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Erin Burnett Outfront

Trump's Ban On CNN, Other News Networks Backfires At White House Event; ICE Shooting Protests; El-Sayed Responds To Unlikely Supporter Tucker Carlson Defending Him. Aired 7-8p ET

Aired September 21, 2026 - 19:00   ET

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

[19:00:22]

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next:

Trump's ban on the media backfiring as CNN and others take Trump to court. And the first lady drops her husband's ban for her own event. How come?

And shot by ICE. The city of Austin bracing for more protests after a DoorDash driver was shot by ICE agents. The driver's lawyer is OUTFRONT tonight.

Plus, Abdul El-Sayed on whether he'll follow Zohran Mamdani's lead and work with Trump. And is Tucker Carlson's support for him a good thing?

Let's go OUTFRONT.

(MUSIC)

BURNETT: And good evening. I'm Erin Burnett.

And OUTFRONT tonight, the breaking news: Trump silenced by his own hand. Today, Trump held a ribbon-cutting event to show off his new helipad, a helipad he's bragged about again and again, talking about the grass around it, and, you know, he walks people out there. He's really proud of this.

He was thrilled to show it off, except for the fact that nobody could hear him when the big ribbon-cutting happened, because he'd banned CNN, Politico, and MS NOW from the White The other networks all stood for the First Amendment and refused to bail him out by providing the pool coverage of presidential events that CNN was slated to deliver today.

So, just watch what happened today when there weren't all those cameras and all the things that behind-the-scenes networks like CNN do. Here's what anchors from one of the most Trump-friendly networks Newsmax got stuck with as it all went down.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(INAUDIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Okay, so there is no microphone because -- there's no microphone because the pool cameras aren't there. So maybe, Tim, this is one example of it backfiring just a little bit. Obviously, the ramifications are right here. Can't hear what the president's saying?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Well, that's stating the reality. And Trump kept talking and talking. No one could hear him because there was no pool coverage. He was silenced, and it came as the three banned news organizations filed a lawsuit against Trump, writing, quote, "This ban could not be a more direct assault on the First Amendment nor a more blatant violation of our most fundamental constitutional principles."

Trump responding with an enraged 330-word screed against the press and the judge assigned to the case. The judge, by the way, appointed by Trump. You can still see it scrolling next to me.

It was a stream of consciousness. There were the trademark Trump random all capitalizations throughout because this is a president that truthfully feeds off being covered by the very press he says he loathes. Cutting his mic is akin to cutting the air he breathes.

I mean, just remember what he said in the past when his supporters couldn't hear him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There might be a seething. I'm seething. I'm working my ass off with this stupid mic.

Whoever the hell brought this mic system, don't -- the son of the bitch to put it in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: And now, Trump is without a TV crew from any of the major networks as he heads to New York to speak on the world stage. The only organization traveling with Trump actually is the conservative online outlet called Real America's Voice. And all of this for what?

Well, sources tell CNN. that Trump's close personal aide, Natalie Harp, was showing Trump clips of media coverage just before he fired off the post in which he banned CNN, "Politico" and MS NOW, and said there would be more to come. The source said a graphic from "Politico" may have been the straw that broke the camel's back. But he was there with Natalie Harp, who was by his side. Apparently, there was no one else there to push back. Trump's chief of staff, Susie Wiles, was not in the building at the time.

But the ban is not going to change the facts. And those facts are that right now Trump is facing major headwinds in his presidency. His approval ratings are the lowest levels that he has ever seen. Voters are unhappy with the war. They're unhappy with the economy. They're frustrated with Trump's focus on his own pet projects, like Kennedy Center, where a judge has refused to allow Trump to put his name back on the building, something which angers Trump and consumes his time. Here he is looking at Kennedy Center plans for possible demolishment

on Air Force One in the midst of a nation at war, a focus which is at best bizarre, given the war and the fact that prices have surged as a result for Americans. Trump's war with Iran is now seven months in. It is a war that more and more Republicans are publicly turning against.

Here's a post from Iowa Congresswoman Ashley Hinson. She is now running for the state Senate seat and she writes, "Iowans are being squeezed and shouldn't have to flip the bill at the pump or the checkout line for the war in Iran."

[19:05:05]

I mean, that is direct. And this is someone who easily won her district two years ago. Now the Cook Report has shifted her Senate race from lean Republican to tossup.

And it's not just Hinson's lead that's taking a toll. Trump's approval rating is now at 32 percent, according to the latest from Reuters. which may be why the administration is struggling to find anything to tout.

Our Daniel Dale did a really incredible thing. He went to the achievements tab on the official White House app, okay, to see what they have there. Here's what they have. The gas price that they list is $2.91 a gallon. That's from seven months ago. It's now $4.50. The inflation rate, also seven months ago. Inflation out 3.4, up a whole percentage point.

And GDP growth, the most recent available quarter was nearly three points off where it is right now. It's pretty incredible. And by the way, when I say seven months old on gas prices, seven months old on inflation, remember, Trump's war is seven months old.

Alayna Treene and Brian Stelter both have breaking details here on this story tonight.

And I want to begin with you, Alayna. You have new reporting tonight about what led up to the ban. What are you learning?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, look, I've been speaking a lot with, of course, all of my sources at the White House, allies of the president, Erin, and part of the reason, in addition to what our colleagues Katelyn and Kevin had already reported about Natalie Harp showing the president some materials, particularly one from Politico that he didn't like. I was also told the president was watching some of CNN on Friday and in a moment when CNN was actually walking through some of the president's bad poll numbers, something that, of course, the president doesn't like.

We know that he is told about these poll numbers, often by some of his advisors, but that was also something my source said kind of set him off.

I'll also say too, just, you know, speaking with another one of my sources basically said that it's so notable and you can't understate the fact that Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff, was not in the West Wing on Friday when the president announced this ban, nor did the president have a press secretary in place.

I'd remind people that Karoline Leavitt was actually someone, you know, one of the people who surrounded the president who talk him off this idea of wanting to borrow the media from the White House in the past. This is actually isn't the first time the president has thought about wanting to ban news organizations that he views as unfavorable from the White House just to have his close aides, the people who are in his ear telling him it's not a good idea. He didn't have that on Friday surrounding him. And that's why I think partly led to this decision.

I also talked to some people today around that helipad, you know, the unveiling of the new helipad where the president and his team had covered this. And you couldn't hear any of the audio. I mean, people recognize that that was embarrassing. People close to the president recognize that that was embarrassing today.

So, all of that, I think, contributing to what we're going to potentially see play out this week, because even as the president is here at the U.N. General Assembly, I was actually, Erin, supposed to be the one pooling with the president while he goes to all these meetings in that building behind me tomorrow. He is going to be frustrated that there's not a camera there capturing a lot of this so in some ways it's also detrimental to him -- Erin.

BURNETT: Yeah. Yeah, incredible, and of course, important to note that you were going to be the one who was there and you know, instead, you're standing on the street talking about this doing your job because you can't go to the White House lawn.

All right. Alayna, thank you very much.

And I want to go to Brian Stelter now.

And, Brian, you've got more reporting about how this ban is not turning out the way that Trump wanted in part because -- yeah, go ahead.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: Yeah, I've been working the phones on this all evening and getting more information about what's going on in all corners of the American news media, because we are seeing the most remarkable show of solidarity that I have seen the media mount during Trump's return to office.

Erin, we started out with Trump's inauguration talking about capitulation by universities and law firms and media companies. We talked about those tech CEOs standing there in Washington on the inauguration day. Capitulation has been the story.

But not anymore. We're seeing the opposite. We are seeing CNN's rivals, we're seeing photographers, networks all stand up in a united front against this media ban.

So, here's what's happened in the past couple of hours. Virtually all the still photographers who cover Trump on a regular basis, they have worked with their photo desks and their bosses and determined that they will not publish images of Trump's events until the very end of the day today. Sources tell me this was a, quote, "universal response by the photographers".

Trump loves some of these photographers, but "The Washington Post" is calling it a collective effort with photographers in other newsrooms to withhold photographs of Trump's appearances until midnight Eastern Time. So, there's a noticeable lack of photos of the president during his trip to New York today. This is probably going to get under his skin just like the lack of television coverage is going to get under his skin.

Meanwhile, a judge in Washington has scheduled a hearing for Wednesday. The president is already attacking that judge, who is a Trump appointee, perhaps betraying that Trump knows he's probably going to lose.

And, Erin, that same Trump-appointed judge sided with CNN in the Jim Acosta press pass case back in 2018.

So, what's old is new again. But the difference tonight is that the entire American press corps seems united in a way that I have not seen in a long time.

BURNETT: All right, Brian Stelter, thank you very much.

And Ty Cobb is with us now, the former Trump White House lawyer, along with Stephanie Grisham, former Trump White House press secretary. Both of you know so much of this from every aspect.

So, Ty, Trump goes and posts this 300-plus word post tonight. There's, as I said, there's capitalizations in there. There's not much punctuation.

He says, "Virtually every story about me or anything having to do with me is negative, wrong, and in many cases all caps dangerous for our country. No matter how great my achievements, they trivialize and demean, why should I have to give access to such people?"

What do you make of that? I guess, to me, one of the things that stands out there is why should I have to give access when obviously he's a person. We're talking about the freedom of the press and the executive branch.

TY COBB, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE LAWYER: Right. That's the way he views things. You know, it's all personal to Trump. I mean, that's a consequence of his malignant narcissism. Anything, any criticism is personal. It creates an enemy. And he can't -- he just is very thin skinned. He really can't take it.

You know, it's not -- it's not negative. It's just real to say that diesel is approaching $7 a gallon. It's not negative. It's just real to say that Republicans are reeling and that his polls are in the low 30s now. It's not negative. It's real that he traded 29,000 individual stock

trades since he's taken office, more than the combined total of senators and congressmen together. You know, these are facts.

You know, he's flailing. He's doing unconstitutional things from birthright citizenship to tariffs to the post office. So, you know, the fact that these stories are negative is merely because that they accurately reflect the assault that he is committing on the Constitution.

BURNETT: You know, Stephanie, there was no audio on that White House live feed, Newsmax pointing out his ban is backfiring. You could hear them actually say that.

Now, I'm just curious as to whether he just keeps doubling down here. I mean, what are they going to do, Stephanie? They'll get -- tomorrow, they'll have the U.N. press corps doing some of the feeds, so it'll look more normal for maybe a few hours of one day. But what does that all -- what does this do for him? Does he -- I mean, is he backed into a corner here or not?

STEPHANIE GRISHAM, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Well, he's definitely backed into a corner, but he's not going to admit that. So, to answer your question, yes, he's going to continue to double down, which I think he already did with that post talking about that they're going to appeal the case that's going on Wednesday. I think he's going to rely on appealing until he gets to the Supreme Court thinking that maybe they're going to be the ones who kind of side with him.

And if not, I kind of worry that he's relying also on his pardon power. I mean, there's so any of these things that he wants to do and courts are rightfully pushing back on. And maybe Ty can answer this, but you know, I feel like he's going to say I don't care what the court said. I'll pardon you afterwards. Go knock down the Kennedy Center or let's keep ignoring the press and not letting them in.

So, I think he'll continue to double down. He's not going to admit that this was a bad a bad choice.

BURNETT: Ty, and yet the first lady. Melania Trump's office has approved Betsy Klein's credential to cover an event on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly tomorrow. Betsy Klein is one of our excellent White House reporters. So, CNN is banned, but Betsy's gotten a credential to cover Melania Trump.

So, what do you think that that's about? It's not accidental.

COBB: No, it's not accidental. And I think it just shows how unvetted and unthought through this whimsical effort of Trump to lash out at those who might criticize him or accurately report his failing is. I mean, even his own wife can't countenance it.

But I think that, you know, we're talking about a matter of hours. I mean, you know, on Wednesday afternoon, there will be a temporary restraining order in place preventing the implementation and execution of this ban. You know, these actors, the judge, Tim Kelly, Very highly respected judge. Yes, he's a Trump appointee, but he had a long career. Arnold & Porter, a reputable law firm, the Department of Justice, and on the Hill, you know, very smart person. He's the person who restored Jim Acosta's credentials.

And he did it --

BURNETT: Yeah.

COBB: -- for the lawyer that represents CNN, MSN NOW and "Politico" in this case, Ted Boutrous, who's an excellent lawyer.

[19:15:04]

So, you know, they've been there before. We know what's coming. The law is going to be set out and he's going to be restrained. And yes, he can appeal it, but unsuccessfully because we already have the -- we already have an appeal -- appellate decision in "The A.P." case. Remember, he banned ap because they refused to play his game of calling the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America, and you know that that has been enjoined and that -- that's been upheld by an appellate court even though they did narrow the injunction slightly.

So, this has all kind of come to an end. And it's all partly out there to prevent discussion of some of the corrupt issues, some of the economic issues, some of the polling issues that you highlighted earlier, because we're talking about this instead of those things. I mean, this is a shiny object. where the president hopes we'll talk about this and his war on the press as opposed to his other broader failings.

BURNETT: Stephanie, one thing as part of this, which I think bears emphasis, is when everyone tries to understand what's driving Trump's behavior in his decision making right now, especially given that he frequently threatens to annihilate an entire nation and civilization in the case of Iran, right? You know, what does he really mean? What is his state of mind? What is the quality of his mind?

This decision that he made about the press was made, we understand, with Natalie Harp beside him. Susie Wiles, chief of staff, was not present, was not there that day, so her voice was not present on this, at least in person. He does not have a sitting press secretary.

What do you read into this in terms of his state of mind and the power of the people around him.

GRISHAM: Well, I mean, it's no secret that in this administration, he has surrounded himself with absolute sycophants who tell him what he wants to hear at all times. I know that because I was in an administration that did that to a degree, but you're right. I mean, they don't have a Pat Cipollone who was our White House counsel for a long time who would tell me, you can't ban the press, Stephanie, because I was tasked with getting rid of the press, too.

So, we had people who were serious and who put those guardrails up. Now, that's not the case. And I do hope, of course, that Susie or Dan Scavino or some people in White House counsel are giving him good advice, but at the end of the day, if he sees some stuff on TV and he's in a mood and he's truly had an epically bad couple of weeks, he'll do what he wants. We all know this.

He'll post stuff on X and then everybody has to scramble to make it happen. So, on the one hand, I understand people thinking, oh, there was nobody around him. But on the other hand, he does what he wants when he wants.

And I will also just kind of point out, I think it's very ironic that he's going to be sitting down with President Xi, who is known as a dictator know Trump and he's going to brag to President Xi that he's gotten rid of the press because he looks up to people like Kim Jong-un in North Korea and people in Iran and China and the people of Russia, the people who have total control over their press.

BURNETT: All right. Thank you both very much. I appreciate you.

And next, the breaking news. More protests are expected tonight in Austin, Texas. A DoorDash driver there has been shot by ICE. His attorney says he was then taken to an ICE facility with a bullet stuck in his back. A lawyer is OUTFRONT.

And Iran's president on his way to New York City. Trump reportedly opened a meeting with him, despite threatening over the weekend to blow up his entire nation.

And Cindy Crawford and her family mourning the horrific loss of her son, dead at just 27.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:23:20]

BURNETT: Breaking news, the city of Austin bracing for more protests tonight after an ICE agent shot a 28-year-old man from Venezuela. Wilber Rafael Garces Perez was working as a DoorDash driver when he was shot yesterday, according to his attorney, and I'm going to speak with her in just a moment. He was ultimately then taken to an ICE facility 100 miles away, his attorney says, with a bullet in his back, and no pain medication. She said he slept in a processing center without a bed. The incident was captured on video by a woman who was live streaming on Facebook.

Here it is.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

BURNETT: Caught live on Facebook. Otherwise, we wouldn't know all these details. And now you can see two bullet holes in the right rear window of Garces Perez's vehicle, as we're showing you. And the video that we're going to warn you is graphic here when you see him up close. You see Garces Perez handcuffed on the ground. His shirt is cut open, revealing what appears to be the gaping gunshot wound to his back. The Department of Homeland Security later posted on social media in

part, the illegal alien's condition is stable and he is in federal custody pending removal. At least 20 people have been shot by immigration agents in Trump's second term so far, according to a CNN analysis, eight of them have died.

OUTFRONT now, Kate Lincoln Goldfinch.

[19:25:00]

She's the attorney representing Wilber Rafael Garces-Perez and his wife, Elazdar (ph).

And Kate, I appreciate you taking the time here.

Obviously, extremely disturbing. And if it weren't for that woman live streaming this, maybe we wouldn't even know exactly what had happened. How is your client doing tonight?

KATE LINCOLN-GOLDFINCH, ATTORNEY REPRESENTING DRIVER SHOT BY ICE AGENT IN AUSTIN: Wilbur is doing terribly. He was in the hospital for only four hours yesterday. And he reported today that the doctors didn't talk to him about his condition, that every time there was an update about how he was doing, the doctors and the ICE agents would go out into the hallway. And he was in immense pain and was transferred into ICE custody without pain medication with a bullet lodged in his back.

He reported to me this morning that he was bleeding, that he was not on pain medication. And I just heard through Congressman Castro's office, who had a staffer visit him, that he has lost movement on the entire left side of his body, which means that he is facing paralysis. So, we have to consider this is a man who was shot in the back. Four hours later was moved, was transferred, as you said, 100 miles away, and is now facing transfer again to a hospital because he is being paralyzed, which certainly none of these transfers are helpful to him. He should have stayed in the hospital all of this time.

BURNETT: I mean, what you're saying is stunning and deeply disturbing, that the condition has worsened to this point, with the bullets still lodged, and he's lost feeling on the left side of his body. You can't move. So that is obviously very disturbing.

We don't even understand what led to this. So, we know that that gunshot that you are talking about was in the back. But we don't know what led to this. No federal authorities are answering that. A source familiar with the incident told us that ICE officers were conducting targeted immigration operations based on license plate checks.

They said they came across a vehicle registered to your client who had a deportation order. And then that source says, well, officers conducted a vehicle stop. They questioned your client and had an exchange. And then he fled the scene in his car. This is their version. What's your understanding?

LINCOLN-GOLDFINICH: It doesn't match his version. Wilber has a valid driver's license, and he was driving DoorDash today. In fact, his wife didn't want him to go to work. She wanted to spend time with him, but he decided that he wanted to go make money for his family.

And he was driving down the road in a fairly populated area of town. He wasn't anywhere rural. And he said a large, black, unmarked truck sideswiped him. He thought it was just an aggressive driver. And he did a U-turn and realized that these were agents and asked them if he could pull over. He tried to pull over and they rammed his vehicle again and then shot him in the back of the neck and then cuffed him and pulled him out of the car. And we know that all of this is true because there is video footage.

ICE later claimed that there had been a foot chase. We know that there was not. He did not exit the vehicle. And this is just one more example of ICE agents out on the streets dangerously conducting traffic stops and then immediately lying to the American public about what's happening.

But we see the reality, we see the truth, and we need to make an immediate call for ICE to stop conducting traffic stops because what is crystal clear is that they don't know how to do this safely. And people can die.

What if Wilber was an Uber driver? What if there was a passenger in his car? This is a man with a valid driver's license and no law enforcement official should be ramming a car and shooting someone in the back of the neck who is inside that vehicle.

BURNETT: Yeah. No, absolutely not. Sideswiping, ramming, none of it. None of it at all.

I mean, again, I don't know what the random situation was where a woman happened to be streaming live, driving by. I mean, that is what's going on because we keep hearing in case after case, oh, ICE agents don't have body cam video. So we don't get that side of the story in so many cases. Do you even know, Kate, how many times your client was shot? I mean, you're talking about this one bullets still lodged in his back that has caused him to perhaps be paralyzed on the left side. But do you even know how many bullets?

LINCOLN-GOLDFINCH: There were three shots. You can hear them in the video. I believe that he was shot once or twice. I've seen the photos of his back. We know of the one bullet lodged near his spine, so some of that is unclear.

But to your point about the videos, This is why it's so important that bystanders take videos of ICE enforcement actions. ICE is trying to take this stuff underground through these cooperative agreements with law enforcement agents, agencies like 287G agreements and traffic stops. They don't really want us to know what's happening.

And part of our power and the American public is recording them when they're making actions like this.

[19:30:04]

So, I'm very -- I'm very grateful to this woman for whatever reason she was there, that she was brave enough to pull out her camera and provide this video footage because it helps refute the lies that ICE has already told us.

BURNETT: Kate, I appreciate your time. Thank you so much for sharing all of this with us, including the unfortunate developments on his condition, but thank you for sharing.

LINCOLN: Thank you for telling the story, Erin.

BURNETT: Next, the president of the United States is coming to New York, about to come face to face with Xi Jinping of China. But are the two on the same page on anything?

Plus, also ahead this hour, New York Mayor Mamdani speaking to CNN and revealing new details about his meeting with Trump and what really happened behind closed doors.

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[19:35:32]

BURNETT: Breaking news, Iran's president is on his way to New York City, about to attend the United Nations General Assembly. That's an extraordinary thing, right? The United States and Iran have been at war for 205 days. You know, you don't see Putin coming to New York, but you're going to see the president of Iran. Trump reportedly telling Fox he would probably be, quote/unquote, open to meeting with the Iranian president while he's in the United States. It comes as Iran tonight warned it has new weapons with new capabilities and new targets it has not yet hit.

And Trump doubled down on his threat to, quote, "blow the entire nation up", telling Fox News he's in deciding mode.

OUTFRONT now, Susan Rice, the former national security advisor and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Ambassador Rice, we're in an absolutely incredible moment. And the Iranian president is coming to New York as we speak. He's flying. Trump says he's probably open to meeting him, but he's threatening to blow the entire nation up, similar to his, you know, threat over Easter to wipe a civilization off the map.

And then today, you had the U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent weighing in, and he said -- I'll play it for you. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SCOTT BESSENT, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: All the Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world. And how do we do that? That if they land, you cannot provide them with fuel, you cannot provide them with landing services, you cannot sell them tickets, or you will be knocked out of the dollar system.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Meantime, presumably on an Iranian airplane, the president of Iran is coming to New York. It's just another way of asking you, Susan, from where you sit. Is all of this tough talk doing that, wiping civilizations off the map, blowing an entire nation up, or at some point, could there be teeth to it?

SUSAN RICE, FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Well, we've heard this administration and President Trump for many months issuing bombastic threats and engaging in rhetorical jobs of the sort you've just heard. But none of that changes the fact. The United States has blundered into a very costly, protracted conflict decided by a president who claimed that there would be no more wars of choice, no more foreign wars, particularly in the Middle East, and that he would put this country first.

Instead, the cost the American people are paying for this war increased by the day in terms of fuel, diesel, food prices. Everything is going up. And then the direct cost to the American taxpayers has exceeded $40 billion and is counting, money that could have been spent in this country on healthcare at a time when we're cutting Medicaid or on food at a time we're cutting SNAP benefits. So, this has been an utter and total disaster. And that's before you get to the implications for America's role in the region and the world.

We've expended tons of munitions. Our bases have been destroyed. We've lost nearly two dozen American servicemen and women. We don't know the number because the administration won't tell us the actual number transparently.

And so, this is a costly mess that has achieved none of the potential objectives of the United States.

BURNETT: Former CIA director David Petraeus says that the bases in the Middle East, America's bases, are inoperable. We know that two-thirds to three-quarters of our supply of Tomahawks, Patriot missiles, THAAD missile defense systems, perhaps has been used up. All of this is incredible to contemplate, and one person who is focusing on it as much as anybody else is China's Xi Jinping, right?

So, he's coming to the U.S. He's going to meet with Trump, and he's coming in, I suppose, with a position of strength, given all of that, on the military front. So when they sit down and they talk about A.I., this crisis and all these concerns we've heard about A.I. and possible civilizational threats. In an op-ed today, you write that Trump and Xi should order A.I. companies to stop training or releasing advanced models. It's what you call a freeze in place.

There are some in the top of the U.S. companies who do A.I. here who would agree with you. But when you look at Xi Jinping's, what I just laid out, looking at America's military position, what he could perceive as unprecedented and unexpected weakness, what are the chances he would agree to self-halting on A.I.?

[19:40:08]

RICE: Well, thanks, Erin. There's a lot to unpack there. First of all, yes, indeed, Xi Jinping comes to the United States in a position of relative strength due to the blunderous national security policy decisions that this administration has made. We've talked about Iran, that's chief among them. But there are many others, including failing to stand up and stand with our allies, a costly trade war that's harmed not just American consumers, but our relationships around the world.

There are all kinds of ways in which this is not the ideal setting. But we don't always get to pick the ideal setting when we're dealing with existential challenges.

And the reason I feel very strongly that the United States and ideally the United States and China have to deal with the risks of A.I. is because for many years, I, like others, have been very concerned that as A.I. improves so rapidly and reaches the level of achieving the equivalence of human intelligence or even greater than human intelligence, what we call superintelligence, and is doing so on an exponential curve that we face very real and proximate risks that this technology can be misused, cyberattacks by terrorists and biological weapons in many ways that would be deadly on a mass scale. And worse still that it could result in loss of human control and even an existential risk to humanity. And in that context, we have to deal with this threat.

Now, in an ideal world, It would be something that the United States and China and other countries in the world would deal with together. This is a threat not just to one country or another, it's a threat to humanity. The Chinese don't have any greater interest than we do in terrorists getting a hold of biological weapons that are mutated to be super pathogens that can kill on an extraordinary scale. They have arguably an even greater concern than we do about loss of control because the whole Communist Party system rests on during maximal control of their population and everything that happens within their boundaries.

So there are on -- there is on one level -- if the leadership would perceive it this way a Recognition that there are areas in which we share concerns that relate to A.I. and on that basis My suggestion, recognizing that it's a moonshot diplomatically and scientifically, is that the two leaders order their companies in each country to freeze their development of A.I. in place until an all-star team of the world's leading experts assembled by the United States and China can get together and solve these critical problems on a technical basis so that we can prevent misuse and prevent loss of control.

Now, I don't have great hope that this administration will take us up on that or even that the Chinese would be ready to do it, but I put it out there as a moonshot because frankly, we need one at this point, the alternatives are much worse.

BURNETT: You also write, might someone so intent on erecting memorials and winning a Nobel Peace Prize be tempted to negotiate a world- changing accord that safeguards humanity?

I'm curious in that context what you think of Trump in recent days, in the face of all these headlines about A.I., doubling down on not limiting it, not regulating it, not doing the things that you just said. Why do you think he has been so intent on protecting A.I. from any kind of government oversight? RICE: Well, last thing I want to do is try to his head, but let me just say this. You know, if he cared about the American people, if he cared about the safety of our country, if he cared about his own legacy, he would not be whistling past the graveyard on what is going to prove to be the most important issue of our time. and his blight disregard for the warnings that have been issued and the evidence that's already out there that A.I. poses an extreme risk to our safety and security is going to blow up in his face.

And frankly, it's not my business most days to be advising President Trump on how he could burnish his own legacy and save -- you know, save humanity. But in this case, I do think there is an opportunity if he would take it. Instead, he seems to be intent on bolstering his buddies in the tech industry and, you know, enabling them to reap billions and trillions at the expense of the rest of us.

[19:45:01]

BURNETT: Susan Rice, I appreciate your time and thank you very much for being with me tonight.

Next, Tucker Carlson has been throwing his support behind the Democrat in Michigan Senate race. It's real. And Abdul El-Sayed is with us next to respond.

Plus, Cindy Crawford's son, suddenly passing away at the age of only 27. Tonight, we are learning more from his family.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BURNETT: Breaking news, President Trump just moments ago meeting with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani at the mayor's residence. Mamdani telling CNN's Christiane Amanpour about the meeting and why he chooses to work with Trump, even though the two have savaged each other in the past.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: I just wondered if you thought that you might get to this working relationship when he was calling you, you know, a lunatic, radical, probably a communist during the campaign, you were calling him a fascist, amongst other things. Things have changed.

MAYOR ZOHRAN MAMDANI (D), NEW YORK CITY: Well, I think we've both said that we would be willing to have a conversation if it could benefit the people of the city. And to me, you can hold very disparate opinions and also be able to sit down because that is what this work demands of us. If I was only willing to speak with people who agreed with me all the time, I would be sitting at home looking in a mirror.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: OUTFRONT now, Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan's Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate. And I appreciate your time. Yeah, I'm really interested in this

because there are some who in your party who do not feel that you can sit down with the president. For them, it is a moral issue of fundamental values on so many fronts. But when Trump and Mamdani meet publicly, they've had a lot of smiles and friendliness and compliments on both sides, even after meeting.

When it comes to you, Trump has said awful things about you. He's called you a jihadist, right? He's gone right there racially and religiously. If you win, will you follow Mamdani's lead and try to work with Trump and sit down with him, or will you refuse?

[19:50:10]

ABDUL EL-SAYED (D), MICHIGAN SENATE CANDIDATE: This race has never been about me or my feelings. It's always been about Michiganders and the fact that right now we have a politics that has allowed big corporations to buy off their politicians. They're paying more for things like groceries and gas, and they can't see a doctor in the richest, most powerful country in the world.

So, I will sit down with anybody and everybody who I can to actually try to address those problems and maybe even sit down with the president. Now, look, I'm not going to agree with him on much. When it comes to the tariff policy with Canada, when it comes to the war with Iran, these are things that are raising those prices.

But if I have the opportunity to share the perspective of the Michiganders that I represent and sit down with him to address these things, I absolutely will. That's what people are electing you to do. So yeah, I'll sit with anyone. I'll have the conversation with anyone.

It's the reason that I go on Fox News. It's the reason I sit down with anybody and everybody to have the conversation about getting money out of politics, put money in your pocket, passing Medicare for all.

BURNETT: OK. So, in all of this, you have been an unlikely candidate in many ways, one of which is the disparate locations of your support. Most recently, enter Tucker Carlson. He has described your campaign as Trumpian and in a complimentary way.

He's defended you from attacks by your Republican opponent, Mike Rogers, and then he went on to say this about Rogers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TUCKER CARLSON, HOST, THE TUCKER CARLSON SHOW: I wouldn't vote for Mike Rogers at gunpoint.

There's no one who should be farther from a position of power than Mike Rogers.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Okay. What do you say to that? And do you welcome Tucker Carlson's support? EL-SAYED: Well, look, Tucker and I don't agree on much, but we definitely agree on what he just said. Mike Rogers is feckless. He's someone who is a coward. He will say whatever it takes to get him to power, because for him, power is a means to more money.

And so, I think what you're seeing here is MAGA eating itself, because those who believed in the ideas, the idea that we should have America first, that we shouldn't go to wars, that we shouldn't be fighting. Those who believe in just basic principle, folks are turning on people like Mike Rogers because Mike Rogers was a neocon and then he decried Donald Trump when Donald Trump came to power and now he's willing to do whatever Donald Trump tells him to do so long as Donald Trump is happy with him.

So, I think this is less about me, it's more about Mike Rogers and it's more about recognizing that I'm going to be principled whatever it takes. I'm somebody who came through a 11 to 1 spend, $70 million spent against me because I don't take corporate money and stood up on my principles. And so, I think that's what he's speaking to right now.

I've never had a conversation with him. He's not somebody whose endorsement I saw it, but really this is more of a non-endorsement for Mike Rogers, an anti-endorsement against Mike Rogers than it is anything about me.

BURNETT: That's true. I guess he didn't come out and said he would vote for you, but he did say he wouldn't vote for Mike Rogers even at good point. So, I guess you can read into that what you will. But interesting that you say you've never actually spoken to him.

Your opponent, as Trump is calling for the trade war to end with Canada, a recent "Wall Street Journal" editorial actually talked about something else that Mike Rogers has been stuck with, which is Trump's tariff policy, OK?

Their headline here is the tariff gift to Abdul El-Sayed. And they go on to basically say that you've been able to slam Mike Rogers because Mike Rogers has, you know, supported Trump's trade policies and at least refused to take Trump on about the tariffs. And they say that this is really basically handed you on a silver platter, a gift -- the tariffs have helped you, the tariff gift to Abdul El Sayed.

Are Trump's tariffs helping you?

EL-SAYED: Look, the thing I care about most is that Trump's tariffs are hurting Michiganders. We're paying an average of $5,600 a year for a tariff policy that has no coherence. It's also costing tens of thousands of jobs in my state.

Insofar as Mike Rogers wants to rubber stamp those tariffs, that is a stupid decision. Perhaps that's why Tucker Carlson understands that Mike Rogers belongs nowhere near any position of power. These aren't a gift to anybody in Michigan, but my job is to stand up for Michiganders.

So yes, I'm going to talk about them. I'm going to talk about them in the way that they highlight what Mike Rogers is. He's corrupt and cowardly.

Just last week, Erin, I had to debate an empty podium because he would not show up to talk about anything he actually wants to do for Michiganders. Instead, the week before, he was in Dallas because Donald Trump told him to come.

And that's exactly what he's going to be. He's going to be a rubber stamp for whatever Donald Trump wants, and he is going to follow through even on policies he knows to be stupid. That's what corruption looks like. That's what cowardice looks like.

BURNETT: Trump's midterm convention, of course, one in which, interesting as you say, that Rogers went. There were many in districts that are very tough right now who chose not to go.

[19:55:03]

I want to ask you about something else, though, that has dogged your campaign, and that is a prominent supporter of yours in the primary, the left-wing streamer and activist Hasan Piker. And you've been asked about him a lot. I'm sure you expected me to bring it up, right? It comes up in almost every interview because of his incendiary comments, including that America, quote, "deserved 9/11".

Now, Michigan's Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Dingell was asked about Piker's recent comments that America is worse than al-Qaeda in terms of the deaths it causes, and here's what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. DEBBIE DINGELL (D-MI): I'm so sick of talking about Hasan Piker, and I want Hasan Piker to go away. If he wants to see Abdul El-Sayed, stop going on television.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Do you agree with her? I'm so sick of talking about Hasan Piker, and I want Hasan Piker to go away.

EL-SAYED: I would like to be talking about the things that matter to Michiganders, which is gas and groceries and the ability to see a doctor. I do understand that people like to make this race about a streamer in California. It's a comfortable thing for somebody like Mike Rogers to have to talk about a streamer in California because he does not want to talk about the issues that Michiganders are facing, whether that's the insane price of gas or the price of groceries because of the Iran war, or it's the fact that we're having to pay so much more to lose our jobs because of the tariffs.

And so, yes, they want to make this about a streamer in California. This race has never been about a streamer in California. This race has always been about Michiganders and what they need.

So, yeah, I'm tired of talking about a streamer in California. I'm going to continue to talk about gas, groceries, the ability to see a doctor in Michigan. BURNETT: So -- but when he says something like, America deserved 9/11, what do you do about that? He defended you and supported you, right? That's part of the reason why you've been stuck with this. How do you unstick yourself?

EL-SAYED: Erin, the reason that keeps coming up is because it is a talking point for people who don't want to actually talk about real issues. It's a dumb comment. He himself has called it a dumb comment. And they keep bringing it up because all they can talk about is the comment of a guy who has zero power aside from his stream, rather than talk about the guy who has a lot of power to make dumb wars that we're paying for.

Whether it's an actual war in Iran that everybody could have told him he wasn't going to be able to get out of, or it's a trade war with Canada, like our best neighbor and the people who preemptively apologize for things.

So yeah, if you want to change the subject and talk about a dumb comment from a streamer of California, I understand why that's their only strategy. But my approach is going to be to talk about how to get money out of politics so that corporate stooges like Mike Rogers don't see another ring around the revolving door and to about the issues that Michiganders are really facing.

BURNETT: Abdul El-Sayed, I appreciate your time, and thanks for being with us tonight.

EL-SAYED: Thank you, Erin.

BURNETT: All right. And next, new details about Cindy Crawford's only son, who has died at the age of 27.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BURNETT: Supermodel Cindy Crawford's only son, Presley Gerber, has died. He was only 27. The L.A. County Medical Examiner's Office confirmed he died Sunday at a rehab facility. The cause of death was not listed.

Crawford's publicist tells CNN the family is asking for privacy during this very difficult and painful time. He is survived by his mother, his 25-year-old sister, Kyle. Crawford's publicist tells CNN the family is asking for privacy during this very difficult and painful time. He is survived by his mother, his 25-year-old sister, Kaia, and his father, Randy Gerber.

Like his sister, Presley Gerber started modeling in his teens, and in recent years, he had spoken out publicly about struggles with mental health and his use of drugs and prescription medications. Weeks ago, on her son's 27th birthday, Cindy Crawford posted a message saying, "I'm so proud of the man you've become, but I'll always see you as my little boy."

Thanks for watching.