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Lindsay Clancy Trial Continues; Two Pennsylvanians Die From Measles; South Carolina Holds Senate Primary; Interview With Mayor of Brampton, Ontario, Patrick Brown. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired August 25, 2026 - 13:00   ET

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

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BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: An all-out trade war. Canada set to enact tariffs on more than 700 American goods, matching the U.S. dollar for dollar in the economic battle between the two neighbors.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: And a test for President Trump. South Carolina Republicans go back to the polls in a special primary run-off for U.S. Senate. Six of his chosen candidates in primaries have lost this month so far.

And alarming new deaths from the measles. Two people have died from the disease in Pennsylvania. Both were unvaccinated.

We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SANCHEZ: We start this afternoon with Canada fighting back, vowing to match the U.S. dollar for dollar as this trade feud escalates. Starting two weeks from today, top Canadian officials say 15 to 50 percent tariffs will take effect on more than 700 American goods.

Meantime, President Trump is suggesting that he's toying with the idea of renaming Lake Ontario Lake America over this clash, also writing on social media -- quote -- "I deal with many countries, and Canada is easily the most difficult and unreasonable," blasting Canada's prime minister as weak and ineffective.

I'm joined now by the mayor of Brampton, Ontario, Patrick Brown.

Mayor, thank you so much for being with us.

First, I just want to get your reaction to that statement from President Trump, the most difficult and unreasonable nation to deal with.

PATRICK BROWN, MAYOR OF BRAMPTON, ONTARIO: It's a bit surreal.

Canada considers America our closest neighbor, friend, ally. We fought world wars together. We faced adversity together. And so we're in uncharted territory, where we're seeing this U.S. economic aggression, when we have, throughout our history, only have seen a close partnership.

SANCHEZ: We saw a response yesterday from the premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, telling President Trump to kiss his ass. And then, today, a few hours ago, he was on CNN saying that he wants to make a deal.

How do you feel about the way that the premier, that your premier has handled this conversation and this public escalation of rhetoric?

BROWN: Well, first of all, I think the name-calling started in the White House. I think a lot of Canadians are hurt by it. Donald Trump has challenged our sovereignty, our independence that we are fiercely proud of.

And so of course we want to have a deal. You know, we have built, frankly, an economic partnership over the last 120 years that is the envy of the world. And so to have this single moment in time where the president is trying to blow it up in a way that will hurt Americans and hurt Canadians is the last thing we want.

This is not a trade war that Canadians have chosen.

SANCHEZ: So I mentioned a moment ago the 700 U.S. goods that Canada is going to be targeting with these tariffs in two weeks. I wonder if you agree with Premier Ford that Canada should cut off electricity exports to the U.S. if this feud escalates.

BROWN: Well, I would say I think every tool in this trade war needs to be on the table with the goal of getting a deal.

We have had the closest economic partnership of any two countries in the world with the U.S. In many cases, we have families living on either side of the border. So these are friends and family. No one wants this trade war. No one wants to have to use tools like electricity or additional tariffs.

It's only going to hurt both countries, and so I think every tool needs to be on the table if Donald Trump wants to continue to go down this misguided path of tariffs and taxes, but the goal being we never need to utilize those tools.

SANCHEZ: Mayor, looking closely at the demands from the U.S., one of them stood out to me, the French language laws. They have become a sticking point in these negotiations.

The administration argues that American goods are effectively facing an unfair tax, that Canada essentially creates a trade barrier when it requires American producers to label its products in both English and French. Help us understand what is at stake here. How are Canadians harmed if these American goods only have English labels?

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BROWN: So, Canada is an officially bilingual country, and this is the law of the land.

We have a province, Quebec, where the primary language spoken is French. And English-language producers in Canada have to abide by the same rules. And so I think the Canadian side felt this was almost a poison pill put in last-minute to try not to have a deal.

And I think a lot of Canadians are just puzzled by the fact, why does Donald Trump want this economic fight, this trade war with Canada, when for 120 years we have had success in building product together?

Frankly, I think the only people celebrating right now and sipping champagne are auto producers in China, South Korea, the E.U., are now going to have access to a market that was dominated by North American auto producers.

SANCHEZ: Last question, do you think that these trade tensions make cooperation on other issues of international importance, namely the ongoing war with Iran, the war between Russia and Ukraine as well, does it make it harder to cooperate with the U.S. because of this?

BROWN: Possibly, in the sense that we have always depended on America as an ally.

And I think right now, with this economic aggression against Canada, Canadians are rightly bewildered that we would be Donald Trump's latest target. But I think, because of the fact that the majority of Americans don't support Donald Trump's tariffs, because there is a real sense of an integrated friendship, that I'm hopeful will get past this moment in time.

It's never a straight line. Sometimes, it zigzags, and I'm optimistic we're going to see the same type of prosperous relationship in the future that we have had in the past, and hopefully wisdom will win the day.

SANCHEZ: We will see where it zigzags next.

The mayor of Brampton, Ontario, Patrick Brown, thank you so much for joining us.

BROWN: My pleasure.

SANCHEZ: Of course -- Brianna.

KEILAR: The power of President Trump's endorsement is being tested right now in South Carolina. He's backing Senator Darline Graham in today's Senate primary run-off to see which Republican will replace her late brother Lindsey Graham's name on the ballot this November.

She's locked in a tight race with Congressman Ralph Norman. And the president super PAC, in the meantime, is putting its money behind Senator Graham, spending more than $800,000 on her campaign. That is despite a shaky debate performance where she admitted she didn't know much about national security issues.

Let's discuss with Meg Kinnard, who is a national politics reporter for the Associated Press. She has covered South Carolina politics extensively.

Thanks for being with us to talk about this race.

The big question is going to be about the president's backing, if it's going to be enough to get Senator Darline Graham over the finish line. What are you hearing from voters about that?

MEG KINNARD, ASSOCIATED PRESS: Hey, Brianna. It's great to be with you.

And that is the big question. We have talked to a lot of voters across this state over the last couple of weeks, particularly in this run-off space. And many of them have said that they are happy to go with the president's endorsement.

One gentleman that we talked to in Horry County near that rally site in Myrtle Beach said that whatever the president had to say in terms of candidates he had picked was good enough for him because he supported Trump.

But there have been plenty of others who have also voiced a lot of difference of opinion, in saying that they really respect the president perhaps, have voted for him before, but when it comes down to making a pick for the Senate, they were inclined to go another way.

So there's a lot of difference of opinion, certainly among these run- off voters here in South Carolina. But, as you noted, we have seen President Donald Trump, through money from his PAC, through holding that rally in Myrtle Beach, putting a lot of stake in his endorsement of Darline Graham in this run-off.

And so we will see in the results exactly how much sway that had with the voters.

KEILAR: What do voters tell you about Congressman Ralph Norman? He is one of the most conservative members of the house. He initially endorsed former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley in the 2024 primary when she was campaigning against Trump, though, later, he went to Trump. What are they saying about him?

KINNARD: There have been some who have noted that they like particularly Ralph Norman's stance when it comes to fiscal conservatism. He is one of those -- like Mark Sanford in the primary space before this run-off, is -- has been consistently talking about the need to rein in America's spending.

But Ralph Norman also, in his campaign for governor before this and also in the Senate race, has talked a lot about how he votes along with a lot of President Trump's legislative priorities. And voters have noted that they're watching that, they see that, they like that, and that perhaps it's time to give Ralph Norman a promotion from the House into the Senate.

So we will see exactly where a lot of that bears out in the votes, but at least in terms of what we're hearing from some, they're willing to give him a chance, but plenty of others are hearkening back in some ways to that support that Ralph Norman had for Nikki Haley in 2024.

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I have heard that come up several times in terms of marking that as a stance that Ralph Norman took against President Trump, and something that's been pointed out in some of the ads we're seeing from Darline Graham's campaign in this run-off.

KEILAR: A lot's been made of her debate performance. How much is that something that voters are talking about?

KINNARD: Well, it's, again, a difference of opinion.

But a lot of the voters that I have talked to particularly have said that they like her because she's focused on affordability. She talks often about gas prices and household goods prices, and those are things that are important to them. But there have been others who also point out that they feel that they could find Taiwan on a map.

And so they're concerned about having a representative in the Senate who doesn't either place a lot of stock in needing to know about national security or seeing that as something that, as a member of the U.S. Senate, one would need to be able to be knowledgeable about and conduct business over.

So, in this election season where we're hearing a lot about affordability-related issues, but also the war in Iran, those two major issues come up often in conversations with voters, and there have been references to some of the measures that they may feel that Darline Graham might not be ready to take in the Senate if she does come through this run-off and the November election.

KEILAR: Meg Kinnard, thank you so much for being with us to talk about this race that we're all watching.

And still to come: Pennsylvania records its first measles deaths in decades. What we know about these cases.

Plus, we're following the latest on the Lindsay Clancy trial. Our reporter was in the courtroom as a prosecution witness delivered key testimony about the mom's mental health before she strangled her three children.

We will have that and much more coming up on CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

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KEILAR: We have breaking news into CNN. The U.S. has now recorded its first measles-related deaths this year. Health officials in Pennsylvania say two unvaccinated people have died in Lancaster County.

This is the latest sobering statistic in a year that has been a record-breaking number of measles cases -- or seen that, rather, more than 2,700 cases so far. And this outbreak is happening as both the president and the nation's top health official baselessly link the MMR vaccine to autism.

Data shows there have been more cases detected in the year-and-a-half since RFK Jr. became health secretary than in the previous 25 years combined. And these recent deaths in Pennsylvania happened in the very county where Kennedy spoke out against vaccines back in 2021.

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ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR., U.S. HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: I am a measles survivor. It was extraordinary, lucky.

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KENNEDY: Very, very lucky to have lived through that nightmare, because we had to stay at home and watch TV the whole week with all of my brothers and sisters.

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KENNEDY: It was horrible. Oh. What is the cure? What is the cure for measles? Your measles is chicken soup and vitamin A.

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KEILAR: Let's bring in Dr. Peter Hotez, who is the dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. He's also the author of the book "Vaccines Did Not Cause Rachel's Autism: My Journey As a Vaccine Scientist, Pediatrician, and Autism Dad."

I just wonder how you're seeing those comments, considering we are looking at these deaths happening in Pennsylvania. How are you seeing the state of things right now?

DR. PETER HOTEZ, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE: You know, Brianna, as a country, we're going in the wrong direction. We have had now two deaths in Pennsylvania. Remember, we had two deaths in my state of Texas last year.

And since that big huge epidemic in West Texas that went up into the Panhandle and Kansas and New Mexico and multiple states and in the Southern Great Plains, it followed what -- followed was additional massive epidemics in Arizona and Utah, and then we're still on the heels of the South Carolina epidemic, and now this one.

So we're likely losing our measles elimination status, and measles is returning as a new normal to the United States. And it's a completely self-inflicted wound. There's no reason this should happen.

KEILAR: So Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro said this morning that he was actually late to a press conference because he was on the phone with Secretary Kennedy, and he said that he appreciated Kennedy's willingness to assist, but he thinks that Pennsylvania is able to manage this through its state Health Department. He said he was very blunt with Kennedy about the effect of the

rhetoric that is coming from him and his administration. What does it mean if that's the pattern that we are seeing where you have states dealing with this kind of thing who may feel that they're best going it alone? I mean, is that the right approach, or is that going to cause problems as well?

HOTEZ: Yes, that's right, Brianna. I mean, the states are pretty much on their own about this. So this means that the state of Pennsylvania is going to have to mobilize a catch-up vaccination campaign in Lancaster County, possibly elsewhere.

But if you have got this steady stream of anti-vaccine rhetoric coming out of Washington, D.C., and Department of Health and Human Services, that makes it much more difficult. And what we're seeing from Washington, D.C., is still the same old fake assertions about MMR, measles, mumps, rubella, vaccine autism.

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You know, and then the rhetoric goes on. He says it's a leaky vaccine, whatever that means. It declines in 4 percent protection per year. That's not true. It's 0.04 percent. He says the hospitalizations are not due to the fact that the kids are sick. He says it's due to quarantine and isolation, which is absolutely not true.

He says the MMR vaccine is contaminated with aborted fetal remnants. And this stuff goes viral, both literally and figuratively. And we're seeing the consequence now. This -- we had our first measles deaths in decades last year, and now it's happening again.

And remember, Brianna, this is sort of the warm-up act. What do I mean, by that? Historically, in the pre-vaccine era, big measles epidemics occurred late winter, early spring. And, sure enough, in 2025, we had a big epidemic late winter, early spring, and that was even bigger in 2026, late winter, early spring.

We know what's coming in 2027, and this could really be lights out. And it's not only measles, but we're going to see the return of congenital rubella syndrome, which I have taken care of two kids a long time ago as a as a pediatric house officer, as a resident. We could see the return of -- or we're seeing the return of pertussis, whooping cough. We could see the return of polio.

So this is serious stuff, and we need more than just to stop with the disinformation. We need our Centers for Disease Control to launch a massive advocacy campaign for vaccinations, and they won't do it.

KEILAR: Yes, I mean, the rhetoric continues, right? This is what the president said just yesterday in the Rose Garden.

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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're strongly requesting, even telling people, when you get your shots for your young child -- and this has to do, we think, with preventing autism -- that you go to the doctor for five small shots, instead of one big massive shot, you do it in five different shots, five different shots, small little shots where those beautiful little bodies can handle it.

And I think you're going to see a very big difference in the rate of autism, which is like an epidemic what's happened with autism.

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KEILAR: I mean, let's be clear here. This link does not exist. He's talked about the size of vaccines being the size of a soda bottle. Talk to us about how you see this idea of parceling out the MMR vaccine, as he suggests, and also just your reaction to what he's saying, both as a scientist and as the parent of a child with autism.

HOTEZ: Yes, both the president's comments and Mr. Kennedy's comments have no basis in science. The MMR vaccine is one of the most -- safest and most widely tested vaccines.

And multiple studies have shown that vaccines do not cause autism, not just one or two, but at least a half-a-dozen really sound epidemiologic studies.

But here's the other point, Brianna. It's not just the study showing that the MMR vaccine or any other vaccine does not cause autism. It's the lack of plausibility. What do I mean by that? We have identified more than 100 genes involved in autism, all beginning in early fetal brain development. It has nothing to do with postnatal events.

And, by the way, we do have known environmental exposures in early pregnancy that can interact with autism genes that can contribute to autism. And I have spoken to Mr. Kennedy about that. And he's the one who doesn't want to investigate it.

So, all he's doing is pushing harmful rhetoric to promote lack of confidence in getting vaccinations, and now you're seeing the consequences, two deaths last year, two deaths so far. It's going to be worse in 2027 come spring and into the winter next year.

KEILAR: Dr. Peter Hotez, thank you so much for being with us. Obviously, a lot of people paying attention to these cases.

HOTEZ: Thank you, Brianna.

KEILAR: Coming up: It's the key question at the center of the Lindsay Clancy trial. Is she criminally responsible for killing her three children? What a psychologist just said on the stand.

We're live from Massachusetts.

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SANCHEZ: Testimony will soon wrap up in the triple murder trial of Lindsay Clancy, the Massachusetts mom who strangled her three children to death. Prosecutors are calling their final rebuttal witnesses today, with

closing arguments expected tomorrow.

KEILAR: This morning, a psychologist who examined Clancy testified that she was not psychotic at the time of the killings and is criminally responsible for killing her children.

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KIRK HEILBRUN, FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGIST: She retained an awareness of the illegality of killing others, including killing her children. Her moral awareness of the wrongfulness of this killing was influenced by her strong desire to die, and, if she were dead, not to leave her children behind.

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KEILAR: Clancy has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to three counts of murder.

CNN's Jean Casarez has been in the courtroom for today's proceedings.

Jean, this is a case where we hear conflicting things coming from different experts. How are jurors reacting to this testimony?

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They are reacting by writing a lot of notes.

Brianna, I was in that courtroom for quite a while this morning, and I saw so much, I want to tell you. First of all, well before a jury comes in, nurses come out. The defendant has two nurses by her side all the time. They sit in the front row in case there is any type of an emergency.

When -- earlier in the trial, when she sort of rang out saying, "I can't take this anymore," they were right there, right to her wheelchair. So, they come out first, and they sit in the front row. And then a court officer actually wheels her in, in the wheelchair.