Return to Transcripts main page

The Situation Room

Harris Hits The Trail As Presumptive Democratic Nominee, We Will Win Again; Biden To Give Oval Office Address On Ending Campaign Tomorrow Night; Trump Attacks Harris, Says He Wants To Debate Her But Nothing Set; Delta Meltdown Now In Its Fifth Day As Airline Warns Problems Could Continue All Week; Pop Culture Embraces Harris In Memes And Music. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired July 23, 2024 - 18:00   ET

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

[18:00:00]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Happening now, Vice President Kamala Harris hits the campaign trail as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, vowing her party will win again in the battleground state of Wisconsin and beyond.

Also this hour, President Biden is back at the White House where he plans to explain his exit from the race during a primetime address tomorrow night.

And Donald Trump is testing lines of attack against Harris and sending mixed messages about debating her saying he wants to, but he hasn't agreed to anything specific yet.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer. You're in The Situation Room.

Our top story tonight, it's game on for Vice President Kamala Harris. She just held the first rally of her brand new presidential campaign, with enough delegates now in her corner to win the Democratic nomination.

CNN's Kayla Tausche has more on Harris moving quickly to make the race for the White House her own.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KAMALA HARRIS, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT, DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Good afternoon, Wisconsin.

KAYLA TAUSCHE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Vice President Kamala Harris taking the reins of President Biden's campaign.

HARRIS: The baton is in our hands.

TAUSCHE: Her first rally as the presumptive Democratic nominee in battleground Wisconsin.

HARRIS: The White House goes through Wisconsin. TAUSCHE: Where she put a new twist on a familiar message.

HARRIS: This campaign is also about two different visions for our nation, one where we are focused on the future, the other focused on the past.

TAUSCHE: And a familiar foe.

HARRIS: We will stop Donald Trump's extreme abortion bans.

TAUSCHE: In just two days since President Biden tapped Harris to replace him on the ticket, Harris has rallied the party at breakneck speed, raking in more than $100 million from mostly new donors, recruiting 58,000 new volunteers across the country and racking up critical endorsements from her former staff, foreign policy experts and prominent leaders of the party.

GOV. ROY COOPER (D-NC): I endorse Kamala Harris 100 percent for this job as president.

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): Vice President Harris has done a truly impressive job securing the majority of delegates needed to win the Democratic Party's nomination to be our next president of the United States.

REP. HAKEEM JEFFRIES (D-NY): Kamala Harris is a common sense leader who knows how to deliver real results.

TAUSCHE: With delegates on board too, the Democratic Party moving forward to make her official in a process that pledges will be open and fair and conclude by August 7th.

In Wilmington, Harris helming a rebranding of Biden headquarters, as Biden tells staff, she's suited to finish the job.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TAUSCHE (on camera): President Biden is back at the White House now, preparing to deliver a primetime address tomorrow evening, where he'll focus on his decision to exit the race and end a decades-long career in public service in January.

A senior administration official tells me that Biden began working on that speech while he was still isolated in Delaware and that he'll be working on it and deciding how much of his legacy to include versus how much of his to-do list for the next six months to disclose in that speech, pretty close to when he delivers it, Wolf.

BLITZER: Kayla Tausche reporting from the White House for us, thank you, Kayla.

I want to bring in our panel of political experts, and, Van Jones, I'll start with you. You saw that energy at Kamala Harris' first campaign rally, where she announced she had the best fundraising day in American campaign history. How were you thinking about this remarkable shift among the Democrats in just the past two days? VAN JONES, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Oh, free at last, free at last. Kamala Harris is unleashed. She's just brilliant. She's -- just the energy that's coming off of her is the energy that's coming off of the American people.

Look, I mean, this is 2008 vibes already. She's done in literally 48 hours things that were considered impossible. She got the nomination.

[18:05:00]

She took over cultural -- she's a cultural phenomenon now. TikTok loves her. She raised more money than anybody. She's signed up 50,000 people. You can do your whole career and not get 50,000 volunteers, she did it in 48 hours. You are witnessing the birth of a cultural phenomenon and you need a cultural phenomenon to stop a cultural phenomenon. Donald Trump is a cultural phenomenon.

So, now you've got two superpowers colliding, but this one just came out of nowhere. Listen, a week ago, two weeks ago, people were like, Kamala Harris, I don't know, she can't win, I don't like her, (INAUDIBLE). All those people are marching in line and getting information. It's unbelievable to watch.

BLITZER: It's very impressive, indeed. And, David Chalian, we take a look at some of these numbers, 1.1 million individual donors just in the past couple days or so, 62 percent of them, that's about 680,000 individuals here in the United States, were first time contributors. So, how does the Harris campaign keep this momentum going?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, it's going to be tough to keep the momentum going at the level that you shoot out of the launch with. That is true for most campaigns. But they are going to have to find ways to bring -- keep resupplying more, more new donors, more grassroots activism, more volunteer sign ups, and they will aim to do so.

The reality is those metrics, Wolf, are -- they're not just talking points. I mean, this is real. This is -- those contributions, the signups, those are real numbers that show a different kind of enthusiasm. Biden's campaign was suffering from a pretty significant enthusiasm gap. That has completely closed right now.

BLITZER: It certainly has, very impressive, indeed.

Ashley Allison, you heard Kamala Harris really draw on her experience as a prosecutor. She was the attorney general in California, district attorney in San Francisco. How effective do you think this line of attack against Trump is?

ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, she draws on that experience because of how large the Department of Justice of California is. It's the second largest in the country just after the actual Department of Justice. I think it's important because the contrast of her being a prosecutor and Donald Trump being convicted of 34 felony accounts and potentially counting, if other cases actually come to trial, is significant. I also think, though, it can draw a contrast between people who have been involved in the criminal justice system. One out of three people know someone in America that has been a part of the criminal justice system. One out of five people in America have actually interacted with the criminal justice system. Those individuals don't get immunity like Donald Trump is getting from the Supreme Court. Those individuals don't get to skip their sentencing day, which happened on July 11th. Those individuals don't have the system actually work the same way as Donald Trump.

And so there are multiple contrasts that Kamala Harris can draw between her and Donald Trump and the American people and how they don't have the same lived experience as Donald Trump.

BLITZER: Yes, she's really going after him on that line of attack.

Matt Mowers is with us as well. Matt, it was interesting. I thought that Trump, what he said today, he said he's ready to debate Kamala Harris, but he's not going to do it on ABC, which he had earlier agreed to do if Biden was going to be the Democratic presidential nominee. So, he's not going to do ABC. He doesn't trust ABC, he says. How do you read that between the lines?

MATT MOWERS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, I think, you know, candidly, he's got to find a new agreement if he wants to, to debate Kamala Harris the same way she will. It would not have been surprising if Donald Trump chose to debate Joe Biden again. I think he's going to honestly make a cold, hard political calculation about whether he debates Kamala Harris.

And if polling is the same in September as it is today, where he's leading nationally, he's leading in every key swing state, a new Quinnipiac poll came out today showing him with a -- the most popular he's ever been among the American people at the same time when Kamala Harris was negative 14 in that same poll in her favorable rating, I don't know why he's going to debate her because he's going to look at this and say, I'm going to win this election.

BLITZER: You think he's afraid to debate her?

MOWERS: I don't think he is. And at least at a personal level, I don't think he is. And I don't believe his core supporters believe he is either. I mean, it's clearly going to be a very different debate. You're going to actually have a Democrat nominee show up. Does she perform well or not? That's a different story, but she'll at least be there in a way that President Biden clearly was not at the end of June. But I don't think he's afraid of debating her. He has very great confidence in his debate abilities. I don't think Donald Trump's afraid personally to go up against anyone.

CHALIAN: And in fact, I think he said today, Wolf, that he believes that the American people do deserve debates between their candidates and he seems fully -- like he's moving ahead prepared to --

ALLISON: I don't think people should decide whether or not they should debate people based on their polling numbers. I think that when you decide to be a candidate, you should get up and debate your opponents. Donald Trump wouldn't do that in the primaries. He definitely should do that with Kamala Harris. We as voters deserve that.

BLITZER: Yes, I think a lot of people agree with you on that.

Van, Republicans today are trying to distance themselves from some lawmakers' supposedly racial attacks on Kamala Harris. But listen to what Trump told reporters this afternoon about Harris' debate against Biden back in the 2016 election cycle.

[18:10:04]

Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: He was by far the nastiest to Joe Biden. Now, that's why I was so surprised that he took her. There was nobody nastier than her. She played the race card at a level that you rarely see and she really was very nasty to him and then he picked her. So, I don't get that exactly. Now, they act like they're great friends, but you don't really recover from that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: So what do you make of that, Van?

JONES: Oh, that's his favorite word to use about women, nasty, nasty, nasty, like he's Janet Jackson or something. Look, here's reality. The Republican Party is going to have to resist its worst impulses to make this a racial, gender trash truck of insult and innuendo against this candidate. I don't want to hear it. She checked a box by winning at the local level. I voted for her at the local level in San Francisco when she was my district attorney. I voted for her when she was attorney general in California. I voted for her as a senator. I voted for her as vice president. What more boxes can you check? The only people who've been giving her special treatment are voters who keep electing her.

And so, I don't want to hear it. And the Republicans who are smart will separate themselves from this nasty stuff really quickly and the ones who are not will go along with it. Let's have a straight up competition, someone who's won at the local, state, and federal level, who served with honor and distinction versus somebody who has been a con artist his whole life and who led an insurrection. Nobody has to insult anybody's race or gender. Let's just put the records out there and have a clean fight. But the Republican Party will tarnish itself irrevocably.

By the way, Republican Party has been trying to get black folk over there, trying to get black men over there, trying to get Latinos over there. They're going to lose all of that if they start insulting black women the way that they're starting yesterday.

BLITZER: Ashley, what do you think? ALLISON: Look, a week ago we were at the RNC and we all said we were going to turn the temperature down. We're not throwing racial -- bringing race and gender into this. It's part of turning the temperature down. You either can walk the walk and talk the talk or don't come to me with this unity talk.

CHALIAN: And let me just say, I just want to say how absurd what Donald Trump said there was. He was blaming Kamala Harris -- blaming Joe Biden for selecting Kamala Harris as the running mate given all the things she criticized Joe Biden about.

Have you looked at what J.D. Vance has said about Donald Trump? Like it just makes absolutely no consistent sense what Donald Trump said there.

BLITZER: He once said, J.D. Vance said that Trump was America's Hitler.

CHALIAN: And yet he picked him. So, like it's not -- I just don't understand what metric he's using.

MOWERS: I'll just say, I don't think the campaign has to go anywhere near any of that, right? This is, in a lot of ways, the same campaign it was last week. It comes down to three I's, immigration, inflation, incompetence. You have Kamala Harris, who's the deciding vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, that actually spent trillions of dollars causing inflation. She was the -- what Biden's borders are, when we've had record number of border crossings. And incompetence, she stood side by side with Joe Biden on every single foreign policy disaster we've had, including the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. She owns that record. That's all Donald Trump has to talk about. The rest will take care of itself.

ALLISON: She's not incompetent, okay? Like you don't become the attorney general of California.

BLITZER: Or a U.S. Senator.

ALLISON: Or the vice president of the United States. By calling her incompetent, you're calling the 81 million people who voted for her incompetent as well. But let me just say this. That is what we're talking about. There is a way to attack her record on policy without calling her a name.

Incompetent is an unflattering name. And when people do that to black women, that is what Van was talking about. You might not agree, but as a black woman, let me tell you how we hear it.

MOWERS: Well, you know who disagrees there? The voters. The voters right now believe the Biden-Harris administration is one of the most incompetent administrations in American history. That's not me. That's the voters right now. They're not just saying about the vice president. They're saying about everyone in the administration right now.

BLITZER: Let me get Van to respond to that. Go ahead, Van. JONES: Well, I agree with, with Ashley. Look, we're going to have to learn how to talk to each other. There's certain things that if -- there's a way -- there's a smart way and a dumb way to do anything. It's a very dumb way to, after 400 years of this mistreatment of black people and black women, to say you're incompetent. Maybe that makes sense to you in your world and you wouldn't take it that personally, but that has been the slur. That has been the core, that we are not worthy, we are not as smart, we are not as good, we can't do stuff.

And so when you have someone who's overcome all of that again and again and again and again, and that's the word you pick, incompetent, I'm just going to tell you, it's not going to work as well for you as you think. And what you're going to wind up doing is getting a lot of people who are not going to vote, who really did not care, who are sick of all of it, people are going to crawl through broken glass to vote against a party who says that about a black woman. Pick another word. Don't pick that one.

BLITZER: Button this up for us, David.

CHALIAN: Listen, I think, I just want to say, she's had -- the vice president has obviously very strong rollout, big coalescence around her, very well-executed to launch this. But nobody should be fooled that this election is not going to be very close, and she has a lot of work to do.

[18:15:02]

Matt was talking about the poll numbers that showed Donald Trump at his political apex right now. Kamala Harris, we'll see how the American people perceive her in this new context, but going into this, her numbers were, in terms of favorability, almost as bad as Joe Biden's. There is work for her to do here. And the battle is on for both sides right now to define her in this new context for the American people. Her team is doing that in the way they think is most positive, and the Trump camp is going to be out there every day trying to define her on their --

BLITZER: She's off to a strong start, at least so far.

CHALIAN: Sure.

BLITZER: All right, guys, everybody stand by. There's a lot more we need to discuss. Just ahead, we'll have much more on the vice president's campaign kickoff, former Biden Adviser and United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice standing by live to join us here in The Situation Room.

Plus, what Donald Trump is saying about plans to debate after the switch at the top of the Democratic ticket.

More information coming in, we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:20:03] BLITZER: More now on our top story, Vice President Kamala Harris hitting the campaign trail today as she locks up support from top Democrats and generates a huge surge of enthusiasm just two days after President Biden decided to step aside.

Let's get reaction from former Biden adviser and United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice. Ambassador, thanks so much for joining us.

The numbers are impressive. As I've been mentioning, the Harris campaign has raised now more than $100 million in campaign contributions, signed up almost 60,000 campaign volunteers just in the past few days. Van Jones, our analyst, says he's seeing 2008 vibes. And you know what I mean by that. Do you agree? What do you make of this enthusiasm we're seeing for her now?

SUSAN RICE, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE U.N.: I think there's an enormous amount of energy and excitement out there. Kamala Harris is really about the future and people feel that they're grateful to Joe Biden for having been an incredibly successful and effective president and a selfless patriot in his decision to pass the torch. And in Kamala Harris, they see somebody who will prosecute the case against Donald Trump, provide a really compelling vision for the future of this country, where our democracy is revitalized and everybody has a fair shot. And they're ready to get it done and beat Donald Trump.

BLITZER: Donald Trump is already slamming her, Kamala Harris, in his words, as being dumb as a rock, his words. He says she's dumb as a rock. Other Republicans are saying she was a diversity hire. What's your reaction when you hear that?

RICE: Well, that's extremely offensive and dehumanizing. And let me tell you what it means when somebody calls a person like me or anybody else a DEI hire. What that means is, if you are a woman of any background, if you are a person of color, if you are an immigrant, if you are LGBTQ, if you are disabled, if you're a religious minority, if you're a veteran, and you achieved success, rose to a position of leadership, you didn't deserve it. You didn't get there on merit. You got there because you got some unfair advantage. That is incredibly insulting to the vast majority of Americans who fall into all of those categories.

And it's worse than that, Wolf. What this is, is emblematic of what this race is really all about. It's a race about whether we are going to move into the future as a democracy, where every American has the opportunity to vote, to have their voice heard, to have a chance to make themselves a success, or whether we're going backward, to Donald Trump and J.D. Vance and their Project 2025 vision of an America where women don't control their own bodies, they can't get contraception or in vitro fertilization, to an America where we don't educate our children in public schools that are sufficiently funded because we don't want them to have opportunity. That's 19th century, where the only people who mattered were, frankly, white Christian men.

And that's what they're saying with this DEI thing, that if you're somebody who is not a white Christian man, then you didn't get where you got because you deserved it. That's not the America who we are. BLITZER: She would be the first woman president of the United States, the second black president of the United States. How does she navigate though these attacks that are already starting against her?

RICE: She navigates it by being who she is and being excellent. Remember, this is a woman who is a prosecutor, a district attorney, an accomplished lawyer, the attorney general of the state of California, United States senator, and the most experienced person to run for president since before the four presidents that preceded Joe Biden.

So, you know, you go back to Joe Biden, he's extraordinarily experienced. The four presidents before him didn't have anything in terms of national security or governing experience on the level of Kamala Harris. So, you speak to that, you ignore the haters who want to divide us and use fear and hate as their tool. She believes, like Joe Biden believes, that we are a country that is stronger when we celebrate each other, recognize each other, unite with each other, and believe in a future where all of us have a chance. That's what's at stake in this election.

BLITZER: So, the stakes are clearly enormous right now, from your perspective?

RICE: Absolutely. It couldn't be more serious.

BLITZER: She's going to have to pick a vice presidential running mate presumably very soon, maybe even in the next few days. Four of the leading candidates, and I'll put their pictures, there they are up on the screen, Josh Shapiro, Governors Josh Shapiro, Andy Beshear, Roy Cooper and Senator Mark Kelly. Do any of them stand out to you?

RICE: They all stand out. They're all excellent leaders. They bring different strengths and weaknesses but they are all accomplished, up and coming Democrats with a great future.

[18:25:05]

And I believe we'd be very lucky to have any of them. She'll make a great choice and they'll be a fantastic team.

BLITZER: How does she make the case to the American public, at large, that she can help improve their lives?

RICE: Well, very clearly, as she said today in her opening rally in Wisconsin, this is first and foremost about an America that she believes in, where our democracy is strengthened, where our freedoms are protected and where there's economic opportunity for everybody, where there's child care, paid family and medical leave, care for our elders and protection for Social Security and Medicare, where people have an opportunity to get jobs and education on their merits, and not go back to a time when some of us were inferior and others were superior.

BLITZER: Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, the leaders of the -- the Democratic leaders in the Senate and the House, they jumped on board and endorsed her today. We haven't yet heard from your former boss, former President Barack Obama. Why?

RICE: President Obama is obviously a senior figure in the party. He will be there behind Foursquare, our nominee and be a force to unite us. And I think he's very wisely leaving this to the process that it will unfold. It appears very clear that Kamala Harris is on track to be our nominee, and he will undoubtedly be fully, fully supported.

BLITZER: So, once it's official that she's the presidential -- Democratic presidential nominee, he'll come on board and go out there and campaign for her and everything?

RICE: He'll absolutely campaign for her, no question.

BLITZER: I think you're right. Susan, thanks very much for coming in. I should call you ambassador.

RICE: Thank you. Good to be with you.

BLITZER: Thanks very much for joining us.

And coming up, Donald Trump starts revealing his playbook against Vice President Kamala Harris, seizing on her record and her days as a D.A. in San Francisco

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:31:22]

BLITZER: Tonight, Donald Trump is giving reporters a preview of his strategy against Vice President Kamala Harris as his campaign is forced to abruptly shift gears from focusing in on President Biden.

Let's bring in CNN's Kristen Holmes. She's reporting, getting a lot of new information on all of this. So, Kristen, what's Trump's game plan now?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, this is really a race to define who Kamala Harris is. Obviously, Harris has enormous name identification. But if you talk to people on his, they believe that she is lacking in what they call name education, meaning that people don't know much about Kamala Harris other than that she is the vice president.

So, what they plan to do is fill this void as quickly as they can, because, obviously, Harris is going to want to define herself as well in the same timeframe, with negative information. That includes not just linking her to Joe Biden and his current policies, particularly around inflation, crime and immigration, but also shedding light on what they believe to be poor policies that were enacted while she was in San Francisco as a district attorney, as a prosecutor. And Donald Trump himself, on a call with reporters earlier today, outlined some of that strategy. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Take a look at San Francisco now compared to before she became the district attorney, and you'll see what she'll do to our country. So, I think she should be easier than Biden because he was slightly more mainstream, but not much.

She's the same as Biden, but much more radical. She's a radical left person.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, one of the other things that Donald Trump said in this call was that he wanted to debate Kamala Harris, but he hadn't agreed to it yet, noting that he had only agreed to debate another time with President Joe Biden. But, really, the thing to break down here is the fact that, yes, the campaign says that they had been preparing for this, that they knew that this was a possibility, that Joe Biden would not be at the top of the ticket, and that they had always been focused on it being Harris.

The one thing to point out when I talk to some of these Trump allies is that they don't really know and they acknowledge that this could put us in uncharted territory. There could be an enthusiasm behind Harris that just wasn't there for President Joe Biden.

They are still waiting to see how this is going to play out, but interestingly, Wolf, Tony Fabrizio, the lead pollster for the campaign, put out a memo today, sent it out to all reporters. It was a public memo that said that Harris was going to have a Harris honeymoon, essentially setting expectations for polling saying that she was likely to have a bump that could make her be on par with Donald Trump or even ahead of him in certain polls. So, clearly, they're, again, trying to temper some of those expectations, Wolf.

BLITZER: We'll see what happens. Kristen Holmes, thanks very much for the excellent reporting.

I want to get some more now on the presidential race, and joining us. Representative Elissa Slotkin. She's a Democrat of Michigan who's running for the U.S. Senate seat in Michigan right now. Congresswoman, thanks very much for coming in.

REP. ELISSA SLOTKIN (D-MI): Thanks for having me.

BLITZER: You quickly endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris after President Biden stepped aside. Were you surprised he made the decision, first of all, not to seek re-election?

SLOTKIN: I mean, I think, look, it's a surprising turn of events, but it's been a tumultuous three weeks. And I think, you know, when you think about American politics, it's usually pretty staid and predictable. Having that event happen, I think, sent some new energy into the system. And I think it's a positive thing.

I give President Biden an incredible amount of credit for being courageous enough to do this, to putting the country ahead of himself. Not a lot of people would do that. And I think we should acknowledge that. But I think it was a positive thing. BLITZER: He's getting a lot of praise from Democrats for doing that. You've said in the past that President Biden's debate performance, the CNN presidential debate performance, didn't help your Senate race right now. Are you in a better position now that he's not running?

[18:35:01]

SLOTKIN: Yes. I think that the energy is palpable. I think you can feel that. I was in the airport flying to D.C. yesterday and a bunch of college kids from University of Michigan were getting off the plane, and they came up to me and they said, you know, Congresswoman, we're so excited. We're finally able to get our friends to register to vote. I think there's definitely an enthusiasm.

But it's a swing state, right? No one would ever say that Michigan is going to, you know, be an easy win for anybody. So, it doesn't mean we don't have to work, it just means it's a positive momentum right now.

BLITZER: Michigan, clearly a critically important battleground state right now. President Biden was trailing Trump in Michigan, as you well know. Will Vice President Harris do better than President Biden in the upcoming polls and in the elections?

SLOTKIN: Yes. I mean, I think, you know, like you heard polls are one thing and we always get enamored by polls. I don't think anyone wins in our state without putting in the work. So, the thing that was really important to me was literally the day after Vice President Harris came out and sort of announced her candidacy, her role. She kept all of the people that are working in Michigan. We've got over a hundred people from the Biden campaign working there. She kept all of them, all the offices, all the staff. So, it really was a hand-in- glove type situation.

The work we put in will determine who wins. It's not just sort of like people eyeballing it. They need to get to know her and we need to work.

BLITZER: Donald Trump already, almost every day, is attacking Kamala Harris out there on the campaign trail, citing her record. And kisten to what he said earlier today and then we'll discuss. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Kamala Harris was appointed border czar, as you know, in March of 2021. And since that time, millions and millions of illegal aliens have invaded our country. And countless Americans have been killed by migrant crime because of her willful demolition of American borders and laws.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: She wasn't appointed the border czar. Immigration was part of her portfolio as vice president of the United States. How vulnerable is Harris to these kinds of attacks, though, from Trump?

SLOTKIN: Well, I think immigration was at the top of their list of flashpoints to begin with, right? Immigration, no one's happy with immigration right now. No one's happy with our southern border. So, that was an issue that was animating the party long before this last three weeks. So, they're obviously going to do that.

But I think we got to be transparent about the fact that, that what's going on the southern border, for a nation of immigrants, we can't get immigration right, it's everyone's to blame. Congress, the White House, Democrats, Republicans, they like to use it as a political issue, but when we actually have an opportunity to get in a room and hammer things out, Trump doesn't want to do that. He wants to use it as a political hammer against his opponents.

So, to me, this was an issue for them before, it'll be an issue after, because it's not a healthy system right now.

BLITZER: On a totally different issue, I just want to get your thoughts, as you know, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is already in Washington. He will be addressing a joint meeting of the House and the Senate, the Congress, tomorrow. The vice president, Kamala Harris, as president of the Senate, according to the Constitution, she has decided not to sit behind the visiting prime minister of Israel. And, normally, she would when a visiting leader addresses a joint meeting of Congress. The speaker will be there, of course. Will you be in attendance at this event when the prime minister speaks?

SLOTKIN: Yes, I thought about it. I mean, I try to go to every prime minister that comes and speaks. So, when Prime Minister Modi came, he was obviously controversial as well from India. I've been open about my feelings about Bibi Netanyahu and that I don't agree with how he's prosecuting parts of this war. I'm spending the morning with hostage families. We have a lot of hostage families who are coming. Some of them are going to the speech, some of them refuse to go to the speech, but they want attention on that issue and want to hear from him what they're going to do to get a negotiated ceasefire, get those people home.

So, I am going to go. That doesn't mean I agree and I hope to hear some sort of plan from Prime Minister Ben Netanyahu on how we get from where we are to a better place.

BLITZER: All right, let's see what happens tomorrow. We'll have live coverage of that. Representative Elissa Slotkin, thanks very much for coming in.

SLOTKIN: Thank you.

BLITZER: And this programming note, up next on Erin Burnett, our friend, the Illinois governor and potential vice presidential contender for Kamala Harris, J.B. Pritzker will join Erin. We'll watch that.

Just ahead, we're getting new details on the timeline of the law enforcement response during the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, just as the head of the U.S. Secret Service steps down.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:43:31]

BLITZER: Tonight, the director of the U.S. Secret Service is stepping down ten days after the near assassination of Donald Trump. Kimberly Cheatle's resignation comes on the heels of blistering bipartisan criticism of the agency and her leadership at a contentious congressional hearing yesterday.

I want to bring in CNN's Evan Perez for us. Evan, bring us the latest.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, what happened today was the realization that Kimberly Cheatle could not remain in that job despite her claims that she believed she was the best person to lead the Secret Service during this very difficult period. You saw all of those calls for resignation, and so she tendered her resignation this morning.

The Secret Service is now going to be led by her deputy, who is a career person at the Secret Service. And the president has said that he's going to appoint a new director of the Secret Service.

Now, today is also the day where we learn important new details at another hearing where the Secret Service was not there in attendance. The Pennsylvania State Police commissioner, Christopher Paris, provided some important new details about exactly what has been found as part of this investigation. He said that there were a total of eight shot casings that were found on that roof where the shooter was perched and fired at former President Trump.

And he also said that there are some members of the local emergency services unit, a sort of a SWAT team, that were in a building that had a view of that roof where the shooter was and they left their post. Listen to his testimony today.

[18:45:03]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COL. CHRISTOPHER PARIS, PENNSYLVANIA STATE POLICE COMMISSIONER: I was told they were any window. Yes, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did they remain on post?

PARIS: I was told that at a certain point they began searching along with other local officers in the immediacy before after Crooks had been identified as suspicious by them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREZ: And, Wolf, that's important new details because obviously those officers could possibly have spotted the shooter before he started firing.

I also would note that the former president himself has now it started accusing the administration is saying that they failed to protect him at his rally that day -- Wolf.

BLITZER: All right. Evan Perez, our senior justice correspondent, thank you very much.

Coming up, a live update from Atlanta where one of the nation's largest airlines is now under federal investigation after a massive technical meltdowns.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:50:04]

BLITZER: Tonight, Delta Airlines is still scrambling to fix problems with its crew tracking software, leaving it unable to find the pilots and the flight attendants needed to fly its planes.

CNN's Isabel Rosales has the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DYLAN STEELE, FEDERAL WORKER: It's been an experience. It definitely has been an experience.

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Delta Airlines still struggling five days after a massive CrowdStrike outage caused the airline systems to crash, leaving its customers stranded, while other airlines are back to normal.

STEELE: United Airlines seems to be back up and running.

ROSALES: Delta has canceled more than 6,000 flights since Friday, and accounts for 66 percent of all the flight cancellations in the U.S. on Tuesday.

Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, Delta's headquarters and largest hub has been left in chaos. Rows and rows of bags lined the floors of the world's busiest airport.

Even celebrities like Charles Barkley are searching through it.

CHARLES BARKLEY, FORMER NBA PLAYER: I'm looking around. It's going to be a minute because there's a lot of luggage here. I just flew in today, didn't have any issues. Well, I don't know that yet. I haven't found my golf club yet.

ROSALES: Frustration is everywhere.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're not being picky. I'm just -- I will go anywhere in North Carolina but he booked us some tickets and before we got out of the airport, they had canceled them, five minutes later.

UNIDENTTIFIED FEMALE: This is out of control. It's not -- it's not okay.

ROSALES: Dozens of Delta employees from all different departments have jumped in to ease the pain for passengers. BARKLEY: I fly Delta twice a week for 24 years. They're always been fantastic. I've never had issue, but in fairness though, they can't do anything about this.

ROSALES: But the Department of Transportation doesn't agree. Secretary Buttigieg today launching an investigation into Delta.

The airlines CEO, Ed Bastian, has apologized to passengers.

The airline responded in a statement saying in part: Delta is in receipt of the department's notice of investigation and is fully cooperating. We remain entirely focused on restoring our operation. Delta teams are working tirelessly to care for and make it right for customers impacted by delays and cancellations.

Such meltdowns are not new. Earlier this year, DOT reached a $140 million settlement with Southwest Airlines following an investigation into similar systems problems triggered by weather over the 2022 holiday. Like with that meltdown, Delta system that schedules crews for flights failed.

RENEE ROWE, STRANDED PASSENGER: They would cancel, delay, bump and then it would start all over again.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROSALES (on camera): And, Wolf, we are now looking right here at the effects of what has become a Delta meltdown. Here in the last couple of hours, we heard directly from the Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who gave us a clearer picture as to the impacts. Half a million Delta passengers have been impacted, and the Department of Transportation received over 3,000 complaints from Delta passengers about this incident -- Wolf.

BLITZER: So many people are looking for their luggage right now.

Isabel Rosales, thank you for that report and we'll be right back with more news.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:57:27]

BLITZER: Tonight, Vice President Kamala Harris is sparking enthusiasm in the world of pop culture.

CNN's Brian Todd is joining us right now.

She may be getting a boost from popular memes and music.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: She does seem to be getting that boost, Wolf, including from two very popular singers who's backing of Kamala Harris could steer some critical votes her way.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(MUSIC)

TODD (voice-over): Kamala Harris takes the stage in Milwaukee today to the beat of Beyonce's hit song, "Freedom". A source close to the vice president tells CNN, Harris's team got approval from Beyonce's representatives to use the song throughout her presidential campaign.

(MUSIC)

TODD: Analysts say it's an extraordinary move for Beyonce to let Harris use her 2016 Grammy nominated ballad.

LISA RASPERS FRANCE, CNN ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER: She does not need to step into politics. So, by virtue of the fact that she's allowing her music, which she keeps a very tight rein on, to be used as part of this potential campaign is huge.

TODD: Also trending, British pop star Charli XCX posted on X, quote, Kamala is brat.

Brat has become a popular trend this summer, after Charli XCX released her album by that same name in June.

Brat isn't just an album, it's a lifestyle as the singer herself explain to the BBC.

CHARLI XCX, BRITISH POP STAR: But it can also so, like, trashy. Just, like, a pack of cigs and a BIC lighter.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

CHARLI XCX: And like a strappy white top.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah.

CHARLI XCX: With no bra. That's kind of all you need.

FRANCE: It's a person who was like, you know, a little bit messy, but very much self-aware and does who they -- what they want to do and you have the opportunity to be who you want to be.

TODD: There's even a brat color, a kind of lime green and Kamala Harris's camp has embraced all of it.

The Kamala HQ account on X now has a background photo in that color and the vice president's name in the same font style as the one on Charli XCX's album.

This as the internet is now inundated with coconut means. They've spiked since President Biden announced he was leaving the race, but have been popular on social media since Harris made this remark at an event last year.

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: My mother used to -- she would give us a hard time sometimes and she would say to us, I don't know what's wrong with you, young people. You think you just fell out of a coconut tree? TODD: The context of what Harris's mother meant --

FRANCE: You're not, you know, understanding that you come from a place, you come from a people. And so people grabbed hold of that, the whole coconut imagery.

All of this analysts say could galvanize Harris's campaign with critical part of the electorate.

ZOLAN KANNO-YOUNGS, THE NEW YORK TIMES: This is sort of a sign and indicative of just the momentum that Kamala Harris has and the Democratic Party has right now, including with a voting bloc that Democrats were worried about. And that was young voters.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TODD: The entertainment and political analysts we spoke to say the next big endorsement we should look for from the pop and culture, entertainment world is that of Taylor Swift.

Wolf, we'll see if that happens.

BLITZER: We'll see if that happens indeed. That could be huge.

Brian Todd, thanks very, very much.

And thanks for watching.

"ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT" starts right now.