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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Democrats Rage At Sen. Schumer Amid Shutdown Deal; Interview With Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC); President Trump On Democrat Leader Schumer: "He Just Went Too Far;" Trump Pardons Allies Who Tried To Overturn 2020 Election; Rep. Raskin: Whistleblower Says Ghislaine Maxwell Working On Commutation Request And Getting Special Treatment In Prison; 2 MLB Pitchers Indicted In Pitch Rigging Scheme; Trump Wants To Issue $2,000 Tariff Rebate Checks. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired November 10, 2025 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BOB COSTAS, EMMY-AWARD WINNING SPORTSCASTER: It's so much easier to do now. My dad was an inveterate gambler. He had to gamble with bookies who were connected to the mob unless he went to Vegas. Now, it's everywhere, it's right in the palm of your hand. But because of my personal experience with that and because of my general feeling, I always refuse to read the gambling come-ons when I was broadcasting a game.
ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: Bob, always good to see you. Thank you for coming in today, appreciate it.
COSTAS: Thank you Erica, good to see you too.
HILL: Before we let you go, in earlier, K-file report do not include the full statement that we have from Abdul El Sayed's campaign. I do want to bring you that in full now.
In a statement to CNN, campaign spokesperson, Roxie Richner said that rather than defund the police Dr. El Sayed is challenging government choices, that defund food, healthcare, and social services by militarizing agencies like ICE in sharp contrast to Donald Trump's Presidency, because real safety comes from investing in people, not in tanks and teargas. Thanks for joining us.
AC360 starts right now.
[20:00:55]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Tonight on 360, it could come within the hour, a vote to finally end the government shutdown. The question now, has Democratic support for the move started a war within the party?
Also tonight, the President pardons Rudy Giuliani and others who helped him try to overturn the 2020 election. What they did and the message it now sends to his allies in future elections.
And later, as Ghislaine Maxwell reportedly angles for Presidential help getting out of prison, new allegations about the cushy life she leads there. Special meals, visits, service dog and all. Good evening, thanks for joining us tonight. The beginning of the end
of the longest government shutdown ever. This is day-41 and it's ending, these are live pictures with the Senate now holding a series of votes on a deal to fund the government through January 30th, pay furloughed federal workers and those who worked without pay and fund food stamps through September 2026.
Eight Democratic caucus members broke ranks to advance the measure, even though it does not deliver their original demand, namely extending health care premium subsidies. It only promises a vote next month on that which Democrats are expected to lose.
Now, despite major pushback within much the Democratic Party keeping the shutdown going, these eight, say, would not bring a better deal, only further harm they say to Americans.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. ANGUS KING (I-ME): The goal was to pressure the Republicans to negotiate an extension of those ACA health care credits, which Chuck Schumer was talking about. By the way, one of the first bills I introduced this year was to extend those ACA credits. The problem was the shutdown wasn't achieving that goal.
SEN. JEANNE SHAHEEN (D-NH): I understand that not all of my Democratic colleagues are satisfied with this agreement. But waiting another week or another month wouldn't deliver a better outcome. It would only mean more harm for families in New Hampshire and all across the country, and this is the only the first step.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Well, to call this unpopular with the rest of their party likely understates the case. Listen to Connecticut Democrat Senator Chris Murphy, who posted this as the deal went down.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. CHRIS MURPHY (D-CT): I've been working throughout the past few weeks to try to prevent this moment. After the elections on Tuesday, it just became absolutely clear that the American people do not want Democrats to be bullied into submission. They want Democrats to fight for their health care. They want Democrats to fight Trump's illegality.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Massachusetts Congressman Seth Moulton, who is running a primary against incumbent Democratic Senator Ed Markey, had this to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. SETH MOULTON (D-MA): I mean, the guy literally went to the Supreme Court this past weekend and pleaded with them to allow him to let Americans starve. What kind of President is this? And now we're going to give in to him? It doesn't make sense.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: It's a sentiment a lot of Democratic lawmakers and supporters are expressing as they look at the Presidents cut off of food assistance, coupled with him throwing lavish parties in Mar-a-Lago while lines at food banks grow, compounded by the repudiation the voters delivered last week in a series of Democratic electoral victories.
On top of the anger, over thousands of canceled and delayed flights and those Democrats are asking why give in now?
To that point, the President just weighed in on Fox saying this about Senate Minority Leader Schumer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Well, I think he made a mistake in going too far.
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST, "THE INGRAHAM ANGLE": Going too far, how?
TRUMP: Well, he just went too far. He thought he could break the Republicans and the Republicans broke him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: We start off tonight on Capitol Hill with chief congressional correspondent Manu Raju. So, Manu, the Senate has been voting tonight. Where do things stand?
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we expect a vote to pass this bill as soon as later this hour, potentially into the 9:00 P.M. Eastern hour. And then it would go over to the United States House, where we expect the House to come back, probably by Wednesday, to give its final blessing of the bill.
But also, we do expect this to pass in the narrowest of margins, not just in the House, but also in the Senate because of those eight Democrats who did vote yes.
They gave it to the magic number of 60 votes in the United States Senate, which is what you need to overcome any attempts to try to thwart the legislation, which is what's prompted so much concern among Democrats who believe that the minority of the minority in their caucus should not have agreed to this, given that they had to concede on their chief demand to extend the affordable care act subsidies.
They will get a separate vote in mid-December on this bill, on any sort of healthcare bill that they draft. There is no guarantee, though, that that bill will become law. In fact, it most certainly will not. And that's what the Democrats who are critical of this plan are telling me tonight. They say it is now incumbent on those eight Democrats who are voting for this bill to find a health care deal with Republicans.
[20:05:32]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. RUBEN GALLEGO (D-AZ): My whole goal, my whole purpose of engaging in this process, was to make sure that 24 million Americans did not see their insurance premiums. I'm going to continue focusing on that. I believe and hope that those eight senators are going to do everything they can, whatever they were able to get in terms of leverage, in terms of favor from these Republicans, that they're going to be able to deliver that.
KING: I understand my colleagues wanted to make this stand and say, well, the Republicans are going to come to the table and negotiate. There was no indication that they were going to do that. If the strategy you're following isn't working, and it's also hurting people in the process, it seems to me it's time to change the strategy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RAJU: And that's what the Democrats who have been supporting this plan have been saying is that, look, nothing was going to change next week. And they point to President Trump's hard line, the increasing hard line he took against extending Affordable Care Act subsidies over the last several days.
They had initially thought that perhaps Trump could get behind some sort of extension on these ACA subsidies, especially in the aftermath of the Republican election losses last Tuesday. But after Trump came out on social media and bashed Obamacare, said that he wouldn't go along with this idea, the approach changed. I'm told, by these Democratic members saying that, look, we have to take the deal that's on the table. This is the best deal we can get. We can't afford to see this shutdown last even longer, causing so much pain for the American public, which is why they ultimately cut this deal. But as a result, Anderson, facing a lot of blowback from the left.
COOPER: Yes, Manu, thank you. If the bill is approved in the Senate, obviously it goes to the House where Speaker Johnson said it could get a vote as early as Wednesday.
Joining me now is Democratic Congressman Jim Clyburn from South Carolina, author of the new book, "The First Eight: A Personal History of the Pioneering Black Congressman who Shaped a Nation."
Congressman, I appreciate you joining us. I'm going to talk about the book in a moment. If this does come to the House, would you vote for it? And if not, do you think there's enough Democrats who would?
REP. JAMES CLYBURN (D-SC): Well, first of all, thank you very much for having me. I don't think I can, not so much because of the deal itself. I think that if you talk about allowing a vote, the question is, are you allowing the presentation of the bill, or are you going to allow us to go to a vote on the bill, or are we going to get caught up in the 60-vote question? Democrats don't have 60 votes. Now, they did not have enough votes to
break the filibuster. Eight Democrats gave them the votes necessary to move forward. Now, will 13 Republicans give us votes enough to get beyond, the filibuster threshold and have a direct vote on the bill?
So, I would have to look at and see exactly whether or not that's going to happen, because if you get a vote on the bill, then everybody in America will get to see exactly who is for it and who is not.
COOPER: But what do you say to Democrats who are angry tonight at these eight Democratic Senators?
CLYBURN: I share their anger. I do not believe that we could not do better than this.
COOPER: Do you think there was a better deal to be had?
CLYBURN: Well, there's one thing not to continue. It's something else to offer an alternative. Now, Schumer put up a bill, that didn't go anywhere. The question is, was there some other bill that could be presented? Should we have attempted to pass Schumer's bill with less in it? I don't know. That's not what happened here.
What happened here, it seems to me, is that they decided not to fight any longer and didn't get any more for it. Now, I always say that the darkest point of the night is that moment just before dawn. And so, we were in a very dark place. But was it the darkest point of the night? Was dawn going to come in the next moment? Who knows?
But if you stop fighting and that's what our folks wanted us to do, they did their part in the elections last week. They fought hard, they turned out votes that nobody expected would turn out and all over the country. They registered the fact that they thought the Democrats were fighting for them, and they fought for us. The moment the fight was over, it looks like we have stopped fighting.
[20:10:17]
COOPER: Talking about fighting, this book is about the first eight Black Congressmen who served from your state. You were the ninth and there was a 95-year gap between the last Black congressmen elected than you. Talk a little bit about why you wrote this book now.
CLYBURN: Well, when I started out writing this book, it was sort of a passion for me. I studied history all my life. I've known about these people forever. My father made me learn stuff about them when I was a teenager. And one day, someone saw their pictures on the wall of my office and asked me who they were.
And when I explained who they were, they expressed the thought that I was the first Black congressman from South Carolina. And I kind of playfully said, no, no before I was first, there were eight.
And so, I decided later that day that maybe my next book, because this happened right after I wrote my memoir which was published ten years ago that I would write a book about these eight people and about six or seven years ago, I started. But then, the election of 2020 happened, and the reaction to that election trying to get alternative electors coming out of Florida and Georgia and, Pennsylvania and Michigan. And I said to myself, wait a minute, this is exactly what brought an end to the service of these eight people, when they were in the Congress.
COOPER: History repeating itself?
CLYBURN: Yes, and so, I changed directions and decided, to make this not just a history of these eight people, but rather of a biography and show how what has happened today when it happened before. And so, people would get a good understanding of exactly what is happening.
COOPER: It's extraordinary when you know you live long enough, you start to see history repeating time and time again and lessons that we learned forgotten. The book is "The First Eight" by Congressman Clyburn, thank you so much, I really appreciate it.
CLYBURN: Thank you, appreciate it.
COOPER: Coming up next, more on the divided Democrats on Capitol Hill as we wait for this key vote, a party that just won a major series of election battles but can now be at war with itself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. HAKEEM JEFFRIES, (D-NY): Now, with respect to the senators on the other side of the Capitol, they're going to have to explain themselves.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Later, what to make of this Presidential promise to put thousands of dollars in American's pockets.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We're going to issue a dividend to our middle income people and lower income people about $2,000.00 and we're going to use the remaining tariffs to lower our debt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:17:35]
COOPER: Looking at the Senate floor where a vote to end the government shutdown could come within the hour. Again, eight members of the Democratic caucus paved the way for this, setting off a wave of criticism from across the party's ideological spectrum.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MURPHY: There's no way to defend this and you are right to be angry about it. I'm angry about it. JEFFRIES: Now, with respect to the senators on the other side of the
Capitol, they're going to have to explain themselves.
SEN. JOHN HICKENLOOPER (D-CO): I voted no just because I am just so pissed off. I'm just frustrated.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: He's not the only one. California Congressman Ro Khanna writes, "Senator Schumer is no longer effective and should be replaced."
Massachusetts Congressman Seth Moulton, who recently announced a bid for the Senate, says, "Tonight is another example of why we need new leadership. If Chuck Schumer were an effective leader, he would have united his caucus to vote no tonight and hold the line on health care."
Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin did not mention Schumer by name, but writes in part, "Leadership is about changing and adapting when there is real need and unless we hear that, we will fail to meet the moment".
Still others like Senator Tammy Baldwin, lamented not being able to address the crisis facing countless Americans, saying, "A wink and a nod to deal with this health care crisis later, with no actual guarantees is just not enough for me or the Wisconsin families I work for."
I'm joined now by former senior adviser to President Obama, David Axelrod; former Trump White House communications director Alyssa Farah Griffin and CNN political director David Chalian.
So David Axelrod, to democratic voters who look at this and say, the party finally had some wind at their backs after last week's election results, why would they fold now, you say, what?
DAVID AXELROD, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, look, they have reason to be unhappy because the Democratic leadership said for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks that this is a battle about health care and particularly about these health premiums that are going to skyrocket now in the Affordable Care Act without action by Congress, and that this is what we are fighting for and this is really the key.
And then, they suddenly walked away from it and this has been part of a pattern that people have seen. There is a strong feeling among Democrats that they've been rolled quite a bit over the last ten months. You remember there was a -- there was another Continuing Resolution in March where Senator Schumer said for a month, we're going to fight, we're going to fight, we're going to fight and then over a 24-hour period, he caved and led nine others with him to pass that C.R. and that there was a tremendous backlash to that.
There will be a tremendous backlash to this within the party. And I think what you're going to see it, Anderson, is in primaries. I think there are insurgent candidates running against party, blessed candidates in a lot of these open seat races for the Senate who are going to bear the weight of this.
[20:20:32]
COOPER: Alyssa, I'm curious how you think President Trump sees this for any negotiations going forward.
ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think the President thinks that he called Democrat's bluff. And listen, this is the reality of losing elections. Democrats are in the minority in the Senate and the House. And I think he held longer than, frankly, I expected him to.
But what ultimately happened is, yes, this fight was about the Obamacare subsidies, but it became an untenable position for Democrats to say, we are holding out because 20 million Americans are going to see their premiums skyrocket, but at the expense of 40 million Americans who are not going to get their SNAP benefits.
Letting people feel the pain, which was a really, really risky gambit by The White House and by Congressional Republicans, seems to have panned out. And I would just ask Democrats who are pushing back. I mean, this was always the logical conclusion of this shutdown. You see flights that aren't taking off. You see FAA shortages, you see benefits that aren't going out.
There are some wins in here, and I'm going to take John Thune at his word that he's going to give this vote on Obamacare. Because keep in mind, President Trump has been pushing him to nuke the filibuster and to pass this with just Republican votes. He didn't do that. He gave his word that he's going to give them their vote. So, they're going to have their day. If the votes aren't there, that's the problem with being in the minority, frankly.
COOPER: David Chalian frustrating for Democrats, but was it a smart thing to do or -- well, sensible?
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: I mean, you heard Tim Kaine, one of the eight senators who participated in this deal, the Democrat from Virginia, say, you know, there were many more who were happy we were doing this, even though they're not voting with us on this. I think sort of giving voice to what Alyssa was just talking about.
I do think that there was no clear path to get Trump and the Republicans to actually engage in a negotiation about the health care subsidies before opening up the government. That had been clear from the outset. So, it is a bit of that logical conclusion, but that does not change the energy in the party that is demanding fight.
And David was talking about how this may play out in Democratic primaries, Anderson. What's so interesting to me in the reaction is across the ideological divide in those primaries, whether it's the establishment candidate or it's the progressive insurgent candidate in those primaries, they were all agreed to be opposed to this deal. If you're a candidate facing voters as a Democrat, no matter where you are in the spectrum, you were opposed.
It's that these eight senators, none of them are up for reelection this next cycle. Two of them are retiring.
COOPER: David Axelrod, I mean, do you think Schumer could be in trouble here with the left flank of the party?
AXELROD: I think he's been in trouble. I think he is in bigger trouble now. I honestly, I think Senator Schumer has been there since 1982. My guess is that he won't be leader of the party in 2027 after this election, unless something really surprising happens.
But one thing I want to say that we haven't discussed, we're talking about the internal strife within the Democratic Party. Democrats had internal strife before these elections last Tuesday, and they unified because they had a bigger concern, which was Donald Trump.
And I think one of the problems Republicans have to consider now is Democrats did do a very good job of shining a bright light on this Affordable Care Act issue and the general issue of health care costs, and now Republicans were steadfast in opposing a solution to it. Maybe they'll change their mind, but this is a heavy burden for them to carry into the into the midterm elections.
COOPER: Alyssa, do you think the Republicans feel that burden?
GRIFFIN: Yes and listen, there's been a lot of oxygen on Marjorie Taylor Greene speaking out about these Obamacare subsidies because it impacts her but state, but I'd also point to Mike Lawler who's in a very, very swing district in New York, who's also in favor of a one- year extension of these Obamacare subsidies.
Now, you can be like me and think that Obamacare is a mess that needs to be addressed. It's created monopolies, there's a lot that needs to be dealt with in a major legislative manner, but also believe you cannot pull the rug out from under people who may see their premiums skyrocket in the next year.
I think there's going to be a growing momentum ahead of the midterms among Republicans, especially in vulnerable seats, to want to extend these Obamacare subsidies. You cannot run for reelection in 2026 if you have people whose premiums are going from $500.00 a month to $2,400.00 a month, which is as high as it can go in some states. So, I think it's very much an unresolved problem for Republicans still at this time.
COOPER: David Chalian, do you see this as a rallying cry for Democrats for the midterms?
CHALIAN: I do, and again, not because of the Senate strategy or how Democrats gamed out the shutdown. I don't think the shutdown will impact the 2026 very much but I do think we saw the real potency of affordability, this health care issue in the elections last week that drove a lot of Democratic turnout, as David said, also, opposition to Trump that too, powerful message opposed to Trump putting affordability in the economy and people's lived economy front and center, that is a very powerful message right now the Democrats are going to ride in 2026.
[20:25:34]
COOPER: David Chalian, David Axelrod, thank you, Alyssa Farah Griffin as well.
Coming up next, the impact of a new wave of pardons, this time for the 2020 election and the falsehoods like this one surrounding it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUDY GIULIANI, FORMER TRUMP ATTORNEY: I know crimes, I can smell them. You don't have to smell this one. I can prove it to you 18 different ways. I can prove to you that he won Pennsylvania by 300,000 votes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: The hair dye dripping down the face, it's legendary.
Later, the efforts Ghislaine Maxwell is reportedly now making to secure clemency from the President.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:30:44]
COOPER: For a president whose first big act in office this time around was pardoning people who stormed the Capitol to be police officers and tried to chase down and perhaps hang a vice president all to overturn the election he lost, perhaps it shouldn't be surprising that he's now also pardoning the lawyers and other officials who helped lay the groundwork for it.
Former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, his former election lawyers, Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, two architects of the fake elector scheme, Kenneth Chesebro and John Eastman, Attorney Boris Epshteyn, Georgia Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones, those plus many, many more lesser known people who served as the so-called alternate electors as part of the last ditch attempt to change the election's outcome.
In a statement today, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the pardon recipients were and I quote, "persecuted and put through hell by the Biden administration for challenging an election which is the cornerstone of democracy."
Now keeping them honest, the word persecuted is a subjective one. Prosecuted, on the other hand, is a matter of fact. Jenna Ellis and Kenneth Chesebro, for example, these two, those are their mugshots, pleaded guilty in Georgia to election-related state charges which a presidential pardon does not erase. So did Sidney Powell.
And state charges elsewhere are still pending against Giuliani, Mark Meadows, many of the 2020 fake electors and others on the pardon list. Giuliani's been disbarred in New York and in D.C. for his role in the 2020 aftermath during which he made countless false or unsupported allegations like this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) RUDY GIULIANI, LAWYER AND FORMER ASSOCIATE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES: I've tried a hundred cases. I prosecuted some of the most dangerous criminals in the world. I know crimes. I can smell them. You don't have to smell this one. I can prove it to you 18 different ways. I can prove to you that he won Pennsylvania by 300,000 votes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Apparently, his sense of smell had faded. He could not prove what he promised, nor could Sidney Powell prove this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SIDNEY POWELL, AMERICAN ATTORNEY: What we are really dealing with here and uncovering more by the day is the massive influence of communist money through Venezuela, Cuba, and likely China in the interference with our elections here in the United States. The Dominion Voting Systems, the Smartmatic technology software, and the software that goes in other computerized voting systems here as well, not just Dominion, were created in Venezuela at the direction of Hugo Chavez to make sure he never lost an election after one constitutional referendum came out the way he did not want it to come out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: That actually happened five years ago. That too was false. Also false, claims by law professor John Eastman upon which a California court based its recommendation that he be disbarred. His case is now before the state Supreme Court.
There's nothing a presidential pardon can do about that. What it can do, though, critics say, is send a signal to would-be future allies that the President has their back when it comes to any federal charges. And as Bulwark publisher and conservative Trump critic Sarah Longwell put it online today, it says something else.
She writes, "Anyone who helps me try to steal an election gets a pardon is perhaps the most corrupt thing to happen in American history."
Joining us now, Jeffrey Toobin, bestselling author of "The Pardon: The Politics of Presidential Mercy." So in a recent opinion piece, you wrote, pardons and commutations offer X-rays into the souls of presidents more than any other presidential actions. Clemencies tell us who they are. What does this say about President Trump, then?
JEFFREY TOOBIN, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Well, you know, pardons are an exception in our Constitution to the concept of checks and balances. There are no checks and balances on pardons. Presidents can do whatever they want. There is nothing Congress can do. There's nothing courts can do.
So it really is this unilateral power that tells you a lot about these presidents. And what it tells you is that Donald Trump wants America to believe that the people who tried to overturn the election, whether through violence like the 1,600 at the Capitol or through the courts like Giuliani and company, did nothing wrong. That's the message here is that they were right all along.
The President continues to lie about the fact that he lost the 2020 election. He is using these pardons to try to persuade people that he wasn't lying, that this was all a good cause.
[20:35:06]
COOPER: I mean, none of these people were actually indicted on federal charges.
TOOBIN: Correct. And it's unusual, but it is possible to give a pardon for people who haven't yet been charged. The most famous example of that was in 1974, Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon, even though he hadn't faced any federal charges. It's the same paradigm with these people. But it's really more of a political statement.
I don't think anyone believes that any federal government is going to indict Rudy Giuliani for this at this point. But it's the political statement of the pardon that the President wants to make.
COOPER: Do you think it also sends a message to folks who are currently serving for him, whether it's the Department of Justice or wherever it may be, that I'll have your back?
TOOBIN: Absolutely. That as long as you were with Trump, the very fact that you were with Trump means you can't be violating the law. And I think if you look at the political way that he has used pardons, you know, he is a completely transactional person.
He has pardoned a bunch of the Biden accusers, especially Hunter Biden's accusers, who were convicted of really egregious white collar crimes. But he's pardoned them because they were on his side with Hunter Biden. I think, you know, he's using pardons throughout his presidency, not saving them up to the end like most presidents do, to send the message that if you're with him, you're going to be taken care of.
COOPER: Yes. Jeff Toobin, thank you.
Up next, Jeffrey Epstein's co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, the sentence commutation that a whistleblower says she's trying for, and the VIP treatment she's allegedly getting now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D), RANKING MEMBER, JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: She's basically being treated like an honored guest at a Trump hotel rather than a federal prisoner.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Also, tonight, another betting scandal rocking professional sports, this time in baseball. We'll have details ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:41:40]
COOPER: Jeffrey Epstein's co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell, is working on a presidential commutation application and getting special treatment in prison. Now, those are new allegations from a whistleblower, according to Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee.
He's written a six-page letter to the President demanding that he, quote, "provide answers for the American people and all the survivors harmed by Ms. Maxwell's conduct." She was moved to a lower security prison in Texas in August after being interviewed by the President's former personal attorney turned Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.
More now from CNN's MJ Lee.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL ENTERPRISE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Convicted child sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell is hoping to reverse her fortunes with help from President Donald Trump.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Would you consider a pardon or a commutation for Ghislaine Maxwell if she's cooperating --
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's something I haven't thought about. It's really something --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If they recommend it --
TRUMP: It's -- I'm allowed to do it.
LEE (voice-over): Trump, when asked, has repeatedly not ruled out the possibility of leniency for the late Jeffrey Epstein's notorious right-hand woman. According to a whistleblower who is making new allegations, Maxwell is currently working on filing an application for a commutation.
RASKIN: She's basically being treated like an honored guest at a Trump hotel rather than a federal prisoner.
LEE (voice-over): Congressman Jamie Raskin, the House Judiciary Committee's top Democrat, says the whistleblower also claims that Maxwell is receiving preferential treatment at the prison camp in Bryan, Texas, where she's currently serving out her 20-year sentence.
The favorable concierge-style treatment is said to include private meetings with visitors, including snacks and refreshments for her guests. Maxwell's guests being allowed to bring in computers during their visits. And the camp's warden personally helping to send e-mails on Maxwell's behalf.
Maxwell's lawyer and the Justice Department did not comment.
TODD BLANCHE, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: Did you ever observe President Trump receive a massage?
GHISLAINE MAXWELL, JEFFREY EPSTEIN'S NOTORIOUS RIGHT-HAND WOMAN: Never.
LEE (voice-over): These new revelations coming less than four months after Trump's deputy attorney general and former personal lawyer Todd Blanche met in person with Maxwell at her previous prison in Florida.
MAXWELL: I never witnessed the President in any inappropriate setting in any way. In the times that I was with him, he was a gentleman in all respects.
LEE (voice-over): During the course of two days of interviews, Maxwell telling Blanche that she had never seen Trump behave inappropriately. Trump, who was friends with Epstein decades ago, has not been accused of any wrongdoing related to Epstein.
DAVIS OSCAR MARKUS, ATTORNEY FOR GHISLAINE MAXWELL: Ghislaine answered every single question asked of her over the last day and a half.
Ms. Maxwell would welcome any relief.
LEE (voice-over): Just days after Blanche's unusual July meeting with Maxwell, the convicted felon was transferred out of a low security federal prison in Tallahassee to a minimum security facility in Texas. The move drew the ire of critics, Democrats and Epstein survivors alike.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were horrified to learn that she had been transferred to a prison camp.
ANOUSKA DE GEORGIOU, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: It's one of my worst nightmares that she not only be transferred, but the possibility that's very much going around that she might be pardoned.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEE (on-camera): And we certainly expect the Epstein survivors to continue speaking out. We saw it at that last press conference there. I've heard it in the conversations that I have had one-on-one with some of these survivors. And they are really disturbed by any possibility, Anderson, of Ghislaine Maxwell getting any kind of preferential treatment or any idea of leniency being afforded to her.
[20:45:14]
And, Anderson, the Epstein-Maxwell issue really has been sort of ready to bubble up when we are starting to see that now as the government is getting ready to reopen again. Because, remember, there is that discharge petition that is just lacking that one final signature. And we expect that Adelita Grijalva, whenever she is eventually sworn in, is going to provide that last signature to force a House vote on the issue of the Epstein files.
And I am told, Anderson, finally, that some of these Epstein survivors are just waiting for the next opportunity to descend on Washington, D.C. again so that they can continue pressing this issue. Anderson?
COOPER: MJ Lee, thanks very much.
Joining me now to discuss is Erick Erickson, conservative commentator, host of the nationally syndicated "The Eric Erickson Show." Erick, it's great to have you on again.
The President has repeatedly been asked if he is considering a pardon or a commutation for Ghislaine Maxwell. Why do you think he just doesn't completely rule it out for a convicted sex offender?
ERICK ERICKSON, HOST, "THE ERICK ERICKSON SHOW": He should. The Republicans have handled the Jeffrey Epstein stuff as well as the Democrats handled the shutdown, which is to say badly on all sides. It's frustrating that he won't just come out and do this. And he oftentimes doesn't.
And I think he should to shut down the conversation on this. But I also think that we're probably here talking about this today because of the Democrats in the Senate caving on the shutdown. Progressives need to be distracted. And I think both sides start weaponizing these anonymous whistleblowers to say, hey, hey, base, look at this thing over here. Don't look at how we just lost them.
The Republicans did it repeatedly with Joe Biden where suddenly a whistleblower would be like, ah, guess what this other Biden revelation was. And now we're back to Epstein. But we're only there because Republicans did it to Joe Biden and never released the list. This is why I hate everything about Washington these days.
COOPER: Well, I mean, Maxwell, it is weird that Maxwell is behind bars for three years of a 20-year sentence. And one week after her meetings with Todd Blanche, you know, President Trump's deputy AG, former personal attorney, gets transferred to this minimum security prison in Texas, which is uncommon since sex offenders almost always deemed too high of a risk for public safety. I mean, it looks -- it certainly be seen as special treatment.
ERICKSON: I mean, they -- this White House, remember, why are we actually here, though, Anderson? In this one, there's -- someone should write a book on this other than me. We're here because the Republicans held Epstein over the Democrats head --
COOPER: Right.
ERICKSON: -- and claimed that there was a White House cover up with Joe Biden. And now suddenly we're talking about the Republicans and they botched it the entire way through. There are so many questions, but those questions have long predated.
And, meanwhile, by the way, I do have to say there actually are real victims here. And I do hope all of the information comes out in Congress. I think people will probably be disappointed by some of what's there. But the victims, a lot of them were pressured into signing nondisclosure agreements and only the speech and debate clause in Congress can get around that. So I'm not a big Marjorie Taylor Greene fan, for example, but God bless her for wanting to stand up for these women.
COOPER: But you raise a really interesting point, which is kind of often forgotten. Republicans were using this against Democrats --
ERICKSON: Yes.
COOPER: -- long ago. And, you know, talking about the files, you know, there were phony flight lists that would be published and --
ERICKSON: Pam Bondi did, yes.
COOPER: Any time somebody -- this is even before Trump came in. You know, any time, you know, somebody was critical of -- a famous person was critical of President Trump or of Donald Trump when he was out of office, suddenly they would pop up on these phony flight lists. My name was on a phony flight list out there for a while.
ERICKSON: Yes.
COOPER: So it's interesting to me that the very people who were using that, you know, the Kash Patels, Dan Bonginos are now running the FBI and are, you know, now having to deal with the repercussions of the shenanigans they were pulling before they came into power.
ERICKSON: Listen, there's a level of poetic justice in the fact that, I mean, Pam Bondi was on with John Roberts on Fox said she had the list on her desk.
COOPER: Right.
ERICKSON: There was no list. And now you do have Kash Patel and Dan Bongino say, well, actually, we thought there was a list. Turns out there is no list. Who do you believe?
This is why both sides and it really is a both sides issue should stop taking advantage of the vulnerable. You got the President out doing a 50-year mortgage today because the economy still screwed up and they're out of ideas and Democrats are screaming Epstein because they have no ideas either. Washington's broken and all they can do is throw chum in the water for their bases.
COOPER: Erick Erickson, great to have you on again. Thank you.
Coming up next, Major League Baseball being rocked by an alleged sports betting scandal just weeks after allegations of mafia link gambling and sports rigging schemes in the NBA. Two Cleveland Guardians pitchers, Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz, are accused of working with co-conspirators to rig specific pitches that they themselves threw.
Now prosecutors say the inside information we use to place fraudulent bets, which earned hundreds of thousands of dollars for betters with money kicked back to both players who now face multiple conspiracy charges. [20:50:09]
Major League Baseball released a statement that says it, quote, "contacted federal law enforcement at the outset of its investigation and has fully cooperated throughout the process." Now, tonight, the league is putting new gambling safeguards in place.
I want to discuss it with Bomani Jones, who's hosted "The Right Time with Bomani Jones" podcast. Thanks for so much for being on the program. Do you think professional sports has a gambling problem here?
BOMANI JONES, HOST, "THE RIGHT TIME WITH BOMANI JONES" PODCAST: Well, yes, I think the big problem that they have is all of these outcomes were very, very likely and foreseeable. But this is -- I guess they've decided there was going to be the cost of doing business once they decided to really lean into the idea of legalized gambling. But any time you get to a place where every couple of weeks you feel like these stories are coming out about in major sports, it's hard to say they don't have a problem.
COOPER: Prosecutors allege that these two pitchers, they got $1,200 each for rigging pitches for men who are both, I mean, making money that most people can only dream of. I don't -- I'm always surprised at how low the dollar figures are that people are destroying -- potentially destroying their lives for. I mean, $1,200, you know, these -- I don't think these are hugely known pitchers.
You can correct me if I'm wrong. I don't know any pitchers, but it doesn't seem like they're -- I'm sure they're being decently paid.
JONES: They're being decently paid. And Clase is one of the best relief pitchers in baseball. But I think that people --
COOPER: Show -- OK, show us how much I know.
JONES: Yes. But people with good judgment typically have a difficult time understanding the behaviors of people who have bad judgment, like people who don't know a bad idea when they see them. But the reasons that people wind up in these sorts of situations can be myriad.
Often it's because somebody owes some money. Sometimes people just don't know that what they're doing is a just a terrible idea to engage in. But I was a little surprised at how low the dollar amounts were that seemed to be alleging, you know, the allegations are that induce these guys to get involved in this.
COOPER: And majorly baseball, now they're taking measures to address it by enacting limits for betting on specific pitches. I didn't realize that was a thing.
JONES: Yes, it is preposterous that you could bet on these things in the first place. And what they're saying is the allegations in place were someone would place a bet about whether or not a particular pitch would be a ball or a strike or what the velocity of that particular pitch would be. And so the shenanigans are the pitcher can determine both of those things, give that information to people, and then they bet in that.
Clase is alleged to also have, you know, given people money to bet on himself under those circumstances. And you would think that in the design of this, that people would have recognized how easy --
COOPER: Yes.
JONES: -- that would be for somebody to decide to try to fix why you were able to bet on something so manipulable and so small. That is crazy. So now the limit is, oh, you can only bet up to $200 on something like this. But the real question is whether or not those types of bets should be allowed at all.
COOPER: Yes. Bomani Jones, thank you so much. Appreciate it.
JONES: Thank you.
COOPER: Up next, the President's proposal will give Americans $2,000 tariff rebate. Details on that ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:57:53]
COOPER: At a time when millions of Americans worried about the rising cost of living, the President now says he wants to send out $2,000 rebate checks paid for by tariffs.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: One of the things we're going to do, we're going to issue a dividend to our middle income people and lower income people of about $2,000. And we're going to use the remaining tariffs to lower our debt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: So we likely can't do this without congressional approval. It appears that there's not enough tariff revenue that's been collected to actually pay for it.
So I want to bring in CNN's data guru, Harry Enten. How popular is that u have a rebate?
HARRY ENTEN, CNN DATA ANALYST: Yes. Besides all those problems, how was the theater show, Mrs. Lincoln? Look, at the end of the day, this is probably going to be one of the most popular things he would have done in a long time if he could get it done.
You could see it in the Google trends. There's a ton of interest in this particular story. We're talking about Google searches for stimulus checks way up over 3,000 percent versus before this conversation started. It is, in fact, now the most searched topic associated with Donald Trump after months upon months of negative news. This seems to at least got Americans at least somewhat (INAUDIBLE). COOPER: Well, it's so smart about the idea is that it takes a negative, which is terror of people's perception of tariffs. And it's, you know, if it was possible, seemingly turns it into a positive.
ENTEN: Yes, it turns out people like to get money, right? And tariffs are something that are tremendously unpopular. Look at Donald Trump's approval rating on tariffs.
Look at this. The approval rate is just 37 percent. The disapproval rating, 61 percent. The average was he's trying to take something that is a negative, as you pointed out, and turn it into something that is actually a positive.
COOPER: In 2020, when he put a signature on the stimulus checks that went out to people during COVID, were the -- was that -- what did that do to his popularity?
ENTEN: It actually worked. You know, there was a great experiment that was run. And it turns out that the checks that were sent to people that actually had Donald Trump's name on it, those folks, in fact, were 20 percent plus more likely to vote for Donald Trump than other voters were.
So it turns out Donald Trump probably is trying to take a lesson from that and says, you know what? I'm going to try and boost my popularity by giving folks do-re-mi.
COOPER: Do-re -- all right.
ENTEN: So-la-ti-do.
COOPER: Harry Enten, thank you.
ENTEN: Thank you.
COOPER: Before we go, quick note on my podcast, All There Is, new episode releases tomorrow night. My guest this week is country music superstar Kenny Chesney. The podcast is available starting 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time tomorrow, wherever you get your podcast.
Or you can listen or watch it the full video version of my conversation with Kenny at our grief community page, CNN.com/AllThereIs. You can access a full library of past podcast episodes there and watch my new companion streaming show All There Is Live at CNN.com/AllThereIs.
That's it for us. The news continues. The Source with Kaitlan Collins starts now. See you tomorrow.
