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Inside Politics

Lawmakers Question Ex-Victoria's Secret Owner Over Epstein Ties, One Epstein Victim Claims She Was Trafficked to Billionaire Les Wexner, Which He Denies; Talarico Says GOP Trying to Control What We Watch, What We Say; Big Tech Companies Wade Into Big Democratic Primary, Pro-A.I. Groups Ramp Up Political Spending Amid Calls to Rein in A.I.; Kennedy Posts Video of Himself Working Out in Jeans With Kid Rock. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired February 18, 2026 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

REP. ROBERT GARCIA, (D-CA) RANKING MEMBER, OVERSIGHT & GOVERNMENT REFORM COMMITTEE: -- of course, is incredibly wealthy, a billionaire, obviously very well known, not just here in Ohio, but across the country. And when you think about Epstein's wealth, whether it was the plane, the island, the amount of money he had, his homes, much of that came directly from Wexner.

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Now, Wexner has said that he cut off ties with Epstein, and our review of the Epstein Files does not show that there was any continued communication between them. That's something we've seen with some other powerful people who said that they stopped communicating with Epstein.

That turned out not to be reflected in the records, showed that the communications did continue. That doesn't appear to be the case with Wexner. He's been fairly consistent, so we'll see if we hear from the lawmakers today and how what he told them informs their opinion and how they view that this will help their investigation going forward. Dana?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT AND ANCHOR OF 'INSIDE POLITICS': All right, Kara, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

When we come back, the latest fight between Stephen Colbert and his bosses turned into big campaign dollars for a Democratic candidate. We'll explain next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:35:10]

BASH: Call it the Colbert bump. Texas Senate candidate, James Talarico is rolling in money and attention after his interview on Stephen Colbert's show on CBS was pulled from the airwaves and put on YouTube instead.

Colbert blamed threats from the Trump administration's FCC, which is vowing to start enforcing equal time rules on late-night TV. Talarico says it shows the Trump administration is scared of him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JAMES TALARICO, (D-TX) SENATE CANDIDATE: Trump's FCC colluded with corporate media executives at CBS to keep that interview off the air. But I think it's safe to say that their plan backfired.

(CROWD CHEERING)

TALARICO: I think -- I think Donald Trump and his billionaire friends know that we're about to take back Texas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Now, it's not quite that simple. There's no evidence of any actual collusion between CBS and the FCC. CBS executives say, ultimately, it was Colbert's decision to put the interview on YouTube.

But Talarico is right. He is getting a lot of attention, and maybe it has backfired. The interview on YouTube racked up more than five million views, and he raised more than $2.5 million.

My panel is back. I mean, Stephen, this is, I think, one of so many examples of whether or not the FCC really did anything here, we don't know, or whether it was just a fear factor from CBS executives and legal. But regardless, when the Trump administration has somebody in their sights or something in their sights, it tends to give them a boost.

STEPHEN COLLINSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICS REPORTER: Right. This is a great moment for Talarico because Jasmine Crockett, his opponent, is very skilled at the attention politics that really dominates campaigns in the Trump era. Now, and you saw there, he's running against Trump.

He's not running against his Democratic opponent. So that gives him that spotlight, and he's got the political skills to use it.

BASH: And, I mean, just look at the Google search trends that have kind of helped tell the story about what has been happening.

James Talarico, like, you know, before, was kind of a who. And Jasmine Crockett was more known, certainly in the circles that she's hoping will help her on Election Day, which is March 3rd, in the primary.

SARA FISCHER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST: I think you brought up such a good point that this is a trend of inadvertently giving more attention to the people you're targeting. Remember when they went after Kimmel in ABC, and Kimmel came back and his ratings were even better than ever, and then all the local syndicates rushed to bring him back because they were getting so much negative feedback from viewers who wanted him there.

And so, I think if the Trump administration is going to put political pressure on networks, I don't believe it was collusion. I think that the Trump's FCC Chair, Brendan Carr, came out and said that he was going to review the way that FCC was giving exemptions to late night. And I think that CBS' lawyers just warned Colbert. But if they're going to do that, they now have a few examples under their belt of ways that they're inadvertently boosting the people that they want to target. It's not working in their favor.

BASH: And in the case of Jasmine Crockett, her whole campaign is about the fact that the Trump administration gives her outsized attention and goes after her. The first campaign ad was her, you saw her, but you didn't hear her. You just heard the president and people around him going after her.

So I'm sure there's a little bit of concern, if you will, that that takes it away because this is a fight among Democrats to take on whomever the Republican is going to be. And it's all about electability, which is what matters in the primary, especially if you're a Democrat in Texas.

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Certainly, and our colleague, Arlette Saenz has a great story on that, both with Democrats and with Republicans in this very moment.

But with Jasmine Crockett, her whole argument has been re-energizing the base, using that sparring to her advantage. And we've seen that with some other potential 2028 Democratic candidates as well across the country. When the administration comes after them, they punch right back.

And that is something that Jasmine Crockett has been doing. Whereas with her opponent, there is, I mean, he has sort of come from a let's find common ground and sort of pulled on his faith. So to the electability point, they have approached this differently.

But this is giving him the moment. And it's how he capitalizes on it, of course.

BASH: Yeah.

ALVAREZ: We're in a campaign. So how he moves forward with this will be worth watching. Because if this dies down, can he continue the momentum? While Jasmine Crockett, of course, to your point, Stephen, is going to play the attention politics.

BASH: Yeah. And the key is early voting started yesterday.

ALVAREZ: Right.

BASH: So, this is not a prospective thing so much as that this is affecting voters currently.

[12:40:00]

Listen to what Jasmine Crockett said about this whole kerfuffle.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JASMINE CROCKETT, (D-TX) SENATE CANDIDATE: I have done Colbert a number of times. If you've paid attention, I've done Colbert a number of times. I've done "The View" a number of times. I've done Kimmel a number of times. I've done all these shows a number of times. We did receive information suggesting that the federal government did not shut down this segment, number one.

Let me be clear, I don't have any love for the current FCC. I don't want anybody to believe that I do. I do not have any love for them. I do think that there are additional layers at play here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SHAWN MCCREESH, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORK TIMES: It's so funny. Her jealousy is hilarious. I think politics is such a funny business. The reason that I think Talarico got so much money and Colbert got so many ratings off of this is because I do think there's a growing sense out there that the Trump administration is an overdog that is wielding the power of the federal government to shut up speech it doesn't like and to pick on people.

It's not conservative. It's not American. I think people are getting really fed up with it. So each time something like this happens, the response gets bigger and bigger, and the administration ends up shooting itself in the foot. But, of course, it can't help itself. I think obsession with late-night television is foundational to the Donald Trump ethos.

So, you see his minions out there trying to preemptively please him in this way.

BASH: Yeah. All right. Everybody stand by. When we come back, the biggest tech companies want to keep our next guest out of Congress and they're spending a lot of money to do it. We're going to talk to one of the many Democratic candidates running for New York's 12th Congressional District. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:46:05]

BASH: Major tech CEOs and A.I. investors are pouring more than $100 million into this year's midterms, boosting candidates friendly to A.I. amid calls to regulate the fast-growing technology.

Alex Bores was one of their first targets. He's a New York State Assemblyman running in a crowded field to succeed retiring Congressman, Jerry Nadler. He's also a former Palantir employee who led the charge to regulate A.I. in New York.

Listen to some of the ads against him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's in black and white. Alex Bores' tech company works for ICE.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Alex Bores' campaign is being bankrolled by Palantir employees. Yeah, the company powering ICE. He made hundreds of thousands of dollars building and selling the tech for ICE, enabling ICE, and powering their deportations while making bank.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Now if you watch those ads, you probably, maybe you'd be surprised to learn that they're backed in part by one of Palantir's co-founders, Joe Lonsdale, who was a vocal supporter of President Trump and said this about his former company's ties to ICE just last week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you think Palantir should still be working with ICE to help them arrest illegal aliens?

(CROSSTALK)

JOE LONSDALE, CO-FOUNDER, PALANTIR TECHNOLOGIES: Yeah. I think we should be way more aggressive than we are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Joining me now is State Assemblyman and candidate for Congress, Alex Bores. Thank you so much for being here. So this is some dark arts we're talking about here. Proponents of Palantir backing negative ads that attack you for having worked there. You're obviously a critic of the company now and an advocate for A.I. guardrails. How has this played into your race?

REP. ALEX BORES, (D-NY) CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: Well, it's so ironic that they are attacking me for having worked at the company when what they're actually upset about is the fact that I'm proposing basic guardrails.

And the fact that they're being so aggressive with it, I think, has been redounding to my benefit. I've had a lot of constituents who have reached out and said, you know, I hadn't even heard of you until all of these text messages and then started Googling, and why did the big A.I. firms attack you for having worked in tech?

Once people start asking questions, they get to the real answers. The only thing I learned personally from those ads is that the tech companies would really like me to shave my beard.

(LAUGH)

BASH: Really?

BORES: It seems to always go to shots before I had the beard. I don't know what they're leaning into.

(LAUGH)

BASH: Or maybe A.I. just got it wrong.

(LAUGH)

BASH: Look, the PAC behind this is called "Leading the Future." And that PAC says they want a national framework. What they don't want is a patchwork of 50 different state laws to comply with.

So, what do you make of that as somebody who wants to be in Congress, somebody who would be part of making laws, assuming that Congress ever gets back to doing that, versus what you're trying to do in New York as a state assemblyman?

BORES: I agree with them. I think there should be a national framework. And just last week, I released an A.I. framework that has eight topic areas, and I think 43 subpoints. I think most of this should be done at the federal level. It's just not being done right now.

You're really seeing states being the only place that can pass bills. And so, these same people who are attacking me in the Super PAC were the same ones pushing behind the moratorium for states to take any action on A.I.

Thankfully, in New York, we beat them. The RAISE Act, my bill, the strongest A.I. safety bill in the country, is the only one that has been enacted in law since that executive order came into effect. And I think these Trump mega donors who are attacking me are terrified of having someone in Congress that's already beaten them.

BASH: Your campaign is receiving financial support from employees at an A.I. company, Anthropic. That, of course, is seen more as a safety- minded A.I. company. But, does taking A.I.-related money complicate your message?

[12:50:00]

BORES: Not at all. I'm also getting a lot of support from employees at OpenAI, but also from a lot of the people who want to regulate A.I. I think there's a big difference between the engineers who are closest to this technology and see the power and view government as having a real role in setting those guardrails to make sure there's a future. They want to focus on innovative technology.

They don't want to be solving the societal problems. That's government's role. There's a big difference between those engineers supporting me and the executives, the billionaires, who are out there openly saying that A.I. is going to replace all jobs, but also saying, don't you dare try to regulate us. Let us just decide.

BASH: I want to go back to what we heard from Joe Lonsdale in that soundbite, one of the co-founders of Palantir, and as it relates to ICE, which he was talking about. Because last year, ICE signed a $30 million contract with Palantir to help its deportation operations. What does that kind of collaboration look like?

BORES: Well, I've been gone from the company for seven years, and so for what they're doing inside, I only know what's reported in public. But it seems like there has been a real shift from just maybe looking the other way as ICE used some of Palantir's software to actively building new features for deportation. And every company gets to decide and put their morals on the work that they want to do.

They have to have that conversation with their employees and with the public. It seems like current Palantir executives are really doubling down on enabling this incredibly right-wing regime.

BASH: Yeah. I do have to ask about a Bloomberg report saying that the reason why you quit Palantir is because, just a few days earlier, that you received a formal warning about inappropriate sexual comments in the workplace. Can you address that?

BORES: Yeah, this is a hit piece that was planted by the same Super PAC that's attacking me. They hired an opposition firm and paid them thousands of dollars to try to find something. When they couldn't, they got two anonymous Palantir executives, the same people opposing me, to plant this story.

I did nothing wrong, which was the same thing that Palantir found at the time when they looked at it. In fact, they were so sure of that decision that a year after I left, they emailed and called me begging me to come back. This is a nothing story. This is the aggressive tactics of a Super PAC that is simply trying to avoid regulation.

BASH: So, there was an investigation and you're saying you were cleared of it?

BORES: There wasn't an investigation. There was one meeting where they heard the story and said there's nothing here.

BASH: OK. Real quick, before I let you go, you are running in a very crowded field to replace retiring Congressman, Jerry Nadler, and represent a lot of Manhattan. We're putting up on the screen the competitors, your competitors in this race, including Jack Schlossberg, who is a liberal media star and a Kennedy, George Conway, and other local elected officials.

Is this the way you differentiate yourself with A.I.? Are there other ways that you do that?

BORES: It's one of many. I also am one of the few people with a lot of private sector and public sector experience. I've had to balance a budget and I've passed bills. In office, I've passed 27 laws. I was rated by the Center for Effective Lawmaking as the most effective new legislator from New York City.

So as Democrats fight to put a positive vision forward and make government deliver, I've shown a track record of doing that extensively more than anyone else in the field. But yes, in a race where we're all promising to fight Donald Trump, being the only person that Donald Trump's mega donors are spending millions of dollars against is a pretty nice distinction.

BASH: Alex Bores, thanks for being here. Appreciate it.

BORES: Thanks for having me. BASH: And coming up, heated revelry. That's right, RFK Jr. and Kid Rock. They went shirtless and they went into a sauna together. Up next, an unforgettable video, they say, to push the president's health agenda. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:58:35]

BASH: Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has teamed up with Kid Rock for a new video to inspire Americans to get fit. He posted a video on social media with this caption, "I've teamed up with Kid Rock to deliver two simple messages to the American people, get active and eat real food."

Well, let's just let the video speak for itself.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Shawn?

MCCREESH: I mean, I think if you are a MAGA person and you love Kid Rock and you dig RFK, you'll think it's a cool, funny video. I think a lot of other people will see it and think a freak show.

And I just hope somebody has sent it to Lorne Michaels because I think it should be on "Saturday Night Live" this weekend.

BASH: Also, by the way, he's 72-years-old.

FISCHER: He does look like he's in great shape for 72, but my initial reaction watching that video is we just had Kid Rock do the alternative Super Bowl show and now he's in the RFK video. Does MAGA have any other stars that they could pull from? I feel like he's so saturated compared to the Democratic Party where you have, like, all of the music industry and Hollywood.

COLLINSON: Yeah, it is a little bizarre and you kind of wish you could unsee it --

(LAUGH)

COLLINSON: But, it's not the most bizarre thing happening in American public health right now --