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Latino Voters' Net Favorability of Trump; Trump Facing Growing Republican Revolt with 46 Days to Midterms; Growing Concerns About AI's Impact on Children's Brains; Trump Rejects AI Regulation, Says U.S. Can't Fall Behind China. Aired 8:30-9:00a ET

Aired September 18, 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]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: So new CNN reporting today shows that you're more likely to find President Trump now featured in political ads by Democratic candidates than by candidates from the president's own party. One Republican ad that's getting a lot of attention today where the president is featured is one that he probably does not want to be in. CNN's Harry Enten with me right now.

We're talking about this video, this ad from Republican Congresswoman Maria Salazar, and she talks about calling out the president by name and speaking out against the extent that his immigration crackdown has gone, saying that some of the very voters that put him in office now feel betrayed. What do the numbers show?

ENTEN: Yes, you know, specifically speaking about Latino voters here, they don't just feel betrayed. They absolutely do. You look at the polling.

There's absolutely a revolt from Latino voters against President Trump on the specific issue of immigration. This is what we're talking about. Look at this, Latinos on Trump and immigration.

You go back to the fall of 2024. Donald Trump was more trusted than Kamala Harris with Latinos on immigration by five points. You come over to this side of the screen.

Look at this net approval rating now that Donald Trump has with Latino voters, way down under the Gulf of Mexico. If you're speaking Trumpanese, we're talking about the Gulf of America. But for everybody else, the Gulf of Mexico, look at that, 39 points underwater.

That is a shift, Kate Bolduan, of 40, what is that? 40s.

BOLDUAN: I don't do math.

ENTEN: Yes, 44 points. Thank you very much, Johnny B, 44 points.

I'm not doing math this morning. Kate Bolduan's not doing math, but Johnny B. is doing math. A shift of 44 points away from the president of the United States on the issue of immigration with Latinos, an absolute political disaster. BOLDUAN: Just so everyone knows, when the camera's on and you're asked to do math, there's something that happens in your brain where it's like almost impossible to actually do said math. Let's do more math. What about, talk to me about like, more of the change, more of the comparison and what you're seeing kind of overall versus the kind of beginning-ish of the second term.

ENTEN: Yes, yes, try, try again when it comes to math, right? We're going to write it down here. But you know, let's just talk about Trump overall, right?

That's the issue of immigration. But this is helping to lead to an absolute revolt among Latinos overall when it comes to Donald Trump. Look at this, Latina favorability of Donald Trump among Latinos.

You know, you go back to January of 2025, the beginning of Trump's second term or right there and about, it was plus six points. It was plus six points. Look at it now, minus 34 points.

[08:35:00]

That's a 40 point shift away from the president of the United States. This time we were able to do the math pretty simply.

A 40 point shift away from the president of the United States. Those numbers are way down there. I mean, for a group that Donald Trump did historically well with Latino voters back in 2024, all of those gains, basically adios amigos, goodbye, see you later.

They're just simply put not there. And now Donald Trump is way, way underwater with Latino voters.

BOLDUAN: The congresswoman that made this ad, she's out of Florida.

ENTEN: Yes.

BOLDUAN: What are the Florida's clearly a state to watch on when we're talking about this. Talk to me about where else.

ENTEN: Yes, OK. Florida, Texas, where James Tallarico is trying to become the first Democratic senator elected since 1988. And one of the reasons why he's doing so well in the polls and one of the reasons why Maria Salazar is running away from President Trump is just look at these numbers among Latino voters in Florida and Texas.

Trump's net popularity Latino voters. You know, you go back to November of 2024. Look at that.

Donald Trump was at plus 17 points with Latino voters in Florida, according to this poll. Look at it now. Minus twenty five points, minus twenty five points.

That's a forty two point shift away from the president of the United States. How about in Texas with James Tallarico running again to become that first Democratic senator since 1988? It was plus five points on Election Day back in 2024. Look at this now. It's minus 34 points. That's a 39 point shift away from the president of the United States.

What was furrowed ground for the president to put in a historically strong performance among Latino voters. All of that is gone. This is a national phenomenon.

Yes, but we're seeing it funneled down to the state level as well. Texas Senate very much in play. Texas governor may be in play and Florida governor, which may be one of these secret races off on the side.

That one may be in play as well. Florida has not elected a Democratic governor since 1994. With numbers like these, you say to yourself, you know what?

Maybe this could be the year that Democrats finally break through, not just in Texas, but perhaps Florida as well, at least when it comes to the governor's mansion.

BOLDUAN: Let us see.

ENTEN: We will see. We got what, six and a half weeks to go, Kate Bolduan? But these are trends that if you're Republicans, you don't want to see.

These are the trends that lead to big blue waves and overcoming historical real difficulties that Democrats have had in both of these states.

BOLDUAN: And early in-person voting is beginning today in at least three states -- John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. With us now, Doug Heye, Republican strategist. Doug, I want to play the ad that really Harry and Kate were just talking about there from Maria Salazar from Miami-Dade County.

Let's watch a little bit of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR (R-FL), SALAZAR FOR CONGRESS AD: Mr. President, some of your immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far. In July, 50 percent of the 50,000 people that were detained had no criminal record. Be careful what your advisors are telling you about immigration policies.

The same Hispanics who helped you get to the White House in 2024 feel betrayed today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So, Doug, you are a Republican strategist. You have been in the room where it happens proverbially. You know, what's the decision making process? Why does a candidate and her team choose to run an ad like that?

DOUG HEYE, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, I think it all comes down to information, both empirical and anecdotal. Empirical. You're seeing all kinds of polling data.

And just as the numbers that Harry pointed out, Donald Trump's numbers are underwater on pretty much every issue. That's especially true with Hispanic voters. That's especially true in her district.

There's also the anecdotal of what she's hearing and seeing from her voters when she's home during recesses and so forth. Clearly, those voters are not happy with the direction of the country, again, not just on immigration and ICE and so forth, but on the economy. Both of those issues, John, were big gains for Donald Trump initially.

He was always way above water on the economy and on immigration. Now he's underwater on both of those. And it's why you're seeing Republicans talking a little bit more.

This obviously is a surprise ad. The other question that I would have, though, is it was it was reported that she recorded in front of the White House about two weeks ago. So we knew she made a decision.

Why today or why yesterday? I think it's an interesting question that we'll find the answer to.

BERMAN: That is a great question. You're a strategist, but, you know, you have a leg in the journalism sphere, too. Doug, you know, you worked in Republican leadership in good times and bad in the House, right? So again --

HEYE: It was too bad.

BERMAN: -- if you're sitting in Republican leadership then and you see a member like Maria Salazar starting to break. What's the feeling inside, you know, the leadership room right now?

Are they bracing themselves for more?

HEYE: Potentially so. And the reality is when you're in leadership or if you're typically at one of the party committees, you're telling your campaigns, listen, you have to do what you have to do. We want to make sure that you come home next year victorious.

That's the key priority. And so when I worked a Senate race in 2006 for Michael Steele in Maryland, George Bush was not popular. He certainly wasn't popular in Maryland.

[08:40:00]

Danny Diaz was the comms director of the RNC -- and he might yell at me privately from time to time, but he would say, you got to do what you got to do. The difference between then and now, the poll numbers are sort of similar between Bush and Trump. The difference is Trump. How does Donald Trump react to this ad? How does Donald Trump react to any Republican who crosses him? And that's a real problem for these Republican candidates as they decide what they need to do to get reelected. If they speak out against Trump, they know that Donald Trump could try and just sweep the leg out from under them in Truth Social or in rallies and speeches.

And it's a real sort of Damocles, and it's the corner that Republicans have backed themselves into.

BERMAN: And again, Doug, for all the discussions that we have all week about the Kennedy Center reflecting pool, this thing, that thing, the Wall Street Journal headline just jumped out at me today. It said, "Weeks Before the Midterms, Almost Everything is Getting More Expensive." Again, you know, for Republicans running for office, what's it like to wake up to that headline?

HEYE: It's a tough headline, and it's a tough headline because of everything that the president is doing that is not focused on that. And so when they go home and they're all home now, basically, at least in the House, they're hearing from their constituents of what they spent at the grocery store, at a restaurant, when they went to the movies or what they didn't spend because this item is now more expensive than it used to be. They can't afford a new refrigerator or whatever it may be.

They want their members of Congress, their senators to talk about what they've done and what they're going to do. And everything that Donald Trump does with renaming and tearing down and rebuilding and anything that is not on that issue doesn't help Donald Trump and it doesn't help those Republican candidates. And I say it doesn't help Trump because if Republicans lose the House and or Senate, forget about legislation.

We know that Trump doesn't care about legislating, but the issue of investigations and the moving from Democrats being ranking members to having subpoena power is going to make day to day life for this White House a whole lot harder than it is already today.

BERMAN: Doug Heye, great to see you. Have an excellent weekend, my friend.

HEYE: Thank you.

BERMAN: Kate.

BOLDUAN: So amid a chorus of warnings about AI, even from some of obviously tech zone leaders, there are also huge concerns about what it all means for kids. Both the nations -- both of the nation's two largest school districts, Los Angeles Unified and New York City schools, have announced measures to limit children's access to AI during the school day. Researchers are also worried that using AI chat bots can change children's brain activity.

Joining me now, CNN chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, for more on this. And Sanjay, the idea of kind of looking into this comes from an odd experience that you even had with your own daughter. What happened?

GUPTA: Yes, I'm a dad, right, Kate? You know, it's interesting. I was walking by one of my daughter's rooms, and the door was closed and I was hearing her have this remarkably good conversation with somebody.

And both people were super engaged, talking, laughing, and it was going on and on. And I was curious, so I knocked on the door, and I walked in and there was no human there, Kate. She was not talking to a human.

She was talking to ChatGPT, having a really, really engaged conversation. And two things sort of struck me at the same time. First of all, this was strange.

It was really weird that she was talking essentially to a program in that way, but also that me as a human would have a hard time replicating that. I mean, this chatbot was really engaging and was mirroring her laughter and all this other stuff. And it really kept her engaged.

And I realized that as a human, I would have a very hard time doing that. And I think that's sort of what started us on this journey of looking into what exactly is happening with these chatbots on the brain. I'm a brain guy, but I'm a dad primarily.

So that sort of launched us looking into this.

BOLDUAN: You know, it's hard to say what are the findings are. It's new, but also not new. So far, what are the concerns to all the experts -- and you are one of them -- that you've spoken to about children using AI?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I think the metaphor that a lot of people have used in some way is they're sort of likening this to ultra-processed foods. Ultra-processed foods do provide energy, but they taste really good. They're addictive to some extent.

And oftentimes, they crowd out other good food choices. If you start to think about AI chatbots in the same way, they can be endlessly engaging, addictive to some extent. But more importantly, I think what a lot people kept telling us was, what are you not getting instead as a result of that AI chatbot conversation?

You're not getting that human connection. You're not getting eye contact. You're not getting shared laughter.

You're not getting sort of the rupture and repair that come with normal human relationships.

[08:45:00]

Those AI chatbots are designed to basically please you in any way possible. All those things they say are important.

Look, my kids are older your kids, Kate, but especially during the early childhood years, 90 percent of your brain's architecture is being built. And so much of that is coming from human-to-human connection. These AI chatbots, they threaten to basically sort of crowd out a lot of that human connection.

I think that's where a lot of the concerns sort of revolve.

BOLDUAN: So, Sanjay, you were saying that we need to actually think about this in terms of brain, actual brain development and how AI is used, especially when we're talking about young children.

GUPTA: Yes, absolutely. And I don't think these researchers are equivocal about this. Dr. Dana Suskind was my guest on the podcast talking about this, but that's exactly right. Way before AI, way before social media or even devices, there were these studies looking at what happens to humans who don't have contact with other humans and looking what happens to their brains, especially at a very young age. And again, so much of that brain architecture is developed during those early childhood years. And so much of that is driven by human- to-human contact.

It was interesting. When I asked my daughter, I said, what are you doing? What is this thing you're having with ChatGPT?

And she said, you know, look dad, I'm just sitting here rotting, is what she said, which was interesting. And I asked Dr. Suskind about this idea of brain rotting. And she made an interesting point about brain rotting versus brain stunting.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. DANA SUSKIND, PROFESSOR OF SURGERY AND PEDIATRICS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICAL CENTER: So you can't rot something that hasn't been built. So I think about that in the early years as brain stunting. You are stunting.

You haven't even built the skills that you can de-skill like the ability to connect and have critical thinking and all those other skills that you want to have. You're going to stunt. So brain rot, you know, brain stunting, it's not a good thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA: Stunting the brain. So, you know, my, again, my kids are older than your kids. So maybe more brain rot as you get into your late teens, early twenties, but younger children, they don't ever get the chance to sort of build those skills because of these conversations with chat bots.

You know, Dana gave me a few rules, which I'll just share with you quickly, Kate, because I think they're really relevant here. The red flags. If the chat bot is acting too sycophantic, too agreeable with everything, red flag.

If it's starting to anthropomorphize, refer to itself as a human in some ways, that is a red flag. If it is starting to steal your time, you're like, hey, I got to go. No, why can't you stay a little bit longer?

That's a red flag. And one thing she also said is that every time you interact the chat bot, start a new search as opposed to sort of continuing an old one. That sort of resets the platform at least and sort of reduces at least some of those red flags.

BOLDUAN: Sanjay, I mean, it's a whole new world every day, but man, a whole new world. Thanks for, thank goodness for you. Really appreciate it.

And if you want to hear more and we all should, Sanjay's conversation with child development expert, Dana Suskind, like he was talking about, you can go to the podcast, "CHASING LIFE WITH DR. SANJAY GUPTA," and you can get that wherever you get your podcasts -- John.

BERMAN: Sanjay, I'm a brain guy, Gupta.

All right, a brand new CNN original series featuring acclaimed chef David Chang premieres this weekend. In "THE DETOUR," David Chang finds some of the best hidden culinary gems across the country.

Here's a preview.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID CHANG, HOST, THE DETOUR WITH DAVID CHANG: The reason why I love oxtail is I don't believe my personal opinion. You're going to eat this with a fork and knife. Would you eat a pizza with a fork and knife?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.

CHANG: Would you eat barbecue with a fork and knife? Or fried chicken? Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.

CHANG: Because this is how you do it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just go in. All right. It's hot, so you be careful.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is hot. And all that gelatinous stuff from the oxtail, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. I'm burning my hands.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That looks like a dinosaur bone.

CHANG: I don't think anything beats it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, it's my favorite cut.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is this your favorite cut of beef?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wow.

CHANG: Because it's got personality. You know what I mean? This thing's been abroad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's been places we haven't been.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a basketball.

CHANG: This is the dude that comes back from abroad that's drinking a half of ice.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Smoking rolled cigarettes.

CHANG: Smoking rolled cigarettes. And listen to John Coltrane.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: "THE DETOUR WITH DAVID CHANG" airs Sunday at 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific here on CNN and the next day on the CNN app.

This morning, opening statements begin in the trial of an ex-American Idol contestant accused of murdering his wife and staging the crime scene.

[08:50:00]

A car bursts through a backyard fence, nearly striking children playing in the pool.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: New this morning, AI is certain to be a major topic at one of the -- I'm going to call the most highly anticipated Oval Office sit- downs of the year, at least -- when President Trump hosts Chinese President Xi Jinping for a state visit to the White House next week.

[08:55:00]

Add to that several top CEOs, heads of the big AI companies are expected to travel to DC for that visit, like the CEO of OpenAI, the CEO of NVIDIA, are among those expected to attend the state dinner. And this is quite a moment for this face-to-face to be playing out just as AI executives are sounding the alarm about the existential threat that AI can pose, could pose, will pose if the U.S. and the world doesn't pump the brakes on the pace of development and put in some guardrails. So far, President Trump and others have responded to those concerns with the pushback that if we pump the brakes, we pump the brakes at our own peril. If we do, China wins.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're also making sure that we lead. So we're leading China in AI by a lot. China has virtually no controls. It's freewheeling a little bit. So we have to be careful in both ways. We don't want to restrict them.

We're all of a sudden, we're coming second to China. Whoever wins with AI is going to win.

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA), HOUSE SPEAKER: If Congress just races in and does some sort of emergency session to try to regulate AI, we will lose the race to China. And that is a threat to every single American.

SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): If we all of a sudden unilaterally limit our ability to iterate and to stay ahead, we're just benefiting China.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BOLDUAN: Let's test that theory. Joining me right now is Scott Singer, co-director of the China AI Initiative at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. It's good to have you, thank you for being here.

I want to also play kind of the flip side of this as well. Tristan Harris, the co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology, told my colleague Anderson this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRISTAN HARRIS, CO-FOUNDER, THE CENTER FOR HUMANE TECHNOLOGY: What does the Chinese Communist Party care about more than anything else? Control, right? And so they don't actually have any interest in losing control.

So the idea of we can't lose to China is a thought terminating cliche. It stops us from thinking about the specific evidence that's right in front of us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Scott, give me your take on this. How much does China regulate AI now?

SCOTT SINGER, CO-DIRECTOR, CHINA AI INITIATIVE, CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL PEACE: China actually has the world's most extensive regulations of any country in the world. By and large, these regulations focus on control over the content, making sure that AI's outputs are consistent with the party's core narratives, including in areas like Tiananmen Square or Taiwan. In the last couple of years, the regulations have extended and now include, for example, regulations on what the Chinese Communist Party calls human-like AI, making sure that if you're interacting with an AI companion, that there's a minor mode to protect children.

So things like that are really central to how the party is now governing the technology.

BOLDUAN: So Scott, when you hear politicians say, if we pump the brakes, if we put on guardrails, if Congress acts, China wins, are they wrong? Half right? Something in between? SINGER: I think that it depends how you design the policies. I think that China's experience shows that if policies are overly restrictive, they can really hinder beneficial innovation. On the other hand, they know and we know that publics are going to want to trust the technologies that they are using.

And so in that sense, well-designed governance and policies in areas, for example, like transparency that allows us to get a sense of what the companies are doing, being able to respond to critical incidents are areas where I would expect that the U.S. might actually be able to really benefit the companies where they're really asking for some standardized sense of what they should be offering the government.

BOLDUAN: One of the things I've been starting to think about is when you think of the existential threats, the concerns, what Dario was really getting at when he put out his long essay, is when you look at that -- and it comes to these kind of national security concerns -- isn't U.S. versus China -- which would be kind of the traditional setup and thought -- or is it U.S. and China versus someone or something else?

SINGER: Let me offer a thought experiment for you. In the OpenAI Hugging Face incident in which an OpenAI agents in a testing environment penetrated the internal infrastructure of Hugging Face, that was two U.S. companies that ended up working together. But it's not too hard to imagine a U.S. company's models accidentally malfunctioning and entering the critical infrastructure of a Chinese company or vice versa. And when we have those types of risks, there's going to need to be international coordination.

And so this is not to say that the U.S. and China are ideologically the same. But when it comes to managing the most serious risks that cross borders, finding areas to cooperate is going to be essential to manage the most extreme risks ...

END