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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Trump Vows to Hit Iran Much Harder if It Retaliates; Interview with Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE); Hegseth's Focus On Culture Wars Draws Scrutiny; Jury Indicates They Are Deadlocked Again in Lindsay Clancy Trial; Kennedy Center Removes Outdoor Sculpture Blue; Court Battles Continue Over Adding Trump's Name to Kennedy Center; MapQuest is Number One on App Store After Refusing to Change Lake Ontario's Name; Demonstrators Protest Against Moroccan Migrants in Ceuta, Spain; State Department Says 75 Americans Still Missing in Nepal. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired September 02, 2026 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: ... few hours today. Crews arrived here and took multiple hours to go piece by piece, beam by beam, removing parts of this aluminum sculpture. You can see here this hole in the ground here where the sculpture once was. In fact, you have the plaque here acknowledging the artist, Joe Shapiro, who made this piece of art. He died just only last year.
And you'll see we're just steps away from the shadow of the main Kennedy Center building here Kania Center officials, Erin, offering no explanation as to why this root part was removed now other than routine deinstallation, Erin.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: All right, Sunlen, thank you very much. And thanks to all of you for being with us. AC360 begins now.
[20:00:48]
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: Good evening, Jim Sciutto here sitting in for Anderson, who is on his way back from Nepal.
Tonight, the President says he is prepared to strike Iran again, in his words, any time we want. Yet even as he makes that threat, there is growing controversy surrounding the man in charge of prosecuting the war. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and a new call for the President to fire him. The controversy centers on how he is managing the conflict, the Pentagon and the military's transformation into a modern fighting force. That, and what critics say he is prioritizing instead, namely, waging culture wars.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETE HEGSETH, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF WAR SECRETARY: We're not a college or a university. We're not interested in your woke garbage and your political correctness. We're war fighters who close with and destroy the enemy -- (END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: Today was Army Secretary Dan Driscoll's last day on the job. According to "The Atlantic," before announcing his resignation, he brought his concerns about Secretary Hegseth directly to the President in person. He was, "The Atlantic" reports surprised when Secretary Driscoll told him how many generals and other top officers had been purged under Hegseth, making it impossible, he reportedly said, for the Army to transform itself the way it must.
Subsequently, multiple sources have told us they agree with the concerns Driscoll raised that Secretary Hegseth is damaging efforts to adapt the Army to modern drone warfare and focusing instead on fighting those culture wars, even, as it turns out, petty ones.
On Monday, he posted this photo of a Canadian military youth cadet on the left and her trainer there on the right. His caption quote, "this is real, two young women, one or both, apparently not fitting his image of the proper war fighter, it seems."
Former Republican Congressman and combat veteran Adam Kinzinger responded online with this. Literally, they're kids. This is a cadet program, and our asshat. His words of a secretary of defense is making fun of children, MAGA males are betas who have to punch down to feel big.
Whatever Secretary Hegseth had in mind, neither of these women expected to be part of his culture war, especially in the middle of a very real one, which the secretary is also now facing criticism for. Today, the President weighed in on the latest U.S. airstrikes and threatened more to come.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We hit them hard last night, very hard. They gave a little love tap, but we hit them very hard, last night. We took out all of the new equipment that they tried to build along the Strait of Hormuz. Some defensive, some offensive. It was a very heavy attack last night, and we're prepared to do another one any time we want.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: Yet at the same time, he was threatening more of the same, though the President was seemingly signaling less of it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: How long will this renewed campaign go forward?
TRUMP: I don't think it's too long.
REPORTER: And also, given that what you've said about having destroyed the Iranian military, what is there still left to strike and why?
TRUMP: Okay, we have controlled and we are controlling the Hormuz Strait.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: In fact, not quite and a simple measure is the price of oil, which is again, approaching $100.00 a barrel, at the same time, to hear the President signaling that this new phase of combat would be brief lends credence to recent reporting that U.S. Forces in the region and elsewhere are stretched very thin.
The Supercarrier Abraham Lincoln just docked in Thailand after more than nine months at sea and widely reported supply shortages and morale problems on board. Secretary Hegseth called the reports, "completely misrepresented."
But "The Washington Post" recently reported that a number of top military commanders have warned him about global shortages of missiles and other capabilities if operations against Iran are prolonged. And all of this, it seems, is now too much for one Republican Senator, North Carolina's Thom Tillis. He was the decisive vote, you may remember, for confirming Hegseth in the first place. Here is what he posted on him today.
"He is creating a leadership void at the top of our military ranks. I have never witnessed more inept management of the brave men and women who serve our country." Senator Tillis goes on, "He is intimidated by competence and retreats to ginning up culture wars instead of soberly attending to the vital work of our National Defense and the health and well-being of our fighting force." And he finishes with this, "I urge the President to find a new leader at the Pentagon who will retain and empower our military talent rather than diminish it."
[20:05:51]
A lot of ground to cover. CNN's chief White House correspondent, Kaitlan Collins starts us off. And, Kaitlan, I wonder with all that noise, is there any concern at the White House tonight about Hegseth leadership, particularly the criticism from Tillis? And is there any concern that perhaps he might lose his job?
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN'S CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT AND THE ANCHOR OF "THE SOURCE": Well, there might be two lines of thinking here, one of which is the White House officials that are dealing with this and getting a lot of questions about it. But the second person, and maybe the most important, obviously the most important here is the President himself and he does not have an issue with Pete Hegseth. He actually was just praising him a few moments ago as he was in the rose garden with battleground Republicans. These Republicans, some of them who are not in tough races, but a lot of them who are in tough races come November that were having a dinner on the Rose Garden patio just now.
And the President at one point paused to shout out Secretary Hegseth and say that they were on the phone last night as the United States was striking Iran. He praised him for what happened last night and also claimed, again, the United States is winning the war in Iran. And of course, it is that very same war that is proving to be such an issue for many of these Republicans that are in tough races, dealing with the war going on much longer than the White House had initially telegraphed, and also what's being impacted by it, namely gas prices and how those have been rising and inflation numbers.
And in terms of Secretary Hegseth himself and the concerns that were brought to the President, reportedly by Secretary Driscoll before he departed as the Army Secretary, where he was saying that he had real concerns about the purge that Hegseth was doing at the Pentagon, that he was pushing out senior leaders, not promoting those who were up for promotion. And instead of focusing on drone warfare and adapting to these new technologies, was instead focused on DEI and cultural issues.
And our colleagues are reporting tonight that that is the same concern many other of the people at the pentagon also share in this moment. And so, "The Atlantic" reported that the President was caught off guard when Driscoll laid out for him. How many senior leaders that that Hegseth has gotten rid of or purged? But in terms of Hegseth position atop the Pentagon right now, he does still have the full backing of President Trump himself. And while some white house officials believe there's a real silo in between, what happens at the Pentagon and the White House, knowing what's going on at the Pentagon, there is not usually been a clear line of communication between those two.
Obviously, the relationship between the President and Hegseth is what would matter the most. At the end of the day. And as evidenced by what he just said about him 20 minutes ago, Jim, he still has his backing.
SCIUTTO: Yes, I mean, it seems like given that that lack of communication that Driscoll genuinely surprised the President. Kaitlan Collins, thanks so much. Well, of course, see you at the top of the next hour for "The Source" and she will be joined by former Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall.
Earlier, I spoke with Nebraska Republican Congressman Don Bacon, who also is a retired Air Force Brigadier General, about his thoughts about the defense secretary.
So, Congressman, do you agree with your GOP colleague in the Senate, Thom Tillis, who, as we mentioned tonight, is calling on President Trump to replace Pete Hegseth, saying on social media, "I have never witnessed a more inept management of the brave men and women who serve our country." Of course, you served your country as well. Do you agree with that?
REP. DON BACON (R-NE): I agree with the sentiments of Senator Tillis. I hate to tell the President who he should hire and fire. I don't know if it's really my role, but I would say this I would not he would not be on my team. I think he has not been a very good leader in many in many ways. So, I agree with the sentiments of Senator Tillis, and I wouldn't hire myself or he would not be on my team.
SCIUTTO: You, of course, served. You reached the rank of brigadier general. You did four tours in the Middle East. So, when you see the secretary of defense disparaging a Canadian cadet, a teenager, we should note, taking part in a summer training camp and an instructor on social media posting a photo of two women. You see them there at a moment of what is clearly great pride for them. Is that beneath the dignity of the office, as Canada's defense minister said.
BACON: It is, it's low brow. I think it's unprofessional, and I'd like to think that our leadership representing us in the Pentagon and in the White House, we should be better than that. And I thought it was demeaning and uncalled for.
[20:10:13]
SCIUTTO: As you know, there were questions about Hegseth during confirmation hearings, quite hard questions. And yet Republican Senators confirmed him. Should they have seen this coming?
BACON: I think so. I told a few senators that I would vote no, and I was told by some, and I'll keep them nameless. Don, you're not under all the pressure that we're under to vote for him. But I said, I've been under a lot of pressure and other bills. I still vote no or vote my conscience. I felt like he was trouble from the beginning. And then right after he got, you know, confirmed, then we had, you know, the signal gate. And what bothered me there, he put classified information on an unclassified phone and unclassified application gets caught.
And instead of just saying, you know, I was wrong, I shouldn't have done it. He gets mad at the reporter and I expect leaders to take responsibility when they fail and they make a mistake. We're not, none of us are perfect. But when you fail, you own up to it and say, I was wrong and it won't happen again. And I heard somebody that acted more like my teenagers when they're 30 and 40 now. But when they we're teenagers, just deny and accuse somebody else of being at fault. I didn't like it. I thought it was wrong.
SCIUTTO: Clearly there are broader issues here because, as you saw with the resignation of Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, who had clashed with Hegseth, "The Atlantic" is reporting now that President Trump was surprised when Driscoll told him how many generals and other top officers had been fired. And a lot of these folks have been pushing for modernization of the military at a time when that is a priority here. Does this put U.S. National security at risk, this kind of leadership?
BACON: I think it weakens us. And by the way, it's just wrong. Most Americans expect more out of our secretary of defense. I mean, he's fired approximately 20 generals and admirals, have been treated this way mainly three and four stars. Now, we're seeing service secretaries as well, either resigning or being fired. And it's wrong. And what bothers me, it's not only just 20. It's no explanation, no, I think when you fire someone, especially someone who served 30 and 40 years to their country, have done a great job serving our country, to say, you're fired, you pack your bags, you go Friday and no explanation why and no explanation why it's not right. Most Americans want more respect and decency out of their senior leadership.
I could see if it was once or twice, but we're talking about 20 generals and admirals have been treated this way. And it's also what, to your point, Jim, it's weakened us because it's allowed for a long time. Vacancies in these key positions. So, for example, cyber command general hogg was fired. There was a vacancy for nearly 11 months. And it's very hard for a deputy who's filling that role to make major changes. They're sort of waiting to get the new leadership in. They're not going to; they're just going to try to keep things the trains running on time. They're not going to make needed changes that were maybe necessary.
SCIUTTO: Congressman Don Bacon of Nebraska, appreciate you joining tonight.
BACON: Thank you.
SCIUTTO: When we come back, our political panel, including Congressman Adam Kinzinger, who as we mentioned earlier, had words of his own for secretary Hegseth. Later, after five days of deliberation, jurors deadlocked over Lindsay Clancy accused of strangling her three children. What the judge said today and whether one more day might bring a verdict.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:17:48]
SCIUTTO: We're speaking tonight about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who is now under fire, including by Republicans, for depending on who you ask, his handling of the Iran war, his management at the Pentagon, the damage he is allegedly doing to army modernization and in the words of one of our next guests for punching down at two young Canadian women.
Joining us is CNN senior political commentator Scott Jennings, who is reportedly, we should mention, being considered for the role of the next White House Press Secretary. Also, former Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger and former deputy Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh. We appreciate all of you joining this evening.
Scott, if I could begin with you. You heard Congressman Bacon, not just a Republican, but a retired brigadier general in the Air Force himself, saying his party should have seen these problems coming, that he warned some of his colleagues in the Senate are the same. Do you believe President Trump is being well served by his defense secretary?
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, in the personnel game, only one person's opinion matters, and that's the commander in chief. He obviously has confidence in Pete Hegseth, and I'm certain they're spending a lot of time together because were prosecuting a war in Iran right now, quite successfully, I might add. And they prosecuted an action against Venezuela as well, among other issues.
I think the president has lots of confidence in Hegseth and the chain of command, as it's been for 250 years as the Commander in Chief, the secretary of war, and then the combatant commands. And so, whether its Driscoll or these other positions, they all flow directly through the chain of command. And the President and the secretary of defense deserve to have the team that they think is going to best carry out their policies. Everyone can have an opinion about that. And you could disagree on certain policies, but when it comes to chain of command and team and mission, the President and the secretary of defense have to be absolutely sure the people they have working under them are fully committed to that mission. Sometimes in Washington, when you're a Republican president, you don't get that from the permanent bureaucracy.
But of course, the next president will have the same decisions to make as well
SCIUTTO: Congressman, you, of course, did not mince your words in response to the secretary of defense's post, particularly about the Canadians and we should note, in this image, were blurring their faces deliberately. We don't want to play into this shaming, but what do you make of his preoccupation with physical appearance? And I just wonder, being a veteran officer yourself, does it appeal to serving officers who, of course, have to command all types in their units? Does this kind of language, this kind of attacks, appeal to them?
[20:20:09]
ADAM KINZINGER, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: No, and I'll tell you, well, first off, people have opinions about who's in the White House. It's just for whatever reason, when Trump has somebody in the White House, people can't have opinions about that person, it's all up to him.
Look, I've got to tell you, it's been interesting to me because typically my time in the military, I would say in the officer corps was generally about 80 percent Republican, 20 percent Democratic and we all got along. That's shifting a lot and there are a lot of people that are seeing Hegseth as a guy focused on these shallow things that don't matter. Yes, fine. You know, maybe do a video or two occasionally where you're doing some pull ups or pushups to encourage good health among the troops.
But when that becomes the obsession, and I'll tell you, I also know bad commanders and bad commanders are the ones that always end up reverting back to focusing on things like, did you shave close enough? What is your uniform look like? And they use the old adage of, if we can't trust you to get your uniform right, how can we trust you to fly and eight-million plane? Always bad commanders that do that, and to put on Twitter, you know, kids, kids that that have a desire to some level to serve in the Canadian military and shame them to an entire country is not just punching down. It is the most beta male guy who is scared to death of his own shadow thing I've ever seen, and nobody can defend that. it's disgusting. And he needs to apologize for it.
Sabrina, this is, of course, part of a broader attack on U.S. Allies, including with particular focus for some reason, on Canada, America's neighbor, one of its closest allies here, and not just from the President and the defense secretary, but a whole host of people in Trumps circle. What is the impact of that, in your view on that alliance?
SABRINA SINGH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, when we continue to go after our allies, I mean, were degrading our these very deep relationships. I mean, we have a very deep relationship with Canada. They are part of our intelligence sharing. They help us protect our men and women overseas, serving all around the world. And it is because of that close relationship that we need to protect these alliances and going after, I mean, like anything from canceling the exercises with South Korea to going after Canada to, you know, kind of this trolling of this is the 51st state.
It all has irreparable harm to not just the military who has to work with these countries every single day, wherever they are placed around the world. But just to the, our alliances everywhere we go and after this President, a new President has come in, whoever that is, Republican or Democrat, and they are going to have this baggage of having to repair these alliances that have been so degraded.
And I will say, just like to the point of what the congresswoman was saying earlier, you know, going after these young cadets who are who are stepping up to take a chance and serve in their military to serve their country, we should be applauding these people. We should be applauding that they're committing to their country, to our ally, to serve, and hopefully we will work with them as well.
And I just, I thought that was just so beneath the secretary to do that, especially on Twitter. It was just gross.
SCIUTTO: Scott, I recently went to one of the places where U.S. and Canadian forces work most closely together. That is NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command and what I heard from Canadian and U.S. officers alike was about how well they work together.
I want to play some sound from a U.S. officer about what he had to say about cooperation with Canada.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LT. COL. JONATHAN BLENKUSH, ALASKA AIR NATIONAL GUARD: Absolutely essential here, not just from Alaska being, you know, a lot of common interest with Canada, but from a mission partner perspective, showing that combined effort and defense of the homeland of North America, keeping integrated on that is absolutely essential for us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCIUTTO: So, Scott, if the men and women serving in those roles alongside Canadian partners speak of their Canadian partners that way, why does the President attack them so often and ignore those shared missions?
JENNINGS: Well, we have an important military alliance with Canada, we're allies. We're also having an important trade dispute with Canada right now. We're having some political disputes of an economic nature, but one shouldn't necessarily have to affect the other. And so, this trade jostling is going on. I hope it gets worked out. It's good when our countries work together, but we should never be subservient to the Canadians.
We should never let them take advantage of us, and we should never be, you know, sort of acting like, well, we have a military alliance, so we can't press our interests on other areas such as free trade. But it's absolutely true. The Canadians have been good allies. My personal view about the tweet is, I have no problem with the focus on military readiness and fitness in the military.
But if I were Secretary Hegseth, I would think about all of my public communications in this way. Does this enhance or advance what my missions are right now for the President of the United States' chief mission right now is to finish off Iran, among other things. So that would be my humble advice, would be make sure your public communications are serving the most important missions that you have.
[20:25:11]
SCIUTTO: All right, we will see if he is listening.
Congressman, we mentioned earlier about Army Secretary Dan Driscoll's departure among a string of high profile departures there. I am going to ask you the same question I asked Congressman Bacon. You know, given that we are at war, right? The war with Iran. But also there is an enormous focus, as you know, in The Pentagon, about modernization, drone warfare, a whole host of things.
Are you concerned that this culture war focus is affecting the broader missions?
KINZINGER: Yes, I am extremely concerned.
Look, I think when Hegseth came in and he said, look, there are some focus in the Pentagon on some things that don't matter, there was some a little bit of truth to that. I mean, when I would do military duty, I would spend a whole lot of time doing computer-based training of the same subject over and over again. That stuff had to go.
But the reality is, if you look at what is going on in Ukraine, and this is even beyond the moral implications of it, why we should have a close relationship with Ukraine is because they are, in the 21st century warfare. We were caught flat-footed a little bit in Iran with these drone attacks and this drone fight.
And so the modernization is the most important thing right now because literally, the tools we have are not built to fight a mass drone warfare. And what concerns me is I've heard rumors, I can't confirm it, but that part of the issue between Driscoll and Hegseth was that Driscoll was trying to push modernization and Hegseth was the one blocking it, regardless of whether that's true or not, the one thing we shouldn't be doing is emptying all the leadership ranks of the army, which have basically been done.
Just bring the best people on board, tell them not to focus on the DEI stuff, if that's your focus. But the main thing they should be focused on is how do we do mass drone warfare in the 21st century.
SCIUTTO: Yes. Interestingly enough, we are asking Ukraine for their help these days.
Final thoughts, Sabrina, before we go.
SINGH: Yes, I think, you know, we are seeing from the Secretary just misplaced priorities and going after these culture wars when the reality is, is that he should be focused on the modern day battlefield. It is here. It is in Ukraine. It is in Iran. They are using drones -- and we need to be focused on that and he has this attention to go, you know, "back to basics," which I think is going to set our military back.
And we are seeing in this war how we have to be dynamic and we have to be able to adapt quickly. And so the fact that, you know, Secretary Hegseth and the acting chief-of-staff, LaNeve, basically disbanded the Army drone battalion that was focused on this training, I think is quite shocking and should alarm everyone in Congress, not just Democrats, but Republicans alike.
SCIUTTO: And there are a lot of folks in the military, from my own reporting that are concerned that the U.S. has fallen behind in terms of drone warfare.
Scott Jennings, Adam Kinzinger, Sabrina Singh, thanks so much to all of you.
Coming up next, are they really hopelessly deadlocked? What jurors in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial told the judge and what he told them to do about it.
Later, another notable change in one of the Washington landmarks, the President is leaving his mark on, or in this case, is subtracting from. What is being taken away and the reaction to it when 360 continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:32:20]
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST & CO-HOST OF "ANDERSON COOPER 360": The Plymouth, Massachusetts jury in the Lindsay Clancy trial remains deadlocked. They have deliberated for just under 30 hours, over five days, and will be back tomorrow. Her attorney says she should not be held criminally responsible for fatally strangling her three young children because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis.
Prosecutors, though, said Clancy acted, "intentionally, rationally and swiftly to kill them." The jury is weighing whether to convict on charges ranging from first-degree murder, second-degree murder or manslaughter, or to find her not guilty by lack of criminal responsibility, or even acquit altogether.
Joining us now, CNN Senior Legal Analyst, Elie Honig. And Elie, it's good to have you because you've been in this situation in your career as a federal prosecutor, a deadlocked jury saying day after day they cannot reach a verdict. What do you think the feeling is in the courtroom today? And maybe even what's the feeling inside that jury room?
ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, Jim, I'm sure the defense lawyer is feeling ecstatic but still cautious because they're on the brink of a hung jury and a mistrial. And having been in this situation, unfortunately, as a prosecutor, I'm sure the prosecution is feeling devastated. A word you never want to see come back from the jury, if you're the prosecutor, is deadlocked.
Now, when that happens, as happened here, the judge will then give the jury instructions, which essentially says you are to stick with your own convictions. However, you're to keep an open mind and keep working. After that, sometimes, not often, but sometimes the jury will resolve itself. They will undeadlock and reach a verdict. But if you get that second deadlock note, and that's what happened today, then the chances of an undeadlock and a verdict go down substantially.
So I think this thing is pretty close to over with. It's not over yet, but the prosecutors are not feeling good right now.
SCIUTTO: So if that happens, deadlocked jury, then a mistrial, what are the options for the prosecutors?
HONIG: So the prosecution absolutely can retry a defendant after one mistrial. If there's a second hung jury and mistrial, then it gets dicey as to whether you could do it a third time under the law. But definitely, they can retry Lindsay Clancy. I'm sure, given the gravity of these charges, the prosecution will recharge her and retry her.
The other thing, though, is sometimes after a hung jury, that will encourage the parties to come together and reach a plea deal. The prosecution doesn't want to roll the dice again. The defense can maybe get a lesser charge. Again, given the seriousness of the charges here, I'm not sure how likely that is, but that does happen after a hung jury sometimes.
SCIUTTO: What kind of plea deal? I've spoken to other lawyers, judges who mentioned the possibility that admitting some responsibility might satisfy the prosecutors in that situation.
[20:35:00]
HONIG: Right, so as you laid out here, there are various degrees of murder. First degree, second degree, involuntary, on down the line. So it could be that there is some agreement that Lindsay Clancy will plead guilty to less than the first degree, to the second degree or the involuntary. I think it's a tough sell though, if you're the prosecution, given the hideous nature of these allegations to give her any kind of deal.
But sometimes, practicality is doing out and both sides want to avoid risk. So that happens.
SCIUTTO: Gosh, those pictures of those little kids. Elie Honig, thanks so much.
HONIG: Yep. SCIUTTO: Just ahead, more big changes at the Kennedy Center. Also, what a Great Lake's name has to do with the comeback of a decades-old app.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCIUTTO: President Trump's D.C. renovation continued today with the removal of a sculpture from the Kennedy Center grounds. It's called "Blue" and was installed there back in 2019.
[20:40:00]
The president has also tried, as you've seen, to add his name to the building, along with closing it for renovations. He tore down the White House East Wing to build a ballroom. He's proposed a 250-foot arch near Arlington National Cemetery and painting the Eisenhower Executive Office Building white. He also drained and repainted the Reflecting Pool badly.
Joining us now from outside the Kennedy Center, CNN's Sunlen Serfaty. And Sunlen, I wonder what the Kennedy Center's reaction has been to the removal of the sculpture.
SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Jim, they really aren't revealing too much. They are attempting to portray it as a routine de- installation, as they say, that happens from time to time. But they did confirm and tell us that it was indeed the center's decision to make the decision to remove the sculpture today.
And importantly, they did not reveal why, the why the sculpture was removed at this point in time. And that's so interesting and important to the context of everything that's happening around the Kennedy Center. Now, we did speak earlier today and previously to a former curator here at the Kennedy Center.
Last year, he was in a meeting in September 20025 and it was told to him then that the center had wanted to get rid of some of the sculptures on the campus around the Kennedy Center. And specifically, it was because he says that President Trump had wanted to make room for art of his own to come in after the planned two-year renovation.
Now, Jim, one source tonight telling me that they dispute the account of that meeting and the reasons to why. But again, the Kennedy Center not revealing any more as to why the sculpture came down earlier today.
SCIUTTO: And we don't know what art of the president's own they were talking about.
SERFATY: We certainly don't. And that's still a huge question mark. Again, this is just one source claiming that in that meeting, the feeling and the message that was communicated to him was that there was a desire on the part of the center to bring in art that the president had wanted after the two-year renovation.
SCIUTTO: Sunlen Serfaty, outside the Kennedy Center, thanks so much. Joining me now is Ohio Democratic Congressman, Joyce Beatty. She is an ex-officio member of the Kennedy Center board. Congresswoman, thanks so much for taking the time tonight.
REP. JOYCE BEATTY, (D-OH): Thank you. Glad to be here.
SCIUTTO: So first, your reaction, if I could ask, to this de- installation of the sculpture on the Kennedy Center grounds.
BEATTY: Well, look, at this point, there's not too much that will surprise me. This is a president that likes either putting his name on things or building things in honor of himself. And so certainly, removing this, he's doing what he does best. It takes us off focus of some of the real issues of what we're doing. So I'm not surprised.
SCIUTTO: You, of course, have sued both the Kennedy Center board and Trump himself over his efforts to put his name on the building. Can you ask -- can you update us as to where that suit stands and what's next in the case?
BEATTY: Yes. Tomorrow, it will be seven days ago. We were in court again because the board and Donald Trump wanted to put the name, his name with the words renovated and remodeled, past tense, mind you. And certainly, as you can see, it's not been renovated or remodeled and it's still unlawful.
The law is very clear on this only living memorial to John F. Kennedy. And so we needed to go back because we were still in the court case waiting for the judge to render a decision. We get to court. They come up with a magical September the 8th date that they're going to try to put this inscription on the board. And it's illegal.
So when we left court, the Department of Justice, who represents the president, did call us and they have pushed back away from the September the 8th date until October, giving the judge more time to review, to give us discovery and et cetera. But it is still unlawful.
SCIUTTO: In the midst of this, the president himself has gone so far as to say he'll tear the whole thing down, right, if his renovation plans don't go forward. We've seen him act, right, before he had a court's approval with the East Wing of the White House. What would happen if the president just started tearing it down and waited for the judges to act later?
BEATTY: Well, here's what we're thinking, because it is federal court, because we have been victorious in the response from the federal judge and that they agreed to push back the date.
[20:45:00]
Now I'm not trusting necessarily, but we do have the law on our side and they have followed the other rules. Many thought he would never take his name off the building.
SCIUTTO: Yeah. BEATTY: And we were able to win in that case and the name did come down. I want to make that clear. But where we are now is waiting on discovery and we are continuing to go to court and will continue to do that. But I do think that we need to be concerned, you mentioned the East Wing and what happened there, and we could talk about the Reflecting Pool and so many other things, because he's the type of person that's throwing a tantrum.
I didn't get my way and so now, I'll consider just tearing it down and making it into an amphitheater. Here's the other thing, we have so many of the American people on our side. The hundreds of hundreds of performers who have performed there in recent times and all of the followers for this is a little different than the Reflecting Pool, is a little different than the East Wing, and it is the only living memorial to John F. Kennedy.
SCIUTTO: Are you concerned at all, listen, there are more than two more years in President Trump's term and as you said, he doesn't like to give up even when the courts rule against him. Are you concerned at all that the Kennedy Center might not survive the end of his term?
BEATTY: Well, I am very hopeful that it will survive. And again, if you could just see the number of people that were out there the day -- people who traveled not just from the Washington, D.C. area, people came from all over the country. And here's another thing, people are tired of having someone who is supposed to be our protector, our leader in this wonderful America we live in, not standing up for what's right for and someone who's being unlawful.
So I think we're going to see a storm of people joining the fight, wanting to make sure that they are doing something that's lawful, but better yet not letting anyone get away with doing something that's unlawful.
SCIUTTO: Congresswoman Beatty, we appreciate you joining.
BEATTY: Thank you.
SCIUTTO: Well, the self-proclaimed O.G. of online mapping is making an unlikely comeback. MapQuest, the online relic many people once used for maps and driving directions before Apple and Google took over, is now the most popular free app on Apple's App Store. This comes after they refused to change Lake Ontario's name to Lake America following President Trump's executive order.
Both Apple and Google however updated their maps to reflect the president's demands which followed collapsed trade talks with Canada. Joining me now is Tech Journalist and CNN Contributor, Jacob Ward.
Jake, good to have you.
JACOB WARD, CNN CONTRIBUTOR AND TECH JOURNALIST: Thanks, Jim, great to be here.
SCIUTTO: So first question is, do you believe that this is about business? That the companies who changed the name have business before this administration and wanted to please the president?
J. WARD: I mean I don't think it's because they're outraged by Canadian names on lakes. I would certainly say, I mean I think it is you know clearly the case that if you are an everything company right now, a big tech company, even though, right, Google and Apple have the resources of entire nation states, they are at the whim of the president when it comes to some of the most important parts of making that a successful company.
I mean if you're Apple, right, not only are you in the, you know, maps business, you're in the email and calendar and hardware and A.I. business all of a sudden. And you know, in Apple's case, back in August of 2025, they announced a $100 billion investment in the United States and as a result President Trump said I will then exempt you from the 100 percent tariffs on semiconductors he was about to impose. Semiconductors are the lifeblood of Apple, Jim, right?
So if you are a company, I'm not saying there's a direct quid pro quo here but, you know, supposedly Doug Burgum, the Secretary of Interior, told Fox Business that he in fact -- that President Trump called Apple last week to put some pressure on them about this lake thing.
If you've got, you know, the whim of the president determining whether blood flows into your company or not, I mean you're not going to die on that hill it seems to me.
SCIUTTO: Yeah. We've seen other companies do the same. So listen, I remember MapQuest back from the days when it was a true innovation. I used to printout like 27 pages, right, of directions, you know, take a left turn there, right turn there. It's been a while since folks have been using it. Why do you think MapQuest refused to change the name when Apple and Google went along with it?
J. WARD: Yeah. I love harkening back to the days when, you know, I mean the value of that company used to come out literally in a printer because traveling journalists of a certain age would have to like print out the directions. That was the whole point of that system.
[20:50:00]
You know, I think MapQuest is to be applauded of course for standing up for this, but it doesn't cost the company all that much. They don't have any business before a federal judge the way Google does, right? Just today, Google was told that it could keep its 12 -- 12 percent of its revenue in the form of its ad business by a federal judge, right? It had business in front of a federal court, and again, you're not going to die on a hill when that's true.
MapQuest doesn't have those hills to die on, right? It doesn't have an app store to maintain. It doesn't make hardware. It doesn't care about A.I. It doesn't cost it anything to turn against this. But what we know from this is that, you know, they are the -- they show us, MapQuest shows us that it is possible to not capitulate to President Trump.
This was true back when the Gulf of Mexico versus Gulf of America thing happened. At that time, they put up a really cute little tool that let you name the Gulf whatever you wanted, but they didn't change the name then either, even as Apple and Google did. And so this is telling us, I think, something, Jim, about how big companies really aren't as powerful as we would like to think they are.
In the old days, in the '90s, when you were MapQuest, you only did maps, right? Or you only did recipes, or you only did headphones. And you couldn't be put over a barrel in the same way that these enormous companies are. And as we're seeing them turn away from what used to be a cultural brand for them, which was resisting state power, now we're starting to see the limits of just how huge these companies have become.
SCIUTTO: No question. I mean, they used to have -- they used to take other stands as well. They don't take any more either. Jake Ward, good to have you on.
J. WARD: Appreciate it.
SCIUTTO: Coming up, we will have an update on the latest search efforts in Nepal, more than one week after that devastating flood.
Tens of thousands of people took the streets in Spain, protesting the border crisis there. Clarissa Ward joins us next.
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[20:56:36]
SCIUTTO: Tens of thousands of people took to the streets across Spain earlier today, protesting the country's migrant crisis. You may remember these pictures from a border surge nearly five weeks ago when more than 70,000 people came into Ceuta, Spain from Morocco. According to authorities, more than 10,000 migrants, including unaccompanied minors, remain stranded in makeshift camps or scattered across streets and beaches.
Demonstrators are criticizing the government's handling of migration and calling for stronger border security. CNN's Clarissa Ward is in Ceuta, Spain.
CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Thousands and thousands of people have taken to the streets of this relatively small city of Ceuta. Just 84,000 people actually live here. And so many of them are out tonight to demonstrate just how fed up they are with this crisis.
You probably remember, it was just over a month ago that more than 70,000 migrants came in from the border with Morocco. The majority of them returned to Morocco. But the Spanish government says at least 5,000 migrants still remain. The local authorities here say the real number is actually 9,000 -- as many as 9,000 migrants, including more than 1,000 unaccompanied minors, which creates huge problems for a small community like this in terms of feeding them, housing them.
A lot of these migrants are sleeping rough in makeshift shelters on the beaches. And people here, you can hear it. They are saying, enough is enough. You see over and over again the slogan, 'Ceuta is not for sale, Ceuta will defend itself.' They want Spain and the government to take the initiative to bring this crisis to a rapid end.
Clarissa Ward, CNN, Ceuta.
SCIUTTO: It's been more than a week now since that devastating flood at the Nepal-China border. The death toll now tops 1,200 people. Some 4,200 remain missing, including 75 Americans. Heavy machinery and search dogs are part of the expanded rescue and recovery operations.
Some 900 workers are missing at various hydropower plant projects. It's not clear how many of those workers were inside the tunnels or how many might still be alive. On the ground in Nepal, Anderson reported from a town that took generations to build, but just seconds to nearly vanish.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST OF "ANDERSON COOPER 360": In town after town along this river, the scenes are in many ways the same. Devastation is complete. This is the -- formerly the Trishuli market. This is what remains.
Residents, people from other areas have been coming down here throughout the day, taking pictures, staring, trying to comprehend what has happened and what happens now.
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[21:00:00]
SCIUTTO: So much suffering and so much need, and much you can do to help. For information on exactly how, just go to cnn.com/impact. Again, cnn.com/impact. The news continues. "The Source with Kaitlan Collins" starts now.
