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The Source with Kaitlan Collins
Trump Calls Negative News Coverage Of Him "Really Illegal"; Source: U.S. Attorney Is Resigning After Resisting Pressure To Charge NY A.G. Letitia James; Dems Split On Resolution Honoring Kirk & Condemning Violence. Aired 9-10p ET
Aired September 19, 2025 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, ANDERSON COOPER 360: Program note about my other show, "The Whole Story." This Sunday, in it, Sara Sidner meets the black and white sides of an old-fashioned Southern family, united by a shared secret. One side of the family is descended from enslaved people. The other descended from the enslavers. Now, they all share a name, but don't spell it in the same way.
It's a fascinating hour, and in the end, an uplifting story. CNN's Sara Sidner tells it this week, on "The Whole Story" "A Family in Black and White." That's Sunday night, at 10:00 Eastern, right here on CNN.
The news continues. "THE SOURCE WITH KAITLAN COLLINS" starts now. I'll see you, Monday.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, CNN HOST, THE SOURCE WITH KAITLAN COLLINS: Tonight, President Trump says overly negative coverage of him is illegal, as he is ousting a prosecutor that he picked who declined to indict one of his political opponents without enough evidence.
I'm Kaitlan Collins. And this is THE SOURCE.
Tonight, President Trump is no longer just suggesting that some TV networks should have their licenses revoked. He now seems to be clearly saying that he -- the coverage that he deems to be too negative is illegal.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: The stories are 90 -- they said 97 percent bad. So they gave me 97. They'll take a great story and they'll make it bad. See, I think that's really illegal, personally.
You can't take -- you can't have a free airwaves -- you're getting free airwaves from the United States government, and you can't have that and say -- and somebody that just won an election. And I had to go through this during the election. I think it's a miracle that I can win, when 97 percent of the stories on the networks are bad.
That's no longer free speech. It's no longer -- that's just cheating.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: Like freedom of the speech, freedom of press is legally protected by the First Amendment. That includes positive and negative coverage. It's not based on percentages either.
The President, though, seems emboldened today, by ABC's decision to pull Jimmy Kimmel's show off the air, after the network was facing intense pressure from the President's FCC chair.
Other former and current late-night hosts are coming to Jimmy Kimmel's defense, in recent days, using their own primetime platforms to accuse the administration of trampling on free speech.
Tonight, one of the President's Republican allies in the Senate made clear that he also shares some of those concerns.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): Look, I like Brendan Carr. He's a good guy. He's the Chairman of the FCC. I work closely with him. But what he said there is dangerous as hell.
He says, We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
CRUZ: And I got to say, that's right out of 'Goodfellas.' That's right out of a mafioso coming into a bar going, 'nice bar you have here. It'd be a shame if something happened to it.'
I think it is unbelievably dangerous--
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
CRUZ: --for government to put itself in the position of saying, 'We're going to decide what speech we like and what we don't, and we're going to threaten to take you off air if we don't like what you're saying.' And it might feel good right now to threaten Jimmy Kimmel.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
CRUZ: But when it is used to silence every conservative in America, we will regret it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: But when the President was asked about those comments, from Senator Ted Cruz, in the Oval Office, he didn't seem too concerned.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: When they take a great success, like you often do, and you make it into like it's a loser, or you put a negative spin on it, I don't think that's right. So, I think Brendan Carr is a great American patriot. So, I disagree with Ted Cruz on that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: This comes, as also tonight, in a separate pressure campaign that is playing out, someone else is out of a job, with sources telling CNN that the top prosecutor in Virginia has told his staff, he will be resigning, a move that comes hours after the President said quite bluntly that he wants the U.S. Attorney, Erik Siebert, out.
Siebert has been under pressure to file charges against one of the President's biggest political adversaries, the New York Attorney General, Letitia James. Siebert hasn't because he doesn't think he has enough evidence to do so. One source told CNN, quote, "He wanted to be a team player, but also follow the law."
As Trump is flexing his presidential power, though, in more ways than one, tonight, he's also learning that it comes with its limitations, after a federal judge today not only rejected his defamation lawsuit that he filed against The New York Times, just this week. He also made a mockery of it.
This is a judge who is a George H. W. Bush appointee, by the way, that called the President's 85-page complaint, Decidedly improper and impermissible, and added that, A complaint is not supposed to be a public forum for vituperation or invective and a megaphone for public relations.
[21:05:00]
The judge gave the President's legal team a month to refile that, and we heard from a Trump spokesperson who said they will.
My legal sources are here tonight.
Tom Dupree is the former Deputy Assistant Attorney General.
And Elie Honig is a former Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and also the new -- author of the new book, "When You Come at the King: Inside DOJ's Pursuit of the President, From Nixon to Trump." An all-too appropriate book right now, Elie.
And I just wonder, on that first comment, though, that the President said there, where he was talking about news broadcast, after we heard him talking about negative coverage on late-night shows. He said today that if it's 90 percent -- 97 percent negative, he believes, he said, personally, that it's illegal.
ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST, FORMER ASST. U.S. ATTORNEY, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NY, AUTHOR, "WHEN YOU COME AT THE KING": OK, public service announcement, negative news coverage of the President is not illegal. In fact, it is very legal. The Supreme Court has told us that the most protected form of speech under the First Amendment is political speech, and he -- yes.
COLLINS: Elie, just the fact that you have to say that.
HONIG: Right.
COLLINS: Can we just talk about that?
HONIG: Yes, I mean, we do have to go back to basics here. We are so far out of line of what the First Amendment is. We've actually come to a point where the First Amendment has been completely reversed.
Ted Cruz, by the way, putting aside his terrible mob accent there, is spot-on. What he says there is if the government is policing speech, based on content, and is using its coercive powers, the powers of government? That is the core of what the First Amendment prohibits. So, good for Ted Cruz for taking a correct and principled stand there.
COLLINS: Right.
But, I mean, Tom, obviously, to just say that you don't want the FCC chair pressuring late-night hosts out of a job, and forcing broadcast networks to make programming changes because they don't like what they're saying. I mean, it's a low bar, first. But you are a constitutional conservative attorney. When you hear the President say that, given how successful he's been in testing these boundaries, what do you make of it?
TOM DUPREE, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: Well, I share Senator Cruz's viewpoint.
And by the way, Elie, I thought his accent was pretty good.
But look, Senator Cruz is right on the First Amendment.
And look, conservatives, we love free speech. Conservatives know better than anyone, the dangers that can come when the government polices what people can say, and when it tries to suppress or police speech with which it disagrees.
The First Amendment was a core principle of our founding. Our Founders wanted Americans to have the right to speak freely, particularly when it comes to speaking about their government, and speaking about public officials.
And so, it doesn't surprise me at all that what we are seeing tonight, Kaitlan, is real -- a group of Republican senators, who are starting to sound some alarm bells here, saying, Look, yes, can you take short- term pleasure in Jimmy Kimmel getting suspended? Yes. But the longer- term dangers to free speech and the First Amendment tower over all of that.
COLLINS: Elie, do you think we're at real risk of seeing FCC license -- the FCC deny licenses or not renew them? Or is it even just that the pressure campaign is enough here?
HONIG: So, there's a couple of layers of power being exercised here. First of all, the FCC does have control over licenses. And separately, there are apparatuses, within the executive branch, that have to approve corporate mergers. And I think both of those things are at play here.
And here's the problem. If the media companies, the ABCs of the world, capitulate, if they don't stand up? You're not going to have a clear vehicle to bring this into court and challenge it.
Maybe Jimmy Kimmel can bring a lawsuit against the government here. I guess it will be interesting to see. But if he does, the problem is he's got ABC in the middle there, and he's going to have to prove that the reason ABC fired him was because of the government pressure. Yet ABC -- or suspended him, I should say. The reason ABC has said they did it is because his speech was offensive, and the affiliates didn't want to carry it.
So, it's going to be a little difficult, if Jimmy Kimmel wants to bring that suit. The real ones who need to stand up here are the media organizations.
COLLINS: Yes, and I'll note, though, those affiliates did not protest airing Jimmy Kimmel. He made those comments on a Monday.
HONIG: Yes.
COLLINS: Whether you like the comments and think they were fine, or you think they were distasteful. He made them on a Monday. Those affiliates still carried him on Tuesday. It was only on Wednesday, after we heard from Brendan Carr, basically saying, Do this the easy way or the hard way, that then a lot of these affiliates dropped him.
But can I ask you, Tom, because I think all of this is connected here between what we're about to talk about in the next block, what happened with this prosecutor today, what is happening here with Jimmy Kimmel, this New York Times lawsuit today that was just outright rejected by this judge, where he was basically mocking it. Trump was filing a lawsuit against him for defamation, and he basically said that it read like a megaphone for public relations, instead of making actual legal arguments in it.
DUPREE: Yes, and this is a Republican-appointed judge who saw this 85- page complaint and said, This reads like a political speech, not a complaint that you would file in federal court. So, he gave Trump's lawyers some homework. He rejected the lawsuit, sent it back to them and said, You need to do a do-over.
[21:10:00]
But look, what we have seen, both in this lawsuit and in other similar Trump lawsuits, targeting the media, is that his arguments really aren't legal at their core. He really does use the legal system as a way to go after his opponents, to go after the media, to make arguments, and get those points and those arguments and those claims in the court of public opinion, so people will read about it. There may be a chilling effect on the media, because even if you get hit with a $15 billion lawsuit that's meritless, it's still a $15 billion lawsuit.
So, I think from Trump's legal lawyers' perspective, look, this is to be expected in some sense. I don't know if they actually thought they had a chance at winning on the merits. But they wanted to file their complaint. They filed their complaint. Now they're going to have to come back with a shorter, slimmed down version of that complaint. COLLINS: Yes.
Tom Dupree. Elie Honig. Great to have both of you here tonight.
And also joining us is leading -- the person who is leading the Democratic response to ABC's suspension of Jimmy Kimmel's show. Democratic Senator Ed Markey is on the subcommittee responsible for oversight of the FCC.
So Senator, based on what you've seen, in terms of what we've heard from the FCC chair, and also the President today saying he believes negative coverage of him is illegal, or a certain percentage. He didn't say where that percentage draw -- where he draws the line on that. What was your reaction, when you heard that today?
SEN. ED MARKEY (D-MA): Well, I think it's the same reaction that almost every American is having.
The First Amendment is the beating heart of our democracy. Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, is what is the central protection for our democracy. And having people be able to criticize those in power, to be able to laugh at those who are in power, is a central part of who we are as a nation, and why we are the envy of the rest of the world. That First Amendment protection.
And that's something, by the way, that Chairman Brendan Carr used to believe in. He believed that five or six years ago. But once he was named Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, by Donald Trump, he has reversed his position to just echo Donald Trump. And it's no longer the public interest, which is the constitution of the Federal Communications Act, but now Trump's interest that Brendan Carr is seeking to protect.
And that's why it is very important that, on a bipartisan basis, Democrats and Republicans come together, in order to ensure that the Federal Communications Commission does not become the Federal Censorship Commission, censoring anyone who Donald Trump wants to punish because of the criticism of the words--
COLLINS: Yes.
MARKEY: --that might have been uttered on television or radio--
COLLINS: And he--
MARKEY: --to undermine his presidency.
COLLINS: He keeps arguing that these broadcast networks are bound by their FCC licenses to serve the public interest. Obviously, he seems to be defining that people disagree with it.
One question that I've seen raised here is, do you think that Republicans should worry, about this being turned on them, if a Democrat is in office? Do you think they understand that this is something that could just completely go in the opposite direction? MARKEY: 100 percent. And I think that is what you just heard, from Ted Cruz, when you pulled up his quote, because he knows, and everyone should know, that we cannot allow any administration to determine what is in the public interest, what is permissible free speech, what can be said in criticism of the government. We always support our country, but we only support our government when they deserve it. And you have a right to criticize that government, when they're wrong.
That is what Donald Trump is now trying to instill at the Federal Communications Commission.
And I think what Ted Cruz just said is something that Ed Markey agrees with. And we should have a hearing, in the Senate Commerce Committee, so that Brendan Carr sits there, and he hears Ted Cruz and Ed Markey explain the United States Constitution, and the Charter of the Federal Communications Commission, to him. That's the only way in which we're going to put pressure on him.
And, by the way, create the courage, for Disney and ABC, to put Jimmy Kimmel back on the air again. They must do that. They must exercise their free speech rights as a network. And unless and until they do that, I'm afraid we're going to -- going to continue to see a deterioration, an erosion of free speech, because of the chilling effect--
COLLINS: Yes.
MARKEY: --Brendan Carr, for Donald Trump, is seeking to create in our country.
COLLINS: Well, and they seem to face pushback from their own former CEO, Michael Eisner, today. We'll see how Disney responds to this.
Senator Ed Markey, I really appreciate your time tonight.
MARKEY: Great to be with you.
[21:15:00]
COLLINS: And we have some late developments tonight, after the President's own hand-selected U.S. Attorney is now saying he's going to resign after only a couple of months on the job, after he was facing pressure to do so. Not just pressure. The President said today in the Oval Office that he should resign, because he declined to prosecute someone that the President wants him to prosecute.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: A U.S. Attorney, nominated by President Trump, just a couple of months ago, is resigning tonight, after facing intense pressure from the White House to prosecute one of the President's most well- known political targets.
[21:20:00]
Trump said today that he did want his own U.S. Attorney, Erik Siebert, out of his role. He's the top federal prosecutor in Virginia, who's been investigating the New York Attorney General, Letitia James, for alleged mortgage fraud.
But sources told CNN that Siebert and other DOJ prosecutors didn't think they had enough evidence to indict Letitia James, something that the President today said he disagreed with.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Are you disappointed that the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia has not prosecuted Letitia James? Do you intend to fire him?
TRUMP: Well, we're going to see what happens. I am not following it very closely. It looks to me like she's very guilty of something, but I really don't know. I know that the U.S. Attorney from the Eastern District, or from that district in Virginia--
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
TRUMP: --that he was approved by two Democrat senators who, in my opinion, are among the worst.
When I saw that he got approved by those two men, I said, Pull him, because he can't be any good.
REPORTER: So you want him fired.
TRUMP: Yes--
REPORTER: You want him out?
TRUMP: Yes, I want him out, yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: Just a side note. The President was referring to Virginia's Democratic senators there, Tim Kaine and Mark Warner. But it was Trump himself who nominated Siebert to this job, in May.
And Senator Kaine and Senator Warner's support for him was known an entire month before the President nominated him, because they wrote to the President, recommending Siebert for this job, back in April. That means he still nominated him, after they said they supported him for this role.
And that also means that the President is either arguing that Siebert should go, because two Democrats supported his own nominee, or because four months after he selected him, Siebert is declining to prosecute one of the President's political opponents.
My legal source, Elie Honig, is back with me. As I noted, he is the author of the new book, "When You Come at the King: Inside DOJ's Pursuit of the President, From Nixon to Trump."
Elie, I mean, if you're Erik Siebert, and you just got nominated to this job, it didn't seem to be a point of issue before, that the two Democrats had nominated him, or had approved his nomination.
But the fact that he said -- doesn't feel he has enough evidence to prosecute someone, and is not bringing an indictment on that, I just wonder what you make of this tonight. Isn't that your job as a prosecutor?
HONIG: Of course it is. Sometimes your job as a prosecutor is not to prosecute.
And I got to tell you, if I could add, I wish I could add one more chapter to this book, because this story here would be perfect. The heart of this book is about the conflict between Presidents and prosecutors. And I argue in the book that what Donald Trump is doing now is different, in kind, a complete break from anything we've seen back to Watergate.
And if you look at that, you can actually make a comparison here, between what has happened today and the Saturday Night Massacre. They're not identical, but there's important differences.
So, the Saturday Night Massacre, when Nixon fired the special prosecutor? That was a defensive move. That was meant to protect the President.
What Trump is doing here is firing this prosecutor, Erik Siebert, because he won't use the power of prosecution, offensively, to go after and seek retribution against a perceived enemy, Letitia James.
Now, we don't know yet whether DOJ prosecutors will have enough fortitude and strength to resist that now. But the reason the Watergate prosecution continued and ultimately succeeded is because you had brave, integrity laden prosecutors who stayed there and finished the job. I talked to them for the book. So, this really does hearken back to our history, and in some ways it's even worse.
COLLINS: Well, and also, as you've written in this book, and studied this with the Justice Department, the person who is representing Letitia James here is Abbe Lowell. He's the powerful attorney. He's represented Democrats and Republicans, Hunter Biden, Jared Kushner, basically everybody in Washington.
Given what you know about his work, and how he is, as a defense attorney, what do you make of what they are thinking, reading this reporting tonight, and hearing this comment from the President?
HONIG: Abbe is a fantastic defense lawyer. He is tenacious. I mean that as a compliment. He spoke to me, on record, for this book, relating to his defense of Hunter Biden. And he held nothing back. I mean, he described that prosecution, used profanity to describe what he thought of that Hunter Biden prosecution. And he's going to stand strong, in this case, to represent Letitia James.
And defense lawyers play a really important role here too. When prosecutors overstep, defense lawyers have an important role in our Constitution. I talked to defense lawyers for Bill Clinton, for Joe Biden, for Hunter Biden, for Donald Trump. And so, sometimes, when prosecutors overextend, it is the job, the constitutional role of the defense lawyer, and Abbe Lowell is as skilled as anybody at playing that job.
COLLINS: Elie Honig, I mean, we will see how this plays out in the next step here. Thank you so much for joining us.
HONIG: Thanks, Kaitlan.
COLLINS: And for everyone else, be sure to get Elie's new book. It is excellent. It is called, "When You Come at the King: Inside DOJ's Pursuit of the President, From Nixon to Trump."
[21:25:00]
Up next here for us. As you have seen, tendons (ph) reaching a new point on Capitol Hill, after Charlie Kirk's assassination. We're going to speak with someone who has been at the center of a lot of that. Democratic congresswoman, Ilhan Omar, who is going to respond to Republican accusations that she smeared him, right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[21:30:00]
COLLINS: On a bipartisan basis, the House of Representatives today passed a resolution, honoring Charlie Kirk and rejecting political violence. 95 Democrats joined all Republicans, in voting yes. 58 Democrats voted against it, including Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.
This comes, after a vote to censure her failed, earlier this week. Had it passed, it would have removed the Minnesota lawmaker from her committees. Congresswoman Nancy Mace pushed it over -- pushed that resolution, that censure, I should note, over comments that Omar had made after Charlie Kirk's assassination.
These are just some of the tweets that the South Carolina Republican directed at Omar. We're not even showing you all of them. At one point, she called for her to be deported, despite the fact that Omar is a U.S. citizen.
Omar responded, calling her crazy, unwell, and saying that she's in need of therapy.
My source tonight is Minnesota Democrat, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.
And it's great to have you here.
I mean, we'll talk about the Nancy Mace of all of this in a moment. But on that resolution that passed today, a lot of your House colleagues, the Democrats, voted yes, on this. Why did you vote no?
REP. ILHAN OMAR (D-MN): Yes, while I condemn political violence, and I obviously condemn the assassination of Charlie Kirk, I just not get myself to honor a legacy that I believe was filled with hate, bigotry and rage-baiting. And I think it's really important for us to have this honest conversation about what this man's legacy was, what he spewed on his podcast, and the ways in which he disparaged women of color, like myself.
COLLINS: Your colleague, another Democrat, Jamie Raskin, voted yes on this resolution. He basically said, even if he didn't agree with every phrase in it, that he viewed it as a moment for both parties to come together. Do you think he's wrong in that?
OMAR: Well, the moment should exist. But what we have seen, this week, in regards to what my Republican colleagues have decided to do, in their attacks targeting me, and what the President has decided to do, these are people who are calling, basically, for our -- assassination of us. Nancy Mace, as you just referenced, called me the enemy of the state.
And so, these are not people who are interested in bringing us together. They're not interested in turning the volume down. They're not interested in finding common ground.
And even the Republicans, who voted, out of their obligation to the Constitution, and doing the right thing, in making sure that I didn't get censured, for words I did not actually say? They are being under attack, right now. They're being threatened. They're -- a call for their resignation is out there. And some of them are actually frightened for their lives from their own base.
And so, when we say, we want a country that's united? It starts with all of us and all of our actions. And we're not seeing that on the other side of the aisle right now.
COLLINS: Yes. And to be clear, on Mace, she didn't literally call for your assassination. But you're saying because of all of the comments, I mean, we just showed the dozens of tweets directed at you, that that she is -- you're arguing, instigating violence against you.
OMAR: Right. I mean, what do you expect for people to do with me when you call me the enemy of the state? What do you do with people -- to do with me, when you're the President of the United States, and you say, This person here in Congress is in our country to destroy the country? There is no clear way to incite violence against a sitting member of Congress unless you go after them in that kind of way.
Nancy Mace also retweeted something Charlie Kirk said, which was that Islam was the sword that was going to slit the throat of Western civilization. As a visibly Muslim member of Congress, how am I supposed to feel safe, when words like that are out there, and there are deranged people who will take action to protect me from the United States? It's frightening.
COLLINS: And I want to be clear, all this started, and what Mace was trying to censure you over, and get you removed from your committees, was because of comments that you had made, in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk's murder. I want everyone to have a chance to listen to what you said--
OMAR: Unfortunately, it is not. She has not used the comments that I made, with Mehdi Hasan in that interview, which--
COLLINS: Well--
OMAR: --those are not the words that she quoted in the resolution.
COLLINS: Let's listen to--
OMAR: So, we'd have to be clear about that.
COLLINS: Yes, because in the -- what she's accusing you of is smearing Charlie Kirk, and said that you implied he was to blame for his own murder. That's what she said in the censure. You're saying you didn't say that.
I just want people to be able to listen to you, themselves. Let's play those comments.
OMAR: OK.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OMAR: Charlie was someone who was willing to debate and downplay the death of George Floyd, in the hands of Minneapolis Police.
MEHDI HASAN, BRITISH-AMERICAN BROADCASTER AND WRITER: I think he called him a scumbag.
[21:35:00]
OMAR: Right. Have no regard. Downplay slavery and what Black people have gone through in this country, by saying Juneteenth should never exist. And I think, you know, there are a lot of people who are out there, talking about him just wanting to have a civil debate. And there--
HASAN: It's bullshit. Complete rewriting of -- a complete rewriting of history.
OMAR: Yes, there is nothing more effed up, you know, like, than to completely pretend that his words and actions have not been recorded and in existence for the last decade or so.
And, you know, you have people, like Nancy Mace, who constantly harass, you know, people that she finds inferior, and wants them not to exist in this country or ever. And, you know, you have people like Trump who has incited violence against people like me.
HASAN: Yes.
OMAR: And so, you know, these people are full of shit, and it's important for us to call them out, while we feel anger, and sadness--
HASAN: Yes.
OMAR: --and you have, you know, empathy, which Charlie said, No, it shouldn't exist, because that's a newly created word, or something.
Like, I have empathy for his kids, and his wife, and what they're going through, because I don't want--
HASAN: Yes, same.
OMAR: --I do not want that--
HASAN: No one should -- no one should go through that, and we hold ourselves, I hope, to higher standards.
OMAR: And--
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: When you listen back to that, do you -- do you stand by what you said there?
OMAR: Yes, I do believe it is important for us to hold a mirror. There are so many people that are pretending the words that Charlie said don't exist, the way he made black people -- black women feel when he said we didn't have brain processing power to -- thought -- thought processing power to get ourselves into college, and to be taken seriously as professionals. Or as a black person, if you were a pilot, and he walked on that plane? He'd be scared.
These are -- these are actual words that this man has said. And I can't even begin, we will be here all day, if I told you all of the things he has said about Muslims and immigrants and the trans community. He--
COLLINS: Yes.
OMAR: He had hate for so many people, and he mocked the death of George Floyd, you know? This is not somebody, I am going to sit back and say, had a great legacy of bringing people together, because he did the opposite. And it is important--
COLLINS: But Congresswoman--
OMAR: --while we mourn his death, and condemn his assassination, and feel empathy for his kids and wife, we are not here to whitewash what he did, while he was alive.
COLLINS: And no one is saying that you have to whitewash what he did, or that you have to defend what he said, or the views that he held.
But regardless of those views, do you believe the timing of saying that, the day after that he was assassinated, the comments there, do you regret the timing of those comments?
OMAR: Do you think Charlie regretted mocking George Floyd's death, as his 7-year-old pled to the world on what happened to her -- child? I think saying what Charlie did, and who he was, has nothing to do with his assassination, it has nothing to do with the timing of his assassination. It is a matter of record.
COLLINS: I ask, because the way former President Obama put it, he also said he thought that Charlie Kirk's ideas and views were wrong. OMAR: Yes.
COLLINS: But he said, and I'm quoting Obama now, We have to extend grace to people during their period of mourning and shock.
Does he have a point?
OMAR: Yes, I extend grace to his wife and kids. I cannot imagine what they are going through. But the reality is that his wife sat by him, as he said those things, and did not tell him that these are human beings who you are calling, garbage, who you are saying, they don't have the brain power because they were born in a different skin color.
Like, I do not understand how we are OK, as a society, with people who say that, about our fellow Americans, a fellow human being, and regard them as the hero? I just, I'm sorry, I don't see it.
COLLINS: I don't -- no one is saying that you have to agree with him. I don't think it's surprising that his wife agreed with him, obviously, or that they shared similar views. I just think that what people looked at it is, the day after his shocking death, that his views were being litigated, in that way.
OMAR: But we -- but we -- but we--
COLLINS: No one is saying you have to lionize him.
OMAR: But we were responding to the people who were lionizing him. I was not going to have a debate on Charlie. We were responding to the people, who wanted the debate on Charlie.
[21:40:00]
I put out a tweet, right when he was killed, that political violence is wrong, and that we should work everything, within our power, to end gun violence in this country.
None of us were interested in litigating his life, until his supporters, and our House Republican colleagues, decided to say he was akin to Martin Luther King, who this man loathed. So, you invited us into that debate that you wanted to have, that you said Charlie was always interested in. And so, you cannot get upset--
COLLINS: You had--
OMAR: --you can't be mad, if people then hold that mirror and say, But here's really who he was, and we cannot forget.
It's one thing to ask us to condemn the violence. But it's another for you to ask us to pretend Charlie wasn't who Charlie was.
COLLINS: I'm not sure anyone's asking that. I mean, maybe some people are. I'm certainly--
OMAR: That is what -- that is what people are asking that--
COLLINS: I'm certainly not asking that. But--
OMAR: That is what people are asking.
COLLINS: But can I ask you, Congresswoman, because--
OMAR: People are asking, and are getting fired--
COLLINS: Well--
OMAR: --for sharing Charlie's words.
COLLINS: Well, and some people were celebrating it. That was part of it.
OMAR: I haven't seen that.
COLLINS: But on that issue--
OMAR: I've just seen people sharing his words.
COLLINS: There was a town hall that you had six days ago. You called Kirk a, quote, hateful man. And you had reposted a video that I'm sure you've seen, you've taken criticism for. It's a video that called him a reprehensible human being, and said Kirk was Dr. Frankenstein, and his monster shot him through the neck.
Why repost that video?
OMAR: Because there were a lot of things in the video that I did agree with. Obviously, we share videos. We don't have to agree with every single word.
But I do believe he was a reprehensible, hateful man. Like, that is my view of the words that he has said about every single identity that I belong to. He didn't believe that we should have equal access to anything. He also just didn't even believe, I could be smart enough, I could have thoughts that could be equal to a white man.
Where are we missing this conversation about who this man was, and the things that he said? How do you not -- do you not find that reprehensible, Kaitlan?
COLLINS: Well, of course, I don't--
OMAR: Do you -- do you think I don't have--
COLLINS: --I don't subscribe to that. But I think the argument being made--
OMAR: But do you think I don't have the brain processing power, like you, or a white man?
COLLINS: Well, of course not.
OMAR: I know, but -- but if somebody said that--
COLLINS: And I think it's very clear here that I'm not sharing his views, and I don't justify them.
OMAR: --would you say that that would be reprehensible views?
COLLINS: I think the argument that was being made--
OMAR: No, but I am asking you. What I'm asking you--
COLLINS: --and what we have heard is--
OMAR: --is would you say that as--
COLLINS: Yes, I understand what you're asking me.
OMAR: But you're asking me how could I find him reprehensible?
COLLINS: I understand what you're asking me, Congresswoman.
OMAR: Like, that is reprehensible.
COLLINS: No, I'm not--
OMAR: You said, it is reprehensible yourself, that it's vile, it's reprehensible, and it is hateful.
COLLINS: No, no, I'm not asking why you think he's reprehensible. I think -- you're obviously allowed to have your own views. That's why we have you on here so often--
OMAR: Yes.
COLLINS: --because we like to hear your views and what you think on something. I just think it was the video, where it called him Dr. Frankenstein, and said his monster shot him through the neck.
I mean, obviously this is a person, and looking at this, this is someone who was a husband and a father, and in the days after his shocking death, that happened as a result of his views, or happened as a result as he was sharing his views, publicly with people, that people found it jarring to hear such criticism of that in the immediate aftermath--
OMAR: What I -- what I find--
COLLINS: --of someone's death.
OMAR: --jarring is that there's so many people willing to excuse the most reprehensible things that he said, that they agree with that, that they're willing to have monuments for him, that they want to create a day to honor him, and that they want to produce resolutions in the House of Congress, honoring his life and legacy.
It is one thing to care about his life, because obviously so many people loved him, including his children and wife. But I am not going to sit here, and be judged for not wanting to honor any legacy this man has left behind, that should be in the dustbin of history, and we should hopefully move on and forget the hate that he spewed every single day.
COLLINS: Do you think your colleagues who voted -- your Democratic colleagues who voted yes, on that resolution, should not have voted yes? Is that your view?
OMAR: A lot of people come to their own conclusions on why they vote. We heard from some people, who said they loved the part about condemning gun violence, about condemning political violence. There's people who obviously voted for different reasons that they haven't shared.
I'm not here to judge what people do and the votes that they take. We all have different relationships. But there is a clear reason that you see a huge portion of the Congressional Black Caucus take that vote, because we did find this man reprehensible, in the way in which he talked about us, and those of us who are of African descent.
[21:45:00]
COLLINS: Why do you think Nancy Mace is targeting you as much as she is?
OMAR: It's an easy clickbait. There is a lot of hate in this country for Muslims. There's a lot of hate in this country for black people, especially black women. And there is a lot of hate, severe hate for immigrants. And so, I fit the bill. She knows that she can easily raise money, and get support for her bigotry from her bigoted -- from the bigoted people who want to give money to her campaign.
But the reality is, in this country, the First Amendment does not only protect speech. It protects the right and liberty for anybody to practice their faith. I do practice the Muslim faith. I am an immigrant. I am proud of both of those things.
COLLINS: Yes.
OMAR: And I was, of course, born in Somalia, which the President likes to mention. And I'm also proud of my Somali heritage, and that is not something that they can take away from me.
And I just want to say, one thing that the President should understand is that you can't impeach a sitting member of Congress. And it is unfortunate--
COLLINS: Yes, he called for your impeachment.
OMAR: --that the members of Congress have not educated -- they're not -- their uneducated (ph) President about how things work in Congress.
COLLINS: Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, thank you for your time tonight.
OMAR: Appreciate that. Thank you.
COLLINS: We also have some breaking news, this hour, as a group of advisers, handpicked by the HHS Secretary, RFK Jr., have made a major decision on vaccines. What they recommended when it comes to the COVID-19 shot?
[21:50:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: Today, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s hand-picked vaccine advisory board voted unanimously to recommend that people who want a COVID vaccine must consult with a health care provider first. The committee also narrowly rejected a proposal to require a prescription for it.
And that's a vote that came on day two of yet another chaotic meeting, with the Board voting, yesterday, to remove the recommendation for the measles, mumps, rubella vaccine, for children younger than four. But in a surprising twist, they also postponed a vote on changes to the hepatitis B vaccine recommendations for newborns.
I should note, the panel's recommendations are not final. That final decision, as of now, would come from Secretary Kennedy's deputy, who is the acting CDC director, after they ousted the other CDC director after just a month on the job.
Up next. We're going to take you behind the scenes this week, from interviewing Willie Nelson, to Windsor, to Washington and back.
[21:55:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TRUMP: The problem is on the left. It's not on the right, like some people like to say, on the right. The problem we have is on the left.
COLLINS: President Trump, another question?
ON SCREEN TEXT: Monday, September 15.
TRUMP: You could see they're professional agitators. I had one the other night, I had four. And started to scream when I got into a restaurant.
(PROTESTERS CHANT "FREE PALESTINE")
TRUMP: And I've asked Pam to look into that, in terms of criminal RICO, because they should be put in jail.
COLLINS: What went through your mind, Tom, when you heard that?
DUPREE: I'm sure it was disruptive, but I am not sure it's a RICO case.
ON SCREEN TEXT: Tuesday, September 16.
REPORTER: A lot of your allies say hate speech is free speech.
TRUMP: I should probably go after people like you, because you treat me so unfairly.
COLLINS: They're literally casting images of this, on Windsor Castle, earlier tonight, to remind everyone of those ties with Jeffrey Epstein. This was done, I should note, four people have actually been arrested as a result.
Having the state visit is a huge card, basically, that Keir Starmer has in his pocket.
(PROTESTERS CHANTING)
COLLINS: Were those women in the restaurant inflicting harm, or terror, or damage, by protesting the President of the United States?
TODD BLANCHE, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: So, you're asking whether there's damage done by four individuals, screaming and yelling at the President of our United States while he's trying to have dinner.
I mean, it's true that there's a difference between shouting and committing an assassination--
COLLINS: People can protest the President.
BLANCHE: --committing an assassination, which is what happened to Charlie.
COLLINS: There were supporters outside as well.
ON SCREEN TEXT: Wednesday, September 17.
COLLINS: This is what it looks like outside, where we have seen some protesters.
President Trump likely has not seen the protests himself, unless he's been watching any of the television footage. He's been safely ensconced inside the walls of Windsor.
President Trump is celebrating, after ABC announced that it is taking Jimmy Kimmel's late night show off the air indefinitely.
This announcement comes just hours after we heard from the FCC chairman, Brendan Carr.
BRENDAN CARR, FCC CHAIRMAN: I mean, look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way.
REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): This is really taking us back to the days of King George. That was a crime in Great Britain to insult the dignity of the King.
ON SCREEN TEXT: Thursday, September 18.
COLLINS: There have been real questions about whether or not any trade agreements were going to be reached specifically on aluminum and steel tariffs.
[22:00:00]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is free speech more under attack in Britain or America?
TRUMP: Jimmy Kimmel is not a talented person. He had very bad ratings, and they should have fired him a long time ago. You could call that free speech or not.
COLLINS: President Trump just wrapped up his press conference here, at Chequers, walked out on the lawn, got into Marine One, and now will head back to the United States.
TRUMP: The networks were 97 percent against me. They give me only bad publicity. Maybe their license should be taken away. It will be up to Brendan Carr.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COLLINS: Thanks for joining us behind the scenes, and also every night this week.
"CNN NEWSNIGHT WITH ABBY PHILLIP" starts now.
