Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

CNN International: Top U.S. Generals Testify On Afghanistan Withdrawal; Blinken To Visit Saudi Arabia, Egypt For Ceasefire Talks; Supreme Court Lets Texas Enforce Controversial Border Law; Congressional Leaders Announce Deal To Fund Government For Rest Of Fiscal Year; Today: Biden Travels To Nevada & Arizona For Critical Reelection Rematch. Aired 3-3:45p ET

Aired March 19, 2024 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:36]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: It is 7:00 p.m. in London, 8:00 p.m. in Berlin, 11:30 p.m. in Kabul, 3:00 p.m. here in Washington. I'm Jim Sciutto. Thanks so much for joining me today on CNN NEWSROOM.

And let's get right to the news.

We begin at the U.S. Capitol just behind me here, where top U.S. military generals are testifying on the frenetic, violent withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan in 2021, after some two decades of war. It was the first time retired General Mark Milley, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and retired General Frank McKenzie, the former head of Central Command, are publicly testifying since leaving their positions.

Milley reflected on the challenges of ending the war, and exactly where the withdrawal failed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. MARK MILLEY, FORMER JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: Nothing we're going to discuss today happen overnight. It was a process of withdrawal that spanned a decade. The outcome in Afghanistan was the cumulative effect of many decisions over many years of war. At the end of 20 years, we, the military, help build an army of state where we could not forge a nation. The enemy occupied Kabul, the overthrow of the government occurred in the military we supported for two decades faded away. That is a strategic failure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Let's bring in CNN Pentagon correspondent Natasha Bertrand.

And, Natasha, I'm sure like you I don't speak to really anyone, including inside this administration, who defends how that withdrawal played out. I wonder, what is the goal of lawmakers in this hearing? Is it just to expose those decisions and their consequences? Is there a report that's going to come out of this or something more?

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, House Foreign Affairs Chairman Mike McCaul, he has been conducting in investigation into the administration's handling of the withdrawal since last year. And so, this hearing is a part of that investigation, is one of several hearings that he has held about the withdrawal and how it was handled and the process that led up to it. And importantly, the military recommendations to the Pen -- to the White House, as well as the State Department, you know, talks between the White House and the Pentagon as well about the best way to go about this withdrawal. But if you're Democrat on that committee, you are saying that this is purely for political points, and that is exactly what the Democrats have been saying throughout this hearing, is that this is just an excuse for the Republicans to kind of dredge all of this up again and slam the Biden administration yet again for how it conducted this withdrawal.

But really, you know, McKenzie and Milley, the two retired generals here, they were pretty outspoken about throughout this hearing about the fact that they believed that this was overly rushed. It was chaotic, and it was not the way that they would have preferred things to have been executed. In fact, they really went after the State Department for not ordering or asking for an evacuation much, much sooner. And they reiterated that asking for an evacuation really one day before the Taliban overran Kabul was simply a mistake. It was -- it was a failure as Milley has said, many times.

And so, it was eye-opening in that regard and I should say the hearing is still ongoing, but that has been generally the broad theme of this is that the generals say that they would have ordered this evacuation if they were able too much sooner. And also, of course, the recommendation that they would have kept about 2,500 troops in the country in order to maintain that kind of stability there, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yeah. I mean, listen, at a minimum, there are very legitimate questions about how this played out and frankly, you hear some of those questions from both parties.

The U.S., of course, is focused on another ongoing war, that the war in Ukraine. Today, we know the Defense Department announced a $300 million aid package has begun arriving there. The bigger picture, right, is, of course, Congress is still stalling on this much larger tranche of aid that the Biden administration and even some Republicans want.

How much does this small piece of assistance help bridge the gap?

BERTRAND: Well, look, it is tiny, right? I mean, they are asking for -- the administration has asked for $60 billion in supplemental funding for the Ukrainians. This is $300 million.

And so it comes from the fact that the Pentagon was able to scrounge up some money from savings from other arms contracts that it has that his negotiated over the last several months.

[15:05:00]

But this isn't something that can necessarily be replicated over and over again in a way that can actually sustain the Ukrainian military for, you know, months and months, if not years to come. That is what they need the supplemental four.

And importantly, though they weren't able to get some of the security assistance into Ukraine from this package, very quickly. And we are told that it has already started to flow in. Whether or not it actually makes a difference though, that is really what we're waiting to see.

SCIUTTO: Natasha Bertrand, thanks so much.

And joining me now to discuss, CNN political and national security analyst, "New York Times" White House and national security correspondent, David Sanger.

David, good to have you on.

I want to play as we begin that conversation, another clip of the testimony from Generals McKenzie and Milley, and then get your thoughts. Have a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE MCCAUL (R-TX): And you urge the White House and State Department to put pen to paper to develop a plan to get Americans and our Afghan allies out of Afghanistan, correct?

RET. GEN. FRANK MCKENZIE, FORMER CENTCOM COMMANDER: Yes, I did. In fact, I was concerned by the middle of July. Having a plan is one thing, preparing the plan, vetting the plan, coordinating the plan with the people that are going to actually carry you out. The Department of Defense, that's another set of tasks completely yet.

MCCAUL: And that was too little too late.

MCKENZIE: It was my judgment that it was far too little, far too late.

MCCAUL: Was that your assessment, General Milley?

MILLEY: It was. And I would broaden it a little bit by saying it was a pretty consistent assessment by me and other members of the uniform military up through and including the secretary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: David, that last statement there, a pretty consistent assessment of the failures. They were speaking there about the failure to ramp up quickly enough evacuation, particularly for those Afghans who fought alongside U.S. troops. But frankly, you hear a fairly consistent assessment of a whole host of decisions regarding the withdrawal.

I wonder if the bottom line here is that this was Biden's call, right? That many of his advisers, whether it's state or in the Pentagon, said, listen, we've got at least slow roll this and he moved forward. Is that a fair assessment?

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: It is, Jim, and he made his decision in April, announced it publicly in April, and publicly, General Milley, General McKenzie, they all stood up and saluted but they'd all advised against it. They all called for leaving a force, a smaller force there.

Now, what Biden's answer to that was is to evacuate that smaller force, we're going to have to bring in a bigger force. So he was afraid that would ultimate -- that ultimately the Taliban would having run out of an agreement that they reached during the Trump administration would attack that 2,500 force.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

SANGER: And so, that's why he moved out fast. But as you pointed out, it may have been the right decision to get out, they did it in the worst possible way?

SCIUTTO: No question. To that point about those 2,500 troops, General Milley is glad that to me as the finger in the dike plan in effect that a small number of troops would keep the whole dike, the dam from breaking, which is what we saw happen.

Now, what's notable about this is that President Biden told ABC in 2021 that none of his advisers said leave 2,500 troops in Afghanistan.

I want to play that bit of sound for Biden and then how Generals McKenzie and Milley described it themselves today. Have a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

INTERVIEWER: Your top military advisers warned against withdrawing on this timeline. They wanted you to keep about 2,500.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No, they didn't. It was split. That wasn't true. That wasn't true.

INTERVIEWER: They didn't tell you that they wanted troops to stay.

BIDEN: No, not at -- not in terms of whether we were going to get out at a timeframe all troops. They didn't argue against that.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, no -- no one told -- your military advisers not tell you, no, we should just keep 2,500 troops. It's been a stable situation for the last several years. We can do that. We can continue to do that.

BIDEN: No. No one said that to me that I can recall.

MCKENZIE: -- hundred U.S. forces if you also assume that will allow the Afghans to stay in the fight, you can maintain a viable base at Bagram.

MILLEY: But there's little question in my mind that had the United States -- that either president agreement to withdraw if we didn't withdraw 100 percent and we would have been back at war with Taliban, that's right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: I mean, Miller and McKenzie are effectively contradicting the president on his account there. Why that stark difference?

SANGER: Great question, Jim, and we can only guess. But first, it's pretty clear the military did --

SCIUTTO: Sorry, Dave, we're going to have to try to fix those -- those audio, those audio problems. We'll do our best to do that.

As we do, turning now to the Israel-Hamas war, today, Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said his country will press on with its campaign to eliminate Hamas and reiterated the need to defeat Hamas fighters in Rafah.

[15:10:02]

That is the city inside Gaza, where many -- hundreds of thousands of Gazans are now taking shelter, despite the Biden administration's deep concerns about a ground invasion of that southern Gaza city. We also learn that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Saudi Arabia and Egypt this week in yet one more attempt to reach a ceasefire deal.

CNN's Jeremy Diamond, he is live in Tel Aviv.

Jeremy, I wonder where those negotiations stand. I mean, they've been stop and start for weeks now. You don't travel out to the region unless you think there's some use in it. But from where you're standing, any sense of progress?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Look, it certainly seems like things are moving again. The Israeli and Hamas delegations both into Qatar this week to discuss the latest Hamas counter proposal, of course, via those mediators because they're still not engaging in direct negotiations. But there is some cautious optimism get them from various corners involved in these discussions.

David Barnea, the head of the Mossad, who was heading this delegation, has since returned to Israel. But that was not a sign that these talks have fallen apart. Rather, it is an effort to kind of take stock of what was discussed, technical teams, continuing to have discussions in Doha, Qatar, and the cutters are saying that they are cautious asleep optimistic that progress can indeed be made.

But no one is yet popping the champagne here. There's still a lot of difficult work to do, and of course its important to note that in the backdrop of all this, the Israelis are continuing to emphasize the necessity of carrying out a military offensive in Rafah set to have major discussions with American officials the beginning of next week over potential alternatives that the Americans will present.

But the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu emphasizing the importance of carrying out that offensive and that in some corners as being viewed as yet another effort to kind of put some pressure on these negotiations. The military pressure that he has talked about. We will see how quickly a deal can potentially be achieved and whether or not it would avert that offensive that the Israelis are promising.

SCIUTTO: One of the biggest points of contention between the Biden administration and Netanyahu has been about the delivery of aid, crucial humanitarian aid to Gaza, and Blinken issued a bleak warning about that aid today. What do we know?

DIAMOND: Yeah. I mean, he is raising what is the reality on the ground, the kind of dire catastrophic situation that people in particular in northern Gaza are facing. But as a leading authority on global food security has now kind of put numbers and affirm firm data on that, noting the fact that half of Gaza's population is now on the brink of starvation, famine projected to arrive in northern Gaza any day now. And all of Gaza facing catastrophic levels of food insecurity, which the secretary of state noted is the first time in history that that has occurred to an entire population.

And so it just kind of raises the stakes of those ceasefire negotiations that are ongoing as the secretary of state is set to arrive in the region to try and push those along. And, of course, stresses the urgency of more humanitarian aid getting in. The United States and other countries have been trying to pressure for Israel to allow more aid. And we've seen the Israelis tests out some methods of allowing more aid directly into northern Gaza via land crossing. But that has not yet become a kind of a firm routine matter, simply a pilot project as of now.

But there's no question that the pressure is mounting on the Israelis to get more in. It has, of course, for weeks now, but very little has actually changed, Jim.

SCIUTTO: No question. So much suffering there.

Jeremy Diamond, thanks so much

All right. Back here in the U.S., United States Supreme Court in just the last hour has cleared the way for the state of Texas to begin immediately enforcing a controversial state immigration law that allows state officials to arrest and detain people that they suspect -- just suspect -- of entering the country illegally.

Joan Biskupic covers the Supreme Court for CNN.

Enormous significance here, right, because I believe 40 percent of the state of Texas's population is Latino. This gives state authorities are enormous power here to stop people based on suspicion. Could -- can you explain what this actually decides?

JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN SENIOR SUPREME COURT ANALYST: Well, it's a major intervention by the U.S. Supreme Court allowing a state law to go forward that has never one that has never been enforced before in any other state because typically, Jim, as you know well, immigration authority rests with the federal government. And what Texas, because Texas does have a problem, obviously, and the state and the federal government have been wrestling with this for many, many years at the border, Texas has tried to take matters into his own hands, passing a law that Governor Abbott signed in December that would allow state law enforcement to arrest and detain migrants who are suspected of being in the state illegally.

[15:15:11]

Now the federal government and immigration rights groups, you know, challenged it for reasons that you talked about, as you suggested in your earlier statement, you know, about racial profiling that would come from this, but the administration really stresses that this is not -- this is not the domain of states. This is a federal issue, and the three dissenters, three liberal justices, Sonia Sotomayor, Ketanji Brown Jackson, and Elena Kagan really stressed point.

Justices Sotomayor and Jackson wrote: Today, the court invites further chaos and crisis in immigration enforcement. Texas passed a law that directly regulates the entry and removal of noncitizens and explicitly instructs its state courts do disregard any ongoing federal immigration proceedings. That law upends the federal state balance of power that has existed for over a century.

And then Justice Kagan writing separately herself, noted that the subject of immigration generally has been thought to be the special province of the federal government. Now I should say, Jim, the majority did not explain itself. Two of the justices in the majority Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh wrote a concurrence that said they did not want to second guess the Fifth Circuit, a lower court that had said the law can take effect.

But, you know, a lot of unanswered questions for why the justices did this. But bottom line, it really gives Texas a lot of authority for now, at least, Jim.

SCIUTTO: No question, Joan Biskupic, enormous consequences from this. We'll continue to follow those. Good to have you on.

BISKUPIC: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: Still to come this hour, just days before a possible U.S. federal government shutdown, there is a deal at least on the table to keep the U.S. government funded through the fiscal year. We're going to speak to a Republican congressman about the path forward as well as a whole host of other important issues.

Please do stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: Congress has until Friday night at midnight to avoid a partial government shutdown. Leaders in both parties announced this morning they have a deal. The clock though is ticking as House Republicans want 72 hours to review any bill before a vote. The text notably not yet finished.

Joining me now is Congressman Tim Burchett. He's Republican from Tennessee.

Congressman, thanks for taking the time this afternoon.

REP. TIM BURCHETT (R-TN): Thanks for having me on, brother.

SCIUTTO: You've been deeply critical of past budget deals between Speaker Johnson and those deals involving Democrats as well. Will you vote for this agreement?

BURCHETT: Probably not, as just another -- another deal we kick the can down the road. Congress really required to do one thing and that's to pass a budget. And the last 30 years, we've said to the American public we're, in fact, not going to do our job. And, you know, until we lockdown this border, I don't -- I don't see -- I don't see me and several others not voting for this thing because, what, 10 million people, 400 billion a year.

[15:20:11]

It's just -- the fentanyl, the whole deal. It's just too much.

SCIUTTO: You, of course, voted to oust Speaker McCarthy in part due to opposition to deal he made with Democrat -- involving Democrats to pass a budget.

Would you threaten Johnson's speakership as well if this goes through?

BURCHETT: No, sir, he's been truthful to us. He's -- he didn't mock my religious beliefs. He didn't. We actually pretty much share religious beliefs, but he -- you know, he didn't have, as you all called it, $50 million in side deals. He's been very open about what he's doing. And I find that frankly, I found that refreshing.

The end result is not exactly what I'd like, but I would -- but I think at least he understands where were coming from and he's not critical of it, but I understand his willingness to want to keep the government open.

But the folks back in Tennessee, the number one issue is immigration. And we're not doing anything about it. Either party -- you talk about the uniparty and a lot of talks been given to that, but that's the reality is is that Republicans get in power. They don't do anything about it.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

BURCHETT: The national Chambers of Commerce want something to -- want it to stay open and Democrats get in power, the same thing. Everybody wants somebody on the roof. And if they fall off, they can pay them a lot less. And they don't have to settle with them because they're afraid they're going to get deported. And that is the bottom line and it's disgusting.

SCIUTTO: Well, there was a deal as you know, in the Senate, a bipartisan deal. And I know it didn't give everybody everything, but it certainly raised the standards for asylum seekers. It added security at the border.

Was it a mistake do you think to blow up that deal? BURCHETT: No. I don't. You know, everybody said Trump gave -- I would

say to give me credit for it, honestly, it was a terrible deal. It didn't fix the border, it didn't lock it down. You had to 4,999 people could come across the border. But when that fat thousand one comes over in one day, in one day, then everything goes into effect.

And the reality is they weren't going to lock the border down. This is more bureaucracy, just another excuse to hire more bureaucrats, more lawyers and what we need is people at the border. We need a wall. We did our military there. We need to get them out of all these other foreign wars that we're in and put them down and secure our border.

That to me is -- would be my power (INAUDIBLE).

SCIUTTO: Let me, I will say that James Lankford, Republican, he questioned the way that 5,000 figure has been described. But you do mention foreign wars. Of course, the hearings are underway. You told me just shortly ago, you were at those hearings this morning. You're going to return, regarding the withdrawal -- the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

I wonder, would you have preferred if U.S. troops, at least some troops, had remained there?

BURCHETT: No, I think it was it was a worthless situation. No, it was -- but the way we handled it was terrible. You know, we left billions of dollars of things on the ground and worse than that, 13 brave Americans lost their life and a constituent of mine, Ryan Knauss, was the last person who died in Afghanistan and every day when I leave my house, I see the road named in his honor, you know?

And so I have a daily reminder of that in Knoxville and I think it was just a complete capitulation. We showed America at its worst, we had a bunch of bureaucrats and in that instance, for the rules of engagement that America has are bogus. We had a marine sniper who had the suicide bomber in his sights more than once, was told to stand down probably through the State Department.

You have people who have never shot a -- fired a shot in anger telling military men and women, 13 brave Americans lost their lives. Dozens more were injured. Folks were killed.

It just -- you know, innocent, innocent civilians lost their lives and it's all because of bureaucracy. And we need some answers and, I -- you know, everybody's making it a partisan thing. Somebody wants to blame Biden, somebody wants to blame Trump.

I really don't care who gets blame. I just wanted to make sure we never do that -- make those same mistakes again, but that I'm sort of in the minority. It's a partisan issue as it always is. We're getting close to an election year and it's pitiful.

SCIUTTO: Well, you --

BURCHETT: Americans died (ph), we ought to be able to -- all hold hands and say, hey, we screwed up, let's not ever do this dadgum thing again.

SCIUTTO: So let me asked you in that point. You say that Afghanistan withdrawal was a capitulation. You oppose additional funding to Ukraine. Why would leaving Ukraine weaker against an ongoing Russian invasion not be a capitulation as well?

BURCHETT: Well, first of all, it's our money, $114 billion. You saw -- you saw congressional members in both parties make a lot of money off of our missile defense system that we sent to Ukraine.

[15:25:00]

And then all of a sudden, guess what? We had to buy a multi-billion- dollar no-bid contract in American -- congressmen on both sides of the aisle just happened to own stock in that company. And so, the things stunk from the beginning. I think we ought to be -- we had to borrow the money in the first place, as you know, we're $35 trillion in debt. We bring in around a little less than $5 trillion and we spend about $7 trillion every year and we call that a success.

And then with our Pentagon, they haven't passed an audit and the history of audits, they can't find a half a trillion in assets. And how did we punish them the last time? We fight them 20 billion new dollars addition -- gave them 20 billion.

The whole thing just stinks top to bottom. We ought to be -- we ought not to have Americans anywhere near Ukraine or dollars. They ought to be on our border protecting our border. When Americans take an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, when they join our military to fight for this country, it has nothing to do with Ukraine.

SCIUTTO: But why would --

BURCHETT: And Russia, Putin a thug, and I would assume that he'd go away.

SCIUTTO: He's go away from --

(CROSSTALK)

BURCHETT: -- it's not the case.

SCIUTTO: -- from Ukraine.

I mean, the thing is, if it's fundamentally weak to withdraw, to capitulate, as you say in Afghanistan, why wouldn't ceding the largest country in Europe, right, Ukraine, tens of millions of people who say they don't want to live under Russian power, why would conceding that to Russia show American strength, wouldn't that show weakness?

BURCHETT: We're not there in the first place. It's Europe. Why are we over there in the first place? It doesn't -- to me, that doesn't make any sense. It does not -- it's not conceding if we're not over there. Now, we're over there and we're putting more and more for our hard- earned dollars over there that we're having to borrow. Again, why don't we use the same thing for the Uyghurs that the Chinese have imprisoned, those poor Muslim folks that they've been imprisoned, organ harvesting, slave labor, things like that for cheap American goods? And the reason again, is your national Chambers of Commerce and the uniparty are getting rich. They want those cheap products and they don't -- you can't pick and choose. It's either all or none.

And I would say none. Just protect America that needs to be our goal.

SCIUTTO: Well, you mentioned China. I went to Taiwan and spoke to military commanders, officials there, all of whom said China is matching and learning about the U.S. and the world about its response to Ukraine. Would abandoning Ukraine signal to China that, well, you know what Taiwan is yours as well?

BURCHETT: Well, I had breakfast with the former secretary of state. He told me that in fact that the Chinese know how many paper clips we use in the Longworth Building and Longworth happens to be the building I'm in. They're studying every move we make.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

BURCHETT: They're studying our political expediency. They're -- every, every angle of this and they do that in everything we do. I think they're also probably looking at just how weak our border is. And that's probably why were seeing quite a few Chinese coming over our southern border now, unchecked, communist Chinese that would in fact, if they do roll on Taiwan, I suspect there'll be up to no good if they're not already.

So I think its a the multi-faceted thing, but China studies everything we do and we've, again, because of our greed in this country, both parties, both parties, brother, we've allowed them in every which way we can and currently to this day, they're wreaking havoc I feel like.

SCIUTTO: Yesterday, your party's presumptive presidential nominee, of course, Donald Trump. He said that any Jewish-American who votes for Democrats quotes -- quote, hates their religion. Looking for consistency here, his former chief of staff, John Kelly, 40 years in the U.S. marines. He told me that while President Trump expressed admiration for Hitler, he said he did some good things.

I just wonder, are those comments acceptable?

BURCHETT: I have a -- I really have two rules in my office. One is when you name an alphabet agency, spell it out because I usually don't know what -- which one you're talking about. And the other is never make any mention of the Holocaust unless it's of the Holocaust.

My momma lost her brother fight the Nazis. The day she died, every time they play the national anthem, brother, she would cry. And I have these 48 star flag up on my wall.

There is no comparison to any the evil that Hitler brought into this world. And any antisemitic comments are not -- they are not allowed in my office.

But with Trump, you just need to ask Trump that.

SCIUTTO: Congressman Tim Burchett, thanks so much for joining this afternoon.

BURCHETT: Thank you, brother

SCIUTTO: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:32:00]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

President Biden is out west today, campaigning in two major battleground states, Arizona and Nevada, where Latino voters are a key. First up, Nevada. It's almost a third Latino rapidly diversifying. Biden won the state four years ago by just 33,000 votes. And it's hoping to shore up support there today, especially by focusing on the economy.

Have a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The fact is that the support around the country is real. I mean, it's not just -- it's not just for me, it's Kamala, for the Democratic Party. We've already created tens of thousands of good paying jobs right here, in this state as well, by the way. Clean jobs, jobs -- clean energy jobs,

Trump lost millions of jobs, millions when he was president. It's amazing how the nostalgia for lost four years was.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Let's bring in our political panel now, CNN commentators Karen Finney and Alice Stewart.

Good to have you both with me this afternoon

KAREN FINNEY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Hey, Jim.

ALICE STEWART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Hey, Jim. Great to be here.

SCIUTTO: So, Karen, that's a good encapsulation of Biden's message, not just in Nevada, but another states de its right, hey, the economies better than it was four years ago. Here's what I did, but also certainly messaging on women's rights, reproductive rights, et cetera.

FINNEY: Uh-huh.

SCIUTTO: Has any of that work -- we've been hearing, that it was in the State of the Union. He has been out there pushing hard, trying to change what are pretty negative ratings for this president on so many issues. Is there any data that shows it's working?

FINNEY: Well, actually, there is. I'm happy to say, and I've been talking to us a little bit.

So from the State of the Union, there's been a lot of testing, particularly. What I've seen is by the outside groups. I can't say what the internal polls are looking like and testing different sort of clips of the president talking about different issues. And they have started to re -- they are resonating.

And that's expected to -- that's exactly what you've got to do, right, when you're trying to rally the base. I thought one of the things about this event, too, it looks like he's at an organizing event, good to rally the troops before they go out and knock on doors and make calls.

But, yeah, we are -- we are seeing at least in the outside data that I'm looking at, that these messages are resonating. Now that it is more of a direct head-to-head, people are getting more engaged, they're paying more attention and recognize whether you liked it or not. It -- this is the matchup.

SCIUTTO: And, Alice Stewart, I wonder, you know, of course, the border and immigration like they post from our central issues to this election consistently rated at the top, or at least among the top issues for voters. And consistently we see Trump rating far better than Biden on border issues.

That said, Trump once again, is deploying offensive rhetoric when he speaks about immigrants. I'm going to play some sounds of Biden's response to Trump's comments, including calling some migrants animals. Have a listen

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

BIDEN: Here's what he said about immigrants, poisoning the blood of the country. He separated kids and parents at the border and caged children.

This guy despises Latinos. I understand Latino values.

[15:35:04]

You know, like the kind -- we just celebrated St. Patrick's Day. Hope you're not offended by my saying this, but you know, the thing about the Irish that came here, they're about family, about faith, about decency. And that's exactly what the Latino community is all about.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Let me, Alice, ask you a purely political question. Trump has an advantage on immigration. There's some signs he's gaining some voters among the Latino population. Isn't it beyond offensive -- isn't it dumb for him to describe immigrants and that way? STEWART: Yes, probably, yes. In the big picture, it's really not smart to use, you know, such device of rhetoric in many conversations, especially when you can actually talk about the policies. But in this most recent reference of immigrants are being animals, he specifically was talking about MS-13 gang members and saying they're animals. But that's beside the point.

He doesn't need to use that kind of rhetoric when he's addressing the crisis at the border because the facts speak for themselves, and the policies he had in place, we didn't have quite the surge at the border and President Biden overturn some of the mandates that Trump had in place, whether it's remained in Mexico or helping to build the wall. And three years later, we have a crisis at the border.

And, you know, you mentioned Latino voters in the Hispanic community, President Biden is in real trouble with that group, and we're seeing are the recent "New York Times"/CNN poll of Hispanic voters, 46 percent of Hispanic voters say they would support Donald Trump over Joe Biden, who comes in at 40 percent.

So President Biden is really going to have to really message to that community. And as he is in Arizona and Nevada, two states that he narrowly won in 2020, he's behind Trump in the Real Clear Politics average by 5.6 points. So he's got a lot of work to do and I agree with Karen, what is doing going out there and organizing and working with the ground game and getting the organization patient in place is key. But he's got a real messaging problem because he says the economy is good, but people across the country and specifically the Hispanic community don't feel that.

SCIUTTO: So, Karen Finney, there were polls and there were votes. And I've seen the same polls and I've referenced them before about Biden losing support among Latinos. But it if you look at recent presidential elections Trump actually got about the same percentage of Latino voters as Romney and McCain.

FINNEY: Uh-huh.

SCIUTTO: I wonder what the Democrats numbers are. I mean, is there a similar concern among the White House and Biden campaign that they are losing or do they say actually are numbers, they show something different?

FINNEY: Well, look, I think the goal of this campaign for I can tell you the conversation among Democrats is we are going to run like we are behind because we can't afford to lose. So nobody is taking anything for granted and anybody that says so, I promised you they get jumped down pretty quickly.

And having gone up against Trump in 2016, you know, I would just say again, you can't take anything for granted. But here's what I think is happening with the Latino vote. We've seen an expansion despite what people say about Trump, we have seen him do a little bit better with Latinos and African American voters, and that is of concern and something we have to work on, no question. But I think there's something that's going to be happening in Texas.

It's one thing to talk about border security. But now that the Supreme Court has rendered this decision that will allow Texas to restart their state law, which will not only deal with what's happening at the border, but also says that law enforcement can actually arrest people.

And then tried to send them back, quote/unquote, if they are from another country, that's going to create real fear among the Latino population, and we saw it in an Alabama when they did similar. And I think it's going to remind people that are values are comprehensive immigration reform that is humane, and that is the Democratic message.

SCIUTTO: Listen, on things like that, it's one thing to read about it or hear about it in theory. But when a member of your family gets stopped, obviously, it becomes very real characters.

FINNEY: That's right.

SCIUTTO: Karen Finney, Alice Stewart, thanks so much to both you.

FINNEY: Thanks.

STEWART: Thanks, Jim.

SCIUTTO: And still to come, Princess Kate spotted in public, as questions have swirled about her health. We're going to go live to London, next for an update.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:41:31]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

Prince William made a public appearance on Tuesday, announcing new homeless funding. But here's the public appearance folks are talking about Princess Catherine. Here it is video showing her out shopping after extensive public speculation about her health and whereabouts. There she is.

CNN's royal correspondent Max Foster joins us now from London.

An important moment here I think for the British public to see her out and about.

MAX FOSTER, CNN ROYAL CORRESPONDENT: Surprisingly so for some car park cell phone footage of some a couple out shopping, but this is a healthy couple. She looks well and she looks like she's getting old Prince William. So it does address many of the conspiracy theory that are out there.

This video wasn't pulled out of the palace. They would prefer it wasn't out there, but it certainly is serving them in some way because they've been putting out this message that she is well, they deliberately not wanted a fuel too much of this conspiracy, but it has got pretty out of control recently. And they didn't do themselves any favors when they put out a picture

that had been doctored initially around Mother's Day. We've had another one out now, as well. This came out last year actually, but Getty have just said that there was a picture that Kate took of the late queen with her children -- and grandchildren and great grandchildren, which was also doctored. And we've actually assess that as well to be the case.

So lots of issues going on there, but the interest doesn't die.

SCIUTTO: No question. Nice to see that video today, showing her healthy.

Max Foster, thanks so much.

Still ahead for our international viewers, "LIVING GOLF" is up next. For our U.S. viewers watching on Max, we're going to be back after this break with a look at how artificial intelligence is set to reshape the economy here in the U.S.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)