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Millions At Risk Of Losing Food Stamps Next Month Amid Shutdown; Fence Comes Down Outside Broadview Immigration Facility; Pres. Trump Posts AI Video Dumping Sludge On Protesters; Almost 7 Million People Turn Out for "No Kings" Protests; Government Shutdown Could Drag into December; Trump Commutes Sentence for Former Congressman George Santos; Israel Accuses Hamas of Attacking Israeli Forces in Gaza. Aired 7-8a ET

Aired October 19, 2025 - 07:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:00:13]

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: I'm Victor Blackwell, and the breaking news is out of the Middle East. Israel claims that Hamas attacked its forces in Gaza with rocket-propelled grenades and sniper fire. We're hearing there are casualties.

Now, this is the first major test of the now week-old U.S.-brokered (technical difficulty). Jeremy Diamond is joining us live from Tel Aviv. Jeremy, what do you know?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, Victor, an Israeli military official confirming that they have carried out airstrikes in southern Gaza after the Israeli military accuses Hamas of attacking its forces in the southern part of the Gaza Strip. According to the Israeli military, Hamas forces fired a rocket-propelled grenade and directed sniper fire at Israeli troops who were positioned behind the yellow withdrawal line inside of the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military official calling this a, quote, "bold violation of the ceasefire," and it prompted the Israeli military to carry out these airstrikes in southern Gaza. We do not yet have reports of casualties as it relates to those airstrikes in southern Gaza, but it is early as of yet.

We are hearing from an Israeli source familiar with this incident that there are casualties among the Israeli troops who were struck in this alleged Hamas attack, but we do not yet have official confirmation about the nature of those casualties. And this does represent a very significant test of this ceasefire agreement so far.

It marks the first time that we have heard of Israeli troop casualties resulting from incidents of fire, although we should note that there have been multiple instances of the Israeli military opening fire on Palestinians who either approached the yellow line inside of Gaza or who were accused of crossing it. In fact, just on Friday, there was an incident in which 11 people were killed, including multiple children, when they were traveling in a vehicle that apparently crossed that invisible yellow line.

We are already hearing calls inside of Israel from the far right for Israel to respond with full force to this alleged Hamas attack on Israeli troops. The Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben- Gvir, for example, saying that he is urging the Israeli prime minister to order the Israeli military to resume fighting in Gaza against Hamas with full force and to completely destroy Hamas.

The Israeli prime minister and his defense minister, they are set to have a security consultation today as we continue to monitor in the coming hours how this may impact that ceasefire. Victor?

BLACKWELL: Jeremy Diamond from Tel Aviv, thanks so much.

Let's bring in now CNN Global Affairs Analyst Kimberly Dozier. Kimberly, thank you for being here. First, let's talk about -- we're talking a bit, while Jeremy was delivering his report, of signs that suggested this could happen.

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Yes, the State Department put out a rare weekend statement saying that Hamas was planning some sort of attack on Palestinians. Now, what we're hearing about, though, is an attack on Israeli Defense Forces in the Rafah area and an alleged Israeli airstrike in response.

Hamas isn't the only element that could cause violence. There's Palestinian Islamic Jihad organizations inside Gaza that didn't sign up to the ceasefire and could act as spoilers. But there was already a lot of tension between Hamas and the Israeli government because the Israelis said that Hamas wasn't working hard enough to return the bodies of the hostages who were still left in Gaza. Hamas has been saying that it needs heavy lifting equipment to get to them.

BLACKWELL: We've discussed, even from the announcement of the willingness of Hamas to enter this ceasefire deal, just how delicate it would be --

DOZIER: Yes.

BLACKWELL: -- to get from or through phase 1 onto the second phase. But if this is actually happening, that Hamas attacked, is this something that would require the president to come back in and involve his team between Israel and Hamas?

DOZIER: If the Israelis make a good case that Hamas acted in bad faith, I don't know that the White House would intervene and stop continuing violence. At this point, the Israelis control about 52 percent, 53 percent of the Gaza Strip. So they're still well- entrenched in there to defend Israeli territory and to attack various nodes of Hamas's power.

You're already getting calls, as Jeremy was talking about, from the nationalist extreme members of Netanyahu's cabinet. They want a return to full war. They say this kind of thing shows the job isn't done. And Netanyahu had promised his country that he was going to rid it of Hamas, and he just announced that he's going to run again for prime minister.

[07:05:05]

BLACKWELL: And those members also opposed the initial ceasefire --

DOZIER: Yes.

BLACKWELL: -- deal from the beginning as well. You mentioned the other forces inside Gaza. Does it matter whether this was Hamas official in this attack or if it was one of these other groups?

DOZIER: If it's a large number of casualties --

BLACKWELL: Yes.

DOZIER: -- on the IDF side, I don't think it's going to matter. I think it's going to -- since the Israeli government is already leaning forward towards this, already predisposed to get back into this conflict to, quote unquote, "finish the job" now that they've got the live hostages out, I think there might be a drive to continue.

That was what Hamas was always worried about. It was one of the reasons it was holding on to all the living hostages for so long.

BLACKWELL: And so those living hostages are now out of Gaza.

DOZIER: Yes.

BLACKWELL: Of course, I think the latest account is 18 deceased hostages that are to be returned to Israel.

DOZIER: Yes.

BLACKWELL: Without that, and I hate to use the word leverage, but --

DOZIER: Yes.

BLACKWELL: -- without having those living hostages, what stops the IDF from returning to a more muscular approach, a full war inside Gaza with Hamas?

DOZIER: Well, from Gulf officials I've spoken to who've been part of this peace process, they've said the only thing that has pulled Netanyahu back in the past is President Trump. So unless the White House decides to intervene and say, again, enough is enough in Gaza, the killing could start again.

BLACKWELL: And is this something that you would have expected that the White House would have been notified of before or as those strikes from the IDF that they phrase or frame as retaliatory, that they would have called the White House and said, Mr. President, this is happening?

DOZIER: You know, the IDF hasn't done that kind of thing in the past. They have had free reign to respond as necessary if troops are under fire. BLACKWELL: Because it is a sovereign nation.

DOZIER: Yes, yes.

BLACKWELL: It doesn't need permission from the U.S., obviously.

DOZIER: Because this was always the fear that something tactical on the ground could tumble back into war. And I think they'll get a phone call about here's what happened. But right now, this is all so fresh.

The last I checked, the IDF hadn't even put out a media statement about what it's done and why. So that tells me they're still trying to figure out on the ground, who fired the shots, who's injured. The emphasis is on getting the soldiers to safety.

BLACKWELL: And of course, we're still waiting for more reporting from the region. Our team, including and led by their Jeremy Diamond is going to get us more. And of course, we get it throughout the hour. We'll bring it.

DOZIER: Thanks.

BLACKWELL: Kimberly Dozier, thank you.

All right, almost 7 million people turned out Saturday to attend the more than 2700 "No Kings" protests coast to coast.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Today's protest is a peaceful demonstration that we all are united, regardless of where we came from, what our history is, where our backgrounds are, because our nation's democracy is at stake. And we are here to say we are a nation that will not be bowing down to any authoritarian rule.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

BLACKWELL: So we're showing you some of the major protests here, New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Atlanta. But the protests were not just limited to those big cities, small towns and red and blue states alike. They took part to the Trump administration.

And some GOP officials have dubbed the anti-Trump protest as the work of, quote, "violent left wing radicals." But organizers say they're committed to nonviolence and even trained tens of thousands of people in safety and de-escalation.

CNN's Shimon Prokupecz reports from one of the biggest protests in the country that was in New York City.

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: For nearly four hours, thousands of protesters took to the streets of Manhattan, marching from Times Square all the way down here to Union Square Park at 14th Street. And we saw people in costumes trying to keep a movement going like we saw in Portland. So costumes becoming a theme at this year's protest. Also, really, we -- this was a day in so many ways that was led by women. So many women turning out here at this protest. I spoke to one woman who's 76 years old, and she talked about the importance of coming out here, of being here and what she called and trying to save democracy.

I spoke to another woman who was wearing a frock costume and asked her why she was wearing that. And she said because of Portland. And she wanted to show that the protesters here are not violent. And we're here to send a message of unity.

And one of the things you did see out here today was that unity, people smiling, just happy to be together as they walked through the streets of Manhattan, trying to have their voices heard.

Shimon Prokupecz, CNN, New York.

[07:10:00]

BLACKWELL: All right, Shimon, thank you very much.

Protesters also, they didn't hesitate to gather almost right outside the president's front door. CNN's Brian Todd reports on protests in the nation's capital.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Victor, a very energetic and large crowd packed into this area here at the foot of the capital on Pennsylvania Avenue for this "No Kings" rally, the Washington, D.C. version of it. We have large crowds here and in cities across the country in places like San Francisco, Portland, Chicago, and the Twin Cities.

And what we heard from organizers and leaders and protesters was that there were all sorts of different motivations for people coming to these rallies. Here in Washington, there were practical reasons, there were political reasons, ideological reasons. Many protesters talked to us about how they wanted to come down here and voice their displeasure with the ICE raids and arrests of immigrants.

A lot of protesters told us they were here because they are very much against the National Guard deployments that have taken place here in Washington and in places like Chicago and Portland. And also, we had the theme of, kind of unique to Washington, of course, it's going on all over the country, but it really is concentrated here in Washington for the most part regarding the government shutdown and the furloughed government workers.

We talked to several of them who are really hitting some hardship now. They're going now -- we're now in the third week of the government shutdown, and many of them are now going many, many days without pay and without an end in sight to the government shutdown. They don't know when they're going to get their paychecks.

A lot of them, of course, are fearful of losing their jobs because there have been thousands of rifts during the government shutdown. That was part of the motivation for people coming here. Now, as far as the broader messaging of the movement, what we were told by Ezra Levin, he spoke to CNN a few days before these rallies took place. He said they had two main goals for this movement. One of them is kind of ideological. He wanted -- he said, "to burst the bubble of inevitability." Those were his words.

The idea, in his words, that no one can really challenge President Trump and his policies. He says these rallies are going to challenge that inevitability. Another goal, he said, was to use these rallies today to build up that grassroots movement to resist this administration even further.

And judging by the crowds regarding, you know, the crowds in these "No Kings" rallies all across the country, they may have some momentum actually building. Victor?

BLACKWELL: All right, Brian Todd for us there. Thank you, Brian.

Still to come, a federal judge is demanding answers from the Trump administration on orders to avoid violent encounters with Chicago protesters.

Plus, millions of Americans are at risk of losing food stamps next month amid the shutdown. And President Trump posted an AI-generated video on Truth Social depicting him as King Trump in a fighter jet flying over U.S. cities. What else he's doing in that video? That's ahead.

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[07:17:36]

BLACKWELL: All right, morning's headlines now. Eleven people have been injured after a car crashed into a tent at a child's birthday party. This happened in Bladensburg, Maryland. It's a suburb of D.C. Seven of the 11 victims are children, ages two to nine. An infant and a child are in critical condition, and police are now looking for the suspect who took off after the crash.

Millions of Americans are in danger of losing food stamps next month as the federal government shutdown continues. About 42 million people could lose that critical food aid. It's unclear if the Trump administration will intervene and redirect funds from other programs to continue paying these benefits.

The Agriculture secretary already warned late last week that the food stamp program would be out of money in two weeks. About one in eight Americans relied on that program to help buy food.

And new this morning, Paris' Louvre Museum is now closed today after a major robbery of priceless jewelry. France's interior minister told a radio station three or four suspects stole jewelry from the room that houses the French crown jewels. Now, this is also where the housing of the other valuables, including Louis XIV's Hearthstone vessel collection. The interior minister says the thieves used an external freight elevator on a truck, broke a window, and made off on motorcycles this morning with the jewels. He says the robbery took seven minutes.

Well, this weekend marks the first since a fence outside the Broadview, Illinois immigration enforcement facility has come down. And now the director of ICE's Chicago field office is ordered to appear in court Monday. CNN's Whitney Wild explains.

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT: Here in Broadview, Illinois, Victor, this has really been the epicenter of where we've seen quite a few clashes between protesters and federal agents here. For several weeks, we've seen protests here at the ICE facility. This is about 30 minutes west of Chicago.

And what we saw over the course of several days were federal agents using chemical munitions, using rubber bullets against peaceful protesters. In fact, a pastor was one of the people who was shot by federal agents using one of those non-lethal munitions against what was an otherwise peaceful protest. That prompted a lawsuit where protest organizations, a union that represents journalists, went to federal court to try to get a judge to be able to curtail how federal agents are interacting with these peaceful protests.

[07:20:08]

A federal judge put forth a restraining order that limits their ability to use chemical munitions against peaceful protesters and members of the press, limits their ability to use physical force against those same groups. Then Tuesday happened in -- on the south side of Chicago, where there was another flare-up. The crowd became quite testy with federal law enforcement.

And in fact, the Chicago Police Department and the Department of Homeland Security says that protesters were throwing objects at federal agents. As those agents were leaving, they detonated chemical munitions, exposing members of the public as well as members of the Chicago Police Department.

A judge who had previously put that restraining order out saw that reporting and brought the parties back into court this week and put another condition on the restraining order, Victor. Now she wants federal agents as part of Operation Midway Blitz to be wearing body cameras, and she wants them to be recording at all times.

Again, here in Broadview, it is very calm. This is, you know, typical of what we see. We see these, you know, bigger protests usually on Friday mornings and then in the evening on the weekends. But during the day, it is very quiet. You can see here, some of these streets are shut down. The sidewalks are shut down.

There is a law enforcement presence. There are concrete barriers here that are meant to try to, you know, keep the protesters and the media in a designated area to just try to keep that crowd control. And it's this level of control from local law enforcement that has the judiciary saying the National Guard's not needed. A district court had already said the National Guard was not

necessary. This week, an appeals court upheld that. And again, they're looking at the state of play here, looking at how much local law enforcement is able to control these crowds and saying the National Guard is not necessary.

And Victor, ultimately, they are just not buying this argument from the Trump administration that there is a rebellion inside the United States that would warrant the National Guard. So finally, the state of play for the National Guard here is that they remain federalized, but they cannot move throughout the state, Victor.

BLACKWELL: All right, Whitney Wild for us there. Thank you so much.

A lawmaker threw a party for his dog. Turned six. But it's where he had the party and when that's causing some controversy. I'll discuss in the morning roundup after a quick break.

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[07:26:48]

BLACKWELL: Almost 7 million people turned out across the country and some overseas for the "No Kings" 2 protest against the Trump administration.

Joining me now to discuss Ernie Suggs, race and culture reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, SiriusXM Culture and Economics Contributor Andrew McCaskill and Malena Cunningham, former Birmingham news anchor. Welcome back to all of you.

And I want to first start with the protests. And Malena, let me start with you. The import of the number.

MALENA CUNNINGHAM, FORMER BIRMINGHAM NEWS ANCHOR: Yes.

BLACKWELL: And the breadth, the scope of what we saw yesterday.

CUNNINGHAM: Well, you know, a lot of times people question crowd sizes, but I think there was no question yesterday in many cities across the country, 2,700. The estimate now is 7 million people could go higher. So the American people show that they're out there to get their voices to be heard and to try to save this democracy and protect free speech. And it was amazing to see.

BLACKWELL: Ernie, let me come to you with what the president posted on social media in response. And we're going to play it. And I want you to pick up on all of the details here. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

(MUSIC)

(END VIDEOCLIP)

BLACKWELL: I don't think if I describe that, I could have done it justice. What are we watching here?

ERNIE SUGGS, RACE & CULTURE REPORTER, ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION: That's quite an image to start your morning with.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

CUNNINGHAM: Yes.

ERNIE: But I think this is an example of the president playing to MAGA base. He's playing to the MAGA base. He only cares about what he -- what his people care about. So he doesn't care that 7 million people, as Malena said, were out there protesting about what his policies are.

He's only appealing to who he wants to appeal to. And it's easy to say that he's a very unserious president, but I think that this is an example of you having 7 million Americans out there protesting. 2,500 places across this country, right here in Atlanta as well, who are protesting against his policies that he's promoting on -- through social memes of him in a crown with, you know, dramatic music dropping whatever on all these people.

BLACKWELL: And there's more than just the crown. I mean, of course, King Trump --

CUNNINGHAM: Yes.

BLACKWELL: -- on the side of a fighter jet over American cities with a question of militarizing, you know, that sending the military to U.S. cities, but dropping a load on American people in this video. At some point, you know, one half of it is, is he rage baiting, you know, the American people or his perceived enemies?

But at some point when you get past the, you know -- well, Trump's just being Trump. Remember his response when Hillary Clinton called his supporters deplorables.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, yes.

BLACKWELL: And by comparison, what this is.

CUNNINGHAM: But also, I think the president forgets that he is exercising free speech, which is what 7 million people were out there --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.

CUNNINGHAM: -- protesting --

BLACKWELL: Yes.

CUNNINGHAM: -- or rallying around. OK, this is America. You have the right to do that. Ugly as it may be, or distasteful as it may be. Free speech. That's what America is known for.

So if the president could do it, that's what the rest of Americans could do as well. SUGGS: But I'm going to cut you off, but free speech is also about restraint.

CUNNINGHAM: It's true.

SUGGS: He's the president of the United States.

[07:30:00]

CUNNINGHAM: This is true.

SUGGS: The 47th president of the United States who's dropping memes and memes like this, which is uncouth, to be honest with you. I mean, they're -- you know, I'm old enough to remember the time when there was Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, and, you know, the Bushes, who carried themselves in the Oval Office with a modicum of decorum. And now, we're not seeing that. And it's just unbelievable.

ANDREW MCCASKILL, SIRIUS XM CULTURE AND ECONOMICS CONTRIBUTOR: He's not a battle rapper, right? Like, this isn't about hitting your enemies harder when they hit you back. This is, you know, a treatise on how I feel about these Americans, right? These American people who are coming out to have their say. And, you know, the Constitution has always been sort of our negotiating agreement. And once you start to say that free speech is not free anymore, right, he said, hey, we've taken away free speech, but then you do something like this.

But then you also say that birthright citizenship is on the table as well. It's also about saying who gets to be American, who gets to have a say in our public discourse, but also in our democracy. And this is a really interesting way to talk back to the millions of people who are saying, I've kind of had enough of this.

CUNNINGHAM: It may rally his base, but it's also rallying the opposition as well.

MCCASKILL: I think it's going to backfire in that way.

BLACKWELL: Day 19 of the government shutdown, and I had Congressman Jim Clyburn on yesterday, and I asked him, do you expect this could go through Thanksgiving, through Christmas? And he says he doesn't think so, but it could. I had a representative of the Air Traffic Controllers Union on. It's like, what does this look like if this goes into the busiest travel day of the year, the travel season? And he says there might be some people who just leave the profession altogether. And it's hard to recover when you lose an air traffic controller.

SUGGS: Yes. I mean, I think we're barreling into Thanksgiving. We're barreling into Christmas. These are the biggest travel days, you know, the -- not only for the airline industry, but for us. You know, we're thinking about moving around, and it's going to be a lot of trouble. And I think that, you know, I listened to your interview yesterday with Mr. Clyburn, and I do think that we are headed to the holiday season with this shutdown still in effect because it seems like both sides are entrenched. Both sides have no -- have not indicated that there's going to be any kind of negotiations that are going to come forth soon. So, I think that we're heading into the holidays, and it's going to be a mess.

CUNNINGHAM: And the economy is already fragile. So, people are thinking about not traveling, maybe not shopping as much for Christmas, because with tariffs on goods, prices are going up. This is really going to have an interesting effect on our economy. And I even have to fly out next week. I'm going out west. I'm a little concerned about it. You know, I'm going to be super nice to my TSA folks. And they deserve it.

MCCASKILL: As we all should do.

CUNNINGHAM: Exactly. They deserve it. Do it anyway. But, you know, your heart goes out to people who are continuing to work and keep us safe, especially in the air. We want to be safe there. And I thank them for coming to work without the pay, but let's hope that this can get resolved soon enough so that they don't have the stress on them.

BLACKWELL: Let me get to one more thing here. While this is happening and you have so many hundreds of thousands of people who are not being paid, there was a birthday party on Capitol Hill. Senator Jim Justice threw a party for his dog, baby dog, turned six years old. This is at the Capitol. There were there's a long line of staffers who also not being paid during the shutdown who lined up to take pictures. There was a cake. There were cake pops.

And, Ernie, you mentioned previous presidents, the optics of something like this during the Clinton shutdown.

SUGGS: Yes.

BLACKWELL: I mean, it's hard to imagine what the response would have been. But this happened days ago and there's not been much talk about.

SUGGS: Yes. I mean, this is an example of normalization of what's happening in America right now. You know, this had happened on the Clinton or Biden or even Bush. There would have been a lot of controversy, a lot of talk about this. But, you know, I just learned about this when you sent it to me last night. So, we're in a different world.

BLACKWELL: And this was what he told Roll Call about this when they were, you know, asking about why you're having a birthday party for your dog instead of negotiating the shutdown. This is the quote from Senator Jim Justice of West Virginia. "To be perfectly honest, I think what is going on with the shutdown is not good. It's way too much politics for me, you know."

MCCASKILL: Way too much politics coming from a sitting from a sitting U.S. senator is insane, right? Like I'm all for a cute dog moment, but I think Capitol Hill needs a lot more politics and a lot less paw patrol. The 23,000 West Virginians who are also federal employees have to be wondering, is this the best use of their senators time?

[07:35:00] You've also got to think about the seven hundred thousand federal workers who are working eight-hour days and shifts without pay. To your point, the air traffic controllers, TSA agents, Border Patrol, people who are doing really important, really dangerous work without getting paid. It's not just the optics of this, but it feels very it feels indicative of where we are in terms of getting this solved. Like Republicans and Democrats have all been remarkably ineffective in this moment, there's enough blame to go around, but this -- but Republicans are not beating the charges that they're hostile towards government workers with things like this going.

BLACKWELL: All right. I'm going to pause it here, but we'll come back. We've got, of course, so much more to talk about. Malena, Andrew, Ernie, thank you very much. When we come back, should you have to pay to recline on an airplane? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:40:00]

BLACKWELL: Welcome back to the Morning Roundup. Former Republican Congressman George Santos, he is out of prison after having his sentence commuted by President Trump. He's out now doing interviews. Ernie Suggs, Andrew McCaskill, and Malena Cunningham still with me. He's out doing interviews. Posted a long message on social media in which we could put some of it up here where he says that he is now going to focus on prison reform and accountability, ensuring that those in power uphold the dignity and humanity of every person in their care.

Ernie, what is the -- I don't know, the prospect of public life for George Santos now?

SUGGS: Well, we thought we'd never see him again, but he's here.

BLACKWELL: For at least for another seven years.

CUNNINGHAM: Right.

SUGGS: I think George Santos is going to be loud. He's going to be out there. Obviously, when he was in prison, he was writing columns everywhere. So, he's going to be out there more. And I think this is an example of just how the culture can build these people up. And George Santos was built up. He was kind of propped up as his own self- making.

And now, he's out of jail. He's a fan of the president. The president likes people who are fans of his. So, he released him. And I think that we're going to see a lot of George Santos in the next couple weeks.

CUNNINGHAM: And there's nothing to preclude him from running for office again. The Constitution says, it does not say that you can't run again if you are a convicted felon, even if you've been expelled from Congress. So, with all of this, it's almost looking as if he's preparing himself to run for office again, maybe even something higher than Congress.

BLACKWELL: Yes, the president tweeted, of course, when he announced the commutation, at least Santos had the courage, conviction, and intelligence to always vote Republican. So, that was one of the considerations in the commutation.

Let's talk about what I teased before the break. You know, we're going into the travel season. Canadian airline WestJet serves 19 states, D.C., Puerto Rico, international destinations as well. Is getting rid of reclining seats in standard economy on 43 of its planes. If you want to recline, if you want to lean back with that 10 degrees, you've got to buy a premium seat. You've got to buy one of the more expensive seats. Would you miss it?

MCCASKILL: Absolutely. I'm 6'2 and some change.

BLACKWELL: Me too.

MCCASKILL: And I need to recline. This just a little bit goes a long way when you're on a long flight. I'm sure you recognize this too. But I think the economics of this is really interesting because what we're seeing now is that the guardrails are off for corporations and capitalism in general to just go run amok to see what they can get away with. I think that now you're seeing companies saying we're going to break up every piece of the experience and sell the crumbs back to you incrementally, right?

Like Delta also tried this a little bit last year when they said, we're going to roll back medallion benefits. And the people went insane, right? The next thing you know, the CEO says, hey, let's reset. We're going to keep the things the way that they were. And I think that the opportunity here is like people are consumers are going to have to vote with their voice and with their dollars because otherwise it's going to be a frog boiling in water. Every little incremental thing to the point to where then what was considered luxury before is going to be the baseline.

I know you all are probably all like high value carriers, first class carriers. But for me, a budget guy, a bottle of water used to be free on some of the flights and now it's $3.

BLACKWELL: You know, I asked for a blanket and they looked at me like we haven't had a blanket since the '90s. Listen --

CUNNINGHAM: And they never said how much it was going to cost to recline. So, that's interesting. And then there are other airlines that, you know, you may pay $39 for your ticket, but by the time you pay for your baggage, your seat and everything else, now your ticket is over $250. So, it'll be interesting to see if they do the same thing.

MCCASKILL: Some reports matters.

CUNNINGHAM: Exactly.

BLACKWELL: Well, listen, this new seat has an adjustable headrest. So, there you go that. You can you can lean your head back a little bit.

MCCASKILL: Charge me whatever.

BLACKWELL: Can we talk about six, seven? The most popular story on cnn.com right now is this new young people. And I got to that part of the --

MCCASKILL: Young people.

BLACKWELL: The folks are saying it are saying it, just shouting out six, seven. It apparently doesn't really mean any one thing. But teachers, some are buying in. Some are banning it.

CUNNINGHAM: Yes.

SUGGS: You know, my wife is a teacher.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

[07:45:00]

SUGGS: And she comes home every day talking about she's heard six, seven, fifty times. And she has no idea what it means. And I'm old, too. I have --

BLACKWELL: OK. Wait a minute. I ain't saying you're old.

CUNNINGHAM: Well, apparently it means nothing. I was talking to a friend of mine, I was with her and her two kids that they kept doing six -- doing things with their fingers and saying six, seven. And I said, what is that? She said nothing. But it's the thing that kids think makes them cool. So, that's their new slang.

MCCASKILL: So, we don't have MTV anymore for people to -- or BT is not doing music videos anymore. There's no TRL. And so, younger people are trying to get that culture, that sameness, that lived experience from 15 second TikToks and things like that. So, some of what you're going to get is going to be a little odd. If we understood it, it wouldn't be cool.

BLACKWELL: Well, at least it's not, from my understanding, sexual derogatory. And if you just want to yell out a couple of numbers, have at it.

All right. Malena, Andrew, Ernie, thank you very much. Six, seven, apparently.

SUGGS: Six, seven.

BLACKWELL: All right. It was another day of upsets in college football. Next, we'll take you between the hedges for this top 10 SEC showdown.

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[07:50:00] BLACKWELL: A recap of our breaking news out of the Middle East. Israel claims Hamas has attacked IDF forces in Gaza with rocket propelled grenades and sniper fire. Sources tell CNN there are casualties. It's not clear yet how many.

This is the first major test of the one-week-old U.S. brokered ceasefire. The Israeli military confirms its air force fighter jets carried out airstrikes in the Rafah area to remove the threat. And says militants opening fire on Israeli troops is a, quote, "blatant violation of the ceasefire agreement." Hamas denies violating the ceasefire. Let's stay with CNN throughout the morning for breaking news updates on the escalation of violence in Gaza and the state of the ceasefire.

All right. Severe storms are sweeping across the Midwest and south today. CNN's Allison Chinchar is here. Where's the worst of it?

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Right. So, right now it's across portions of the southeast. We've got that strong line of storms making its way across places like Georgia, Tennessee, and into Alabama. Again, you can see that strong line. There are some lightning. Most of that is focused closer down towards the Gulf Coast region.

Off to the north, also lots of rain here. But this is mostly just light to moderate rain. We don't really have as much of the strong to severe component with this, but that may change this afternoon. You've also got a lot of these wind advisories in effect. Most of these go through at least lunchtime. Some of them continue all the way into the evening hours, especially across the Carolinas.

Here's where the greatest threat for severe storms exists today. Again, we've got that tiny little portion still there along the Gulf Coast. But the bulk of it really is focused across the northeast and into the Mid-Atlantic. High gusty winds, and yes, we cannot rule out the potential for an isolated tornado with this line of storms. Again, you can kind of see it sliding off to the east, making its way through the Midwest this morning, then into the Mid-Atlantic by the evening and really kind of the focus tomorrow morning, yet again, another travel hurdle across many of the big cities in the northeast for Monday morning. And that includes New York and Boston, places like that.

We're also looking at a big change in temperatures. You've got that first swing of cold air that's going to come through some areas starting today, the rest of it for Monday. But then you have that secondary cold snap that's expected to come in by the middle of the week.

Take Cleveland, for example. Not too bad today, 69. You see that first dip into tomorrow. It goes back up just a little bit. And then the rest of the week, much colder. And this is going to be the case across many Midwestern, Northeast and Mid-Atlantic cities.

BLACKWELL: All right. Allison, thank you. Let's talk college football now. The pass to the SEC championship took a bit of a turn yesterday. CNN's Carolyn Manno joins us with that and more from New York. What you got, Carolyn?

CAROLYN MANNO, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, Victor. Well, let's start with Ole Miss and Georgia. A high-scoring back-and- forth thriller between two top 10 teams. Ole Miss actually scored in their first five possessions of this game. They led for most of it, but the Bulldogs came back late.

Georgia managing a 17-0 fourth-quarter run to get the 43-35 win, thanks in large part to a career day from their quarterback, Gunner Stockton. Stockton completing 26 of 31 passes, close to 290 yards, four touchdowns, with an additional 22 on the ground. So, it's the first loss of the season for Ole Miss, and the win giving Georgia playoff hopes a little bit of a boost. That game one of a handful of top 25 matchups on Saturday.

Rivals Tennessee and Alabama squaring off on the third Saturday in October. Down 16-7, Tennessee had the ball in Alabama's one-yard line here, but look at this, Zabien Brown picking it off and taking it 99 yards for the touchdown. As time ran out at the end of the first half, a wild 14-point swing that gave the Crimson Tide a 23-7 lead at the half, and Bama quarterback Ty Simpson throwing for 253 yards and two touchdowns as well as Alabama extends its win streak over ranked opponents to four games. They are red hot right now.

In baseball, game six of the American League Championship Series is tonight. The Mariners up three games to two. They have a chance to make history at the Rogers Center, one win away now from advancing to the franchise's first World Series. After losing their first two games at home, Toronto won games three and four to even the series, but Seattle using a pair of eighth-inning home runs to complete a dramatic comeback in Friday's game five. That was capped by the go-ahead grand slam from Eugenio Suarez.

So, Logan Gilbert having the ball for the Mariners tonight. He says he knows how special this can potentially be.

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LOGAN GILBERT, SEATTLE MARINERS PITCHER: It's been such a long year just to get to this point is amazing, but to be the one to have the ball and you grow up dreaming of moments like this and you don't know how many you'll get over the course of your career. Some guys never get this. So, it's a really big deal and hopefully just contribute to the team.

DAN WILSON, SEATTLE MARINERS MANAGER: You know, this time of year being able to focus is -- it's a -- you know, it's a big deal. There's a lot of outside commotion, a lot of outside noise. But our guys have done a great job of it, staying focused, and we know that, you know, we have to stay focused on the task at hand and there's still work to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[07:55:00] MANNO: The Dodgers are waiting to see who wins that series. And in the NFL, the Rams and Jacks kicking off at Wembley Stadium in about an hour and a half. Familiar territory here for Jacksonville. They're going to be playing in their 14th game in the U.K. The most of any franchise. Rams are without their leading receiver, Puka Nacua. He's out with an ankle sprain, but this is still expected to be a close game, Victor, between the two teams. They're both four and two back to you.

BLACKWELL: Carolyn Manno, thanks so much. And thank you for joining us this morning Inside Politics Sunday with Manu Raju is up after a break.

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