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U.S. Takes Control Of 65B Barrels Of Venezuelan Oil Reserves; Trump: Venezuelan Oil Agreement More Than Doubles U.S. Reserves; Deadlockd Jury On Day 5 Of Deliberations In Lindsay Clancy Trial. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired September 02, 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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[13:00:38]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Betting on a bonanza, the U.S. signing a deal with Venezuela that it claims could lead to a doubling of crude oil reserves. But will this actually lead to lower prices here in the U.S. And not giving up, the jury in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial is deliberating despite saying that it could not reach a verdict yesterday morning.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: And Tiger Woods appearing in court, the golfer taking a plea deal in his DUI arrest, but not before receiving a reprimand from the judge. We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN News Central.

KEILAR: The U.S. is signing a historic partnership with Venezuela, doubling the size of America's oil reserves, according to the administration. Right now, Energy Secretary Chris Wright is at the signing ceremony alongside Venezuela's interim president Delsey Rodriguez in Caracas. The U.S. now claiming control of more than 65 billion barrels of Venezuela's vast oil reserves, which are the biggest in the world. The Trump administration says this could bring down gas prices, which jumped to more than $4 a gallon more than six months since the war with Iran began.

CNN's Kristen Holmes is at the White House. So Kristen, how does this deal actually work? And when does the White House expect to see lower gas prices?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, President Trump has been asked this question about when this could potentially happen, and he's given some vague answers, particularly saying he didn't think it would happen before the midterms and then saying it could take two to three years. So, analysts that I've been talking to really believe that this isn't something that is going to happen overnight. And there's a number of reasons for that. One is that the actual refineries that the U.S. has that can process this kind of oil are already acting at capacity, meaning there's not really any room to scale up. But on top of that, getting the oil out of the ground in Venezuela is going to require an enormous amount of funding and rebuilding. It's going to take time. Most of these infrastructure systems for the

oil refineries and for the oil systems in Venezuela are completely dilapidated. And when you talk to these various oil experts, they say they're going to need the funding to actually be able to even get the oil out of the ground. And there are still serious concerns about potential dangers and risks.

Part of the reason why these oil and gas companies have spent so long staying out of Venezuela, particularly given the political discourse, the fact that it was not completely stable as a country. The only company that has been operating, U.S. company that has been operating fully in Venezuela for the past several decades is Chevron.

Now, they have also announced increasing in their oil production. But there are going to have to be a number of steps before two things happen before people actually start seeing any kind of change at the pump, which again, could take two, three years. On top of that, President Trump has said this is going to fill out or top off the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and there are questions about that as well. So since it is a different kind of oil than the reserve usually has in it. So how would that have to change in terms of storage?

KEILAR: Yes. Much more sludgy, tar like kind of oil. Kristen Holmes, thank you so much for us. Boris?

SANCHEZ: We're also now watching to see if one of the most watched murder trials in the nation ends in a hung jury. That possibility looms after jurors in the Lindsey Clancy case said they were deadlocked. They're now deliberating for a fifth day.

On Tuesday, the judge directed the nine women and three men to keep trying after they told him they couldn't reach a unanimous decision. Prosecutors say Clancy is guilty of murder for acting intentionally, rationally and swiftly when she strangled her kids three years ago. Clancy's attorneys argue that she's not criminally responsible because she committed the killings while suffering from postpartum psychosis.

Let's go live outside the courtroom in Plymouth, Massachusetts, with CNN's Jean Casarez, who's been following this case. Jean, any word from the jurors so far today?

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Nothing. Absolutely nothing. They have been deliberating since almost at the point they got in today. We don't know of a note, we don't know of a question. Nothing.

I can tell you. The defense attorney just went to go get himself a cup of coffee. So, he seems relaxed at the moment. Of course they're waiting. But no news is good news in a sense because as they continue to deliberate, they're trying, they're really trying to come to a unanimous decision.

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SANCHEZ: And Jean, the judge opened court today reminding everyone in the courtroom about an order that protects jurors. There was an arrest outside the courthouse yesterday related to their privacy. Bring us up to speed on that.

CASAREZ: Well, a retired nurse, okay. A retired nurse has been charged with one count of intimidating or harassing the jury. And her arraignment, a 56-year-old former nurse. The arraignment was this morning, but it all started yesterday because remember, the jury asked to be released at 3:30 yesterday afternoon, which was early.

And they come and go. We don't see where they are, but they come and go in an area that's behind the Courthouse.

Well, at 3:40, CNN confirmed the Massachusetts State Police had arrested and taken into custody a woman allegedly harassing and intimidating the jury. So today at the arraignment, the defense is saying, no, Your Honor, she did not want to do anything with the jury. She wanted to see Lindsay Clancy.

Prosecution said oh, no, because we've got her phone. And on her phone there were deleted photos of the jurors in this case. So, the judge released her without any bail. A not guilty was entered in on her behalf, but there are conditions she should not come around the courthouse. She cannot disseminate any photos that she may have in her phone at all. And this case will proceed.

But it's serious because this is a deliberating jury and according to the statute, if you have a trial that involves a life felony and that's this case, it can be up to 20 years in prison.

SANCHEZ: Well, that is no joke. Jean Casarez, thank you so much for the update from Massachusetts.

Still to come this afternoon, growing concerns about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and his priorities at the Pentagon. Sources telling CNN that he's damaging the Army's efforts to modernize by focusing instead on culture war issues. That new reporting is straight ahead.

Plus, Tiger Woods is back in court. What we're learning about the plea deal and his Florida DUI case.

KEILAR: And later, family and friends of a 20-year-old Haitian man say the nation's immigration policies contributed to his death. We have that and much more coming up on CNN News Central.

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SANCHEZ: Avoid an army leadership is fueling new concerns amid Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth spoke focus on culture wars. Multiple sources tell CNN they believe Hegseth is damaging the army's efforts to modernize. We're getting this new reporting as the war with Iran is returning to kinetic action.

CENTCOM releasing this video today of what it says is strikes against IRGC core targets in Iran. Iran fired back in defiance of a warning from President Trump promising to hit much harder if Tehran retaliated. Let's get some perspective now from retired U.S. Army Colonel Peter

Mansoor. Colonel, thanks so much for being with us.

First on army leadership, what's your reaction to these reports that Dan Driscoll, who resigned, cited the generals that Hegseth fired as preventing the army's modernization?

COL. PETER MANSOOR, U.S. ARMY (RET.): This is going to be a real blow to army transformation. The army needs to transform. It needs to up its drone game. It needs to learn the lessons from Ukraine. And the opposite appears to be what's happening under Hegseth's leadership.

He's firing the generals who wanted to take the army into a radically different direction, embracing drones. And he also disbanded a unit that was in Ukraine learning about the Ukrainian use of drones and so the result is the army is going to take a step backward under a different leadership, and it's not going to be for the better or for the combat effectiveness of the force.

SANCHEZ: So right now, the army doesn't have a top civilian leader, nor a Senate confirmed top general, nor a confirmed general in charge of operations, nor a confirmed commander of army troops in Europe. What does that mean for the branch and U.S. readiness?

MANSOOR: Yes, and he also -- Hegseth also fired the head of Army Transformation and Training Command, which is another key command. So, you know, without the transformational leadership at the top, the army is going to mark time. And this is not an era in which marking time is going to result in anything good. We can see based on the results of the war with Iran, the ongoing war in Ukraine, that the army cannot go about business as usual. It has to transform and it has to be able to operate in an era where drones control the skies. And if it can't do that, then it's going to become irrelevant.

SANCHEZ: As President Trump nominated Hong Kong to run the Navy, I wonder how you see him fitting into this effort to modernize, because a lot of what we've heard from him is really in line with Hegseth's view on culture war issues in recruiting and the so called warrior ethos.

MANSOOR: Yes, well, unfortunately, the warrior ethos is going to only take you so far. You know, a good example of this is the French army before World War I put a lot of emphasis on morale and alan and attacking aggressively. And when faced with machine guns and artillery, it got mown down in great numbers in 1914.

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This is where the army is heading, unless it transforms the Navy as well. It has to embrace unmanned aerial vehicles and unmanned sea drones. And if you don't have a leader who can embrace that sort of vision, then all the morale in the world is not going to win you any wars.

SANCHEZ: And finally on these latest strikes against Iran, President Trump told FOX News that the U.S. waited until Iran had nearly rebuilt its radar to strike it again. Also striking air defenses, maritime assets, mine laying capabilities. What is that strategy and the list of targets the president has laid out tell you?

MANSOOR: Well, it appears to me that the administration's trying to keep the Strait of Hormuz as open as possible. It is guiding ships clandestinely through a channel that borders the coast of Oman and it's striking Iranian assets that have the potential to interdict those ships.

Now, it's not a lot of ships that are passing through, but it is some. And you don't want to give Iran the capability to close the strait for good. And thus, the attacks on its mine laying capability, its radars, and attacking them right when they've been rebuilt is actually a smart strategy because Iran then uses up resources to rebuild the radars which then are immediately struck and put out of action and it loses both the radars and the resources that went into rebuilding them.

SANCHEZ: Colonel Peter Mansoor, always appreciate you sharing your point of view. Thanks for joining us.

MANSOOR: Thanks.

SANCHEZ: Of course. Brianna?

KEILAR: Also new today, the USS Abraham Lincoln is now docked in Thailand, its first regular port call in more than eight months. The aircraft carrier setting a modern-day record for consecutive days at sea during combat and blockade duty in the U.S. war with Iran.

Its grueling deployment has raised concerns about the welfare of the roughly 5,000 sailors on board with reports of morale and supply shortages as well as deteriorating mental health. Now the crew has a chance to rest, replenish supplies and get some much-needed time ashore. You can see the toll of the lengthy deployment on the 100,000- ton ship itself with rust staining much of the hole after months at sea.

Now still ahead, not enough money, people or paper. Election officials say they cannot comply with President Trump's mail in voting rules.

Up next, what this could mean for the midterms that are just two months away.

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KEILAR: News CNN reporting as President Trump pushes to change the rules for mail in ballots, election officials are sounding the alarm. The saying there's not enough money, people or paper to even try to comply. And with the midterms just two months away, election officials warn the changes could mean tens of thousands of Americans don't receive their ballots by election day. CNN's Gabe Cohen is here with details.

What more do we know about this? GAB COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Brianna. I do want to stress that

at this point, a federal judge has blocked the postal service from actually mandating these rules. So as of now, state and local election officials are proceeding with the status quo. But as that court fight is playing out, that legal fight, they are, as you said, sounding these alarms, raising concerns that they cannot possibly implement these regulations ahead of the midterms. They have presented this long list of reasons why it would be difficult that there is not enough time to redesign and print millions of ballots, that in some places, vendors don't even have enough paper to do that printing, that, reprinting all of those ballots would cost millions and millions of dollars that they have not budgeted for.

And then there is the issue of training perhaps thousands of local election officials on this mail ballot portal that the Postal Service has built where they are going to have to upload all of the information from these envelopes, the barcodes, as well as the names and addresses of every mail ballot recipient across the country. They want to make sure there are no errors that any of those officials would make that could lead to those ballots getting rejected and sent back to election officials. And that directly connects back to that stunning whistleblower announcement, that whistleblower account that we reported on yesterday.

If you remember this USPS worker who came forward and said that the Postal Service has been essentially secretively and sloppily rushing to put together this portal that they would potentially need to be using in the coming weeks, that it has not been properly tested, and that it is vulnerable to potential errors. And one of the reasons that's key is they pointed to this zero percent failure policy where essentially local elections offices would be handing over these big batches of ballots, potentially thousands of them at a time.

And if there is even one discrepancy, one name, address, barcode that doesn't match up, perhaps that entire batch would be sent back to an election office, which would delay ballots from going out to voters and potentially mean that some of them might not get them in time to actually cast that ballot to vote.

KEILAR: So what are the specific changes that the president is pushing for here?

COHEN: Yes, and these changes connect back to this executive order that the President made in March asking the Postal Service to make these changes, stricter regulations around mail ballots, and they issued their final rules last month. They cover a little bit of ground that directly connect what were just talking about. They're asking every or directing every state, I should say, to produce standardized ballot envelopes with unique barcodes on them and ordering election officials to upload those names and addresses of every mail ballot recipient into that government portal, which likely would end up getting shared with federal law enforcement for audits, for investigations.

And the USPS has said there is no wiggle room. States that do not comply do not upload all of that information, that the Postal Service will not deliver ballots in those states. And again, if there are any errors with any of these ballots that they would be at least temporarily rejected and sent back to those election offices.

KEILAR: Gabe Cohen, thank you so much for the reporting.

Oil prices are on the rise after the U.S. and Iran traded another round of strikes. So, what does this mean for you and your bottom line?

Plus, new video of a semi crashing into an overpass and dangling over the roadway. We have details on the high-stakes rescue that followed.

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