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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Trump Draws Backlash After Suggesting Iran Could "Take Out" Los Angeles Or San Diego; Trump Campaigns In Red States As GOP Anxiety Rises; Attorney: Jane Doe Is Facing Threats, Attempts To Reveal Her Identity; Former Deputy AG Sally Yates To Lead Cornell's Independent Review; Attorney: Jane Doe Is Facing Threats, Attempts To Reveal Her Identity; Sources: NY AG Seeks Outside Attorneys For Cornell Rape Investigation; Russia Being Urged To Share Information After Plague Lab Worker Dies; Sales Take Hit At Trump Store; NY Times: DHS Awarded Lucrative Contract To Noem Donor On Her Last Day On The Job. Aired 8- 9p ET
Aired October 06, 2026 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
GLORIA PAZMINO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And I have to tell you, what's happening here on campus is nothing short of impressive. They are gathering to talk, to learn, to ask questions, to come up with suggestions about what they can do to make this university answer to their demands and be accountable. Not just because of Jane Doe, but because they feel like this is a larger campus problem. I also heard from at least students who share their own experiences of sexual assault. They reminded students that they have the power to create some change -- Erin.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: All right, Gloria, thank you very much, and thanks to all of you for being with us. AC360 starts now.
[20:00:41]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Good evening. Thanks for joining us. We begin tonight, just four weeks out from the midterm elections with new signs of trouble for Republicans. Trouble, that the nation's top Republican and star campaigner, President Trump, might not be able to fix because it largely revolves around him, even though he clearly believes otherwise.
A number of candidates in tight races know this and appear to be acting on it. So tomorrow, when the President touches down for a campaign stop in San Antonio, Texas, Governor Greg Abbott, who is running for reelection, will not be appearing with him. He tells "The Hill" he's got several other appearances elsewhere.
Then there's Republican Senate hopeful Ken Paxton, who was recently caught on tape saying the President's midterm convention, which was held in Texas, "dropped our numbers."
The President certainly believes the opposite, or at least keeps talking like he does.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: By the way, I'm going around doing rallies. The Republican Party is starting to go right through the roof. Somebody said today, I wonder why.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: That is the President today in Maryland, a blue state where he was not at a campaign event. So far this month, he's only campaigned in red states. Saturday will be his second appearance in Alabama, a state he won by 30 points back in 2024.
Tomorrow will be his second appearance in Texas, which has gotten so problematic for Republicans that yesterday a State Lawmaker, Briscoe Cain, a diehard Trump supporter who helped in the effort to overturn the 2020 election, weighed in with this online. If the election were held tomorrow, all statewide races go blue. It's hard to believe, but he's talking about Texas.
Of course, the election was not today, and a lot can happen between now and November 3rd. And polls could be wrong. But as the President's schedule suggests, it is not just Texas where Republicans see trouble.
Late today, the highly respected Cook Political Report changed its prediction for the Kansas Senate race from lean republican to toss up. Now, the last time Kansas elected a Democratic Senator was in 1932, ninety-four years ago.
Then there's South Carolina, where today the Maine Senate Republican Super PAC said it is sending $5 million to shore up Darline Graham, Lindsey Graham's sister in a race that is now improbably close. The President, meantime, is lashing out at Graham's opponent, Democrat Annie Andrews, using a slur against people who are transgender.
Quoting from the President's Truth Social post from last night, "Annie 'Tranny' Andrews is running against our wonderful Darline Graham for the Senate in South Carolina." He went on to write, "Darline is a high-quality person, maybe the highest and Annie "Tranny" is not."
For the record Annie Andrews is a pediatrician, a mother of three and not transgender. She also says she does not support gender affirming surgery for minors or transgender athletes participating in women's sports.
The President has been increasingly, I'm not sure what the word is, perhaps loose with his language lately. it's not possible to say why, but it is increasingly notable and hard to miss. This is him in Ohio over the weekend.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Just get out and vote. If you do that, we're going to win or we're going to win big and we're going to shove it up their ass.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Keeping it classy. He also verbally attacked "The New York Times" for suggesting his Doral Country Club was dirty, spelling "The New York Times" as excellent reporter Maggie Haberman's first name as "Maggot."
And in Nebraska last night, though he wasn't vicious or profane, he was speaking precisely enough for some to conclude that he'd be okay with Iran nuclear nuking Los Angeles or San Diego.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We have to stop them from having a nuclear weapon. So, I was riding in Iowa, I made a speech there, and I passed the gas station $1.95 a gallon. I passed another station, $1.85 a gallon. We'll have it lower than that in a very short period of time.
And again, remember, with the war just artificial, it's a little bit high. it's a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe. They can take out a city, let them take out Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay and it's going to be over very soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: California's governor called the remarks, "disgusting and disqualifying." We'll hear from the Los Angeles mayor shortly.
The White House said, "He was clearly stating U.S. cities would have been threatened if a nuclear Iran hadn't been stopped." Is that clear to you? Just imagine any other President said that. Would people have just shrugged their shoulders?
In fact, whatever the President actually meant to say this time, or how he meant it to come out, he certainly never shied away from expressing contempt for big Democratic-run American cities before.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Our capital is the opposite of tippy top, it's a shithouse horrible. It's horrible.
For years, pro-crime politicians like Roy Cooper have tried to bully you into silence while they turned your cities into blood soaked killing fields, flooded your communities with migrant criminals, destroyed your schools with gangs and drugs, and filled your streets with lawlessness, filth and squalor.
Everybody knows Chicago is a hellhole right now.
I'm not walking in Baltimore right now. Baltimore is a hellhole.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: He said that last year he was in Baltimore giving a speech, today. Again, we'll be joined shortly by the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass. We begin, though, with CNN chief White House correspondent, anchor of "The Source" Kaitlan Collins. So, when you hear what the President has been saying in recent days, it does beg the question, does he have a coherent plan or message for the next four weeks while he's out campaigning?
[20:05:58]
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN'S CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT AND THE ANCHOR OF "THE SOURCE": Well, I mean, there are a few things here at play, Anderson, I think, on those comments that the President made last night about, you know, letting Iran take out Los Angeles or San Diego. The White House has been pushing back on what Governor Newsom and other top California officials have said today, saying that if you listen to the bigger context of the President's remarks and as you just played the entire context of that, he's saying that the war with Iran and going after their nuclear program is a small price to pay.
So, something like that doesn't happen. That's the White House's argument today. In terms of the President's comments and the fury that has erupted over those comments.
Now, we saw President Trump twice today when he was leaving the White House to go to Baltimore. And then when he returned to the White House from Baltimore this afternoon on three separate occasions, myself and other reporters included, tried to ask the President to clarify those comments to explain what he meant, just given when you look at the transcript and the audio of what he said there.
He obviously heard the questions, Anderson, but declined to answer them and to say much more about his comments or say anything more about his comments last night. And so, I think that stands out.
But just in terms of where the President is looking over the next month at the midterm elections, his argument today has been that his rallies that he's holding are helping Republicans, that they are driving numbers up for these Republican candidates, though, of course, he's mainly been in pretty red area in Trump country for the last week. When you look at his travel schedule in Oklahoma, and Texas, and Alabama, where he's expected to return this weekend, if a tropical storm doesn't get in the way.
And so really, the President is going to certain places where the White House believes it is safest for him to go. But when it comes to these candidates that are actually in real competitive races that are struggling, it's not clear that the President will go there. I mean, Maine, for example, the President was just saying the other day that he might end up going to Maine.
Susan Collins said tonight that she does not believe the President is ultimately going to end up in her state, given the race that she's in and given voters sentiment toward President Trump.
COOPER: Kaitlan Collins, thanks so much. We'll see you at the top of the hour for "The Source". Your guest tonight, Senator Thom Tillis.
Joining us now, two of our CNN political commentator, Republican strategist David Urban and former Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh.
So, David, we're going to speak more about the President's comments with Karen Bass, as you know. I want to ask you; how do you interpret the takeout L.A. remarks?
DAVID URBAN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, listen, I, I do think it was a clumsy, sloppy kind of statement. Obviously, he is riffing there. I think that this administrations intention the entire time has been to preclude Iran from getting a nuclear weapon so that it could do anything against any U.S. city in the future.
And so, while it was crude and kind of rough and tumble and he kind of laughed about it, I don't think the President meant it.
Even "The Guardian," the conservative bastion, "The Guardian" corrected their headline to say that Trump didn't suggest that the cities be nuked. So, I think her kind of, you know, as he goes on these riffs, Anderson, sometimes they're not so artful. This is one of those instances.
COOPER: Sabrina, with regards to the President's use of the slur to describe South Carolina Senate Candidate Dr. Annie Andrews, it's obviously not the first time he's, you know, insulted an opponent using a nickname. Do you think this has any impact?
SABRINA SINGH, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Well, again, I mean, kind of to piggyback off of what David was saying, it's yet again, just a crude comment coming from the President. And just it's something that we've come to expect. And unfortunately, this rhetoric that we've seen from him just percolates down to other members of his administration or into other candidates in their races.
I don't know that that comment necessarily has an effect. I think what you're seeing have an effect in states like South Carolina is Republican candidates are underwater. I mean, just earlier this week, the Senate leadership fund canceled their buy in North Carolina and are moving $5 million in South Carolina to prop up Darline Graham.
The fact that that seat is even in play. The fact that a Democratic candidate is forcing Republicans to spend in South Carolina. We're talking about a very different map than we were two years ago when Donald Trump first came into came to office, and many thought the Senate was lost because Democrats would have to flip seats in states that that Donald Trump won by double digits.
And you look at the map today, even in a state like South Carolina, where the polling is very close, you look at a state like Kansas or Alaska, where you're seeing our candidates really outperform their Republican counterparts. I think people are more focused on the candidates than his actual name calling anymore.
[20:10:35]
COOPER: David, I'm wondering what you make of the $5 million that's been talked about for Darline Graham in South Carolina. Is that, I mean, do you think it's because she's not the strongest of candidates? I mean, she had that, you know, early on during that debate, you know, she admitted she knows very little about where Taiwan is.
URBAN: Anderson, I think that the Republicans have such a huge money advantage in this election. They are just reallocating resources here. They you know, Sabrina is correct. there are a lot of tough, tough races Republicans are facing. Look, I people don't want to be running these races. You don't want to run this race in North Carolina. You don't have this race in Iowa where, you know Trump was won by 14 points. You don't want to have -- We shouldn't be having these close these close races.
And so, Darline Graham is a good candidate. She's never been tested before, never run before. And so, it's a little bit of, it's buying some safety there, I think. I don't think there's any panic, but, you know, to Sabrina's point, there are lots of places that are on -- around the United States that are that are jump ball.
Listen, I'm surprised to see Michele Tafoya doing as well -- she's doing in Minnesota. So, this is a really kind of a kooky election, a kooky electorate. We will see at the end of the day who comes up. I still like Republican's chances because last time we were on with Sabrina, I asked her to name three things, give me three concrete things the Democrats are going to do when they take over. And neither she nor any other Democrat can name three things.
Sure, they want to bring down prices and stop, you know, make health care more affordable. But tell me what you're going to do on day one. What's H.R. one for Democrats? Nobody can articulate that. And I think the electorate is waiting to see that.
COOPER: Sabrina, do you want to answer that?
SINGH: Yes, well, I thank you for reminding me, David. I actually do remember that conversation and I think some of the things that Democrats are talking about are reversing the cuts to Medicare that this administration has made, reversing some of those cuts to health care, kicking people off of their health care plans. And then you also hear Democrats talking about accountability and transparency.
I mean, the fact that, you know, Don, Jr. had parts of his wedding paid for by a Russian Oligarch, this administration, the Donald Trump Jr. -- Donald Trump's sons are getting richer off of this administration.
The meme coin, the crypto investments that Donald Trump has made. I think you're seeing Democrats saying, okay, enough is enough. We're going to hold you accountable. If we take back the House and potentially take back the Senate, and we are going to hold your feet to the fire because this is wrong. You're enriching yourself at the expense of taxpayers.
And I think a perfect example of that is the President running taxpayer funded ads across the country. That's not a PSA. It's propping up his own image. So, I think Democrats actually have a plan on day one.
URBAN; I'm 100 percent, listen, Anderson, I'm 100 percent for accountability. I just didn't hear Sabrina tell me three things that they're going to do to make things more affordable. I did hear Mark -- listen, I did hear, I did hear Senator Kelly say, they're going to raise taxes on people making over a million bucks. So, we can look forward to that but Sabrina, maybe next time.
COOPER: All right, Sabrina, David Urban, thank you very much.
Coming up next, more on the President's remarks about San Diego and Los Angeles being nuked. L.A. Mayor Karen Bass joins us.
Also, Cornell University named a former top Justice Department official to review the school's response to Jane Doe's fraternity gang rape allegations. And a new report about what happened after the alleged incident, including a purported phone conversation between Jane Doe and one of the men allegedly involved.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:18:00]
COOPER: We're talking tonight about the President's remarks about Los Angeles and San Diego last night, which the White House is calling a, "media freak out" and suggesting the President said the opposite of how it's being interpreted by others.
Just to remind you, he was in Nebraska talking about the war and fuel prices. Here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We have to stop them from having a nuclear weapon. So, I was riding in Iowa, I made a speech there, and I passed a gas station, $1.95 a gallon. I passed another station, $1.85 a gallon. We'll have it lower than that in a very short period of time. And again, remember, with the war, it's just artificial. It's a little bit high. It's a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe.
They can take out a city, let them take, let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego. That's, this is a very small price to pay and it's going to be over very soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Joining us now, the Mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass. Mayor Bass, I'm wondering what you thought when you heard not only the President say that take out Los Angeles, but also the crowd applauding?
MAYOR KAREN BASS (D) LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Well, first of all, I was horrified that the President would basically say that another country is perfectly fine to take out or to attack our city and our sister city two hours away. That the role of the President is to protect and defend the American people. He went to war with Iran, and he basically said, it's okay that it's a small price to pay to attack 3.8 million people in the nation's second largest city. I was horrified by those comments.
But then again, we are the city that he invaded last June with federal troops for no reason at all to intimidate a whole sector of our population, Latino immigrants.
COOPER: As you know, the white house is pushing back on this. They are saying, look, the President was, "clearly stating U.S. cities would have been threatened if a nuclear Iran hadn't been stopped.
Our guest, David Urban was on the program earlier and essentially saying, look, he was off prompter. He's riffing and perhaps he was speaking inelegantly or unartfully. Do you think there's just that explanation?
[20:20:24]
BASS: Well, absolutely not. I mean, I heard what I heard and so did the rest of the world. What does that say to the about the United States on the world stage that the President would say, if you want to take out the nation's second largest city, have at it. How do you think the world looks at us?
I understand that that press deputy wanted to paint it that way, as though we did not hear what we heard. But I'm sorry to say that it is on tape and the entire world heard it. And then I have to say to the people who applauded, are the people who think that that is funny. It just shows how this kind of behavior. There's a segment of our population that thinks whatever he says, no matter how egregious it is, is okay.
Governor Newsom, California Governor Newsom put out a remark saying, "Donald Trump's remarks were dangerous, if not treasonous, putting a target on two of our biggest cities and one of America's largest naval hubs. I'm directing the state threat assessment center to actively monitor the situation in the event that foreign actors interpret the President's remarks as an invitation to target California."
Do you think if, you know, often, I try to play the question of like, if President Obama had said something like that, would candidate Trump, what would he have said about it? It's hard to imagine if you had said that about, you know, a Republican City that this white house would not have the worst possible translation of that?
BASS: Well, let me just tell you that if I had said something like that, I'd probably have a knock on my door within an hour being investigated and people asking me, you know, what on earth was I thinking? And do I realize that I might have crossed the line and committed a crime?
You know, you can't just make idle threats of federal officials. And then to make essentially a terrorist threat against another city, it would absolutely not be tolerated. But we tolerate this behavior from this President.
I think that when our city was invaded by the Marines and 4,000 National Guard Troops for no reason at all, that that's all part of a plan to get the U.S. public to acclimate to military intervention in our cities. I said from day one, I thought L.A. was an experiment, and this was going to spread around the country. We saw that that was the case. Now, maybe the next time it happens, Americans won't be so outraged because they've seen so many cities have federal intervention from the military. it's a misuse of the military and irresponsible words.
COOPER: I appreciate your time tonight, thank you.
Coming up next, will Cornell University's naming of a special investigator in the alleged fraternity gang rape, there quiet the uproar and get answers to the questions that are outstanding? I'll talk to the accuser's attorney.
And later, with Russian authorities, denying that a worker at a plague research facility died of the disease. But hospitals now under quarantine and ambulance workers going around in bio protective gear. What is actually going on? We'll be joined by an expert in the field.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:27:52]
COOPER: A student-led town hall is being held tonight at Cornell. It's built as they talk about sexual violence, accountability and student safety. Meanwhile, the university's leadership announced today that Sally Yates, the former U.S. Deputy Attorney General and briefly the acting Attorney General, will lead an independent review of Cornell's response to the gang rape allegations.
This, as we continue to learn more about the events in the hours, days and weeks following the alleged rape at the Chi Phi fraternity house. "ABC News" obtained this audio recording of a purported phone call between Jane Doe and a fraternity member, who she alleges took part in what happened.
According to ABC, the call took place about three weeks after the night in question.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
CHI PHI FRATERNITY BROTHER: I'm so sorry about all, like, the backlash you're getting from this, by the way.
Oh, dude, I'm so sorry. No, I like, I feel so bad for you, DUDE.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
COOPER: According to ABC, Jane Doe responded with, "I was completely and totally intoxicated and then given multiple sedatives. And then I was surrounded by upwards of 8 to 10 men... this is classified as a gang rape."
The fraternity member responded with this.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP) CHI PHI FRATERNITY BROTHER: Why? Wait, what's -- can I ask, like, what's, what's the purpose for why you decided to call me?
(END AUDIO CLIP)
COOPER: Thomas Giuffra is the attorney for Jane Doe; he joins me now.
Mr. Giuffra, first of all, how is your client doing, given all the attention on this?
THOMAS GIUFFRA, ATTORNEY FOR JANE DOE: She's not doing well at all, Anderson. Just before I got on with you, somebody called her, made a threat to shoot up her house, shoot her, her mother, her father. She's calling the police as we speak now.
I'm absolutely appalled that this has gone so far that people are doing this. But I see this fire of hate that's being fanned lately, and I'm just shocked.
COOPER: Is that the first call you've gotten from her?
GIUFFRA: No. I've had, she's had regular nasty e-mails calling her names, threatening her. She had one yesterday with three emojis with Colt 45s on them saying she should be killed and things like that. This is the first call and this is very worrisome for me, her family. We're terrified and once I get off this presentation with you, I'm going to be getting on the phone with her and getting on the phone with the police.
[20:30:18]
COOPER: Do you support the choice of Former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates to lead this investigation?
GIUFFRA: Yes. Sally Yates is an excellent choice. She's experienced dealing with institutional failures. She's done it before. She'll do it again. My concern is just that the university cooperates and they give her everything they have because, frankly, Anderson, I don't have everything that's come out.
Thankfully, somebody in the Cornell police has been leaking a lot of the investigation materials and hopefully she'll have that. We'll get to the bottom of what happened and if there's anybody who can do it, it's Ms. Yates.
COOPER: You've suggested that evidence could have been deleted from the fraternity Snapchat group because investigators failed to download material from the men's phones in the immediate aftermath of the allegation. NBC is reporting a student actually provided Cornell police with a 54-minute screen recording of the Snapchat discussion from the night of the alleged assault. Have you seen that recording?
GIUFFRA: I have not seen that recording. All I've ever seen are the two pages that I've shared and that's the only thing I've shared to the media throughout this whole thing. Now that I hear pages and pages in my head, I'm saying witnesses after witnesses after witnesses who should have been spoken with, where evidence should have been gathered that was not done and valuable evidence is likely lost.
Look, I'm not a computer person. I don't know how Snapchat works, but I know it goes after a while and there are sites such as Telegram and things like that you could use. And the time to go and do an investigation is close in time and that was not done.
COOPER: ABC has reported your client recorded phone calls with some of the men named in the lawsuit. At least one of those recordings from ABC was made the day before she went to the Cornell police with her initial statement. We heard one of those recordings. Can you talk about the thinking behind making those recordings?
GIUFFRA: Well, I think it's -- as I've said before, she was processing what happened to her that night. At first, it was denial. Then it was shame. Then it was acceptance and she was trying to understand what happened because she didn't know.
You heard her mention 8 to 10 people were in the room. That's what I said the other day. We don't know. We identify the people she knows. So she was trying to get information. She was trying to get these people to tell her what happened and you could see just what happened in the last clip that you played.
Once they figured out that she was trying to get information and they weren't buying into the gaslighting, then they backed up. And another thing I found out today is that the whole fraternity had meetings to try to cover this up and to, you know, be part of the conspiracy of silence. And that's really frightening that this happened.
I mean, these guys, there were 57 people who got that group chat and not one of them, other than the person who leaked it to her, did anything. Nobody walked out of those meetings and said, hey, this is wrong. We're going to the police. We're throwing these guys under the bus and holding them accountable.
All they were interested in was protecting the fraternity, protecting their fraternity brothers and keeping it as business as usual. That's what they were interested in. Not justice. Not in this woman.
COOPER: In an interview with the -- on this network over the weekend, you alleged a cover up by the Cornell Police Department. And I'm wondering, can you talk more about that? What do you think was covered up?
GIUFFRA: Well, at first I thought, and this is what I've said many times, it was just incompetence. It's a small university police force. They wouldn't know what they were doing. And, you know, they should have got brought in outside help. They should have brought in outside agencies because they were in over their head.
But the fact is, now we know they had statements from Jane Doe that documented violence towards her, and she said, I'm 100 percent certain I was raped. Now, here's the question, how are neither of those things in the ultimate six-page police report? They're the most important elements of a criminal case. And yet you have to wonder, who told the investigators to not include it in the report? Because the fact that there's a leak, that tells me something. It tells me somebody who's the rank and file investigating officers thought that there was something amiss, and that's why they're disclosing this stuff to the media outlets, because they think what happened was wrong.
That's why I'm walked away with this. And you have to wonder, who are the people in charge who said to sanitize the report? Because if you read that report, nothing happened out of the ordinary, but you hear about the transcripts and what was said and what the witnesses said, it shows a completely different color.
And that smells to me like a cover up. And then you have the district attorney, D.A. Van Houten, saying he never saw the group chat, he never saw the transcripts. And then it turns out there was a lot of investigation done that none of these people saw. And I would certainly have not found it if somebody in the Cornell Police Department didn't leak it to the news.
[20:35:09]
COOPER: Yes. Thomas Giuffra, I really appreciate your time tonight. I wish you the best. Thank you.
GIUFFRA: Thank you, Anderson. Thank you.
COOPER: I want to get a reaction now from Criminal Defense Attorney Stacy Schneider. Stacy, you heard from Jane Doe's attorney. I'm wondering what stands out to you.
STACY SCHNEIDER, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: A lot stands out. But before I address that, I just want to say no alleged victim in this country should ever be threatened for going forward to police or for filing a civil lawsuit against the people she's accusing. That being said, Jane Doe's attorney says a lot of things differently now that he has a 2026 lawsuit filed in civil court for money damages that did not exist in the 120-page Cornell police investigation, which Jane Doe eventually signed off on.
Now, back in 2024, she signed under oath under penalty of perjury, a statement about what happened to her. And in that statement, there are allegations from her that she was not incapacitated, although the 2026 lawsuit says she was incapacitated from the moment she walked into the frat house.
There are alleged statements by her in the police investigation that her initial sexual encounter was consensual. There are text messages allegedly referenced in subsequent investigations where she had contact with the frat boys, two of them who her civil lawsuit accuses of rape. But she actually allegedly said, I enjoyed the experience and I want to get together with one of you again in smoke --
COOPER: Are you thinking -- are you -- I mean, obviously, you're a defense attorney, this is something that a defense attorney is going to try to point out any inconsistencies. Do you believe she changed her story or that her memory returned to her? Or what do you believe these discrepancies, which you say are, what do you think is the reason for them?
SCHNEIDER: Well, I'm trying to analyze the case with due process on both sides, due process to her for her allegations and due process to the seven accused men. And in a rape trial, what is given the most weight are the statements that are immediate in close proximity to the incident. And I think everyone, because this case is being tried out in the public right now, before there are even charges rendered, criminal charges rendered against any of the seven.
And I believe they will be rendered because New York's grand jury system, it is very easy to indict. That doesn't mean someone's guilty, but it's very easy to obtain an indictment based on probable cause. Is there a probable cause here? Probably.
There are thousands of pages of documents from the Cornell police investigation and the Title IX investigation, the federal civil rights investigation and combined, there's a lot of documentation. So Jane Doe's attorneys claim that they didn't do anything and they didn't investigate, and this was a cover up, I don't see that. That doesn't really fit the facts of what was done.
And he will eventually get access to that information. But right now, I don't think that's a fair way to look at the case when he has a civil lawsuit pending.
COOPER: Stacy Schneider, I appreciate it. We'll continue the conversation another time. Thank you very much.
Up next, what the President said today about the mysterious death of a Russian lab worker at a facility dedicated to studying the plague.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:42:42]
COOPER: The President says he has a call scheduled with Vladimir Putin very soon to discuss the Russian plague lab worker who died. The public health agency overseeing infectious diseases in Russia has downplayed any connection between her death and her work. You know, despite that, the Russian government has quarantined the hospital where she was treated.
Joining us now is Immunologist Gigi Gronvall. She's a professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Professor, we still don't know if this lab worker died of the plague. If she did, how concerning would that be for the rest of us?
GIGI GRONVALL, PROFESSOR, JOHNS HOPKINS BLOOMBERG SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH: Yes, we don't know that she died of the plague. We don't know what she died of at all. Russian officials have denied that she died of anything connected to her work, but who knows. But if she did, and the plague is, you know, while a terrible tragedy for the person who died and for those who may become sick, it is a treatable disease and we have less concern about this than many other much more contagious diseases.
COOPER: So the plague is -- how is plague treatable? And how easy is it to spread?
GRONVALL: So plague is a -- Yersinia pestis is a bacteria. It is treatable with antibiotics, but -- and it doesn't really spread very well when somebody has it, even if they have the pneumonic, so the lung form of the disease. So it usually only affects the people who are caring for the patient and sometimes the close family members.
So it really doesn't spread as well. Usually in past cases, only one, maybe two people have gotten sick from one sick person. So by comparison, measles, it can be 14 to 18 people who can get sick from one person with measles.
COOPER: You're also a member on the Council on Foreign Relations, can Russia be trusted for transparency in this kind of a situation?
GIUFFRA: No, it is a good idea to not put -- to have lots of grains of salt, maybe even a full cup of salt with this kind of declaration. So that is why we have to be prepared for all kinds of things, because it's not, you know -- it's plague. If it's plague, if it's something limited, then we would like to have more information.
[20:45:12]
But it is -- it could be something else, and it could be some -- another country, another disease tomorrow. So we need to be prepared for dealing with all kinds of infectious diseases.
COOPER: Gigi Gronvall, I really appreciate your time tonight. Thank you.
Now back to politics here at home and troubling signs of President Trump on the campaign trail, our Elle Reeve has returned to a shop in rural Virginia. You may remember this where -- that was transformed into a destination for MAGA merchandise. Well, now sales have taken a hit.
Here's Elle's report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WHITEY TAYLOR, OWNER, TRUMP TOWN USA: Come here. Let me show you the hottest two items that we have in the store, in the Wokeness ice cube maker when it comes --
ELLE REEVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's Trump's face?
TAYLOR: Yes.
REEVE: It's Trump's ice face?
TAYLOR: Yes.
REEVE: OK, that is kind of cool. TAYLOR: The liberals, they bought -- I designed this glass myself. Says I took a shot for you, now take one for me.
REEVE (voice-over): Things aren't like they used to be at Whitey Taylor's Trump Town, USA.
TAYLOR: It's not selling like it was.
REEVE: At the peak, how much were you selling a day?
TAYLOR: We had a lot of $12,000 days, maybe a $15,000 day occasionally, but yes.
REEVE: And now what is it?
TAYLOR: Well, $1,500, $2,000, sometimes hit $3,000.
REEVE: It's a really big fall off.
TAYLOR: Well, it is. It is.
REEVE (voice-over): When we first visited Taylor's store in December 2023, sales were better, and they gave us a sense of the energy around Trump before he won the Republican nomination to be President again. Taylor took issue with our report.
TAYLOR: You said the place was almost vulgar. That was your conclusion.
REEVE: Well, there are --
TAYLOR: Oh gosh.
REEVE: Let's go look at them. Let's go look at them. Let's go look at the Trump balls.
TAYLOR: I'm still selling a lot of them because of you. Yes.
REEVE (voice-over): Taylor disputes the idea sales are down because Trump supporters are mad at the President and says sales will pick back up once he leaves office.
TAYLOR: They'll come here by the droves and say, what do you got, man? I know you're still there. So we'll be here waiting on it.
REEVE (voice-over): But his customers say they see public opinion turning.
STEVIE LOVELL, TRUMP TOWN USA CUSTOMER: I've seen a lot of Trump supporters just say, heck with him, put his sticker upside down or not fly his flag or put a red zero on it. You know, I've seen a few of those. Very few people still support Trump.
REEVE (voice-over): Stevie Lovell says he still backs Trump and he'll vote straight ticket Republican in the midterms. But he has a lot of criticism. LOVELL: I'm not a supporter of the war in Iran. And just like later on, we found out information about the war in Iraq. We found out that we shouldn't have been there. This thing that's going on in Gaza is horrible. I think it's more horrible than what's going on in Iran personally.
REEVE: What do you think about the ICE raids and arrests and stuff?
LOVELL: The ICE raids? If you give people absolute power, they abuse it. I listened to a report that was very, very reliable. It showed where Trump had made more money in the office in his position than any other President.
REEVE: Yes, that is true.
LOVELL: Yes, it bothered me a little bit. But I still like him. Profit isn't a dirty word, but it kind of does bother me a little bit that he's in office and he's gaining a lot.
REEVE (voice-over): Two-thirds of Americans say Trump has made the economy worse. And majorities say the Iran war and tariffs have hurt them financially, according to a September CNN poll. The President is at his lowest approval rating ever.
BARBARA KEITH, TRUMP TOWN USA CUSTOMER: What I don't understand is how can we make agreements with, like, Venezuela and yet the gas prices are still up? What's going on there?
REEVE: What do you think about that?
KEITH: Well, I don't think it's Trump's fault.
REEVE: OK.
KEITH: You know, everybody blames Trump for everything. It's a whole bunch of people.
REEVE: Do you think, though, that the war is making gas prices worse?
KEITH: Well, that's what they blame it on. But explain it to me when you still have oil, but yet you already raised the prices, but you're still using the oil that you had. They do it all the time. That's why I don't think grocery prices are going to go down, because they saw that we could afford it, so they're going to keep them high.
JAMIE VARELA, TRUMP TOWN USA CUSTOMER: My son's 17, my daughter's 14. My grocery bill is anywhere between $800 to $1,000 a month. When you're going to the store and you're paying $5 for a pineapple --
REEVE: Yes.
VALERA: -- then you've got to choose fruit or gas, like, it's really, really hard.
REEVE: Do you think any of the responsibility for those high prices falls on Trump? VALERA: Yes, because of the war.
REEVE: Are you going to vote in the elections coming up?
VALERA: Yes.
REEVE: Who do you plan on voting for?
VALERA: I'm not sure yet, to be honest.
REEVE: What are you weighing?
VALERA: Well, to be honest, I need someone who's going to continue on with closed borders.
REEVE (voice-over): A couple customers brought up that they felt like people weren't as nice to each other anymore and that people need to come together and not be so mean about political differences.
VALERA: Doesn't matter what you believe in, what religion, or if you think the color purple is better than the color pink. Like, all that matters is that they bleed, we bleed, we're human. If you don't agree with someone's opinion, that's fine. That's what our forefathers fought for, is that everyone could have their own opinion.
REEVE: Wait, wait, wait, wait. You're saying you want people to be nicer to people, but look at the thing that you're buying.
VALERA: Oh, I do believe she should go fuck off. No, I can say she should kindly go fuck off, but I don't think that she should be around at all.
[20:50:04]
REEVE: I know, but you see what I'm saying, that there's a little bit of, one might say, a contradiction.
VALERA: OK. Wait, wait, what if I said, please tell her to go fuckoff, take a hike, or I could say, (INAUDIBLE).
REEVE: Right. Sure.
VALERA: That's what I'm talking about. The way you say things versus how you say things can be completely taken different.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm freezing my balls off.
TAYLOR: The balls, he's freezing his balls off.
Shut up, Trump. You've had enough of you today.
REEVE (voice-over): Taylor says Trump's made him millions of dollars.
TAYLOR: People ask me all the time, say, oh, so when are you going to close? You know, I said 2040. They said 2040. Why? I said, well, it gives all the Trump kids time to run through the office first. REEVE (voice-over): Elle Reeve, CNN, Boones Mill, Virginia.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Well, up next on Kristi Noem's last day as DHS secretary, guess what? A massive contract for luxury planes was reportedly awarded to one of her campaign donors. Details ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:55:12]
COOPER: Former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem is under fire tonight because of fresh reporting from the New York Times regarding luxury planes, tens of millions of taxpayer dollars and the Times says one of her campaign donors. Quoting from the article now, "In the last hours of Kristi Noem's tenure as the Homeland Security secretary, her agency delivered a windfall to one of her political donors by buying five airplanes from the man's firm at a substantial markup document show"."
According to the Times, this is one of the jets, a Boeing 737 with a bar, two bedrooms and marble showers. I want to play part of an ad for another one of the planes posted online before DHS purchased it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This exquisite aircraft fits 17 passengers in a five zone VVIP cabin configuration. It's meticulously maintained, has low hours and one U.S. owner since new. If you're looking to redefine luxury travel in your life, it starts here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: I should point out that Former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has called the Times reporting factually incorrect and asked for a retraction. David Fahrenthold, investigative reporter for The New York Times, is on the byline. He joins us now.
So, David, just walk us through what more you found out about the sale of these planes and how it dovetails with your previous reporting on Noem's spending on aircraft.
DAVID FAHRENTHOLD, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER, THE NEW YORK TIMES: Yes, you and I talked a few weeks ago about how these planes are part of 10 planes that the DHS bought from this vendor, this donor's firm, and they don't use them. They -- one of the planes they've given to the FBI, the rest of them sit idle.
So we were interested in how exactly did they come to acquire these planes that nobody seems to want now. What we found was that the five of those planes, the last five, the most expensive five, the most overpriced five, were all bought, as you said, literally in the last hours of Kristi Noem's tenure.
She knew she was going to leave office in the early afternoon of March 24th. These things got bought in the late morning. And she committed the government to this huge purchase that provided a windfall to this donor to her super PAC.
COOPER: And I just want to read from your article. It says, quote, "The Department of Homeland Security agreed to pay the donor's firm $108 million for a Boeing 737 airliner that had been converted into massive private jet, complete with a stand-up bar, two bedrooms, marble showers, and a table covered in manta ray skin."
Why would the Department of Homeland Security need an airborne table covered in manta ray skin?
FAHRENTHOLD: They've never given us an answer on that part. Look, one thing -- two things are interesting about this. One is that the company that sold them that plane for $108 million had bought it just a few months earlier from a seller who was only asking less than $90 million.
So that seems to be a pretty significant markup, pretty significant price above the market rate. But also what Noem said at the time was, well, we might use this for deportations. It would be sometimes for command and control by DHS leaders, but sometimes we might deport people on it, which the people we talked to said makes no sense.
COOPER: I mean, when you look inside, it's hard to imagine that that would be a great plane to be deported -- I mean, it would be pleasant for, I guess, the people being deported, but it's just -- it doesn't look like there are a lot of seats, frankly, for a lot of people. She -- Noem is pushing back against your reporting, saying it, quote, "conveys a false implication of a direct financial relationship, obviously intended to influence official action."
What did you learn about her relationship with this aviation company?
FAHRENTHOLD: So its chairman, a guy named William Walters, gave $10,000 in late 2024 to a political action committee supporting Kristi Noem. Basically, it advertised itself as the way to pay for Kristi Noem to travel and campaign around the country. The pushback we've gotten is, you know, it's only $10,000, you know, that doesn't imply any sort of relationship.
We don't know much more about their relationship. We do know he made this donation at a time when Kristi Noem was not, as far as anybody else knew, on the shortlist to be the Department of Homeland Security secretary. And when this PAC wasn't doing very much, there wasn't really much reason to give this PAC money in the last weeks of 2024.
COOPER: And what is the current DHS secretary, who's Markwayne Mullin, saying about these planes? And is it clear where they are now? And is anybody using them?
FAHRENTHOLD: Well, we know that Markwayne Mullin tried to get out of this deal. He takes over a few hours after this contract is signed and inquires about whether he can get out of it, because he doesn't apparently want to use the planes. And he eventually decides there's a financial penalty for getting out of it.
They go all the way to the White House, ask the White House Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles. She says, keep the planes, avoid the penalty. But now one of the planes has been leased to the FBI. The others are just sitting idle.
And that -- it's not -- not that they're even done spending money on them. They cost money sitting idle. And until recently, the money they were paying to maintain them in basically part was going to this same donor to known super PAC, William Walters.
COOPER: Wait a minute. The guy who made the money for selling the planes is making money for storing them?
FAHRENTHOLD: Yes, he made money selling them and then he made money when they didn't fly them, because the DHS --
COOPER: Wow.
FAHRENTHOLD: -- then gave his companies the planes and said, hey, take care of these until we figure out what to do with them.
COOPER: David Fahrenthold, as always, I appreciate the reporting. Thank you so much.
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That's it for us. The news continues. The Source with Kaitlan Collins starts now.
