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Trade War Escalates with Canada; Trump Goes to Supreme Court on Mail-In Voting; Kauai Under Hurricane Warning; Thieves Steal Four Renoir Paintings; Professor Rachael Zeleny is Interviewed about A.I. in School. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired September 08, 2026 - 08:30   ET

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

[08:30:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: And steel, diary, agricultural equipment, electronics, paper, appliances. All told, the new tariffs impact about $20 billion in goods. It's the latest fallout after trade talks between the two countries collapsed last month. And now President Trump is ramping up the pressure even further, threatening to ban the sale of Canadian Bombardier jets in the U.S.

CNN's Alayna Treene, live this morning at the White House.

What are you learning this morning? Will he potentially make that threat a reality?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: He could. And I think what is often with the president when he sees this kind of pressure coming back from Canada, he wants to fight back. And that's why you saw the president yesterday lay out, as you mentioned, Sara, this threat to ban the sale of Canadian Bombardier jets if they are not built in the United States. That threat came just hours before we saw Canada move forward with their retaliatory tariffs on the United States. Really seeing this feud escalate to a much bigger trade war between the United States and one of its closest allies and top trading partners.

Now, Canada, as you mentioned, Sara, put in their retaliatory tariffs of 50 percent of tariffs on $20 billion worth of U.S. imports. That came into effect just after midnight. The new levies include a doubling of taxes charged on American aluminum and steel to 50 percent, matching what the U.S. charges on metals from imports from Canada. Paper products, construction materials, dairy, plastics, home appliances and agricultural products. All of them also facing new levies.

Now, the move that Canada, with these -- imposing these 50 percent tariffs in retaliation come as response to what we saw the U.S. issue on Canada, also 50 percent on roughly $20 billion worth of goods back in August. And we've heard the prime minister, Mark Carney, really not back away from this feud with the president, saying that he's going to go dollar for dollar against the tariffs that the U.S. imposes on them and saying that he sees no reason to move away from this.

Now, all of this comes, of course, as we know that discussions between Canada and the U.S. really fell apart last month. We had seen that perhaps there was going to be some sort of deal to come together to avoid a lot of this trade war. But when those talks fell apart, we saw this feud begin to escalate. Now we're seeing Canada hit back with their own tariffs.

I do want to read for you, though, what we heard from the president himself, who's really been upping the rhetoric and aggression against Canada yesterday. In this post he wrote, quote, "if they want our market, they must build here and stop treating America like a piggy bank." He went on to say, "buy American, fly on American airliners, enjoy American liquor and beverages, sail on Lake America, America first."

He's also, the president, now threatened as well, an additional 50 percent tariffs on autos starting on January 1st. So, we'll have to see where this is lead. But for now, from all the conversations I'm having with Trump administration officials, Sara, it doesn't look like real negotiations, substantial talks to try and find an off ramp to this are happening. Instead, we have to see what the impact of these tariffs are like and whether or not that can spur them back to the table in a meaningful way.

SIDNER: In the meantime, things can get terribly uncomfortable with a neighbor and ally.

Alayna Treene, thank you so much. Do appreciate your reporting there from the White House.

Kate.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's turn now to the midterms right now. Labor Day marks the unofficial kickoff, if you will, of the general election campaign season. Control of Congress very clearly hanging in the balance. And right now this surely is shaping up to be one of the tightest fights for the Senate in years.

CNN's Harry Enten running the numbers on this. He is setting the stage for us for the two months ahead.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN CHIEF DATA ANALYST: Oh, yes. Right near Broadway.

BOLDUAN: Yes.

ENTEN: We're setting the -- setting the stage. We've got a playbill for this.

BOLDUAN: How close is it?

ENTEN: How close is it? Well, I'll tell you, it's closer than Ronald McDonald and Grimace are together. That's how close it is. I mean, just take a look. Kate, I just love the McDonald's characters. I'll just be honest with you. I love McDonald's playland, the whole situation. I can break that down.

Anyway, chance that the Democrats win the Senate. I got two different ways that we can look at this. And we'll take a look at the average of the two.

So, you get poll-based models, right, like that were made famous by Nate Silver. These include the fundamentals. A 53 percent chance, you average all these different models together, a 53 percent chance that Democrats win the Senate.

You think that is tight. How about the prediction market odds. The Kalshi prediction markets, where people put their money where their mouths are, right? Forty-seven percent chance that Democrats win the Senate. When you average the two of them together, it's literally 50/50. You can't get any tighter than what we're looking at right now. Democrats with a 50 percent chance to win the Senate. Republicans with a 50 percent chance to hold the Senate. It is even at this point, eight weeks until Election Day.

BOLDUAN: So, compare this in -- to history. How does this look?

ENTEN: Yes, compare it to history. We are looking at historically close matchup on September 8th, pre-midterm in terms of control for the United States Senate, who is favored. You know, we talked about 2026, right? Fifty percent chance that the party that is favored wins the United States Senate. That is a tie between the Democrats and the Republicans.

[08:35:03]

But take a look here. The chance that the favored party wins the Senate on September 8th pre-midterm. You pretty much always have one party that is favored, right? Democrats had a 70 percent chance back in 2022 pre-midterm. Republicans had a 75 percent chance in 2018. Republicans had a 70 percent chance back in 2014 to take back the United States Senate. And then Democrats had a 75 percent chance back in 2010 to hold on to the United States Senate. This 50/50 matchup that we have in 2026 is the closest matchup eight weeks before the midterm elections that you can find going all the way back since I was in high school, essentially.

So, what we're seeing here is a historically tight matchup for the United States Senate. As I said, it's as close as Ronald McDonald and grimace is at this point in terms of the matchup for the United States Senate and the fight for control.

BOLDUAN: And does that closeness continue on into individual races that we've been watching?

ENTEN: That is an excellent question, Kate Bolduan. An excellent question. An excellent question. And it leads to right here. Senate race polling within three points. There are six states right now. When you look at the polling in which the matchups are within three points. So, what we're seeing nationally, funneling down to the state level, right? We are seeing this historically tight matchup. You know, talk about Texas, Ohio, Michigan, Maine, Iowa, Alaska, all of these states are within three points right now. New Hampshire, we have a primary going on. We'll take a look at the polling post there. This could actually end up being seven states. So, we're talking about an historically close matchup in the United States Senate, and historically close matchups on the state level that are making that up. And at this point, it's 50/50.

You know, I often try and tell you what's going to happen, but at this point, it's a shrug of the shoulders. Who knows?

BOLDUAN: Well, we've got several more days.

ENTEN: Oh, tremendous.

BOLDUAN: Weeks to go to continue to track all of this.

Good to see you, Harry.

ENTEN: Nice to see you, Kate.

BOLDUAN: Thank you.

John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Of course the major takeaway is we learned a lot about the relationship between Ronald McDonald and Grimace there.

ENTEN: That's right, John, very close. Investigative reporting. We'll get the Kfile right on it.

BERMAN: All right, thank you very much.

ENTEN: Thank you.

BERMAN: So, with the race for the Senate that tight, obviously every vote counts. And right now, President Trump is pushing new rules on mail-in voting, which some critics warn could disenfranchise a lot of voters. States and voting rights groups have until tomorrow to respond to the latest appeal at the Supreme Court.

With us now is David Becker, the executive director and founder of the nonprofit Center for Election Innovation and Research.

Thanks so much for being with us.

So, what's different about what the Supreme Court is deciding now versus what they ruled on a couple weeks ago when they said that President Trump's mail-in ballot rules, at least for now, could move forward?

DAVID BECKER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND FOUNDER, CENTER FOR ELECTION INNOVATION AND RESEARCH: Right. When we first saw this executive order, the primaries had already started. The president didn't sign it until the very end of March, after the primaries had already started. And this spawned several pieces of litigation against the executive order, raising constitutional concerns, legality concerns. They clearly violate statutes regarding the Postal Service and timing concerns.

And every court that considered the merits of that, of those lawsuits, ruled that the executive order could not be implemented. They blocked the rule. And then, as we remember a few weeks ago, the Supreme Court came in on a very technical issue of standing and ripeness and said it's not quite ready to be reviewed. We're going to send it back to the courts and wait for the postal rules to be finalized. And in that period of time, the postal rules were finalized, which made clear that the Postal Service was not quite ready to implement this executive order. It could potentially disenfranchise thousands.

And since then, courts have ruled again. We've had a court in Massachusetts block it. There's other litigation going on. There's currently appeal in the First Circuit and in the Supreme Court. So, this is going to be the first time the supreme Court might consider the merits of this, in addition to the really problematic timing of trying to implement this now as we are eight weeks before the election.

BERMAN: And talk a little bit more, the timing here is there are states, North Carolina, that has already begun sending out mail ballots, correct? So, what is the impact of that?

BECKER: Yes, that's right. North Carolina has already sent out mail ballots. About 20 states are going to send out all of their mail ballots or as much of their mail ballots before the end of next week. Every single state is going to send mail ballots out to military and overseas ballots by the end of next week. So, we're going to have thousands, probably millions of mail ballots out by the end of next week.

And election officials, Republicans and Democrats, have told courts, we can't implement this. The Postal Service has not been specific enough about how this is going to work. It doesn't look like it's ready. The Postal Service itself admits they're not ready to accept these lists that they would have to review of mail ballots. So, it's pretty clear, from a bipartisan perspective, particularly from election officials who have filed briefs in these cases, that the Postal Service isn't ready, the states can't implement it. Even if this was a good idea, which it's not, it's way too late to implement it.

[08:40:00]

And then you get into the issues of the constitutionality and the legality of the order, which clearly every court has so far ruled the executive -- the president just doesn't have the power to change election policy in all the states with the swipe of a pen, which clearly comports with Article One, Section Four of the Constitution, which gives the state legislatures the right to do that.

BERMAN: OK, so the Supreme Court did allow this to go through and move forward on a technicality a few weeks ago. Now they're considering it again. How inclined do you think, based on the signs that you're reading, is the court to move quickly on this, to allow this to happen fast?

BECKER: Well, I think the court will probably work pretty fast on this. But they're probably not working as fast as the administration would like. The administration is trying to claim that they need this order affirmed very quickly so they can implement it, even though the Postal Service also admits they're not ready to implement this order.

I am very confident that every court, including the Supreme Court that looks at this, is going to come to the same conclusion of the courts before, that this is unconstitutional, this violates statutes, this Postal Service, in response to a presidential order, cannot decide who gets mail and who doesn't get mail. That is illegal under the laws of the United States.

And then furthermore, that as we sit here now, 56 days away from the election, it's just impossible to implement on the part of election officials. So, I am very confident that voters out there who choose to vote by mail are going to see the same, safe, convenient experience that they've seen in the past several elections, and it won't change at all with regard to this executive order.

And I'll also point out that we have things like early in-person voting in 47 states. Every state, other than Alabama, Mississippi, and New Hampshire. And so, voters who have any doubts whatsoever can take advantage of that early, in-person voting opportunity. That's how I personally choose to vote. It's a wonderful way to vote, and still makes sure that their ballot is cast and there's not going to be any problems.

BERMAN: David Becker, we appreciate you being with us this morning. Thank you.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, thank you, John.

Happening right now, Hurricane Lowell is lashing Hawaii with big rain, high winds and some dangerous surf. New video showing reports in Oahu completely flooded from the heavy rains and the strong storm surge. Kauai County is under a hurricane warning and a tornado watch. The first tornado watch issued by the National Weather Service in Hawaii ever.

Video from a reporter in Hawaii showing just how strong the storm is hitting at this hour. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look at this storm surge. It's crashing over this berm right now. We're on the south facing beaches, and this is where they expected it to be the worst. And with this storm surge and the rising water, it's bringing with it a ton of debris, flooding everything in its path.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: CNN's Derek Van Dam, tracking the storm for us.

An unusual situation with this tornado warning there. But it's strange. We -- so far, during hurricane season, we're usually seeing the eastern -- the East Coast of the United States getting hit. And now we're seeing Hawaii getting sort of the brunt of some of these storms late in the day.

DEREK VAN DAM, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes. This is the third storm to impact the state of Hawaii. We've got a lot to blame on el Nino for that, right? We've got a lot of warm water to work with across the central and eastern Pacific.

Regardless, Hurricane Lowell still moving away from the island, but it's not -- the threats are not quite over just yet. So, there's still the tornado watch, excuse me, as the outer rain bands continue to impact the western Hawaiian Islands.

This is what it looked like late yesterday evening as the final preps, as the storm was moving in. You can see authorities there urging people to stay off of the roads. Still, it's the middle of the night here. There is reports of some damage, debris on the grounds, downed power lines, that type of thing. Ninety percent of Kauai County without electricity right now.

The current status of the storm, it is moving north at 18 miles per hour. So, it is cooking. But it is, obviously, about 110 miles away from Kauai. But the outer rain bands still bringing that tornado threat because we can get those rapid spin ups quite often.

This is impressive wind gusts. This is certainly hurricane force. They're not sustained. But nonetheless, 85 miles per hour. It's still gusting to 63 right now at Lihue Airport on Kauai Island. Honolulu gusting to 35. They're getting some outer rain bands as well. In fact, Oahu has about nine percent of the island without electricity.

So, when will tropical storm force winds start to subside? Well, it looks like about 7 a.m. local time. So, we're going to start to see the sun rising this morning. The conditions will improve drastically as Lowell exits the region. But not before the damage has already been done. Upwards of 17 inches of rain on top of the highest peaks here in Kauai County. That, obviously, funnels down to the communities and the rivers below, sparking rapid rises and rivers, many of which have crested and are falling at the moment.

This is a look at Oahu's rainfall totals. Honolulu at just about 3.5 inches of rain and still counting.

[08:45:02]

Look, it's still raining right now.

But there's the tornado watch. That's valid through 10 a.m. local time. Additional rainfall here, another one to three inches. So, localized flash flooding still a possibility. And big swells associated with this one.

Sara.

SIDNER: Derek Van Dam, thank you for tracking that for us this morning.

John. BERMAN: All right, an historically bad losing streak finally coming to

an end.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here's the pitch. Swing and a foul tip into the glove of Nick Boss (ph). And the longest losing streak in modern day baseball history has come to an end.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: You can see the sense of relief there. The sweet taste of victory, or what can be survived as an absolutely miserable season for the RedPocket Mobiles. They're the newest team in the Pioneer League, which is a small, independent minor league baseball league. It's a crazy story. They don't have a home field. They play every single game on the road. They had lost their last 40 games before finally pulling out a win. And that losing streak shattered a 103 year old professional baseball record set in 1923. Their season is now over, and they finish with a final record of 14 wins and 82 losses. So, something to build on there.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: I mean, that's what I'm saying. Like --

BERMAN: Only going up.

BOLDUAN: And there's -- they are like, they're killing it now.

BERMAN: Yes. Totally.

BOLDUAN: It's all relative. It's all relative.

This morning, the search is on to find a pair of priceless paintings stolen from a museum yet again in France.

And a big change coming from the TSA. How you may be able to get through airport security without a plane ticket.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:51:12]

BOLDUAN: All right, so we're looking at live pictures right here from New York City because we're standing by to hear from the mayor, Zohran Mamdani, to hold a news conference, I think that's him stepping in right now, as the city is set to release previously undisclosed records about air quality in New York after the September 11th attacks. The documents, more than 170,000 pages, allegedly show city officials at the time were aware conditions around Ground Zero were more unsafe than they had let on. Officials say that the documents were discovered last year and are being released now ahead of Friday's 25th anniversary of the attacks. We're going to monitor this and bring you updates as they come in.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, thank you, Kate.

Breaking this morning, a new heist rocking the art world. Police say thieves stole four paintings from the Renoir Museum in the south of France. They ended up, however, dropping two of them as they tried to escape. The theft comes about a year after that wild highs at The Louvre, where thieves stole priceless 19th century French royal jewelry.

CNN's Melissa Bell is in Paris with the very latest.

Do authorities have a sense of how they did this, and I am curious about the condition of the two paintings they ended up dropping.

MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. We've been hearing a little bit more about what happened in the early hours of this morning at that museum (INAUDIBLE) museum that's in the last house that was lived in by the impressionist painter --

SIDNER: If you can hear me, but we are having a problem with the audio there. Melissa, we're having a problem with your audio there. For some reason, it's very, very muffled. Your mic may be tucked under your shirt. See if maybe pulling it up and out.

OK, let's try again.

BELL: Sorry about that.

SIDNER: Ah, that's perfect.

BELL: I'm not sure if that's any better.

SIDNER: It is. It's perfect.

BELL: If you can hear me now. Amazing, Sara.

They -- what we understand happened now this morning is that these thieves had made off in the early hours of this morning at that museum with these four works of art. There are 12 Renoir paintings kept in it. They made off with four, cutting through a fence, making their way through the garden. And when the alarm of the museum went off, they sort of hurried out, dropped two as they went that we understand are in OK condition.

So, we have a better idea of what was taken. Those two paintings that are still at large. Two, luckily, were dropped and now back in the hands of authorities. But the thieves themselves are still being hunted by French authorities.

This has not been a good year for French museums, Sara. I think that's the least we can say. As you say, it was less than a year ago that The Louvre heist was carried out. That dramatic heist. Those more than $80 million worth of jewels, by the way, have still never been recovered, even though arrests have been made. We've also had, over the course of the summer, another couple of

heists at French museums that saw priceless jewelry taken. And this report from Europol last year saying that the nature of these heists is changing. The organized crime is now targeting the art world, and thieves are better organized and being recruited through social media, said the report, and are often acting in more violent ways.

Now, luckily, in today's heist, no one was hurt and the thieves made off before the police could get there. But still, there are calls this morning from that museum in Cagnes-sur-Mer that saw the robbery this morning for authorities to step up and do a lot more to help prevent French museums from this kind of organized crime in order to avoid any more of these robberies happening.

But yet another astonishing heist, very brazen and successfully, they managed to carry off two of these Renoir paintings. The four had been worth $10 million.

Sara.

SIDNER: Yes, you have to wonder who's on the other end of this, buying these paintings. Certainly displaying them would be a problem. The authorities would know that they had been stolen.

There is so much to dig into here. But, yes, this happening a couple of times in these huge heists is pretty stunning.

[08:55:01]

Thank you so much for your reporting there from Paris for us, Melissa Bell.

John.

BERMAN: All right, in Mexico, a supermarket worker saves a child -- look at that -- who runs into traffic. That is terrifying and truly heroic. You can see the mother trying to get out there herself initially, but slipped. The worker did get there just before a car might have run into that little kid. Just a few inches away. What a good job by that guy.

All right, in Kansas, a driver smashed through the window into the showroom of a classic car exhibition. Authorities say the driver had suffered a medical episode that caused the crash. The driver was injured, though nothing life-threatening. Some cars, as you saw there, were also damaged a little bit. No one else was hurt.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Thank goodness for that.

There's a new report out showing a startling reality in America right now. Reading scores plummeting in a new analysis. This is according to results from a key global exam released today. The exam is the Program for International Student Assessment test. Reading scores of 15-year- olds in the United States have cratered now to a near 25 year low. U.S. math scores are also among the lowest since the tests began in the year 2000. By every measure, according to this newest analysis, students in the U.S. were outperformed by those in Singapore and parts of China. So, the state of America today.

This also comes as two of America's largest school districts, public school districts, are tackling yet another challenge, A.I. in education, and now are imposing some sweeping bans on A.I. in the classroom. In New York, the ban applies to students from pre-k to eighth grade. In Los Angeles, they've imposed a district wide moratorium on A.I. for at least this school year. And educators everywhere, though, are trying to figure out what to do about artificial intelligence, the chat bots that everyone's becoming accustomed to, as students and everyone are leaning more and more on this technology.

Joining me right now is one of those educators working on this in real time, Rachael Zeleny, associate professor and writing program director at the University of Baltimore.

It's good to see you.

You have been grappling with this in real time, and your entire department has.

RACHAEL ZELENY, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR AND WRITING PROGRAM DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF BALTIMORE: I have.

BOLDUAN: How -- what have you been seeing, Rachel, and what are the changes you're making this school year because of it?

ZELENY: So, we did find that last year there was a significant uptick in A.I.-generated papers. And in my opinion, I didn't want to be asking adjuncts to be grading text that had been generated by someone other than the student.

However, I've never been somebody who really believes in surveillance as a method for dealing with this. So, for me, one of my ways that I've been handling this is I'm making sure that we have assignments that allow instructors to see a lot more of the back end of how students are actually composing and putting more emphasis on the process instead of the product.

BOLDUAN: It's tough for -- it's something that everyone is grappling with. I mean, because you -- I think you've said you -- instructors should have autonomy over whether A.I. is used and allowed in the classroom. And then you take that a step and it's going to then -- the challenge you -- is presented to you and how you navigate one classroom that allows it in -- one instructor who allows it in the classroom, another instructor not allowing it in the classroom at the very same school at the very same time. And what do you do?

ZELENY: So, that's a great question. And that's one we're addressing at the very moment. And I think the most important thing is that we are having conversations with students about what is allowed in our classes and why and what level of A.I. integration they can be expecting. And that's more than just a line on a syllabus. That's a conversation. And so, at our university right now, we're developing a new multimedia storytelling program. And we're being very intentional in those of us with -- in the department about which courses will be incorporating A.I. and which will not. But again, we're having those conversations with students so that there's the buy in of the explanation of why we've made those decisions.

BOLDUAN: Yes, I really appreciate that because then, you know, you have this -- I'll call it a counterpoint, right, of like, why not embrace it rather than fight it? If you don't -- if you don't harness it, you're going to -- you're, you know, setting your students behind when others are going to harness it. And it's something that everyone's dealing with.

It was an interesting point made by organizational psychologist Adam Grant, kind of that gets to a little bit of the heart of this. He wrote an op-ed piece last week. It said, "creating obstacles," in terms of to cheating, "is never going to be enough. We need to get at the root of the problem by changing students' underlying motivations."

[09:00:02]

And he says, "and that A.I. has made cheating so effortless, enticing and available that many students no longer believe it's wrong."