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Hegseth Meets With Senators As Nomination Momentum Builds; Fall Of Assad Regime Further Strains Middle East Relations; Bill Belichick Confirms Talks With North Carolina. Aired 5:30-6a ET
Aired December 10, 2024 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[05:31:15]
KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: All right, it is 5:30 a.m. here on the East Coast. It's 4:30 out in Kansas City, which is what you're looking at. No word on whether this is Missouri or the -- oh, it's Kansas City. Good morning, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us.
Some of Donald Trump's more controversial choices for his cabinet still fighting for confirmation on Capitol Hill.
The president-elect's choice for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, meeting with lawmakers for a second straight week looking to win over senators as previous allegations of sexual assault, alcohol abuse, and financial mismanagement at veterans' groups have emerged against him -- allegations that Hegseth claims are being made up to take him down.
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PETE HEGSETH, FORMER FOX NEWS HOST, TRUMP'S PICK FOR DEFENSE SECRETARY: This is what the left does, Sean. It's the anatomy of a smear. They take something and then they add anonymous sources, and contortions, and flat-out lies, and then they try to try you in the media before you can get -- even get into the doors with senators.
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HUNT: Now, he is getting into those doors with senators. He is slated to meet with moderate Republican Sen. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski over the next two days.
He's now also met several times with Sen. Joni Ernst. The Iowa Republican has been seen as a key vote around this nomination. She's not publicly saying yes yet.
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MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Are you still supporting the process? It doesn't sound like you're a yes yet. Is that fair?
SEN. JONI ERNST (R-IA): I am supporting the process.
RAJU: (INAUDIBLE) his denial of assault allegations? Do you believe those denials?
ERNST: I'll refer you back to the statement.
RAJU: Is the pressure again back home in primary (INAUDIBLE) play into this?
ERNST: We have been talking to these same issues in every meeting that we've had and he had really thoughtful answers.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right, joining us now to discuss Pete Hegseth and other Trump picks, Max Cohen, congressional reporter for Punchbowl News. Max, good morning to you. Thank you for being here.
Your read on where Joni Ernst is, especially as -- you know, she has come under some pressure. Pete Hegseth has mounted this kind of public campaign. She had been someone who was clearly reluctant. She had kind of gone out in public on Fox and some people that I spoke to interpreted that as her looking for others who might be willing to say no to Pete Hegseth. Now she seems to be waffling a little bit on her opposition.
What's your read?
MAX COHEN, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, PUNCHBOWL NEWS: Yeah, I was in those scrums yesterday with her on Capitol Hill and it's very notable that she says she's supporting Pete Hegseth through the process. Now, I followed up and I said, "Does that mean you're a yes on his confirmation?" And she would not go that far but it's clear I think she's trying to get to a yes.
And if Ernst, who on paper is someone who would not be in favor of Pete Hegseth, let's just take a look. She served in the military. He's been very critical of women in combat roles. And he also has been accused of sexual assault. As he mentioned, he denies that. Ernst is a survivor of sexual assault. But if she's getting to this more open yes answer I think that's a sign that he is in better shape than he was late last week.
HUNT: And do you think that that's an indication that she is under pressure from the MAGA wing of the party?
COHEN: Oh, I think certainly. As you know, she's up for re-election in 2026. All senators have to have that calculation in the back of their mind -- do you want to come back to the Senate? And I think a primary challenge would not be out of the question for some of these big donors to Donald Trump if she stood in the way of a big cabinet nominee like Hegseth.
HUNT: What about the other nominees that Donald Trump is pushing. Tulsi Gabbard is one, in particular. We've also seen Kash Patel start meeting with senators. Where do they stand?
COHEN: Yeah. I think that those two nominees you mentioned, Patel and Gabbard, immediately when people saw those names come down, they said that's going to be a very tough lift. From my conversations with Republican sources in the Senate there's not a huge willingness, in my mind, in their minds to take down another nominee, like Gaetz. So I think senators are trying to get to yes on those two nominations.
[05:35:05]
On Patel, he's meeting with a number of senators today, as well as Gabbard. And Patel specifically met with Chuck Grassley, the incoming chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Grassley had some very positive things to say, which I think is a pretty good sign that Patel faces a likely chance of confirmation.
HUNT: All right, Max Cohen for us this morning. Sir, thanks very much for being here.
COHEN: Thank you.
HUNT: I appreciate your time.
All right, let's turn back now to how Donald Trump won the right to assemble this new cabinet in the first place, winning the 2024 election partly by chipping away at a once reliable bloc of Democratic voters.
Exit polls show that Kamala Harris won votes in union households by eight percentage points over Donald Trump. But four years ago Joe Biden won that same group by 16 points. The slip comes despite some Democrats calling the Biden administration the most pro-union presidency since FDR.
Michigan Congresswoman Debbie Dingell blames the disconnect on poor messaging from her party.
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REP. DEBBIE DINGELL (D-MI): And as Democrats we are not talking. We were actually doing things that were helping them. We weren't communicating the way that we needed to. So I think we all have to take some responsibility for what happened.
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HUNT: Our next guest, Ron Brownstein, writes this about this new divide in organized labor. "Trump's strong showing among the blue- collar components of the labor movement illuminates how high a wall of distrust Democrats face in working class communities at the close of Joe Biden's presidency.
'Look, the Democratic Party has lost their way to some extent with the working class,' said Ted Pappageorge, secretary treasurer of the powerful Culinary Workers Union local 2026 in Las Vegas. 'When we were knocking at the doors it was pretty clear that Trump was winning the fight about dealing with inflation and kitchen table issues, and Democrats essentially were being viewed as the party of abortion.'"
Ron Brownstein joins us now. Ron, wonderful to see you. Thank you so much for being here.
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST, SENIOR EDITOR, THE ATLANTIC (via Webex by Cisco): Thank you.
HUNT: Tell us a little bit more about what you learned as you really dug into these numbers, and why do you think this is happening?
BROWNSTEIN: Yeah. I looked at a lot of previous -- good morning, first of all. I looked at a lot of previously unpublished data from both the exit polls and the VoteCast survey -- the AP VoteCast, which are the two major sources we have right now on voter behavior, and they tell a very consistent story.
Not only did Trump narrow the gap among union households but the educational polarization within the union ranks widened, which means that Harris actually ran even better than Biden did in 2020 among white college graduates in union households. She ran better among actual union members who are college graduates.
But Trump expanded on his margins among union households and union members who don't have a college degree, particularly white voters.
And really, the point here is that unions represent Democrats' best vehicle for reaching working class white voters. And if even unions with all of the advantages they have, all the targeted communications they have, the position of trust they started with their own members cannot slow this movement toward Trump among non-college-educate voters. It just underscores how big a challenge Democrats face.
Ted Pappageorge really puts his finger on it -- what I found in my interviews as a key explanation among almost everyone I talked to Democrats were viewed as focused more on social issues than on economic issues. And despite Biden's strong record of supporting unions, that record simply had not gotten through to folks and was in many ways overshadowed by inflation.
HUNT: Ron, one of the words in that -- in the story -- in your story is the word "trust," right? That they don't --
BROWNSTEIN: Yeah.
HUNT: These union households don't trust Democrats anymore.
BROWNSTEIN: Um-hum.
HUNT: Is that a cultural divide, do you think?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, it's interesting because I'm not sure it's so -- I mean, they're obviously are cultural barriers between Democrats and working class -- particularly white voters but increasingly, Latino voters and maybe, to some extent, Black voters -- but I'm not sure it's the issues themselves as it is a perception of where the party's priority is.
I mean, that's what Ted Pappageorge was focusing on -- Randi Weingarten, and other former AFL-CIO political directors that I talked to. It's a sense that Democrats were not sufficiently focused on their kitchen table struggles.
And, of course, that is -- you know, the irony here -- and I think maybe more than an irony -- kind of the ominous shadow here for Democrats is that Biden had a very clear theory about how to rebuild support among working class families, particularly in unions, and he largely executed that theory. I mean, the theory was he was going to support unions, he often said, and he did govern I think as the most pro-union president since Franklin Roosevelt in the '30s.
[05:40:00]
But most of his domestic agenda was aimed at creating more jobs that don't require a college degree. The infrastructure bill, the CHIPS bill, the Inflation Reduction Act and its impact on green manufacturing. He created 1.6 million construction and manufacturing jobs during his presidency, over $1 trillion in private sector investment.
And yet, when I looked at the VoteCast data only about one-third of non-college whites in union households gave him positive job approval ratings for his performance. Whereas nearly 60 percent of them were, in retrospect, positive on Trump's performance. That is just a devastating verdict and a measure of how deeply alienated these constituencies -- those working class constituencies are from Biden and Democrats at the end of his presidency.
HUNT: Do you think that there was anything about Kamala Harris that made this number worse? Like, if you think -- if Biden had stayed --
BROWNSTEIN: Yeah.
HUNT: -- at the top of the ticket would this change have been as dramatic?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, the fact that his approval rating was 34 percent among non-college, white, union households I think suggests that he was heading in the -- in the same direction. I mean, obviously, you run into the question on -- when you look -- whether you're talking about union households or non, whether there are voters -- blue-collar voters, in particular, who are reluctant to elect a woman as president more than a person of color.
When I interviewed David Plouffe, we talked about that. Last week when I interviewed him in that kind of post-election kind of retrospective, he said that at this point he thinks it's harder to get elected president as a woman than it is as a person of color because of that hesitation.
It is notable that non-college white women who were very cool to Hillary also flipped in the data that I saw that Biden carried most of those non-college white women in union households. Most of them voted for Trump this time.
So I think there is some of that there. But the larger, I think, point is that inflation and, as Debbie Dingell said, a lack of communication about some of the accomplishments left -- Biden kind of dug this hole much more than I think resistance to Harris.
HUNT: Fair enough.
All right, Ron Brownstein. Always so grateful to have you, sir. Thank you so much. See you soon.
BROWNSTEIN: Thanks for having me.
HUNT: All right. Coming up here on CNN THIS MORNING, Donald Trump declaring that the U.S. should stay out of the crisis in Syria. But our next guest says the president-elect has been handed a parting gift from President Biden and he should take it.
Plus, a crushing Monday night defeat for the Dallas Cowboys. The Bleacher Report ahead.
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[05:46:55]
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MATTHEW MILLER, SPOKESPERSON, U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT: We believe it is important that the chemical weapons stockpiles that we know the Assad regime was maintaining be locked down and that they be destroyed. And we will continue to work with our partners in the region to that effect.
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HUNT: Uncertainty amplified in the Middle East after the fall of the Assad regime in Syria. Earlier today a CNN team on the ground again reports hearing loud explosions over Damascus. Currently unclear exactly who is responsible for them.
This morning Iran is urging the U.N. Security Council to respond to Israeli attacks in Syria. Israeli forces striking the country's chemical weapons capabilities. Israel says that's in an effort to prevent extremist groups from accessing the weapons.
The level of the Assad regime's brutality coming into focus after the discovery of 40 bodies with varying signs of torture inside a hospital morgue near Damascus.
U.S. officials also unsealing an indictment charging two former high- ranking Assad officials with war crimes, accusing them of torturing Americans and other civilians.
Our next guest, Joel Rubin, calls this a parting gift to Donald Trump from President Biden. He writes this. " Donald Trump needs to lean in on Syria diplomacy, not look away. Trump's first instinct last night was to say that we've got no interest in Syria. Nothing could be further from the truth. The stability of a keystone country in the heart of the Middle East -- one whose refugees have reached all the way to the U.S. -- is worth pursuing."
And joining us -- joining us now Democratic strategic and former Obama deputy assistant Secretary of State for Legislative Affairs, Joel Rubin. Joel, good morning to you.
JOEL RUBIN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST, FORMER OBAMA DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE FOR LEGISLATIVE AFFAIRS: Good morning, Kasie.
HUNT: Nice to see you.
RUBIN: Thanks.
HUNT: So these strikes -- the Israelis striking some chemical weapons facilities. You saw --
RUBIN: Yeah.
HUNT: -- a state department spokesman there saying that locking down these capabilities is absolutely critical.
Where does that effort stand right now?
RUBIN: Well, first of all, this is the moment right now where all the world needs to lean in. And this is exactly why your point of bringing up the chemical weapons shows that once a state fails and collapses anything can happen.
So we have the chemical weapons storages that people are aware of that Assad was holding on to. That will require international inspectors to get in to verify whether or not they are still there. But in the meantime, countries around the region are going to take their own independent action, so Israel is doing that.
There is the counterterrorism mission where the Islamic State fighters in the east have been fighting our allies, the Kurds. Hundreds are imprisoned there. They can't be let out. There are a variety of neighbors who have their own independent concerns. So this really requires an international effort that's together, comprehensive, consolidated, and clear. Otherwise we're going to continue to see security threats falling out and coming out of Syria.
HUNT: So for Donald Trump, the president-elect who as you note in this piece said right away --
RUBIN: Yeah.
HUNT: -- we want nothing to do with this, right?
RUBIN: Yeah.
[05:50:00]
HUNT: What do you -- what would you say directly to him about -- I mean, clearly, he campaigned on, and his supporters are very focused on the U.S. not being engaged in foreign wars.
RUBIN: Right, right.
HUNT: Are there ways in which you see engagement with Syria as preventing that kind of a conflict?
RUBIN: Yeah. You know, as much as he wants, we don't control the world, and we have to deal with the world as it comes up. And you can't turn your back on crises when they occur. And this is a perfect example of it. It's coming at the end of President Biden's term. It's going to be squarely in the lap of Donald Trump, and he has to decide how it's going to be settled.
The United States is not invading Syria. Let's just be clear this is not Iraq redux. This is not the United States going in to try to overthrow a regime. This is the United States and our allies looking at a country that has imploded and trying to figure out how to make sure the pieces don't scatter across all of us.
And so his instinct to stay out of invading wars is understandable but not an appropriate reaction to this. This is one that requires American diplomatic leadership. Working with the neighbors. Iran is also involved in there on the ground. They're going to want to have a vote and so we're going to have to figure out that point with our allies as well.
So there's a lot of diplomacy that's required. Staying out -- that's going to undermine American interests, undermine American national security, and harm our -- the neighboring allies of the United States who are right now looking at Syria with deep concern.
HUNT: All right, Joel Rubin for us this morning. Very grateful to have your perspective.
RUBIN: Thanks, Kasie.
HUNT: Thank you very much for being here.
All right, time now for sports. The Bengals snatch victory from the jaws of defeat after a huge blunder by the Cowboys on "MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL."
Coy Wire has this morning's Bleacher Report. Coy, good morning.
COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Good morning, Kasie.
It is the final push to the playoffs. Just four weeks to go. There's a saying in the NFL among players and coaches -- the games they remember are played in December. But for Cowboys' fans this one will be one they wish they could forget.
Dallas' defense keeping the Bengals and the league leader in passing yards and touchdowns Joe Burrow in check. A sack with just two minutes to go. But then the unthinkable, Kasie.
The game is tied at 20. The Cowboys block the punt -- Nick Vigil. But Oruwariye, who was just activated, tries to field it and bobbles it. You're supposed to just let it go. The players can't believe it. The coaches were waving their arms like stay away.
The Bengals recover and that is all Joe Burrow needed. He hits Ja'Marr Chase for a 40-yard game-winning touchdown. Burrow threw for three of them; two went to Chase. The Cowboys unable to come back. Star pass rusher Micah Parsons was seen walking off the field before the game was over.
The Bengals now 5-8, keeping their playoff hopes alive.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BURROW, QUARTERBACK, CINCINNATI BENGALS: We needed a break. We needed a break. We haven't gotten many this year, but it was nice to get that one and nice to come out of this one -- come out of this with a win.
MICAH PARSONS, LINEBACKER, DALLAS COWBOYS: I mean, we just got a huge stop. We're going to the two-minute drill. It's just real hard to -- you think you believe you can pull that game out from that situation. That hurts.
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WIRE: The race for college football's most prestigious award, the Heisman Trophy, down to four. Colorado's two-way stary Travis Hunter, Boise State running back Ashton Jeanty, Oregon's six-year senior quarterback Dillion Gabriel, and Miami's quarterback Cam Ward named finalists last night.
This year's winner will be announced at the 90th Heisman Trophy ceremony on Saturday night in New York.
Legendary Patriots' coach Bill Belichick confirms that he has spoken with the University of North Carolina about potentially becoming their next head coach. On ESPN yesterday he said he met with the school's chancellor for about five hours on Sunday.
Coach Belichick is 72 years old, won six Super Bowls in New England, but he's never coached at the college level in his nearly 50 years on the sidelines.
He says if he did take the job, he'd have a sort of GM role as well.
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BILL BELICHICK, Let me put this in capital letters.
PAT MCAFFEE, HOST, "THE PAT MCAFEE SHOW": Yeah, yeah, yeah.
BELICHICK: IF -- I-F --
MCAFFEE: Got it.
BELICHICK: If I was in a college program, the college program would be a pipeline to the NFL for the players that had the ability to play in the NFL. It would be a professional program -- training, nutrition, scheme, coaching, techniques that would transfer to the NFL. It will be an NFL program at a college level.
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WIRE: If that happens, as coach said, Kasie, that would be huge. I mean, to be able to go and learn from one of the greatest coaches of all time and get a great education, that would be a pretty sweet deal.
HUNT: Pretty sweet deal, indeed.
All right, Coy. Thank you very much.
WIRE: You got it.
HUNT: I really appreciate it.
All right, up ahead here on CNN THIS MORNING the dayslong manhunt comes to a close. Details on the moment police confronted the alleged killer of UnitedHealthcare's CEO.
Plus, the collapse of the Assad regime putting past comments from one of Trump's cabinet picks under a microscope. We'll discuss live with Republican Congressman Ryan Zinke.
[05:55:00]
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TULSI GABBARD, PRESIDENT-ELECT TRUMP'S PICK FOR DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: My own views and experiences have been shaped by my multiple deployments and seeing firsthand the cost of war and the threat of Islamist terrorism.
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HUNT: It's Tuesday, December 10. Right now on CNN THIS MORNING --
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JESSICA TISCH, COMMISSIONER, NYPD: We should never underestimate the power of the public to be our eyes and our ears in these investigations.
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HUNT: Manhunt over. How police say they tracked down the suspect in the murder case of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
And --
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HEGSETH: I look forward to the actual under oath conversations with senators.
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HUNT: Building momentum. Trump's embattled choice to lead the Pentagon faces another critical week in his fight for confirmation.
And --
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ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: The end of this regime is a defeat for all who enabled his barbarity and his corruption.
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HUNT: Power vacuum. How the fall of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad could have unintended consequences for the U.S. and the world.
