolves. And, of course, you can tune into CNN all night long to get those results live as they come in.

Francesca Chambers, Zolan Kanno-Youngs, thanks so much -- Sara.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Thank you, John.

New this morning, China is warning that new U.S. economic sanctions on Iran "will only further intensify tensions" and that Beijing's cooperation with Iran should not be disrupted. This is all after the Trump administration laid out its threat of an "Economic D-Day" on Iran.

Let's discuss with CNN political and global affairs commentator Sabrina Singh, and CNN global economic analyst Rana Foroohar. Thank you both for being here.

Rana, I'm going to start with you because we heard from Scott Bessent that China imports up to 90 percent of all the oil that Iran exports. But when he was asked why the U.S. hasn't immediately sanctioned China -- because he said look, others that are doing this need to stop doing business with China -- that it would blow up the global financial system.

If the U.S. were to sanction China and India, and anyone else who is getting oil from Iran, what might be the blowback?

RANA FOROOHAR, CNN GLOBAL ECONOMIC ANALYST, GLOBAL BUSINESS COLUMNIST AND ASSOCIATE EDITOR, FINANCIAL TIMES (via Webex by Cisco): Well, you know, there's all too much truth, actually, in Sec. Bessent's comments.

If you take the U.S. at its word and we say all right, there's going to be a complete tightening of any kind of foreign money going into and out of Iran, that includes China and that includes anybody that China would be trading with.

So you're talking about going back to the beginning of Trump 2, really, where you've got tariffs on everyone, you know. You've got tariffs on adversaries and allies alike. And, you know, at that point it didn't blow up the global financial system because it was -- you know, it was new and everybody was sort of, like, is this the boy who cried wolf.

At this point, Sara, if you start to see that kind of a trade war again -- that kind of provocation, particularly with China at a time when there are already tensions over Taiwan, there is an AI arms race with -- between the U.S. and China -- I think there would be massive economic fallout. And it would be coming at a time where this isn't the only thing

happening to the U.S. financial system, you know. As you know, Scott Bessent has been using treasury money to buy back U.S. bonds to prop up the U.S. bond market because not enough foreign buyers want to buy U.S. debt right now. There's a sense that America is a little dodgy right now. It's a little weak. That the administration is not doing well with the economy and people are shying away from dollars.

So I do think it would be a pretty significant impact if it came to pass.

[07:40:00]

SIDNER: Sabrina, now to you. I'm wondering what you think of the sequence of things here. For example, normally, wouldn't sanctions be imposed as a threat before military action? Now we're seeing this as a threat after words -- more sanctions.

What does this tell you about the administration's strategy?

SABRINA SINGH, CNN POLITICAL AND GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR, FORMER PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: That's right. I mean, usually, the sequencing of events is there is some type of diplomatic talks as you're negotiating through those conversations, like the United States can use economic sanctions to get -- have a stronger hand at the negotiating table. And ultimately, what hangs over the threat of that diplomacy and economic sanctions is the threat of going to war.

And so what's odd about what the administration has done is basically reversed order or reversed engineered the thinking process when it comes to Iran and went in very hard militarily and struck over thousands and thousands of targets all across the country.

And now we're, you know -- at the very beginning of this war I was hesitant to use the word "quagmire" because it did seem like we did have an exit strategy and that, you know, the president was forecasting this was going to be four to six weeks.

Now we're sort of in this quagmire of how does the U.S. extract itself from the Strait of Hormuz and end a naval blockade when Iran has basically said we're going to continue to charge tolls through the strait? And now the U.S. is trying to force Iran's hand back to the negotiating table through economic means, which we know are going to take a lot of time.

And to the point earlier that was being made, China is Iran's largest economic partner. And to get China to say we're not going to trade or, you know, buy even sanctioned Iranian oil, which they've been doing for a very long time, I think that's going to be very difficult, especially since we have President Xi coming to the U.S. in September to meet with the president.

SIDNER: Rana, Iran has already faced punishing sanctions for a long time -- for decades -- but the Trump administration said this was going to be the worst. An "Economic D-Day" if you will is how they put it. Is that what happened? Is that what you saw was laid out by Sec.

Bessent?

FOROOHAR: Well, I saw a lot of vagaries and a lot of provocation about, you know, what could happen. I didn't see Sec. Bessent saying yes, we are cracking down completely on China and here is what we're going to do -- a, b, c -- here's the plan.

I think that this goes to the point about, you know, wouldn't financial sanctions have been better before military action. I think military action was -- you know, it's kind of part and parcel of the way the president likes to do business -- shock and awe.

But the fact of the matter is Iran has the high ground now, literally, in the Strait of Hormuz. It has become the world's biggest economic chokepoint. And that's the sad truth. America has not won this war. Iran does have control of the Strait of Hormuz.

China has the upper hand in terms of dealing with Iran right now. China also, by the way, is exploiting -- better exploiting chokepoints and maritime pathways all over the world. They've just started a weekly shipping route across the Arctic in order to avoid conflict in some of these areas. That's long-term thinking. That's 20-year thinking, which is what China does.

It feels to me like this war has been, honestly, planned on the back of an envelope, you know, with sort of hope rather than real strategy. And I think that that's why the U.S. is in the position it is in right now.

SIDNER: Rana Foroohar, Sabrina Singh, it's a pleasure to talk to you guys through these complicated scenarios that we now find ourselves in. Appreciate you -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: So the Lindsay Clancy murder trial is set to resume very soon in Massachusetts, and this case is really in its final stretch.

Today a forensic psychologist is going to be back on the stand. That's after a dramatic and abrupt end to his testimony yesterday that led to the defense asking for a mistrial. The judge denied that motion but also then had a chat with the jury about it after this witness brought up Lindsay Clancy's Catholic faith.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE WILLIAM SULLIVAN, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE, MASSACHUSETTS SUPERIOR COURT: The religion that the defendant was raised with is absolutely an inappropriate area of testimony. It is to be stricken. It is not to be considered.

Secondly, the witness' understanding of Catholic teachings and considerations, again, is immaterial, it's irrelevant. It needs to be disregarded.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BOLDUAN: CNN's Brynn Gingras joins me now. That judge was not mincing words.

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I was going to say he was not happy.

BOLDUAN: Yeah.

GINGRAS: I watched it all go down. This is the second time that religion has been brought into this case. It's the second time the defense actually could have called for a mistrial by law. But this the first time that he actually did it. He said he did it reluctantly. Of course, the judge denying that but giving those strict orders to disregard that.

This all happened when the witness who was on the stand for the rebuttal case for the prosecution essentially was trying to get at why he thinks there might be a motive to why Lindsay Clancy might have committed these acts.

[07:45:00]

So that's what happened. Literally, court just ended there, and the judge sent the jury home. He said he didn't want them hearing any of that and taking that all in as that being the sort of exclamation point for the day.

So that witness -- let's talk about him. He was a very strong witness for the prosecution. It really has become the battle of the experts.

BOLDUAN: Um-hum.

GINGRAS: This psychologist has met with Lindsay Clancy several times and essentially was trying to get at, you know, exactly that -- why would she have committed this? He claims that essentially, she was extremely suicidal and wanted to take her own life and believed that her children would really suffer if she weren't still in their lives.

And he also got to the point of the hallucinations, right -- the defense's argument. Did she hear this external voice commanding her to do it. Take a listen to what he said to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. KIRK HEILBRUN, PSYCHOLOGIST WHO EXAMINED LINDSAY CLANCY: So there ending up being, in my mind, two possible explanations for why she did what she did.

The first being the acute psychosis with command hallucinations, and the second being this was a serious suicide attempt, and she wanted the children to be with her so she wouldn't be separated from them, and so they wouldn't have to suffer after she was gone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GINGRAS: And so, yeah, that was one of his points. Another one of his points was that he believes that Lindsay Clancy only talked about this command hallucination for the 18 minutes that the act was going on. Didn't hear the voices before. Didn't hear the voices after. He says that is extremely rare and that really resonated, it seems, with the courtroom at that time.

So we haven't heard the cross-examination. The defense is very strong in this case. So it's going to be interesting where we pick up today to see where that goes. And then we're going to get to closing arguments probably by tomorrow, Kate. This case is definitely wrapping up.

BOLDUAN: The cross-examination will be especially fascinating with this witness --

GINGRAS: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- given everything that went down yesterday.

GINGRAS: Yes.

BOLDUAN: And we'll have to see where that picks up now. But thank you so much, Brynn.

GINGRAS: All right.

BOLDUAN: It's good to see you -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right. Thank you so much, Kate.

Still one of the biggest travel weekends of the summer is ahead and this morning we speak to the CEO of one of the biggest airlines out there that's got some new announcements this morning about its planes and where it is flying to nonstop.

Plus, a bear caught red-handed stealing from a fire station. There it goes. What did it get, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL)

[07:52:15]

BOLDUAN: Another holiday weekend is almost upon us. Labor Day weekend, of course, nine days away. More than 17 million people flew last year for the long weekend, and this year could be even busier.

United Airlines is out this morning with its forecast for travel. This company says that it's bracing for record-setting numbers across its hubs. It's actually expecting more than 3.4 million customers through the holiday weekend. That's about 300,000 more for United than last year.

At the very same time, United is dropping a big announcement today, the largest international route expansion in the airline's history. They're adding 10 new international routes for next year, including new direct flights to destinations in Spain, France, Italy, and Japan.

And joining us right now is United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby for more on this. It's good to see you, Scott. Thanks for being here.

The largest international network expansion in the company's --

SCOTT KIRBY, CEO, UNITED AIRLINES: Thanks for having me.

BOLDUAN: -- in your company's history.

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: Why so many routes and -- routes. Why are you bullish on these cities?

KIRBY: Yeah. Well, it's a very exciting day. It's a cool announcement. It's great for United's employees and for our customers. And we really -- we've been opening up new destinations around the globe for several years now. But now that the aircraft manufacturers, Boeing and Airbus, are starting to deliver us all the aircraft we've ordered, this let us have a really big push this year to announce 10 new international destinations. To the best of my knowledge it's more than any airline in history has ever announced in a single day.

And so all of -- almost all of the places that we've flown to have introduced Americans to new cities and new places around the globe. They've all done really well, and we're excited to add 10 more to the roster for our customers to get to traveling next summer.

BOLDUAN: People have been traveling in just big numbers. We've seen this really since the pandemic. Like, no matter what, people are --

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- people want to travel.

Is this a sign with this announcement today that United, as a company, thinks that this post-pandemic trend is here to stay?

KIRBY: Oh, I think it is. It really is here to stay. And my, what a difference it makes. You know, remember back during the dark days of the pandemic all the experts thought travel demand would never recover. And, in fact, as we've come out of it, if it did anything it was make people realize how much experience matters and getting out and seeing the world matters.

And so what we've been doing is adding exotic new destinations that, you know, go beyond the traditional -- the traditional locales. And I think that actually also drives more demand because when you make it easy to get here from -- you know, from Newark to all -- you know, to eight new cities around the globe, it makes it a lot easier to take that extra vacation and see somewhere that was really never on your list before to try to go to.

But we think demand is strong and we think this is the new normal.

BOLDUAN: Yes. I speak for every air traveler. A direct flight is preferred, sir.

[07:55:00]

But also, one thing --

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- that we know --

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- is it is also getting more expensive. I mean, jet fuel surged because of the Iran war.

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: Airfares have gone up. I think some of the numbers we saw was like 25 percent year-over-year. That is super painful.

When are they going to come down, Scott?

KIRBY: Yeah. Airfares really -- air travel remains a great value and a great bargain. And you're right. Costs have gone up in the airline industry and that has driven airfares up, but they're still 13 percent lower than they were pre-COVID.

And what's really happening I think is that it bounced back from the artificial lows that happened because of COVID. When air travel demand collapsed, pricing collapsed. And so they're coming back to a more normal level.

You know, air travel is still a great value. There was an article this week in a newspaper about travel to Hawaii and when Pan Am first started. It's cheaper today to fly to Hawaii than it was when Pan Am first started. Not just in real terms, in absolute terms it's cheaper to fly.

So air travel is a great -- a great value and airfares have recovered but they're recovering to a more normal level that existed prior to COVID.

BOLDUAN: It's one thing to have the routes and have the direct flights, and it's another thing to be able to get there and for things -- for the flights to actually take off. You're adding these routes.

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: You're looking to expand to JFK. But we have all seen, especially at United -- and you know this as well after last summer -- how the country's air traffic control system just can't handle what it already has.

I mean, do you -- and you were outspoken about this. Do you think the government is making --

KIRBY: Yeah.

BOLDUAN: -- the improvements necessary to the air traffic control system fast enough?

KIRBY: Yes. We have the most -- at least for air travel, we have the most supportive administration. A DOT secretary that is -- cares about it. The best FAA administrator we've had in my career. And we've seen huge improvement.

In fact, today's announcement is only possible because of what the FAA has done here in Newark. Eight new international destinations in Newark. And what the FAA has done in Newark -- getting closer to full staffing, to slot control the airport is really what enabled it. Newark is now, for the first time in my career, the most reliable of three New York airports because of what our people are doing but also because the FAA enabled it.

And so I've seen huge progress, you know. We're not to the end yet and there's still a long way to go, but I have seen huge progress. And Newark is a perfect example of how -- Newark runs better today than it has at any time in our recorded history that we have the data for.

It's still New York airspace and it's still challenges, it's still tough, but it runs better than it ever has. And we couldn't have done today's announcement without the enabling factors that the FAA has done to make Newark run better.

BOLDUAN: United has made more than a few headlines on merger rumors reporting you approached Delta last year and asked the Trump administration for preliminary approval to merge with American Airlines in April. Neither of those really moved forward.

Are you still looking for a merger?

KIRBY: You know, we have a great standalone plan here at United. You can see it with 10 new international routes today. And the only one that we've ever publicly commented on was American. The goal there was to really create a true flag carrier for the United States.

And I want a U.S. airline -- I want United to be the best airline in the history of aviation not just in totality. I think we probably already are the best in the world if you count the technology and service, reliability, and everything.

But there are areas like the product where Middle Eastern and Asian carriers are still ahead of an airline like United. They get a lot of state subsidies and support and other things that we don't have or don't want.

But a goal to create an airline that all U.S. citizens can be truly proud of is something I want to do with a merger or without. But, you know, a merger would certainly help give you the scale to grow that even more.

But, you know, I don't think anything is going to happen. It requires a willing partner, as we said at the time. It requires a willing partner and without a willing partner we have a great standalone plan and we're going to keep focusing on building the best airline in history with route announcements like today and great aircraft like the one that you see behind me.

BOLDUAN: I mean, it is quite a flex to be able to do a live shot with an airline -- a new airline of your own -- the airplane of your own behind you.

It's good to see you, Scott. Thank you so much for coming in. I really appreciate your time --

KIRBY: Thanks, Kate. Yeah, thanks for having me.

BOLDUAN: -- coming to us with this announcement.

KIRBY: Yeah, thank you.

BOLDUAN: Thank you. Have a good summer. Thank you -- John.

BERMAN: Nonstop, Newark to Luxembourg. Just like the people demanded.

BOLDUAN: Yes! Lux is amazing.

BERMAN: New video out of San Francisco shows a train operator appearing to fall asleep just moments before crashing into another train. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency says an initial investigation appears to show operator fatigue caused the crash. The driver and two passengers were inside -- who were inside were not hurt.

Target has pulled a children's Halloween costume from stores that critics say resembled blackface and minstrel show caricatures. Target apologized and said in a statement, "The costume is offensive and no longer for sale." The statement went on to say, "The company is looking closely at how this happened and what needs to change to ensure this won't happen again."