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Trump Claims Iran Has Accepted 15-Point Plan; More U.S. Troops Arrive In The Middle East Amid Iran Conflict; Trump Signs Executive Action To Pay TSA Employees; House GOP Rejects Senate DHS Deal, Prolonging Shutdown. Aired 4-4:30a ET

Aired March 30, 2026 - 04:00   ET

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

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BRIAN ABEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us here in the United States and all around the world. I'm Brian Abel in Washington.

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: I'm Becky Anderson live from our Middle East and Gulf programming headquarters in Abu Dhabi in the UAE. We are now entering the second month of the U.S. and Israel's war with Iran.

The White House claims it's making diplomatic headway in ending the war. On Sunday, President Donald Trump claimed that Tehran has agreed to most of the 15-point list of demands that the U.S. has conveyed through Pakistan. Trump also had this to say about the Iranian delegation leading those negotiations.

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DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: We've had regime change, if you look already, because the one regime was decimated, destroyed, they're all dead. The next regime is mostly dead. And the third regime, we're dealing with different people than anybody's dealt with before. It's a whole different group of people.

So I would consider that regime change. And frankly, they've been very reasonable. So I think we've had regime change, but you can't do much better than that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON: Tehran, however, is accusing the U.S. of secretly planning a ground invasion amid ongoing negotiations. Iran has since threatened to rain fire on U.S. troops as the White House contemplates putting boots on the ground.

While President Trump is claiming diplomatic progress, he sounded more forceful in a new interview with the Financial Times, saying he wants to take the oil in Iran and once again debated seizing Kharge Island, Iran's vital oil export hub.

Let's start this hour. CNN's Paula Hancocks who is monitoring the very latest in Abu Dhabi. Paula, it's just after midday Monday here in the UAE, just after half past eleven in the morning in Tehran. What is the latest as we understand it in region?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Becky, as you're talking about the potential for diplomacy, we're not seeing any of that translate into what we're seeing on the ground. We're still seeing bombardments by the U.S. and Israel in Iran and we are seeing that retaliation across the region as well.

We have heard from Israel saying that they believe that they are just days away from having hit all of their targets, which they consider to be top priority in Iran. They say it doesn't mean that they don't have more that they would like to target.

But when it comes to the military infrastructure, the missile production and launching sites and the regime infrastructure, most of their top priorities have already been taken out.

Now we are hearing optimism when it comes to diplomacy, but that is mostly coming from the Trump administration at this point, saying that they believe that Iran has agreed to most of their 15-point plan at this point. But at the same time as we do see some 3,500 Marines and sailors arriving in the Middle East to beef up the U.S. military here, according to U.S. Central Command.

Now, we have been hearing from the U.S. side as well, saying that they believe Iran doesn't agree with their points. We heard very different things from State TV last week though, suggesting that Iran wants to see an acknowledgment of their sovereignty of the Strait of Hormuz, something which the U.S. and quite frankly, most countries in this region would not agree to.

Now, we did hear from a senior Iranian security official saying that it is not up to the U.S. when this war ends, that this is for Tehran to decide when the war ends. We have been hearing some strong rhetoric from the parliamentary speaker, for example, saying that they are waiting for U.S. troops, referring to the influx of more military coming to the region.

But we have been hearing optimism as well from Pakistan. This is the country that has become the mediator in all this. We know that the foreign minister met with his counterparts of Turkey, of Saudi Arabia and Egypt on Sunday. Let's listen to what he had to say.

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ISHAQ DAR, PAKISTANI FOREIGN MINISTER: Pakistan is very happy that both Iran and the U.S. have expressed their confidence in Pakistan to facilitate their talks.

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Pakistan will be honored to host and facilitate meaningful talks between the two sides in coming days for a comprehensive and lasting settlement of the ongoing conflict.

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HANCOCKS: Countries in the Gulf, though still under fire. We see Kuwait, for example, taking incoming fire from Iran, a water plant and a desalination plant and a power station being targeted there. Becky?

ANDERSON: Paula, thank you. Paula Hancock is in Abu Dhabi. The White House has been deploying thousands of troops to the region, as Paula just indicated, including an assault ship carrying 3,500 service members. And another thousand troops have been alerted to deploy to the Middle East.

Worth noting, a new AP poll highlights how deeply unpopular that is with 62 percent of Americans opposing the deployment of ground troops to Iran.

On my next guest in a thread on X writes in part, Iran's main military achievement has been persistence under pressure, absorption of loss and the ability to widen the battle space. Despite heavy losses at home, it continues to impose costs on U.S. forces and regional partners across multiple theaters.

Joining me now is Nicole Grajewski, who's a fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. It's good to have you, Nicole, this morning. Thank you.

I want to start with getting from you what you make of Iran's targeting logic at this point.

NICOLE GRAJEWSKI, FELLOW, NUCLEAR POLICY PROGRAM AT THE CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL PEACE: Well, thank you so much for having me. I mean, it depends on the targeting logic throughout the region. I mean, with Israel, Iran's focus has mostly been on civilian population centers, and that's partly because Iran has struggled to target military assets there, whereas throughout the Persian Gulf, Iran has mostly focused on U.S. bases and in part, energy and civilian infrastructure there. But we've seen more success when it comes to actually military assets in the Persian Gulf on Iran's part.

ANDERSON: What is your assessment of the extent of Iran's existing missile and drone program into the second month of this U.S.-Israel operation on Iran? Can Iran's, for example, missile program and indeed its drone program be destroyed at this point?

GRAJEWSKI: Well, it depends. I mean, Iran's drone or UAV program has is quite expansive and it's much easier to conceal. And Iran has far more of a stockpile of UAVs and they do of missiles.

But even despite hits on Iranian missile production and also missile storage and their missile bases, Iran has still been able to launch somewhat of a steady salvo of missiles each day. At least since the third day of the conflict. There's been around 20 to 30 ballistic missiles launched every day.

ANDERSON: You're a Fellow at the Nuclear Policy Program at Carnegie, so you know you'll have done a really deep dive on the nuclear installations, the civilian program there, the stockpiling of enriched uranium. What is the current situation?

GRAJEWSKI: A lot of Iran's nuclear program was really destroyed in the June 2025 war, which took out the majority of Iranian enrichment capacity. So at Natanz and Fordow. However, at the moment, there remains this kind of fundamental question about the stockpile of highly enriched uranium.

And that's in canisters underground at Esfahan, though there are some suspected sites like Natanz and Fordow, that may have highly enriched uranium there as well, though we haven't been able to verify that.

ANDERSON: I'm taking you through the sort of, you know, the really important points here that I think as we start this second month, our viewers need to get up to speed on. So given the economic and financial impact of the Strait of Hormuz being largely inaccessible, safely, at least for shipping, what's your assessment of the latest on that global chokehold?

GRAJEWSKI: Well, this seems to be one of Iran's strongest bargaining chips in this war, and that's the ability to open and close trade at the Strait of Hormuz. The impact of it has already been seen with the rise in oil prices.

And also to some extent, the U.S. position in this war has been also shaped by the kind of imperative to open the Strait of Hormuz. So this is going to likely be one of the central focuses, I think, of the campaign going forward, both on the Iranian and the United States side.

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ANDERSON: Finally, I just want to get our viewers up to speed on the very latest with regard any support by Russia for Iran. You wrote in 2024, a deeply researched book on the Russia Iran relationship. How do you assess that relationship today in light of this conflict?

GRAJEWSKI: I mean, this relationship is still quite robust. It's a strong relationship, though there are tensions. We do see Russia providing Iran with intelligence. And so that might be signals intelligence, but also satellite imagery which has been confirmed by multiple states.

Additionally, if you look at Iranian drone campaigns at the moment, a lot of it bears the hallmarks of Russian tactics that they've used in Ukraine. So there's a transfer of knowledge going on there. And whereas Russia may benefiting by the kind of boom in oil prices in the long run, I think that they see this as a threat to a lot of their interests in the Middle East and are working to sustain the Iranian regime at the moment.

ANDERSON: And of Ukraine's support for and relationships with these Gulf countries. We have seen Zelenskyy in Saudi Arabia, in the UAE, in Qatar, where they've cut a deal to actually and build a sort of production base for drones in Jordan. What do you make of that? GRAJEWSKI: I think it shows how deeply connected these two wars are.

And it's not just the drone issue, it's the actors involved. But what Ukraine has really thrived in throughout the war in Ukraine is actually counter drone technology. And that transfer to the Gulf would be quite decisive in further campaigns against Iran.

And so we're seeing kind of the, I guess, final thread of the Russia Iran relationship where Iran initially provided drones to Russia for use in Ukraine and now Ukraine is coming to help the Gulf to protect their assets from Iranian drones in the region. So it ties it all these conflicts together, essentially.

ANDERSON: Yes. It's good to have you, Nicole, this morning. Thank you very much indeed. We are now into the second month of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran and the impact that has the repercussions that has around the region where I am and for the world.

We'll do a lot more from the Middle East for you coming up. For now, though, I do want to get you back to Brian in Washington. Brian?

ABEL: All right, Becky, thank you. Still ahead for us, no deal here in Washington as House Republicans reject a plan from the Senate to reopen the Department of Homeland Security. We will have the latest on the partial government shutdown, next.

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ABEL: Some TSA officers could be getting paychecks as soon as today through an executive order signed by President Trump. But since Congress still hasn't agreed on a deal to reopen the Department of Homeland Security, those same workers aren't sure whether this is a temporary fix or if it means the checks will keep coming.

It's also unclear whether there will be any movement here in Washington. On Friday, House Republicans rejected a bipartisan funding deal passed by the Senate. Then lawmakers left town. With Congress now on a two-week spring recess.

Airports across the U.S. continue to be impacted by the shutdown. More than 2800 TSA workers, about 10 percent officers nationwide called out on Saturday. Still security wait times. They were down at some major airports.

On Sunday, travelers Atlanta's main airport had some choice words for members of Congress. They suggested if the roles were reversed, the shutdown may have ended sooner.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What I would suggest is that congressional staffers and aides don't get paid until the federal government is fully funded because we keep going through this dog and pony show shutdowns. But if the staffers didn't get paid. UNIDENTIFIEF FEMALE: There's nothing that we can do. And the people that are working here are working hard. OK? It's Congress needs to be get their act together and if they would just do it instead of playing games on both sides.

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ABEL: Meanwhile, CNN's Jake Tapper spoke with White House border czar Tom Homan about TSA agents finally being paid. He said while he's glad the president is able to pay those agents, there are thousands more DHS workers still going unpaid. Homan says lawmakers need to fund them all. Tapper also had this question for the border czar.

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JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Once TSA agents start getting paid, will ICE agents leave the airports?

TOM HOMAN, WHITE HOUSE BORDER CZAR: We'll see. You know, it depends how many TSA agents come back to work. How many TSA agents have actually quit and have no plan coming back to work? I'm working very closely with TSA administrator and the ICE director to decide what airport needs what.

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ABEL: We will see. Joining me now, Natasha Lindstaedt, a professor of government at the University of Essex. Natasha, good to see you as always.

So you have the president with this executive order paying TSA agents that seem to be the strongest pressure point on Congress to get funding pass when TSA agents weren't being paid.

With that pressure now removed, what if anything can break this impasse and which party now has the upper hand?

NATASHA LINDSTAEDT, PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT, UNIVERSITY OF ESSEX: So now you're going to see that the Democrats have no need to negotiate because I think that was one of the main issues was the total chaos at these airports.

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And we saw with the previous shutdown, it was right before Thanksgiving and the Christmas holidays that the Democrats felt like they had to give in because there was just too much concern about what was going to happen with air travel.

So we see this again with Easter coming up and the spring holidays, and now this has been taken off their worry. And so there's no real reason for the Democrats to negotiate. Instead, you're seeing a lot of divisions on the Republican side.

The House Republicans felt that they were blindsided by the Senate Republicans, who didn't give them a heads up about what was going on. And they're basically accusing the Senate Republicans of being sellouts and really heavily criticized them for this move.

And now you see the House Republicans are digging in and they're trying to pressure the Senate to stay open, to kill the filibuster, to ram through some kind of legislation that's not going to get through without the filibuster going out. And Chuck Schumer, a Senate minority leader, made this very, very clear.

So I think the Democrats are holding steady and they're staying united and they don't really have a reason to give in at this moment.

ABEL: Let's talk a little bit more about that filibuster, because President Trump on Air Force One this weekend again called for the removal of the filibuster in order for the Senate to pass the House's version of the funding bill. And the president also wants to connect voter ID and other voting laws with DHS funding that already created a partial government shutdown in the first place without throwing a voter ID wrench into it.

So, could we realistically see Republicans in both chambers get on board with that, along with removing the filibuster?

LINDSTAEDT: So there is some agreement from House Republicans who tend to be siding with Trump on this, and that's why they've been pressuring Thune, the Senate majority leader, as I said, to get rid of the filibuster, because that's the only way they're going to get through this Save America Act which is going to put tougher voter ID restrictions in place.

And this is something that Trump has been advocating, that he wants to actually couple the this funding for the DHS with this Save America Voting Act, which is just going to be really, really complicated. And John Thune has already said he's made it clear that he's not going to be doing anything with the filibuster. I don't think he wants this to be his legacy. So, again, it's revealing other divisions between House Republicans and Senate Republicans.

ABEL: OK, so maybe we can talk a little bit about some agreements that Congress may have with. Where do you see things standing when it comes to the guardrails for immigration officers that Democrats have been asking for since the start of this? Are there any Republicans agreeing that those guardrails for ICE agents, mandatory body cameras, no mask? Are there Republicans that agree those mandates are needed?

LINDSTAEDT: So there are a handful Republicans here and there, both in the House and the Senate, that do see that this is necessary. I mean, particularly House members, where they're in constituencies in the November midterms where it's really tight. And they know that ICE is really unpopular on some level. Some polls showing, like, 60 percent disapproval rating or about two-thirds think that ICE is going too far.

So they know that this would be popular with the majority of the American public to have face masks, to have warrants to ensure that ICE agents are adhering to the same protocol of other law agencies. But it's not like a critical mass of Republicans that agree to this. There was a bipartisan proposal coming from House members and the

Democrats and Republicans from the Problem Solvers Caucus that were trying to propose that they fund ICE as the Republicans are looking for the amount of funding they're looking for, but also have these kind of guardrails up.

And if we move to the Senate, Chuck Schumer has made clear that they can't fully fund ICE to the levels that the Republicans are hoping for without having these guardrails. This would be really unpopular with their Democratic base. And we're actually seeing recent polling showing this. Pew Research has shown that among Democrats, they really do want, somewhere around 70 percent really do want the Democrats to fight for these types of things, to fight for democracy, to fight for the things that they want. And they're willing to support the Democrats digging their heels in.

ABEL: All right. And we will see if there is any progress in talks when Congress comes back. Natasha Lindstaedt, appreciate you as always. Thank you.

LINDSTAEDT: Thanks for having me.

ABEL: President Trump is offering an update on construction of the White House ballroom. The controversial project includes what he calls a, quote, massive complex that the military is building underneath the East Wing site. The area was once home to another secret underground facility, but few details are known about the current top secret project.

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TRUMP: Now the military is building a big complex under the ballroom, which has come out recently because of a stupid lawsuit that was filed. But the military is building a massive complex under the ballroom and that's under construction and we're doing very well.

So we're ahead of schedule. That's part of it. The ballroom essentially becomes a shed for what's being built under the military, including from drones and including from any other thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABEL: Still to come, we'll hear how markets are reacting as a Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed as war with Iran enters its fifth week.

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