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The Situation Room

Protection Ends For Haitian TPS Holders; Republicans Set to Confirm Todd Blanche as Attorney General; Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Visits CDC. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired August 07, 2026 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:00]

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Fortunately for her 17-year-old, he was away at a sports event.

And we have spoken, another one of our producers, to the father of the son, who says he exhibited no violence in the past, that he liked birds and dogs and he liked to play soccer, so a community absolutely in shock.

And the prime minister is calling for checks of firearms at police checkpoints in the future as a result of this massacre -- back to you, Pamela.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: Ivan Watson, thank you -- Wolf.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Heartbreaking, so shocking.

BROWN: And to think that a CNN's producer's child was there during all this.

BLITZER: Oh, my goodness, awful.

BROWN: Awful.

BLITZER: Just ahead: A fuel truck crashes into a TV station in Texas after a hit-and-run collision. And now police are searching for the other driver. The video, we will share it with you. That's next.

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[10:35:17]

BLITZER: Happening now: Republican Senator Mitch McConnell is back home this morning after being discharged from a rehabilitation center.

The Kentucky lawmaker was hospitalized in June after a fall. It's unclear whether McConnell will be able to cast a key vote for Todd Blanche's embattled confirmation as attorney general of the United States.

Scientists say they have trained A.I. on entire libraries of DNA, then used it to create 16 new viruses, specifically ones that could be hosted by an E. coli bacteria cell. They do not pose a threat to humans, we're told, but doctors warn it could raise biosafety and biosecurity concerns.

And, in Texas, a fuel truck crashes into a news station in Amarillo, and it's all caught on camera. Look at this. Police say a Dodge cam -- truck ran a red light and collided with a fuel truck. You can see the impact pushed the vehicles over the curb and through the station's security fence and parking lot, eventually hitting the building.

The driver and passengers of the pickup ran off. The fuel truck driver was not hurt -- Pamela.

BROWN: All right, Wolf, happening now: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is in Atlanta today making a rare visit to the CDC headquarters. He's expected to attend a ceremony that honors DeKalb County Police Officer David Rose, who was killed while responding to a shooting at the agency last year.

The deadly incident came after months of turmoil and loss at the CDC, which has suffered deep staff cuts under the Trump administration.

So let's go live now to CNN health reporter Jacqueline Howard right outside the CDC headquarters.

Jacqueline, what more can we expect from today's visit?

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: Pam, we expect honoring Officer Rose will be a big part of Secretary Kennedy's visit here in Atlanta at the CDC headquarters right behind me. There's also a memorial that you will see across the street in honor of Officer Rose.

And Secretary Kennedy is expected to host a commemoration ceremony at a memorial plaque in the officer's honor. We're also hearing, Pam, that, later this afternoon, there will be a fireside chat with the secretary, along with Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, the director of the National Institutes of Health.

And CDC staff will have the opportunity to ask questions during that fireside chat. But, Pam, it's interesting. We're hearing from some CDC staff that a lot of people decided to work from home today in protest of the secretary's visit.

And that's because we know that some CDC staff, they say that they have many concerns about the secretary's comments regarding health care workers during the pandemic and his vaccine skepticism. So there is that interesting tension here at the agency between some CDC staff and, honestly, their concerns and their thoughts about some of Secretary Kennedy's recent comments, Pam.

BROWN: All right, Jacqueline Howard, bringing us the latest there from Atlanta, thanks so much -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Also happening now: A monthslong fight to protect hundreds of thousands of Haitian immigrants to the United States is marking its final step after a federal judge allowed their Temporary Protected Status, as it's called, to end. The announcement comes more than a month after the U.S. Supreme Court

reversed a ruling to halt the Trump administration's plans to end the program. It protected Haitians in the United States who fled political unrest and natural disasters.

CNN correspondent Priscilla Alvarez is here with us in THE SITUATION ROOM.

Priscilla, so, what does this mean for the Haitian community moving forward? So many of them have been in the United States for decades sometimes, working hard, paying taxes, and all of a sudden, what, they're being told they got to leave?

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: So, for the 350,000 Haitians we're talking about that solely had TPS, they are stripped of those protections, meaning that they can't -- they are no longer living and working here legally in the United States, which has massive ramifications for the community.

I have been on the phone with attorneys, with community organizers, with advocates who say there is fear within the community, not only because their entire lives have been disrupted, but also because they are concerned about the arrest and deportation to Haiti, a country, Wolf, that they may not have visited now for decades.

Remember, Temporary Protected Status was designated for Haitian nationals in the United States in 2010 after that earthquake. There have been renewals since then, but there are individuals who have been here since 2010 and maybe a little bit earlier than that who are now being told that they are no longer here legally under this program because those protections have been stripped.

[10:40:06]

And, Wolf, I will tell you, in addition to the advocates and attorneys who are working with the Haitian community, this also has a lot of effect on various industries. I have been talking to industry representatives, be it health care or those in construction and other areas.

And they too are worried about what this abrupt end is going to mean for their industries and their work force, especially as they're facing labor shortages and what delays they may be facing, or, in the case of health care, what nursing homes may also be losing their work force.

I heard just yesterday for an attorney who's a teacher who had been here in the United States teaching, lost her ability to work and can no longer be a teacher. So, we are seeing the consequences of this in various parts of the United States right now, and it is something that attorneys and advocates are responding to, as the community itself tries to figure out what their next steps are.

BLITZER: They have been here legally under protected temporary status.

ALVAREZ: Right. They have been allowed to be here.

BLITZER: They have been allowed to. They -- and it wasn't as if they were here illegally or anything. They have been working hard, paying their taxes, raising their kids in the United States, and now they're being told they might have to be deported?

ALVAREZ: That's the bottom line, yes.

BLITZER: Yes, it's a sad situation, indeed.

And, as you correctly point out, and as I know personally, they're so critically important in construction and agriculture, so many fields. health care.

ALVAREZ: Right.

BLITZER: It's really a sad development indeed.

Priscilla Alvarez, as usual, thank you very much -- Pamela.

BROWN: All right, Wolf, coming up here in THE SITUATION ROOM, the largest reservoir in the United States falls to a record low. What this means for the 20 million people who rely on Lake Mead for water.

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[10:45:46]

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R-LA): Important issues have been discussed through this process, and Mr. Blanche has made commitments.

Now on to the specific nomination. Since Mr. Blanche passed out of Judiciary Committee on August the 4th, I have spoken to Mr. Blanche five or six times. We have texted many more. I just got off the phone with him. I have spoken multiple times to Senators Murkowski, Cornyn, and Tillis.

Senator Whitehouse shared his concerns. Additionally, I spoke with current and past administration officials, including a long conversation with former Attorney General Bill Barr. Late last night, I spoke to two U.S. attorneys from Louisiana, David Courcelle and Kurt Wall.

Of course, there's been a lot to read and a lot to consider, and I slept on it overnight.

Let's start with the concerns. Mr. Blanche showed poor judgment in approving the anti-weaponization slush fund and exempting the president from IRS audits. No American should be unfairly targeted by the law, but no American should be above the law.

Mr. Blanche said these were mistakes, and he has made efforts to kill the slush fund. I am particularly concerned about episodes of apparent lawfare, DOJ bringing suits against political enemies. Both parties -- presidents of both parties have been guilty of this. It must stop. It should stop now.

A never-ending cycle of prosecuting political enemies undermines the rule of law, degrades the public's trust in our institutions, and makes our politics more extreme when we need to unite to solve the big problems of our time.

I'm not entirely satisfied where this is, and I have no doubts that I will have concern in the future. I will note that I have learned that some of the cases that have been publicly reported to be under investigation by the Department of Justice have been dismissed or are no longer being pursued.

I am realistic that President Trump can be unrelenting on this, but this will be true no matter who the attorney general is, and this is the rationale for having a Senate-confirmed attorney general with more leverage to push back.

I will also note that Mr. Blanche is criticized for things over which he has no control. He points out that he has been criticized for presidential pardons given to January 6 rioters, some of whom assaulted police officers. Many of us were here then.

But this is a presidential prerogative, and he is not the president. He also points out that he can advise the president, but the president is not obligated to take his advice. That is the same thing that former Attorney General Barr said in a separate conversation. And, Mr. President, I can absolutely believe that President Trump at times would not take advice.

But even critics admit that Mr. Blanche knows the law and is a hands- on administrator. He has instructed U.S. attorneys to focus on violent crime, human and drug trafficking, and fraud in programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

Mr. Courcelle, the U.S. attorney in New Orleans, says that, when he needed extra resources, acting Attorney General Blanche provided them to finish a big drug case. Both Mr. Courcelle and Mr. Wall said that DOJ has accountability measures for each prosecutor in their office, and that there are weekly calls between their offices and DOJ to review the performance of each prosecutor, that morale was high, not despite the accountability measures, but because of the accountability measures.

More cases were being processed and convictions being obtained. David Courcelle spoke of almost $1 billion in fraud being recovered for the U.S. taxpayer from health care fraud. Both men said that having a permanent Senate-confirmed attorney general was important.

I cannot overstate Mr. Wall's and Mr. Courcelle's support for Mr. Blanche. When former Attorney General Bill Barr endorsed Mr. Blanche, he said Mr. Blanche will run the department as effectively as anyone can under President Trump. Some have called that faint praise.

I don't think that it is. I think it is a reality. Barr specifically addressed the allegation that Mr. Blanche would be a yes-man for the president. He said that any attorney to represent a client well has to have tough

conversations and confront a client with difficult truths, that, because of his previous attorney-client relationship with President Trump, Mr. Blanche would be precisely the person to push back on President Trump, but that, ultimately -- and here Barr echoed what I heard from Blanche -- decisions are made by the president.

[10:50:00]

Mr. Blanche is not perfect, and he will tell you this. But the choice is not between perfection and Mr. Blanche. It is between Mr. Blanche and another acting attorney general, who may not run the department effectively under President Trump, and who indeed may not be as good as Mr. Blanche.

This puts at risk the progress made fighting violent crime, human and drug trafficking, and fraud. And this does not serve the American people well. This is not a referendum on President Trump. It is a decision regarding Mr. Blanche in very specific circumstances.

All considered, I will vote for Mr. Blanche. I will be criticized for this vote. What's new? But the people of Louisiana can be assured that I worked hard to understand the issue and to make the right decision.

With that, I yield.

SEN. RON WYDEN (D-OR): Mr. President...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senator from Oregon.

WYDEN: Mr. President, I fully support taking tougher action against Russia. They have waged a deadly...

BLITZER: There you had Senator Bill Cassidy, the Republican from Louisiana, announcing he will support Todd Blanche's confirmation as the next attorney general, permanent attorney general. He's the acting attorney general now. But he will support his nomination to become the permanent attorney general of the United States.

And, Pamela, that presumably will be enough votes to make it happen, to make Todd Blanche the next attorney general.

BROWN: Right. Yes, he was really the wild card in this, because Susan Collins, Republican, and Republican Lisa Murkowski had already come out and said they would vote against Blanche, and then you have a Republican Mitch McConnell who was just relieved released from rehab and is at home recovering.

And so all eyes were on Senator Cassidy, how he would vote. And he even said at the beginning of before announcing his decision that he has quite a history with Trump, but that doesn't matter one bit on his decision. And he laid out his reasoning, as we just heard, saying he did have concerns and thought that Blanche had poor judgment on the anti-weaponization fund and exempting Trump and his family from IRS scrutiny. But then he went on to talk about the conversations he's had,

including with Trump's former Attorney General Bill Barr and others, including attorneys in Louisiana, and he came around to believing that Blanche would be the best person for the job, given the considerations and who else could have it.

So he was the wild card, and now we know that he will be voting for Todd Blanche as attorney general. And we saw there, it's also worth noting, he got a little emotional there at the end.

BLITZER: He did. He did.

BROWN: He lost his reelection bid and said really this message to Louisiana and said he thought about this, he really pondered it, and he made the best decision he could.

BLITZER: And he clearly suggested he was influenced strongly by what the U.S. attorneys in Louisiana, his state, were telling him about Todd Blanche, saying nice things about him, saying he was highly qualified and all of that. So that was obviously another factor in this decision.

BROWN: And he also said just before he made this decision he had -- he had been talking to Todd Blanche, texting with him, and he had talked to him just before he took the floor.

So I want to go to our Annie Grayer on Capitol Hill, who has been following this.

I mean, Blanche has been courting senators for weeks, including Senator Cassidy, and it seems to be paying off in his favor, Annie.

ANNIE GRAYER, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: That's right.

Cassidy talked about how he had been talking to Blanche at least five or six times throughout this process, including an in-person meeting where Blanche came to the Hill to speak with both Cassidy and Murkowski to try and work through some of those concerns.

Now, we know that, despite the appeal to Murkowski, that didn't end up working out. She ended up not supporting his nomination. But Cassidy laid out on the floor a number of reasons why he felt it was important to have a Senate-confirmed attorney general.

And there was a line in his floor speech I thought was really notable, Wolf and Pamela, where he's talking about, this isn't a choice between a perfect option and Mr. Blanche, that, given the lesser of two evils, Cassidy felt like this was the best option.

It was a known entity to go forward with Blanche. He felt like he could work with him after all of the different conversations that he had, after Cassidy had spoken with the attorneys from his state, as you mentioned.

And this announcement from Cassidy is huge, because it really does give Republicans the votes that they need to put Blanche's nomination on the floor, because, as we have said, it hasn't officially been scheduled yet. Leaders were waiting to see for Cassidy's announcement, because, this morning, Murkowski came out and said that she could not be supporting Blanche for a number of the reasons that Cassidy laid out.

[10:55:01]

Murkowski was concerned about the weaponization fund, the politicization of the Department of Justice, the way that the Epstein files had been released publicly and still redacted. So there was still a lot on the line here.

And Cassidy coming out this morning is giving Republicans across the party a huge sigh of relief. We know the president wanted to get Blanche's nomination over the finish line, even though he was going to keep him in an acting position either way.

This just gives the final confirmation that Republicans needed that they can put this vote on the floor, even though they're going to lose Murkowski and Collins on this vote.

BLITZER: Yes, a good point.

Katelyn Polantz is with us as well.

Katelyn, what jumped out at you from his remarks? He got emotional, as we noted, near the end.

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: He did.

And he really gave a summation of what Todd Blanche is and what Todd Blanche does at the Justice Department, both as the deputy attorney general and as the acting, and very likely now as the permanent confirmed attorney general.

The thing that really jumped out at me is something he said at the very end. The choice isn't between perfection and Mr. Blanche.

It is a choice between Blanche and others who could be in that job, him essentially saying, Senator Cassidy saying that the president here, he's not going to be controlled by an attorney general when he wants things from the Justice Department, and Blanche is in a better position than anyone else, maybe given their relationship, as Blanche was Trump's personal attorney through those crucial criminal cases that the president faced, both at the federal level and in New York state.

I watched those cases up close, and Blanche did have quite a relationship with Trump. They were often very jovial at the counsel's table. They were talking back and forth.

Attorney General Bill Barr, the attorney general who was the very well-known one at the -- in the first Trump administration, who had stood up to Trump when Trump wanted to push forward the idea of election fraud in 2020, former Attorney General Bill Barr, who's still very well respected in the legal community, gave his endorsement essentially in the same way as Senator Cassidy here, saying that Blanche would be -- and this is what Senator Cassidy just said -- as effective as anyone else working as the attorney general under Trump.

And so that is what ended up earning this endorsement. It ended up not being just about the anti-weaponization fund or the Epstein files or any number of issues that we have heard come up that really were standing in the way. It was, will you be able to say no if the president asks you to do something that the Justice Department absolutely should not?

And the -- Senator Cassidy here, and I imagine many Republicans are thinking Blanche is in a better position to be able to do that than potentially anyone else who could be in the job.

BROWN: He also noted his concern about DOJ bringing suits against political enemies. He said it's happened on both sides of the aisle.

But he said, in this administration so far, most have been dismissed or are no longer being pursued.

POLANTZ: I'm really glad you're pointing this out, Pamela, because that actually struck me as news...

BROWN: Yes.

POLANTZ: ... in that we know that there are have been cases like this dismissed, the case against James Comey, the case against Letitia James in Virginia, not the one that is currently ongoing against Comey in North Carolina. There have been others that have been dismissed.

But this what Senator Cassidy called the never-ending cycle of prosecuting enemies, he was told, if I was hearing his remarks correctly...

BROWN: Yes.

POLANTZ: ... that, when he spoke to Todd Blanche, he said about five or six times during this confirmation process, and then just before his speech today, that is when Blanche would have indicated to him that some of these are dismissed or no longer being pursued.

No longer being pursued to me means cases that the Justice Department indicated they may investigate and that even the White House may want to have investigated, that they're being dropped...

BROWN: Right.

POLANTZ: ... although we are seeing activity of potential cases that the Justice Department could look at against political enemies of the president right now.

There are four, as far as I'm counting, referrals from Congress for obstruction of Congress against Anthony Fauci, against a witness, key witness in the January 6 House select committee, Cassidy Hutchinson, and then against Jack Smith, the special counsel himself that prosecuted Trump, as well as one of his deputy prosecutors. Those things are all pending. My question now for the Justice

Department is, are they not moving forward on those?

BROWN: Yes.

POLANTZ: What are the cases that would be dismissed or...

BROWN: And just to follow up on that, I mean, the -- it stuck out to me as news as well.

And one of the main points Senator Cassidy was making was that Todd Blanche would just be for the president an adviser, but, ultimately, the president's going to do what he's going to do.

POLANTZ: That's right.

BROWN: With Anthony Fauci and this criminal referral that would go to DOJ, specifically Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for D.C., Anthony Fauci was also an adviser for the president and for governors.