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Laura Coates Live
Trump Says "We Have a War with Iran," Vance Says "I Wouldn't Call it a War"; CNN Updates on Lindsay Clancy Murder Trial; Trump Takes Mail-In Ballot Fight Directly to Supreme Court; DOJ Charges ICE Agent; Remembering Gloria Steinem. Aired 11p-12a ET
Aired September 03, 2026 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[23:00:00]
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR AND SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: People pointing out Florida, you've got no excuse for mail-in voting. People have been voting by mail in this country for many decades.
CAROLINE SUNSHINE, FORMER DEPUTY COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, TRUMP'S 2024 CAMPAIGN: Yes, and they can still continue to do that if their circumstance warrants it. Again, people in the military, people in college, seniors, but we didn't have it for everybody post-pandemic.
PHILLIP: That's not true.
JOSH ROGIN, LEAD GLOBAL SECURITY ANALYST FOR THE WASHINGTON POST, AUTHOR: I voted by mail in 2004.
PHILLIP: Yes, that's the point of this viewer's point.
SUNSHINE: But why did you vote by mail?
ROGIN: Because it was easy and cool. And I liked it and it worked.
SUNSHINE: I don't know about that.
ROGIN: And I got to vote and it was great. Nothing bad happened.
PHILLIP: That's it for us. Thanks for watching "NewsNight." "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: Tonight, war? What war? Vice President J.D. Vance offers up his spin as he admits there's one critical question that he simply cannot answer. Plus, President Trump takes his mail-in ballot fight directly to the Supreme Court. Could the move jeopardize the first batch of ballots about to hit the post office? And an extraordinary moment in the Lindsay Clancy trial. Her defense attorney pushes to remove one juror that he thinks may be standing in the way of a verdict. It's all tonight on "Laura Coates Live." Good evening. I'm Victor Blackwell, in for Laura. Here's my question for you tonight: What would you call what's going on in Iran? Is it a war, a conflict, short-term excursion? Well, the Trump administration has been really all over the place on how to describe it and how long it's supposed to last. Now, it was originally supposed to be four to six weeks. President Trump has declared victory again and again and again even as the U.S. and Iran continue to trade fire. And now, Vice President J.D. Vance says he wouldn't even call it a war.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: The phrase, an end to the war, I want to push back on that just a little bit because major combat operations are currently not ongoing and they haven't been ongoing in a very long time. I wouldn't call it a war. Right now, there is no active shooting. I recognize there have been places where this has flared up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: So, no active shooting. Now, what exactly does the vice president consider a flare-up because the region has been or seen either U.S. strikes or Iranian drone and missile attacks on Sunday and Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and today, five straight days? But there is one person in the Trump administration who does not seem to have a problem calling this a war.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Now, we have a war with Iran. They want our country to lose the war with Iran.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP (voice-over): Prior to the war, prior to what we're doing with Iran.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: This is a relatively little war for us. This is not a big war.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: So, according to the president, it's a war, also a war that he apparently wants to end quickly. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the president is discussing with senior aides whether to declare the war over. Now, you might be wondering, what would over actually mean this time on the ground? Well, we've got the reporter who broke the story here with us tonight.
But the pressure to end it may not just be coming from the battlefield because the midterms are two months away and that same Wall Street Journal reporting says Trump's aides are warning him that the war could hurt Republican prospects in November. Most Americans say they're not happy with how the president is handling this conflict, the war or the cost of living. But V.P. Vance has his own midterm pitch and it's not about Iran.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) VANCE: The choice of the election really is between crazy people who are trying to rig the game and commonsense people who you may have disagreements with from time to time. Democrats stand for somebody else. The Republicans stand for you. My argument to the American people is not that you're going to agree with us on every issue, but there are bunch of crazy people like the commonsense people to Washington.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: All right, let's take a deep dive now into what was said at the White House today and what is actually happening. We are joined now by Xochitl Hinojosa, CNN political commentator and former DNC communications director, Niall Stanage, White House correspondent for "The Hill," Carine Hajjar, editorial board member of "The Washington Post" and Steamboat Institute fellow, and Alex Ward, national security reporter for "The Wall Street Journal." Full table tonight. Welcome to everyone.
Carine, let me start with you. So, the vice president says now that not only would he not call it a war, he says it's not up to the administration to determine when this is over. Six months ago, they were very confident it would take a month and a half. How do they now get to the point where it's acceptable to say it's not a war and we don't know when it's going to end?
CARINE HAJJAR, EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBER AT THE WASHINGTON POST, FELLOW AT STEAMBOAT INSTITUTE: Well, it's not going to be politically acceptable. I mean, the rhetoric isn't going to work. Voters can see through this. The approval is low on this, especially on the economy. And so, I think that the only way that Republicans go into the midterms without this being massive baggage for Republicans is if gas prices go down immediately, and I just don't see that happening.
[23:05:00]
It's certainly not going to happen from an oil deal with Venezuela, which would take a long time to come to fruition if it ever did happen. It's certainly not going to happen if you're not calling what's happening in Iran a war. So, it's a political pickle for Republicans, and I don't see this going away politically for them.
BLACKWELL: Xochitl, is it clear what "war over" would even mean?
XOCHITL HINOJOSA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, FORMER COMMUNICATION DIRECTOR FOR DNC: Well, I mean, I think war over would essentially mean no troops in the region, no U.S. forces whatsoever, the strait would be open, gas prices would come down, all of those things. Here is the problem, is that we have -- there are comms problems, there are political problems, and there are problems' problems. This is an actual problem.
The president and the vice president can do all they want to try to finesse it and try to message it, in which they're not doing well because the vice president was incoherent at the podium today, but they can do all of those things. But until they have an actual strategy behind ending it, behind what they want to accomplish in the last, you know, hopefully, it was in the last few months, it was only supposed to be in the last week, and then tell the American people what that is. They're not there yet.
The problem is the president doesn't know how to get out of this, and that's where we're at. And I think, to be honest with you, I think it is likely that the next president will have to deal with ending this war because the president doesn't know his way out.
NIALL STANAGE, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, THE HILL: And I think to that point, I mean, it's not only this issue of, I wouldn't call it a war, it's also the fact that the timeline for this keeps slipping further and further back, right? Initially, we had President Trump saying it's going to be over in six weeks. Then the last time J.D. Vance was at the White House podium several months ago, he talked about it not being a forever war, we're going to take care of business and come home. Three months pass by, he's now up there not only making this comment about the war, but saying we're not going to set an artificial deadline.
If you're someone who voted for President Trump partly on the basis that he wasn't about forever wars, he wasn't about foreign intervention, you've got a pretty bad feeling in the pit of your stomach as you listen to that kind of rhetoric.
BLACKWELL: Yes. We're beyond 26 weeks now of this war. Alex, give us the latest reporting on how the Pentagon sees this.
ALEX WARD, NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: They're going to keep on fighting because the president wants to keep on fighting. From everything we've discussed, let's remember why the president decided to go to war.
BLACKWELL: Sure. WARD: It was to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon and to have it dissolve its nuclear program. So, when we talk about the war, we're talking about the political objective of this administration, which the president is asking the Pentagon to help achieve. Now, they devised a strategy of basically all-out bombing in order to get the Iranians to dismantle their program, which they have not done.
So, what has the administration done? They've changed the narrative as to what victory looks like, and victory now looks like a decimated Iranian military, which is a thing that has happened, and more oil going to the Strait of Hormuz without acknowledging that oil was flowing freely before the war. So, we're talking about a political objective here that the president is trying to achieve, that he's not close to achieving.
And when they talk about timelines, they can talk about timelines all they want. I actually think it is kind of a distraction. The issue becomes, can you get the Iranians to do the thing you're saying or not? And the president and his team have basically realized that the Iranians, as of this moment, are not going to capitulate in the way the White House is asking. So, can the president accept something short of a full dismantlement of the nuclear work? That doesn't seem to be on the cards.
So, in the meantime, this is kind of stalling because on the one hand, you have the Pentagon willing to have 50,000 or so troops in the region to give the president options should he decide to continue fighting or set the conditions so that somehow the U.S. and Iran make some kind of deal or at least the president can kind of walk away. That's where we're at.
BLACKWELL: All right. So, we are two months away from the midterm election. The vice president today, his pitch, common sense versus crazy. What's your reaction to that and what's the Democratic response, that four or five-word response to the vice president's common sense versus crazy framework?
HINOJOSA: Well, the president's theory of the case is not working. I think that you have seen in many places where Republicans are trying to frame the Democrat, for example, like my home state of Texas, where my sister is running for governor, James Talarico as "Talafreako." That is not working. You still see James Talarico leading in the polls in a deep red state where Democrats have tried to win for so long.
And the reason why people are upset is because of affordability. What Democrats are actually campaigning on is that they will lower their costs and that they will do everything they can to make life easier. Republicans still have not been able to articulate how life is better under a Republican president, a Republican House, and a Republican Senate. They control everything. And why is it now that costs have been going up? And so, Democrats' promise to the American people is that we will lower your costs if you put us in power.
[23:10:00]
We just haven't seen that articulation from the Republicans.
BLACKWELL: Yes. Niall, you were in the briefing room today when the vice president, in the question of affordability and inflation, pointed back to the Biden administration. Let's watch that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VANCE: America's inflation problem wasn't created in a day. It was created by very bad policies of the Biden administration, trillions of dollars of new spending that was going more to fraudsters than it was to the American people. It takes a little bit of time to rebuild the foundation of America's middle-class economy.
If you think that inflation is a problem, if you think affordability is a problem, number one, we're doing everything that we can to bring down prices. But what do the Democrats say? They say that they want to undo taxes, they want to increase taxes on Social Security and tips.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: So, inflation, the latest numbers we have because we'll get new numbers for August soon, 3.4 percent. The day that President Trump came back to the White House, it was three percent. So, this administration, it seems, is going to try to blame the last several months, more than a year, on the predecessor. Do the Republicans who are out in the field, who are on the ballot, do they believe that will work?
STANAGE: No, I don't think so. I mean, they will claim that they believe it will work but, of course, the issue is this argument that Vance is making, that inflation was baked in at the highest point it had during the Biden administration. That's simply not true. As you just pointed out, inflation is higher now than it was when President Biden left office and President Trump took office. That obviously complicates that issue to an enormous degree.
But the other point I would make, Victor, is that these two points of Iran and inflation are so inextricably linked. President Trump's poll ratings are bad in both of those issues, and the argument that Vance is making, we've done everything we can to reduce prices, well, that is rebutted by the decision to go to war with Iran, which has raised oil prices, raised gas prices, and added to those inflationary pressures.
BLACKWELL: Yes.
HAJJAR: And I'll just add that that was one of the early victories that Trump had, was that gas prices were coming down. And now, that has gone away. So, it's going to be very difficult to run on an economic message here. And I think you can do the crazy versus common sense line when you're running and President Biden is owning the economy. But when Republicans are owning the economy, I don't think that that's going to be enough for voters. So, this rings really hollow from the vice president.
WARD: The president has also been pretty clear that he's actually asking voters to take on a bit of cost for the Iran war. He has been very open about it. He goes, yes, you're paying a bit more of the pump, but that's worth the price of ridding Iran of its nuclear program, which goes back to the earlier comments we were making, which is they haven't done that yet. So, the president is still asking voters to bear the cost, the higher cost of the grocery store, gas pump, wherever it is, for this war that he currently has not been able to successfully end.
BLACKWELL: Yes. Question here. Karl Rove says that the Republicans are sticking to a losing strategy, says that time is almost running out. This losing midterm plan, it's almost too late to fix it. And now, you've got the president who's going to have this "Trumpalooza." He says he's going to be out on the road. What does it seem that the White House is willing to change, if anything, about their narrative, considering the context that Rove is offering?
HAJJAR: Look, I'm sure people are asking the White House to change their narrative privately. I would bet that. But it's a tricky situation for Republicans right now who are running because the president is insisting that he be at the center of the midterm strategy. And he is not popular. His approval is in the 30s. And at the same time, he is withholding funding from his own PAC. And so, you have Republicans who are really floundering in the midterms here against those two challenges. So, it's going to be very difficult. And I think Republicans are going to have to focus very hard on presenting fresh policy, showing why their economic ideas might be better than the Democrats that they're running against to tackle affordability.
BLACKWELL: Is he making room for them to offer fresh policy, though?
HAJJAR: Well, he's certainly making it difficult --
BLACKWELL: Yes.
HAJJAR: -- but that's just what they're going to have to do in this situation.
BLACKWELL: OK. One more here on the vice president specifically. He has this friendship with Tucker Carlson. He was asked about it today. How long do you think the president tolerates that friendship between the vice president and Tucker Carlson, who is often throwing bombs at the president?
HINOJOSA: I mean, I think -- I think the whole briefing was just hilarious because he was speaking to one person, and that was Donald Trump. And so, I do think that if you're J.D. Vance and you're running for president, you have to -- you have to make sure that you're pleasing Trump. At the same time, you don't want to give any room for Tucker Carlson or anyone else to criticize you, and that's what you saw on display.
I think what happens is that if J.D. Vance at any point looks weak from any part of the party, you will see Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio and potentially other -- or Pete Hegseth potentially jump in the race. I think that it will -- I am sure J.D. Vance probably got a lot of calls after that comment about Tucker Carlson, but he is playing this dance where he is trying to please everyone in the party so that he is the guaranteed nominee for president and, right now, he doesn't have it locked up.
[23:15:09]
STANAGE: I also think there's a bit more specificity than just trying to appeal to everyone. J.D. Vance came from the sort of anti- interventionist wing of the Republican Party. Now, Tucker Carlson is doing other things as well, but he's still identified with that wing. So, I don't think Vance completely wants to forsake the I'm the America first, avoiding wars guy, but it's an incredibly fine needle to try to thread where Carlson has a go at Trump.
BLACKWELL: Thank you, everybody. We've got more to talk about later in the show. Still ahead for us, a dramatic -- a really dramatic day in the Lindsay Clancy trial. The defense now is pushing to dismiss one of the jurors in particular. Will the judge be convinced?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) KEVIN REDDINGTON, LINDSAY CLANCY'S DEFENSE LAWYER: If we come back here in a half an hour with a mistrial because of a -- because of a juror that has just spurned the instructions of this court, it's a shame. It's a real shame.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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BLACKWELL: The tension inside the Lindsay Clancy courtroom may have now reached a breaking point today. Her attorney went head to head with the judge. At one point, Kevin Reddington slammed his hand on a stack of papers on the judge's bench, even threw papers at it. But then the jury was brought in. The judge read them instructions on reasonable doubt, told them to keep deliberating. Once they left, Clancy's defense dropped this bombshell.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEVIN REDDINGTON, LINDSAY CLANCY'S DEFENSE LAWYER: The court has an instruction from the foreperson of that juror that's been working for a week now saying that there's one juror who refuses to listen to the law that you've given him or her on reasonable doubt. If we come back here in a half an hour with a mistrial because of a -- because of a juror that has just spurned the instructions of this court, it's a shame. It's a real shame. My motion is to remove this juror that refuses to listen to your instruction on reasonable doubt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: According to the defense, the judge is expected to question that one juror tomorrow. With me now, criminal defense attorney Elyse Hershon along with crime reporter John DePetro, who was in the courtroom today. He's also the host of the "John DePetro Show." Welcome to you both. Elyse, let me start with you. This framing from Reddington that there is one juror who is not on his side, what's your confidence in that framework? How sure can the defense be that that's the lineup?
ELYSE HERSHON, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: So, thank you for having me on your show and nice to meet you. So, essentially, I've been staying very close to this trial, and I covered this live today earlier. So, I would trust that Attorney Reddington a hundred percent knows that there is one juror, that there is a holdout, and that there is an issue because we weren't read the note that was given from the jury communication to the judge, but it was dealt with at sidebar, and that to me tells me that that told these lawyers that there was somebody who was not listening to the law and that there was an argument how to handle it.
Attorney Reddington clearly wanted the juror swapped out and the prosecutor may have requested the reasonable doubt instruction. It struck me as strange because prosecutors usually don't want a reasonable doubt instruction. They don't like that because it really reiterates their high burden and that they have to acquit with reasonable doubt. So, the fact that they wanted that made me think it's the lesser of two evils.
The other one is there's a juror that is the only one that maybe is not on the defense side and is not following the judge's instructions, which they took an oath to do, and attorney Reddington's solution was that that juror needs to be removed.
BLACKWELL: So, as you said, Reddington wants this juror to be removed. Being a holdout in deliberation, is that ground for removal? What would be the threshold that this juror would have to reach for that to be justified, Elyse?
HERSHON: Thank you. So, someone being a holdout is not ground for removal. That's essentially what our justice system is. That's what our jury system is. If there's one holdout, three holdouts, six holdouts, a split, then the jury either comes to a verdict after further deliberation or they say that they're deadlocked, we have a formal instruction called Tuey-Rodriguez, and it ends up in a hung jury mistrial. So, there's a big difference between a holdout that the jury is frustrated with and a communication that basically accuses a juror of ignoring the judge's rules and the judge's instructions, which they took an oath to do.
They took each juror in one by one when they were bringing them in for the voir dire before the trial started to ask these very questions: Will you follow the law as it's instructed to you by the judge? Yes. Now, there's a juror that, according to Attorney Reddington, is saying no. So, is that a biased juror? A biased juror or a prejudiced juror or someone with a personal issue could be grounds for removal. A holdout alone is not enough.
BLACKWELL: John, let's look ahead to tomorrow, and the defense says that the judge is expected to question this lone juror. This seems rare. You confirm it. Is it a rare step? What happens if this is happening in open court?
JOHN DEPETRO, CRIME REPORTER: Very rare, Victor. And it was also interesting. You know, Attorney Reddington has a very aggressive, brash type of style. We've seen him during the course of the trial. You know, he sparred with many of the witnesses, with the doctors, even the, you know, the prosecutors or even the psychiatrists. This was the first time we saw him spar, in fact, with the judge. And you could tell right away we were going into the courtroom thinking that they were going to say they were locked and maybe leading to a mistrial. No one saw this coming.
[23:24:58]
As far as tomorrow, you know, there's a feeling, though, floating out that he just wants to get rid of this juror because they want to vote guilty. Something that's really crucial here, Victor, is the fact that, you know, one of the options here is in Massachusetts, they just say you're not criminally responsible. Most people know it as, you know, not guilty by reason of insanity.
And so, there was a feeling and kind of a buzzer on the courtroom that they thought that the bulk of the jurors or maybe 11 of them, that they had 11 not guilty by reason of insanity. If you're Kevin Reddington, that's a total win if you could get one more. I think where they have to be cautious and the judge was cautious is, well, if you have a juror that says, listen.
I sat through this, and I think that she is guilty. And there are many people that feel the commonwealth, you know, they met their burden. I think that's very dicey. Everyone is waiting to see how this is going to go tomorrow morning because, Victor, this is day seven tomorrow where they're deliberating, we're already at 35 hours. All week, though, you could see they were getting increasingly frustrated. We weren't sure why they were frustrated. Now, we know why.
This jury also was interesting. They didn't ask for, you know, questions about the law. They haven't asked questions really about evidence other than just that one question about the pills and the knife. Now, we know there's something far more inside that's going on.
BLACKWELL: John DePetro, Elyse Hershon, we will certainly be watching to see how this especially rare exchange happens tomorrow. Thank you both. And CNN will be on verdict watch tomorrow when court resumes. Live coverage on CNN and CNN All Access.
Still ahead, the president in a hurry to get his mail-in voting rules in place and going directly to the Supreme Court to make it happen. Can the court rule in time to avoid chaos or might they be about to fuel it? We'll get into the debate, next.
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BLACKWELL: Tonight, high-stakes voting showdown. It has landed now on the steps of the Supreme Court just as the very first midterm ballots are set to go out. North Carolina, they're mailing them out tomorrow.
The Trump administration has made this emergency appeal now to the court for sweeping powers to allow the U.S. Postal Service to withhold certain mail-in ballots. Democratic states are fighting back. They warn of voter chaos and point out the post office's own tracking system is not even running yet. Now, the pressure is on the Supreme Court for a quick decision.
Xochitl Hinojosa, Carine Hajjar are back with me. Also joining us, senior legal affairs reporter for Politico, Josh Gerstein. Welcome back. Welcome to you, Josh. So, we know the deadlines here. We know North Carolina is sending out their ballots tomorrow. Josh, how quickly do we expect the justices to weigh in here?
JOSH GERSTEIN, SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS REPORTER, POLITICO: Well, the first signal from the court was that they're not asking the other side to respond to this request until next Tuesday after the Labor Day holiday. So, I don't think the court is going to do anything with it right away.
And the fact that they're not going to do anything with it right away means that it really could be moot as soon as tomorrow. I mean, one of the strange things that's going on here, Victor, is that the judge who issued this TRO that the administration has decided to take to the Supreme Court, she had a hearing this morning on what should happen next in the case, and she said she's going to issue or deny a preliminary injunction in this case either sometime tonight or tomorrow. So, it's all kind of wrapped up on the axle, if you will, here.
And, as you mentioned, some of the things the post office is saying that they want to have the authority to do, they're not ready to do them yet. And it's not really clear what North Carolina is supposed to do with these ballots that they're sending out tomorrow.
BLACKWELL: Carine, the White House knows the calendar just like the state houses know the calendar. The post office, the voters know. Is it clear that they believe that this can happen? They say in these filings that it's a modest request. You listen to the states. This isn't modest at all.
HAJJAR: Well, doing things thoroughly and being detail-oriented isn't always a hallmark of Trump administration policy.
BLACKWELL: Yes.
HAJJAR: But look, this is going to create -- you know, we've already said this is going to create a headache for North Carolina. We have to remember that a third of voters cast mail-in ballots in 2024. I think it's extremely legitimate to ask questions about how states are doing that process, the timing. Obviously, mail-in ballots can come in after Election Day. That can hold things up. But, ultimately, this is a state issue.
The Trump administration talks a lot about election security. Well, decentralizing elections is also a way to secure elections. I think it would be problematic to have one entity controlling all of our elections, and that's why the Constitution gives this power to the states.
BLACKWELL: Josh says this might be a moot point soon. But if the Supreme Court sides with the administration, what's a Democratic response here?
HINOJOSA: The Democratic -- I mean, first of all, I think the Democratic response more broadly, especially with all the shenanigans coming from the Trump administration with this election, is that they want to make sure that voters understand that they should vote in person if they can at all possible and to make plan to do so. And they also want to make sure that voters know that it's still easy to vote, that they still have a right to vote, that if there are any issues, they should check their registration.
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In a place like Texas where I'm from, they have purged many voters. I have two relatives, one who's considered dead, who is not dead, and another one who is considered an immigrant, who is not an immigrant and is a U.S. citizen who has taken off the rolls. And because we noticed it, you know, they're making their case to get themselves back on. And so -- but they're not the only two people.
And so, people just need to be really vigilant, have a plan, and make sure that you are able to vote in person if at all possible. And you're right, 30 percent of Americans did vote by mail. There are a lot of people that rely on it. Our own President Donald Trump relies on it. But at the same time, we need to make sure that we're doing everything possible to make sure that every vote is counted.
HAJJAR: Republicans rely on it, too.
BLACKWELL: Yes.
HUNTE: Right. Yes. Both parties. Yes.
BLACKWELL: And to that point, I mean, there may be a practical implication or consequence if the ballots are delayed or if they don't show up. Is there a political consequence as well that maybe Republican voters or independent voters take this out on Republicans because there's some change in the way they typically vote?
HAJJAR: I think it would be more practical considerations. The confusion that this leads to -- the confusion this leads to for older voters, the confusion this leads to -- again, Republicans should be thinking about this in rural red areas where a lot of people rely on mail-in voting.
And, again, that's why it's I think it's so important that states do get to determine how they're doing their elections. They can tailor it to their population, whether that be a very urban population, a very rural population. So, I think the immediate political effect would be just practical in the logistics of it.
BLACKWELL: Meanwhile, there's the arch. We heard from the interior secretary that in two weeks, work is going to begin on the triumphal arch in D.C. There was some movement today in the courts of trying to stop this from moving forward. What do you know?
GERSTEIN: Well, there's already a case that has been pending for some time about this triumph arch plan. We've got three veterans who are suing over it. And I think it's going to be a very close call, Victor, because many of the issues are similar to what went on with the ballroom.
We just had the Supreme Court rule on that issue and say that they didn't think the person who was challenging it had standing to go into court, that the fact that she didn't like the way the White House would look was not enough grounds to bring a suit. This suit is kind of similar to that. The lawyers for the veterans are arguing it's not exactly the same
because they're actually contending there are things you can see now from Arlington National Cemetery, from the Lincoln Memorial, that you won't be able to see once this triumph arch is in place. It's actually interfering with existing vistas of the Capitol as opposed to, you know, not liking the way a certain building will look.
Whether the judge will think that's enough of a distinction to let this case go forward and possibly block the arch from being constructed, I think we'll have to wait and see over the next week or two.
BLACKWELL: We talked in the first block about voters' disapproval of the handling of the war, frustrations with inflation, and those are things that have a longer life, a plan to resolve. Why is now the time to break ground on this arch, considering the last poll we have of American voters, 73 percent of them say the president is focused on the wrong problems, not paying attention to the top problems of the country? Why now?
HAJJAR: Well, there's a lot of frustration with his base to white working-class voters. We saw polls over the summer where there's high disapproval on Trump's handling of the economy. So, I think it's a particularly bad look to be spending so much time on something so visible and large, obviously ornamentation.
Some of the president's efforts in Washington, D.C. have been successful. I mean, some of the cleaning up in parks has been -- I've gone out and talked to people, and they think, you know, beautifying parks is a really good idea. If the president wants to do those types of projects, I think that that's something that can help people immediately. But building a large, inexpensive arch is just not a good look when you have such low approval on the economy.
HINOJOSA: Well, and also, whenever you have Americans that are really struggling, whether it be at gas prices or higher costs at the grocery store, you typically have a president and a federal government who -- they look at that and they're like, you know what, we're going to also make cuts within the federal government, we're going to make sure that we're not spending as much. Trump is taking the opposite approach.
BLACKWELL: There was this whole DOGE era at the beginning.
HINOJOSA: Well, but that also fired a lot of government employees --
BLACKWELL: Sure.
HINOJOSA: -- and left people unemployed, right? He left people unemployed. People's gas prices are going up. But yet, he is putting money into these beautification projects that aren't necessary projects and do not benefit the American people in any way. And so, when you're talking about 60 days before an election and what, where the president's priorities are, I think Democrats will be talking about his priorities are about beautification, not the American people. BLACKWELL: All right. Two weeks until excavation begins. Thank you, everybody. Up next, something you don't see every day. Trump's Justice Department is now seeking to punish an ICE agent and charging him with lying about a shooting in Minnesota. Could this move help the states in its pursuit of justice?
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I'll ask Minnesota's attorney general. Keith Ellison is with me, next.
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BLACKWELL: A rare moment is unfolding during President Trump's second term. His DOJ is charging an ICE agent with a federal crime connected to the immigration crackdown. Sources tell CNN that 52-year-old Christian Castro has been charged with making false statements about a shooting that injured a Venezuelan immigrant in Minnesota.
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Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis was shot in the leg during the immigration surge in the Twin Cities in January. Now, at the time, Castro claimed that Sosa-Celis attacked him with a snow shovel and a broomstick, but prosecutors later revealed that Castro made false statements and surveillance video shows that Sosa-Celis never attacked any ICE officers. State prosecutors in Minnesota tried extraditing Castro from Texas after the state charged him with assault and making a false report, but Texas refused their request. Well, tonight, a source tells us that Castro has turned himself in and is expected to appear in federal court tomorrow.
Minnesota's Democratic attorney general, Keith Ellison, joins me now. He was one of the officials who sued to try and extradite Castro. Mr. Attorney General, thank you for joining me tonight. First, what's your reaction to the charges?
KEITH ELLISON, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF MINNESOTA: Well, I think the charges are too low. I mean, quite honestly, I would expect a Section 242 civil rights-related charge. This is an officer who, under color of law, used his badge and his legal authority to essentially violate the rights of the people when he shot through that door without any legal basis to do so, and then wounded Mr. Sosa-Celis, and he endangered everybody in that -- in that unit.
And so, I would hope that the charges would be stronger because here's the other thing. The charge of making a false police report is that if that were proven to be a crime, it would be a crime against justice, a crime against the authority of the Department of Justice. But what about what happened to the family whose rights were allegedly, and we helped to prove in our state case, violated and their safety was endangered? What about the people of Minnesota who have a right to have peace and good order on our streets? We have people shooting into houses without any regard to who's on the other side of that door, and then lying about it.
So, look, it's better than nothing. But I do expect that a civil rights charge will be forthcoming and would be associated with these federal charges. But they're not there yet, so we will see.
BLACKWELL: Well, let's talk more about the potential for a civil rights charge. Sources tell CNN the DOJ is still considering whether to bring civil rights charges against Castro. But ProPublica reports that the DOJ blocked those efforts over the -- quote -- "strongest objections by federal prosecutors." So, what's your reaction to that reporting that there are strong objections to -- from these federal prosecutors to the blocking, that there seems to be this internal fight in DOJ over civil rights charges?
ELLISON: Well, it's disturbing, you know, and it's extremely unfortunate. Whatever prosecutors might be advocating for those stronger civil rights, criminal civil rights charges, I hope the best for them. That does seem to be the right and proper charge for this particular set of behaviors. And so, I hope that they prevail, and I hope that they win out.
But we are dealing with the Trump Justice Department. We do know who's the head of that Justice Department, and doing what's right and just and good isn't always what happens. We've seen we've seen career prosecutors quit here in Minnesota because they were asked to do things that their conscience would not permit. I hope these prosecutors prevail and get the proper charges in this matter.
BLACKWELL: So, now --
ELLISON: In the meantime, we're going to fight to bring him back, to bring Castro back to Minnesota.
BLACKWELL: How does the federal case now -- because Castro had been held in Texas, Governor Abbott refused to extradite him to Minnesota, he's in federal custody now, how does this impact your ability to prosecute him there in Minnesota?
ELLISON: Well, the charges in Minnesota are alive, and they are facing -- and he is facing those charges. Should Castro arrive in Minnesota, that would be a good thing. We would start our prosecution from there. But our extradition case remains live and viable. The judge said that he would not grant our temporary restraining order that would -- we will force the governor to sign the extradition papers.
But the case is still ongoing, and we are pursuing the civil case to force that extradition. Even now, that case has not been defeated. Our emergency measure was not granted, but that case is still ongoing and we're going to pursue it vigorously unless Castro appears in Minnesota to face our state charges along with the federal ones.
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BLACKWELL: All right. Mr. Attorney General, thank you so much.
ELLISON: Thank you, sir.
BLACKWELL: Up next, she was the voice of the women's movement, a feminist icon who relentlessly fought for equality. And who better to remember Gloria Steinem than her friend, Gloria Allred, live with me tonight.
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GLORIA STEINEM, FEMINIST TRAILBLAZER, AUTHOR: If there is any legacy, I would just say that I was trying to make the world a little more fair and a little more representative than it was when I got here.
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BLACKWELL: That's feminist icon Gloria Steinem in her own words about the legacy she hoped to leave behind. There have been so many tributes for this trailblazing activist. She passed away yesterday at the age of 92.
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Those tributes include former President Obama, who awarded Steinem with the Medal of Freedom in 2013. The former president said that generations of women are walking a little taller, aiming a little higher because of what she fought for and achieved. Now, it would be impossible to talk about the women's rights movement without Steinem. Her advocacy as a journalist in the 60s and 70s enlightened and inspired a generation of women to join the fight for equality.
I'm joined by one of those women now, her longtime friend and fellow activist and attorney, Gloria Allred. Gloria, good to talk to you again. First, what did -- what did Gloria Steinem mean to you personally?
GLORIA ALLRED, VICTIMS' RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Well, she certainly inspired me. I became a lawyer early in the 70s, actually 1976. But even before that, she was active in the 60s when I was graduated from college. I started being involved in protests, many of which she had organized, protests against unequal treatment of women in the workplace, at home, in the community, in the world, in the political world. And she spoke out. She spoke truth to power.
And women had been silent too long. So many women victims were shamed and blamed, for example, if they were raped or sexually assaulted. They were afraid to speak about it. So many women like myself were forced to undergo abortions when, for example, in California, when it was illegal for a doctor or nurse to perform an abortion. I had one and had to be taken to hospital and almost died, bleeding to death, because it was a backstreet abortion by someone who wasn't qualified to provide one. She also had said that she had an abortion when it was not legal to have one in London. So, the right to choose legal, safe, affordable, available abortions was something she felt strongly about that I had in common with her.
We had a conversation together in her home, and she was just so outspoken. Some of my very favorite quotes of hers were, what do you say when someone calls you the "B" word? In other words, B-I-T-C-H, you know. And she said, just look at them and say, thank you. And she also said, you know, we are the women our parents warned us about, and we're proud to be those women. So, that's how I felt.
BLACKWELL: It's -- I read that you called her the philosopher of the women's rights movement while you were just a foot soldier. That characterization of philosopher, say more about that.
ALLRED: Yes. She had so many books that she has written, another one unpublished that's going to be published later this month. I can't wait to hear what she says in her new book. Well, she said what we were all thinking. Why don't we enjoy equal rights? And we must push for equal rights.
And what she did, for example, when we failed as a movement to win the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment to the United States Constitution, that equal rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by any state on account of sex.
She was one of the co-founders of the National Women's Political Caucus in 1971, which was formed to support women and encourage women to run for political office because we always say, you know, oh, yes, a woman's place is in the house, the White House, and we wanted women to have equal participation in Congress, in the United States Senate, in local state races, in local races of all levels. And so, we had to push to get the funds for them.
And so, in 1976, after I became an attorney 50 years ago, I started becoming active in that organization that she formed, the National Women's Political Caucus, also in the National Organization for Women. So, you know, she formed that kind of sisterhood.
BLACKWELL: Yes.
ALLRED: She went ahead with what feminists say, which is, you know, don't agonize, organize. And she was not just a philosopher. She said -- you know, she went out and she caused the women's movement to be formed. I respected her for that. I admired her for that. Yes, I said I was just a foot soldier on the battlefield. And she said, no, Gloria, you're a legal strategist. If I get in trouble, I'm calling you.
And, you know, I loved her for that. But even if she hadn't said that, I mean, she's such an inspiration. Her spirit lives on, Mr. Blackwell. She will always be remembered because she made her story, not just history. We know our history because of Ms. Magazine, because of all of her books, because of all her writings.
BLACKWELL: Yes.
ALLRED: And we will fight on.
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BLACKWELL: Yes. I mean, you can't really have the conversation about not just reproductive rights but financial rights, be able to have a credit card and a woman's own name, employment rights, of course, the Equal Rights Amendment without starting that conversation in large part with Gloria Allred. ALLRED: Thank you.
BLACKWELL: Gloria Allred, thank you so much for talking with me tonight. "The Story Is with Elex Michaelson" is starting right now.
