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Abbott Breaks With Trump, Pauses New A.I. Data Centers; Natalie Harp Scandal: From Behind The Scenes To The Headline; Could Trump's 50 Percent Tariffs On Canada Hurt Him In The Midterms? Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired August 25, 2026 - 06:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:32:35]

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR: Okay. So, the fight over A.I. data centers is shaping up to be a defining issue in the midterm elections, perhaps even in Texas.

Governor Greg Abbott, who's up for reelection, now finds himself against President Trump on this issue. He was all for it initially. Abbott backed into a corner, apparently and forced to pivot as backlash is growing against the rapid build out of data centers across the state.

Now, according to "The Texas Tribune", there are at least 335 data centers currently in operation. Nearly 250 more are planned.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. GREG ABBOTT (R), TEXAS: I have pressed pause on any new data center. They popped up in places that nobody ever heard of before, until they started the construction, and so they had not been working in collaboration with the state. They have not been working in collaboration with local governments.

And so, they basically dug their own grave for the problem that's been caused for them. And that's why they got the backlash they deserve. And that's why these new standards are in place to make sure they're not going to be able to operate until they come into compliance with the standards that I have set.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Jesse, during the break, we were talking about messaging and how to talk about this, and you've got this Fox News poll saying that 70 percent of the people they polled were at least opposed to having a data center in their area.

So, what do you make of how he's playing this?

JESSE ARM, POLLSTER: Yeah, there's a lot of hysteria. There's a lot of panic about data centers right now. The A.I. companies that came out and said doom and gloom projections about this technology is going to lead to lose to massive job loss. Best case scenario, worst case scenario, Terminator-like killings of all of us.

So, surprise, surprise, people are upset about data centers and have whipped themselves up into a frenzy about it. Abbott, I think, is in a circumstance that's not totally dissimilar from another really popular governor viewed as a rising star in his party, Josh Shapiro, who brought, you know, fast tracked a bunch of data center projects to in particular with Amazon, and then pivoted on the issue and made a big political show of that pivot. Abbott is now doing something similar in Texas.

I do -- I'll be honest with you. I think it's a little bit performative. A lot of the data centers that are responsible actors are going to be abiding by the new limitations and regulations that the governor is stating that they need to comply with and need to come to the state.

CORNISH: I think one thing that's interesting is each state and local municipality, they're starting to talk more and more about moratoriums. They're starting to -- so we know what's planned.

[06:35:00]

But it feels as though there's some obstacles growing to that. And is it just kind of a political messaging thing, or is there a movement behind it?

SARA FISCHER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA ANALYST: I think it's a numbers game. The problem with data centers is that they require a lot of resources, jobs, infrastructure to build. And then once they are built, there's not a lot of jobs to keep them running.

And so, a lot of the local communities have to take the brunt of the noise of the energy, of all the things to keep them up and running, to build. And then once you get them built, they don't get to reap the benefits of them themselves.

Remember, data centers are powering A.I. models that power a large part of the economy in the future, right? But they're not necessarily that moment bringing jobs directly to the communities. I think that's where there's this big backlash.

CORNISH: Here's how Democrats are trying to get an example. So here is the Democratic nominee for governor, Gina Hinojosa. I don't know if you're working with her or anything like that. Okay. But let's play how she's talking about it

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GINA HINOJOSA (D), TEXAS GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I have called on Governor Abbott to issue a moratorium and convene the legislature in an emergency special session today. Instead, Abbott has chosen to issue a temporary pause that we all know will be lifted November 4th, the day after the election.

These are political games. It is smoke and mirrors, and nothing has really changed. And the people of Texas know it. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUCK ROCHA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: So in Texas, not just in Texas and Pennsylvania, in any state, there's very few issues in my 36 year career of running campaigns that's brought Republicans and Democrats together to be against something. And this is one of them.

No matter what the cost is, I really haven't seen something that would align the far right and the far left, especially rural voters. I grew up on a farm in east Texas. A lot of these things are built in rural areas because there's space to build them, and they're very much up in arms. And a lot of them are Trump supporters.

And I think that's why you see something in Texas, not just because there's a lot of data centers there, but somebody like Greg Abbott has taken lots of money from the folks that are building those that Gina obviously will talk about, because its good politics to say, I haven't taken any money. And he has. Who do you think will be for data centers?

ARM: Yeah, I think there's actually a lot of unity on the far right and the far left these days. Increasingly, I watch, you know, Tucker Carlson do an interview with, you know, at "The New York Times". And he talks about an economic policy, we've actually just got to echo more of the far left. On foreign policy, we've just got to echo more of the far left. And social issues, they're kind of a distraction anyway.

So, this is a continuing theme. I think data centers are not as fringe as some of these other things where you're seeing unity between these elements, but one lawmaker who stood out to me as a really effective communicator on this issue has been Senator Tim Sheehy of Montana, who's something of a rising star within the GOP. He's gone to great lengths to point out, recently tweeted something about this, that, look, we wanted to reindustrialize. We wanted to rebuild the American, you know, ability to create new things.

CORNISH: With jobs. Though Sara made it sound like --

(CROSSTALK)

ARM: Well, data centers are going to bring jobs to the economy.

FISCHER: It's just -- it's hard within the local data center, they they're going to bring jobs to the economy, but not necessarily to the place where the data center is physically located. And I think that's where there's frustration.

And just to the point that you made, I think there's the water issue is huge. Like if you are a farmer and you're experiencing droughts and you're having access to water issues, and yet data centers are going to require a ton of water to cool them down. Like there is a resources problem there.

CORNISH: That probably no accident that we really heard a lot about this out of Utah, right where the southwest is in the middle of a pretty serious water crisis to the north of there.

Okay, you guys, stay with me. Next on CNN THIS MORNING, she controls much of what President Trump posts. We're going to talk about why Natalie Harp's deleted posts from January 6th are getting their own attention.

Plus --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOUG FORD, ONTARIO PREMIER: I have a lot of real estate on my (EXPLETIVE DELETED). So, he has a lot of room because (EXPLETIVE DELETED). So --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Canada's leaders not backing down. Has President Trump finally met his match in this trade war?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:43:05]

CORNISH: All right. People on the Internet are asking if the White House is trying to distance itself from Natalie Harp. The official X page for the White House posted this video of Trump waving the green flag at the Freedom 250 Grand Prix Sunday. The internet quickly noticed that Natalie Harp was basically cropped out of the photo.

And Harp has been stealing headlines since that jab from Senate candidate Jon Ossoff. That was more than a week ago.

Then there was this leak of her letters, things she had written to the president, moments when she called herself unworthy of him. And now people are looking at her deleted tweets which show her support for the president on January 6th, and after. Reports that she was also the one behind a racist Truth Social video that depicted the Obamas as apes.

So, is her spotlight getting too bright?

I'm bringing in Maggie Haberman, White House correspondent with "The New York Times". She's also the coauthor of the new book, "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump".

So, I don't -- this story has taken on legs longer than, you know, some bickering from the candidate from Georgia. And one of the things I noticed right away was that leak of letters of hers, it felt as though somebody like the call was maybe coming from the inside of the house. And is she making enemies in the White House?

MAGGIE HABERMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Jonathan and I get into this pretty -- not extensively in the book, but we do write about Natalie Harp and how purely devotional she is to Donald Trump. Those letters were left, and we write about them again in the book. In his personal spaces, during the interregnum period when he was out

of office, one of them said, "You are all that matters to me". These letters and some of her behavior alarmed people around the president then candidate, including the Secret Service, and they spoke to people about what was happening at the time.

She is now -- there's two factors here, Audie.

[06:45:02]

One is she is 10 feet away from him in the Oval Office all the time. She supplies him not with all of his information. He obviously gets intelligence briefings and so forth that she doesn't prepare, but she provides him sort of this alternate version of information, including that plays into his view of the deep state, in his words, of his own government, of being suspicious of what he is being told.

And she was one of the people who he took with him on that plane, when the older Air Force One was a decoy plane, very small group of people. So that's part of why there is a focus. It matters not because, you know, the salacious implications aside that the senator did and others have done, it matters because she's in government and she's close to the president.

CORNISH: People are also pointing out her tweets specifically after he was impeached. And I have to admit, I kind of feel like being close to Trump table stakes is being supportive of Stop the Steal and its movement. It doesn't feel like it's all that unusual to have a person who would espouse these kinds of ideas. Again, why do you think it's drawing so much attention?

HABERMAN: I think that there is now an interest in her because she is so close to the president, because, you know, the argument has been she is not a public figure. Why is she getting all this attention when you are in government and who is around a president is always something that is going to be of note and of interest.

To your point about those -- those tweets, whatever you would call them now, X posts that I think are deleted. Yes, the loyalty issue. Do you believe that January 6th was a legitimate protest and peaceful? Do you believe that Joe Biden won the election?

The correct answer when it was asked to prospective job candidates during Trump's transition was not yes, it was no.

And so, you are right that this is what everybody is expected to say. Where were you on January 6th? What were you saying that day? Were you critical on January 7th?

But again, she is a -- she is a neon sign of why this term is so radically different than term one. For all of the belief that there were -- there were plenty of sycophants in term one. There was no one like this.

CORNISH: Okay, that's Maggie Haberman. You can check out her new book if you haven't already, "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump". Thanks so much, Maggie.

And then, of course, two months to go until the midterms, the fate of a mail in ballot program still hangs in the hangs in the balance. On Monday, the Supreme Court ruled an executive order by President Trump that was designed to kind of limit mail in voting can actually move forward, at least for now. And the White House is calling it a win in an unsigned opinion, the courts six conservative justices didn't rule on the merits of the case.

So, they wrote, quote, "The court's disposition of this application does not mean that any measure taken by the government to implement the order will necessarily be lawful. On that score, time will tell."

Meanwhile, in the dissenting opinion, you've got the courts liberal wing saying that time is already running short and that the ruling, quote, "needlessly injects chaos and uncertainty into the on -- into the upcoming midterm elections."

The group chat is back.

This is a baffling mix of messages from the Supreme Court. Your eyebrows tell me I'm not that far off. Why? I feel like they're saying like, listen, whatever you pass next, it might not be legal, but keep going.

FISCHER: Yeah. So why it's so complicated is because you're now putting the states in a position where they have to essentially get ready for this change. Two months out from the midterms. And that then gives President Trump, you know, more leeway to be able to say that this didn't go the way it was supposed to go. He can now message differently.

Whereas if there was a more definite ruling of like, this is absolutely legal or this is absolutely not, I think everybody in the country would have a better understanding of which way to move forward. The ambiguity is kind of the issue here.

CORNISH: Yeah. I feel like the winners here are people who have billable hours.

ROCHA: Yeah, for sure.

CORNISH: Like lawyers, basically.

ROCHA: And it's really the timetable here. For those of you who always look at election day, who don't run campaigns, Election Day starts in just a couple of weeks because these ballots are going out mainly to military folks overseas. I just got back from Alaska. It goes out to lots of folks in Alaska.

CORNISH: I show people some of the dates here.

So, September 4th, you got Delaware, to your point, military, North Carolina, Kentucky, Wisconsin. I mean, next week, some of these people are going to start getting those ballots. ROCHA: And for my friends that worry about paper ballots, these are

paper ballots with signatures on it that are verified when they're sent back. Like I remember when my Republican colleagues used to advocate for this, because this was mainly built for rural folks that live out in the country. And my friends and neighbors in east Texas who are all Republican.

ARM: Yeah. I think that, noted everyone's concerned that there's no definitive answer here. I think there may be complaints. If the definitive answer was that the executive order could go through, if I if I had to guess.

[06:50:03]

But in reality, I think the court is doing what its job here and opining on the legality of the matter. They've said that it's not for us to say on that particular metric just now, but that Trump does have the authority to do this. So we'll have to see.

CORNISH: Do you expect people -- do you think people are going to challenge their mail in voting state by state?

ARM: I expect political ammunition, a political fight, honestly, more, you know, concern about the election. They're taking away your democracy. This was something that Democrats did a lot of throughout 2024. It wasn't a winning message then. I don't think, you know, excepting some kind of a frenzied panic over Trump trying to steal the midterms is going to be the most effective tool they could use to get voters out the door to vote.

CORNISH: One thing I'm going to be interested in, the postal service has new rules that are going to affect mail in balloting. I think sometimes when the infrastructure of government that we don't see as political starts making changes that can be characterized that way, it can like raise questions for people.

FISCHER: Yeah, and the Postal Service has been at the center of so much political upheaval, especially in the Trump administration. I think about earlier in his first administration fights with Amazon around shipping. And then that got back to the Postal Service.

Like the Postal Service can't really catch a break here. I think what's interesting is there's also this education component that's really missing. So, if you are somebody who's receiving a mail in ballot, who wants to be able to make your vote count, now you need to know and understand what these rules mean for you. Can I send my ballot on election day signed by election day? It gets there five days later and it still counts.

Do I need to make sure that I send it with enough time for it to arrive on election day? I actually just think a lot of voters don't --

CORNISH: Are going to be confused. Yeah.

All right. Listen, I want to turn to this because, you know, right now the U.S. is in this battle, this tariff battle with Canada. And now we are hearing fighting words in response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FORD: Well, he can kiss my ass as far as I'm concerned. We need to throw everything in the kitchen sink at them. He's arrogant. He's cocky.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: So that was Ontario's leader, Doug Ford, after the president threatened a 50 percent tariff on $20 billion worth of Canadian goods. So, Ford comes back. He doubles down. He makes his own threats to cut off the U.S. from electricity and critical minerals.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FORD: Well, I still stand by that statement because there's a lot of people in the U.S. that are calling me saying, way to go, keep going. You know, your own people. President Trump don't even like you. And they're going to speak loud and clear when it comes to the midterms. And if I was allowed to, I'd be down there door knocking.

I've been in this game a lot longer than he has. I got a skin on me like an alligator. And you think an insult from him hurts me. Well, bring it on, buddy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: The interesting thing for me is Canada had a rising, right leaning conservative nationalist movement before the president and J.D. Vance kind of kicked it in the teeth. Maybe this is not a political term. You're nodding. Is that a thing?

ARM: Well, no, I just, you know --

CORNISH: Like he's very Trump-like for a reason.

ARM: Well, you know, Doug Ford's brother Rob Ford was actually a crack use aside, a great mayor of Toronto. And I think that this Ford represents something a little bit different. This kind of Canadian nationalism that is sort of represented by an aggressive anti- Americanism and a -- and a protectionism is not all that wise.

CORNISH: Canada didn't see before Trump, though, right? I just don't remember growing up with Canada as my --

ARM: This is not Pierre Poilievre's Conservative Canadian party, something like 73 percent of Canadian exports go to the United States. Canada is engaged in a lot of protectionism. That's why the Trump administration has a beef here, something like 250 percent tariffs on cheese, 200 -- 300 percent tariffs on other dairy products.

(CROSSTALK)

CORNISH: Chuck, I see you (INAUDIBLE) here -- what's going on? ROCHA: Look, Donald Trump does real good against regular politicians

that are in suit and ties that are wrapped in bubble wrap, like we normally do. Most Democrats who are saying can't say anything outlandish when Donald Trump comes on the scene and says a bunch of crazy shit, excuse me this morning, people are like, oh my God, he's so different. Maybe he's going to fight for us. Us working class, poor, non-college-educated like Chuck Rocha. I'm not pontificating on anybody else.

They vote for him because they like at least that guy something different. This is what the Ford guys doing. Like he don't give two rats, you know, what about this thing? And he likes this kind of fight because it helps him on social media. It helps him in the states.

But where the rubber meets the road is the price of lumber in America, the price of whiskey in America. The reason hockey sticks are going to be terrible. Like who gives two? What's about a hockey stick? It's because they're made out of sticks.

And guess what else is? Your house. And that price is going to go up. And that's what the midterms will be about.

CORNISH: Not about the lumber and housing costs. Also, I noticed critical minerals. It felt like they were taking a page out of China's book and figuring out what hurts the U.S. because they have 70 percent. You know what I mean? We are their market.

But it felt sort of targeted their response in a way that maybe the world is sort of learning how to deal with Trump and his tariff approach.

[06:55:01]

FISCHER: I think that's correct. I think a lot of world leaders have understood that Trump is very tit-for-tat. So any way that you want to respond needs to be in that manner.

Also, just zooming out, like when I hear the rhetoric from that Canadian politician, it reminds me that around the world, Trump has set a new bar for how politicians communicate. Like I once did this analysis on the number of fake news laws, right, that people around the world have brought up, and they use the terminology fake news, because that's the words that Donald Trump has used.

So I just see this as politicians are giving Trump exactly -- they're not actually -- it's not just for Trump. They're giving the people an understanding that if Trump can speak like that, then they can too. That's like the new bar that has been set.

CORNISH: All right. I want to talk to you guys about what is in your group chat, because we're early in the week. I know lawmakers are still at home, but there's a lot of campaigns going on and there's a lot of news in the media world. But what are you actually talking about?

FISCHER: I mean, my group chat, honestly, is about this deal for Paramount to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery --

CORNISH: Hadn't heard of it.

FISCHER: -- mother company to CNN.

CORNISH: Yeah.

FISCHER: And the only reason it's in my group chat is because it's now become like delicious drama. It's not just some like business story. It's like every day, there's an up and there's a down. They're going to meet with the attorney general to do a settlement with the attorney general in California.

But then the meeting is canceled. Like, I'm just looking forward to whoever is going to get the book optioned. And the series on Netflix about this whole saga.

CORNISH: Yet another --

ARM: Series will hopefully be on Paramount+, apparently.

CORNISH: Okay, what's in your group chat?

ARM: Oh, we're talking about my alma mater. We're talking about the University of Michigan dropping grades for first semester freshmen.

CORNISH: Oh, yeah, we heard about this.

ARM: They say it's about mental health. I have a sneaking suspicion it probably is more about poor admissions decisions that the university has made. But --

CORNISH: Oh, meaning what?

ARM: -- nevertheless.

CORNISH: You're saying all the kids are -- what do you mean?

ARM: Well.

ROCHA: Oh, my bad.

ARM: Oh, what --

CORNISH: Are you saying they're dumb?

ARM: Oh, yeah. I mean, I --

CORNISH: Why are you saying poor admissions decision?

(CROSSTALK)

ARM: -- University of Michigan. No, because I think that a lot of people get to school and then don't perform at the right levels. And if that's a challenge for them, it reflects poorly on admissions counselors who have made those decisions. So, the university is going to need to figure out how to weather that

storm. I don't think eliminating grades from the first semester of your freshman year is a good fix for that problem. But I will say there are probably a lot of happy pledges in frat basements out there. Happy their grades don't count in that first semester.

CORNISH: Happier than Penn State, that's for sure.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCHA: On September the 9th of this year, TPS for El Salvador expires. And if not, if it's not extended, 100 --

CORNISH: This is temporary protected status, which the government --

ROCHA: Who immigrated here from El Salvador --

CORNISH: It's a special program when people go through certain things in their country.

ROCHA: It's war-torn country. And one of those people worked for me and or my business partner, she was brought here when she was six years old. Her name is daisy, and she didn't immigrate here. She was brought here.

And we -- our tax dollars paid for her to go to school. She went to college at a Mormon University in Utah, graduated with honors. She's worked for me for eight years. She makes more money than a congressman and pays more taxes than a congressman. And she's being told if this is not extended, she'll have to self-deport.

These are what's wrong with our immigration system, and we should all know what's going on.

CORNISH: You ask a question you've been at the forefront of this conversation among Latino voters, and I feel like years ago, Latino activists miscalculated in assuming that Latino communities cared so much about immigration because -- somehow they were attached to it more.

Do you actually see a shift in how communities think about it?

ROCHA: I think that what we've seen with ICE lately help some of that, because the --

CORNISH: Democrats are not campaigning on it. I don't see a bunch of ads that are like, look what happened.

ROCHA: That's what every ad was about in the primary. And the general, we will see. But there was a lot of that.

The point here is that this is just 170,000 people, but it's people that are -- Daisy's pay taxes and Social Security now for 12 years, and she'll never get Social Security. She didn't immigrate here. She was brought here as a child. She's not been in El Salvador since she was five. CORNISH: A similar story, there was someone from the USS Lincoln

whose father is now --

ROCHA: These are the kind of immigrants. Even my Republican friends say, yes, let's figure out some how to do this. Folks like Daisy, who has involved herself in church, in community, in college, has given back to this country.

And now you're telling me she's supposed to self-deport. That's our immigration system. That's why people are sick and tired of seeing this football game.

(CROSSTALK)

CORNISH: If your candidates actually are talking about this the way that you are, especially now that Nevada is moved up in the Democratic primary, are we going to see this affect things in Texas and other states where suddenly Democrats are like looking around like, could we win this thing? Is it because there's a Latino moderate out there who has changed their mind? I don't know if that's true.

FISCHER: Yeah, well, I also think the counterbalance is just that the Latino cultural issue, like I remember this being a huge thing with Trump in Miami and in Florida. Like these are people who tend to align on sort of a Christian Catholic values with the sort of Republican Party. And so --

CORNISH: These Democratic wins in places like Florida and Mar-a-Lago, right in Miami are making people raise their eyebrows.

FISCHER: Yeah, I agree.

CORNISH: I'm curious. Okay, you guys, thanks so much for being here. Thanks for being in the group chat.

And I want to thank you guys for being with us. I know you can spend your time in a lot of other places, and I'm glad that you spend it with us.

I'm Audie Cornish. Stay with us, because the headlines are next.