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Amanpour
Interview with Representative Steve Cohen (D-TN); Interview with Former Senior Adviser to U.S. Trade Representative and Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow Brad Setser; Interview with The Wall Street Journal Reporter Hannah Critchfield. Aired 1-2p ET
Aired August 10, 2026 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[13:00:00]
PAULA NEWTON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, and welcome to "Amanpour." Here's what's coming up.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Because a lot of them are very angry at Republicans, to be honest with you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why is that?
TRUMP: I don't know.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: From the Iran war to affordability to a drop in violent crime rates, could these issues sway U.S. voters in the upcoming midterms? I
speak with Democratic Congressman Steve Cohen.
Then --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEVIN HASSETT, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ECONOMIC COUNCIL: Look at the overall economy, then things are really, really booming.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: The Trump administration touts a roaring economy, but are the warning signs starting to light up? Former Treasury official Brad Setser
joins us.
Plus --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Israeli bullets, he tells us. Walls completely blown out. Bullet holes above where his grandchildren once
slept.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: -- more than 800,000 displaced Lebanese people are returning home amid the Israel-Hezbollah war. Correspondent Nada Bashir has a report.
Also, ahead --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HANNAH CRITCHFIELD, REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: ICE has deployed this round-the-clock digital dragnet to scour the public internet, from
Facebook to Instagram to X, for speech that could endanger the agency's mission.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: How ICE is weaponizing social media. Wall Street Journal reporter Hannah Critchfield tells Hari Sreenivasan.
And a warm welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Paula Newton in New York, sitting in for Christiane Amanpour.
Patience is wearing thin amongst American voters as President Trump's costly war with Iran drags on. Yes, now into its sixth month. With little
progress towards a solution, oil prices climb and climb. And amid the economic strain of the conflict, there's growing frustration towards the
Republican Party, as Democrats appear to lead in voter support three months ahead of the November midterm elections. That's according to a Reuters-
Ipsos poll.
Now, as the parties campaign hard, of course, across a range of issues, Americans can perhaps breathe a sigh of relief when it comes to one key
domestic concern, crime. A new report by the Council on Criminal Justice shows a notable drop across large cities in the first half of the year,
with homicides reaching their lowest level since at least 1900.
This trend, of course, isn't due to the success or failure of one particular policy, but likely the result of a range of factors.
Translation, it's much more complicated than we first believed.
Steve Cohen is a Democratic congressman and a longtime lawmaker who sits on both the Judiciary and Intelligence House committees. He's going to try and
help us break all of this down. And I hear you, see you, that this is, in fact, much more complicated than we have at first blush.
I want to go first to the fact that you do sit, though, first on the Intelligence Committee. What are you seeing? What are you hearing right now
when it comes to any kind of a resolution in Iran? I think what is most concerning for so many Americans is when they really see that perhaps
America has one arm tied behind its back when it comes to ordinance and munitions. What have you learned that you can share?
REP. STEVE COHEN (D-TN): Well, there's not that much that I've learned that I can share. If I told you, I'd have to shoot you.
NEWTON: That's not exactly reassuring.
COHEN: Don't want to do that.
NEWTON: That's not exactly reassuring. But listen, CNN and other great publications, we've already have our own reporting, right. And they show
that even senior U.S. military commanders are warning that the Pentagon's munitions are dangerously low.
COHEN: Well, I think the common accepted perspective is that munitions are low and that we used an abundance of materials in Iran and we don't have
enough in America to cover what could be problems. If we try to help Taiwan defend itself from communist China, if we try like we should to help
Ukraine stopping the Russian attacks on the civilian population, in what's a -- not a -- it was a genocide in Ukraine, but these are war crimes that
Russia's continuing to conduct. And we're not helping Ukraine, which we should with weapons.
[13:05:00]
So, yes, there's no question we don't have enough weapons and there's no question that we've got problems. And we say we've got a hand tied behind
our back. We've got both of our hands tied behind our back because Hegseth has no business being the secretary of defense. He was a TV guy and he got
hired just like Kristi Noem got hired and Paula, whatever her name was from Florida, got hired to be the second DA, attorney general. And that was
after they went and met gates.
I mean, this guy just hires people based on how they look. And unfortunately, he doesn't take that same policy when it comes to himself,
because if he looked in the mirror, he wouldn't have run.
NEWTON: So, Congressman, though, this remains a problem for Americans, including you, an elected official. Now, I want to point out that we have a
lot of people that come on and illustrate the problem. But what is the solution here? Because America is at war with Iran. I do want to say that
Trump has privately complained that disclosures, the disclosures that you and I are discussing right now on those dwindling stockpiles make the U.S.
look weak, in his opinion.
And Trump wrote on Truth Social, the U.S. has massive amounts of munitions, especially of certain types. Additionally, large amounts are being
manufactured and shipped to the U.S. as needed. Defense companies are building the largest number of plants and factories in our country's
history. Is there anything in what the president says that is the solution here that reassures you that all is not lost?
COHEN: Well, I don't think all is lost. I mean, we're probably going to maximum speed and trying to ramp up the production of weapons, missiles,
planes, et cetera, that we need. And we'll catch up. But it'll be an additional expense and it'll just run up the deficit. It's tremendous
already in the trillions of dollars. And the country's in danger.
There's just pigeons are coming home to roost in America with the president who's not capable of being the president of the United States. I saw
Beschloss posted something today with Richard Nixon announcing his resignation as president. And they were showing early clips. And I looked
at Nixon, I thought, you know, he was a crook in Watergate. And he had some nasty things to say about lots of people in America, but he knew policy and
he knew national affairs and he knew foreign affairs. He can't say that about Trump.
NEWTON: But he has been elected president. He will remain president till the end of his term in 2028. This becomes very serious, right, as so many
Americans say, that once America goes to war, pretty much you've got to be rooting for your team, right. I mean, I guess I'm just a bit confused as
your posture here.
You're on the Intelligence Committee. You can't tell me what you hear. But when you do hear what you hear, what do you think the solution is now? How
does America get out of this thing?
COHEN: We have to be prepared. We have to have our defense stockpiles replenished. And we have to keep our good generals, which we're getting rid
of many of our good generals. But that's unfortunate because of their attack on DEI. And they fired a lot of women and a lot of African-Americans
who were top leaders. And there was a man who was destined to be the head of the military Joint Chiefs of Staff. And they fired him for some reason.
And everybody loved him.
So, there's some crazy things going on in our government. And they're not going to stop because Trump, he doesn't do about faces.
NEWTON: In terms of the Iran conflict --
COHEN: I'm concerned about the future.
NEWTON: Go ahead.
COHEN: I'm concerned about the future of the country. I think the next two years are very serious, not only internationally, which they are, but
domestically. And I would not be surprised if Trump tries to do something with the elections in November. With the throwing ICE and federal agents at
the polls to try to intimidate people and try to change the results. And to claim on January 3 that if the House is a Democrat, which I think it will
be, that they're not going to have them seated. And that our new U.S. attorney general will do what Trump tells him to do. And we'll have a real
constitutional crisis on January 3rd of 2027.
NEWTON: I do want to return to the issue at hand with the war. It's been almost six months since Iran started this war. Strait of Hormuz still isn't
open. We're not exactly sure when it will be.
COHEN: Did Iran start the war? When did Iran start the war? I thought this is the war we started.
NEWTON: Pardon me, I might have misspoken. My point, though, is that the president continues to say that there was a reason that he started this
war. And that's the fact to make sure that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon. So, the strait still is not reopened.
Do you think Iran has a strategic win here? And if it does, I'm going to repeat what I said to you before. You can't be hoping that's the case, even
if it is good for Democrats politically.
[13:10:00]
COHEN: Oh, I'm not thinking of it in terms of Democrats. It's just the reality. And I do hope that we can extract ourselves without too much war.
But we'll be lucky to get like a draw out of this.
Right now, if we can get the straits of Hormuz open, it's going to be -- which they were open in the first place, it's like touchdown. We're not
going to get the nuclear fission that they have. They probably moved it already deep underneath the mountains. But they've moved it, I suspect.
They've got a worse leadership team than they had before the war started. We killed so many of the leaders. How can you expect a man whose father was
murdered on day one to be a nice conciliatory guy? And I think he's nobody -- I don't have any definite proof of any of this, but apparently, he's
disfigured and damaged greatly from that attack. He's not going to think well of Trump.
The Iranians have always thought we were the Satan. And if you were Satan before you killed his father and disfigured him and killed a few other
members of his family, you're even super Satan now. We're going to have a problem with Iran for a long time, the rest of my life, probably the rest
of your life too.
NEWTON: Definitely a sobering opinion you have there for Americans and anyone looking in on how this conflict is unfolding.
I do want to pivot now, though, to the focus of another one of the subcommittee assignments that you have, which is crime and federal
government surveillance. Following the historic 30 percent increase in homicide, and that was from 2019 to 2020, the Council on Criminal Justice
last report estimated that in 2025, national homicide rate will likely be at its lowest level since 1900. Homicides, carjackings, residential
burglaries, carjackings dropped by more than 50 percent compared to their peaks over the past nine years.
From what you know of your work on committee, why do you think this is happening? And do you believe it is something to celebrate?
COHEN: Well, indeed, it's something to celebrate. We've got a large high crime rate in Washington, D.C. and in Memphis, Tennessee, the two cities I
live in mostly, and it's unfortunate. And the crime rates still are too high. They've gone down not because of any federal task force, but because
of local policing and the fact that we've gotten beyond, there was a real rise during COVID times, and COVID peaks have come down greatly. Why
they've come down to the 1900 levels is kind of hard for me to fathom.
I saw some report where somebody said that because of what the police have done and ICE have done, the people distrust the police more, and so there's
less crime. That doesn't make much sense. If they distrust the police, you'll have less crime.
But -- so, I don't think anybody has a good answer, and I don't think the public is just all of a sudden becoming much more Mr. Rogers and trying to
be good and make the neighborhood clean and nice.
NEWTON: I am curious as to what you're seeing there in Memphis. In fact, police there say that in 2025 there was a 26 percent decrease in murders,
22 percent drop in aggravated assault, 31 percent decrease in robberies, carjackings down by almost half. Those are the stats.
But crime still, I'm sure you'll agree with me, remains a political issue. I mean, what are your constituents telling you? Because sometimes they look
at these stats, and they would tend to say that they are safer, and yet perhaps your constituents are telling you they don't feel any safer.
COHEN: Most of my constituents don't feel any safer, and I don't feel any safer. I know that the local police department has had some improvements in
some of the operations, and the crime rates were going down before the task force came here. But Mark Twain was known to say there are liars, there are
damn liars, and there are statisticians. And these reports are all coming from statisticians after their communities had gotten terrible ratings for
high crime rates. So, maybe they're just not reporting as well.
NEWTON: That is, again, a fairly controversial and sobering assessment that you have of the police department in Memphis itself, because that's
where we're getting the data from.
COHEN: Well, they get it from the Crime Commission as well as their own data. And you can classify crimes in different manners or different ways to
classify what's a violent crime and what's a crime. You know, there's classifications therein that they can use.
But this is all over the country. So, it's not just -- it wouldn't just be the Memphis Police Department. But every night when you see the news,
somebody else is getting murdered. It's hard to believe. I mean, Trump came here, and I think it was in May or April, and he said in a month Memphis
will have no crime whatsoever. He said the same thing about Washington, D.C. about six months ago. Just ridiculous.
NEWTON: Congressman, we only have about a minute left. I do want to note that you are not running again for office. Given there are some highlights
there in terms of what's going on with affordability, what's going on with crime, I mean, what do you think will be the most salient point in the
midterms going forward from where you sit, even though, I stress, you're not running again?
[13:15:00]
COHEN: I think affordability. I think people go to the grocery store, and they see the prices are very, very high. I see them myself when I go to the
store. It's as absurd the prices they have. It used to be you'd get a steak, and the price would be whatever it was a pound. Now, it's for the
steak, and it's maybe a 12-ounce portion. So, they confuse you sometimes with not putting on the price per pound, but everything's more expensive.
And people are having difficulty putting food on the table, taking care of their housing needs and their healthcare needs. Healthcare needs are
unbelievably high. I just had a tooth extracted last Wednesday, and it was $5,500 for an extraction and a bridge. $5,500.
NEWTON: Again, it is what Americans --
COHEN: It's expensive.
NEWTON: Yes. It is -- Americans without health or dental benefits put up with every day. Steve Cohen, we have to leave it there. Thanks so much.
Appreciate it.
COHEN: Paula, thank you. Have a good one.
NEWTON: And stay with CNN. We'll be right back with more news after a quick break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NEWTON: So, the Trump administration wants you to believe that the U.S. economy is in a very good place, but there are some worrying indicators
that warrant a closer look. Now, the Fed, still cautious, still refusing to cut interest rates as the U.S. president demands. Then there's the rare
intervention in the Japanese yen, a move aimed at preventing a sell-off of U.S. Treasury bonds.
Does that show real fragility in the U.S. bond market, typically a safe haven for investors? And why should this matter to you and I? Well, we want
to bring in Brad Setser. He was a senior adviser to the U.S. Trade Representative and has worked in the U.S. Treasury. He's now a senior
fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Good to see you. Thanks for being with us.
BRAD SETSER, FORMER SENIOR ADVISER TO U.S. TRADE REPRESENTATIVE AND SENIOR FELLOW, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: Well, thanks for inviting me on.
NEWTON: I want to set the table here first with Kevin Hassett saying things are really booming, in his words. But I do want to play, as well,
President Trump. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Our country right now is doing better than it's ever done. You know, when I see polls on the economy, I should have
150 percent, not 100 percent.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, yes.
TRUMP: Because we have the greatest -- this is the golden age of America. What's being built now in this country has never, ever been built. And
we're really -- we are literally in the golden age of America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: All right. How about it? Brad, what's your take on this economy under Donald Trump?
SETSER: Look, I think most Americans would actually disagree with President Trump's statements. People are concerned about higher prices.
That's not a new concern. And, you know, there's a very strong divide between those parts of the economy that are benefiting from an enormous
wave of investment into data centers and all the kit needed to build out the A.I. supposed revolution, and the rest of the economy, which is not
actually booming. And some people are clearly feeling squeezed with prices up more than their salaries are up.
NEWTON: We do want to have a look at the data about all of this. Now, Donald Trump and his team have promised 5 percent, 6 percent GDP growth. I
mean, let's take a look at that last reading. The economy grew 2.1 percent in the first quarter.
[13:20:00]
We're looking at some of the data now going back to 2021. I mean, where do you believe this growth is headed? And again, there is the question of how
much A.I. is contributing to all of this.
SETSER: I mean, I think 2 percent is a reasonable growth rate for the U.S. economy. Obviously, there isn't as much immigration as there used to be.
There's not as much labor force growth. So, that is a reasonable growth rate. It is not a boom. And I think it is pretty clear that a meaningful
portion of that growth is coming from A.I. and A.I.-related investments.
Though, it should be noted that a lot of the A.I. investment is being spent on imported semiconductors. So, it's spilling over to the rest of the
world. It's all not just benefiting the U.S. Without that, I think we would probably be in a period of actually subpar growth.
NEWTON: But growth nonetheless, I think many Americans are feeling that because they just don't feel that the economy is as robust as the data, as
you said, given the data even at 2 percent and change.
I do want to get to Trump's two major policies, though, on tariffs and the Iran war. And this gets to the affordability crisis. If we look at
inflation here, I mean, look, inflation was very high after the pandemic. We can see that. And yet it came down. But it is stubborn. It is sticky. It
is at 3 and 4 percent. And what is crucial here is the fact that real wages, what people are earning is not keeping up with an inflation.
How much of a problem do you believe this is going forward? And how do you expect the Federal Reserve, Kevin Warsh, the new Fed chair there to deal
with it?
SETSER: Well, I do think it is. For most Americans, it's a problem when prices are up faster than their wages. People want wages to grow faster
than their prices. That's a reasonable expectation. And it -- you know, when there's one sector that is booming and there isn't a broad-based boom,
the economy doesn't feel great to a lot of people.
It's a challenge for the new chair because sticky high inflation actually suggests a case for rate hikes. It will depend on how the data evolves. And
that's at odds with what the president wants. And it's a little bit at odds with how many people feel. If you're trying to buy a home, you don't
necessarily want rates to go up. But right now, the aggregate data, decent growth, not spectacular growth, above target prices tends to point towards
rate hikes.
NEWTON: And yet, he doesn't seem to be moving in that direction. And this leads us, quite frankly, to the bond market. I want to bring up the
mortgage rates, which is a 30-year fixed rate. And I'll tell you why I always look at this. Because I believe this is really what is keeping the
United States from even growing more. And perhaps you might disagree with me.
But when we're looking at interest rates that are stubbornly, a 30-year fixed mortgage is stubbornly above 6 percent and nearing 7 percent. And
it's been that way for a while. How do you read that in the bond market? Because I do want to get then to the Japanese intervention, because it is
all linked. But if we just look at what's going on with mortgage rates right now.
SETSER: Look, mortgage rates are a lot higher than they were during the low for long period after the global financial crisis. That is clearly
making it hard for many people to afford homes. Monetary policy is currently somewhat restrictive. That's why mortgages are high. That's part
of the reason why 10-year Treasury rates are high. Not the only reason.
But it is indeed how -- unfortunately, how monetary policy works. Monetary policy works through interest rates. It works through long-term interest
rates. It works through mortgages. And that's -- that higher level of mortgages is indeed slowing parts of the economy.
NEWTON: When we get to where it's going to go next, though, and you mentioned monetary policy, right? That's what the markets do. That's what
the Fed does. But what about fiscal policy? How much is that a component right now? We've had the big, beautiful bill in the United States, you
know, arguable in terms of what Americans are seeing from that. But spending in government still remains quite high, continues to add to both
the deficit and the debt.
SETSER: Look, we're heading back to a fiscal deficit of about 6 percent of GDP. That's very high for an economy that is not in real trouble.
It's very high for an economy that's growing more or less at potential. And it's very high, frankly, for an economy when big parts of the economy, all
the hyperscalers, all the people investing in data centers, are investing a lot of money, too. So, you have the government borrowing a lot.
[13:25:00]
You have now some of the investment in artificial intelligence and data centers financed by corporate borrowing. And that's certainly putting
pressure on longer-term rates. It's also adding demand to the economy and making it hard for the Fed to achieve the rate cuts that the president
wants.
So, there's a tension between the president's fiscal policy, which pushes demand up, pushes, creates a little bit of inflationary pressure, keeps
pressure on the Fed to keep rates higher, and his desire for lower interest rates, unquestionably.
NEWTON: So, Brad, I do want to get to the very financial foundations, though, that all of us are pinning our hopes on. And for anybody in the
world, it is the U.S. economy, really, that everyone has to look at. So, I put to you, we've already had this century, a global financial crisis, a
global pandemic. Now, we've got this war in Iran, which seems to have no end. Where do you put the risk of another financial crisis in the next few
years?
SETSER: Modest, I would say.
NEWTON: And why is that? Because I would argue that if something happens, that there isn't the resiliency that we've had in global economies in years
past. So, why is the risk modest? And are you confident that central bankers around the world, that governments around the world could handle
it?
SETSER: Look, I don't have as much confidence that we have the most efficient system of crisis response anymore. I think we've seen a lot of
friction and we've seen the U.S. introduce a lot of friction into its relationship with key allies, particularly in Europe. And those are the
people who you need to cooperate in a crisis.
I think the reasons why I don't see an immediate risk of a financial crisis are twofold. One, there isn't recent evidence of large fiscal deficits
causing a financial crisis in the government in G10 countries. It can put a lot of pressure on the rest of the economy. You can be forced to raise
rates to high levels and that can slow the economy. You may find it difficult to manage parts of the government bond market. You may be
pressured to do things you might not otherwise want to. But a crisis- crisis, like we experienced in 2008, that tend to come from leverage in the banking system, leverage in things like the housing market. And right now,
there isn't that leverage in the banking system, in the financial system.
As we mentioned, households aren't borrowing that much. That gives the system a bit more resilience. And frankly, we're lucky that the companies
that are doing most of the investing in A.I. are incredibly profitable. So, for now, they're starting to borrow, but they're mostly financing it out of
their own cash flow. Wait a couple of years, have a lot of the A.I. investments financed by debt. That's when I would start to worry. But as of
right now, I don't think we're facing the risk of a financial crisis.
I think we're facing the risk of kind of a squeeze, low growth, higher interest rates than we like, higher oil prices, higher prices than we like.
That is a different problem.
NEWTON: Again, though, not unrelated to what will be the A.I. disruption. And I hear you on that. They're not highly levered. Although, if you look
at what Google's done recently and -- or Alphabet, I should say, and Oracle, perhaps we may be turning a corner even on that financing.
SETSER: Yes, yes. Wait two, three years and I will change my assessment. I mean, it is still -- you know, we are just at that inflection point when
free cash flow no longer is funding the investments. That is an important inflection point.
NEWTON: Understood. I want to get to something that you do a lot of work on, and that's currencies. Treasury Secretary Bessent said about his Japan
intervention. I want you to listen to what he said to CNBC earlier this month. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCOTT BESSENT, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: Given the trade flows, given the size of the economy, given their contribution to the global savings market,
very important to have a stable yen that the Japanese government understands that. And we are proud to stand with them in implementing their
policies and help them stabilize the region.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: So, I'm going to note that in June you actually called for more coordinated action to raise the value of these key Asian currencies. Why do
you agree with this intervention? And do you think it was done well by the Treasury?
SETSER: I do agree that the yen was incredibly undervalued. So, to the Korean won, although the won has rallied a bit since June. So, to the
Taiwan dollar, so to the Chinese yuan. Really undervalued currencies in a region that now has the world's largest trade surplus. That's a little bit
strange.
[13:30:00]
And it was, in a sense, you know, making it harder for the global economy to find a new equilibrium. When you have weaker currencies in the countries
that are generating the world's biggest trade surplus, the currency market is saying invest in manufacturing in Asia. Don't invest in manufacturing in
the U.S. It's saying run bigger trade surpluses in Asia. Don't reduce the U.S. trade deficit. So, I do think there were a set of risks associated
with extremely weak currencies across Asia, not just in Japan.
Japan, the yen at 1.60 actually got, you know, weaker than 1.60. That's a very, very weak yen. Now, there are reasons for the yen's weakness. Japan
has very low interest rates. And I don't think this will work over time unless the Bank of Japan starts raising rates. And it will have a chance to
do so in September. But as a bridge to rate hikes, as a way of helping a friend, and I think it's actually useful for the Trump administration,
which generally doesn't help friends, which has sometimes poked friends in the eye a little bit.
I think it's helpful for the Trump administration to be willing to help Japan at a point when this has a plausible chance of working. Because the
yen starts off from such an undervalued position. Because Japan actually has a decent fiscal situation. It's got a lot of debt. Should look at net
debt, not just gross debt. But its fiscal deficit was down to 1 percent of GDP. It may go up to 2 percent. That's way below our fiscal deficit.
Japan has a big current account surplus, 5 percent of GDP. We got about that much on the deficit side. Japan has a ton of foreign assets. And the
government of Japan can sell assets, reserves, that it bought at 80 yen to the dollar, now for 160.
And in the process, because of the way Japan holds its reserves, they're part of the finance ministry's balance sheet, not the central bank's
balance sheet, that reduces reported debt. All that's to say is this has a chance of working. In order, though, for it to work, Japan will have to
adjust its interest rates.
NEWTON: And that is key, right? As you said, it will work in the short- term. In the long-term, though, usually the bond market has a way of correcting in the long-term for all that ails domestic economies. Brad
Setser, thank you so much. We are smarter for having spoken to you as we do a bit of a deep dive there on economic data. Appreciate it.
SETSER: My pleasure.
NEWTON: And next, we do want to turn to Lebanon, where Israel continues to strike in the south, despite a shaky ceasefire and talks between the two
countries last week in Rome. Now, locals are returning home to, in fact, rubble and destruction. That's after weeks of intense bombardment that had
forced them to flee. Correspondent Nada Bashir hears from Lebanese families as they begin to rebuild their lives.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Clearing the debris of a home now turned to rubble, the result of a months-long Israeli military assault
on southern Lebanon.
When the shelling started, my family fled, Abu Ali says. And when I returned, everything was destroyed.
His family fled the village of Zolta, which overlooks the Litani River, in February, and have only now been able to return following the withdrawal of
Israeli forces. Inside what remains of their home, the remnants of this war are reportedly scattered.
Israeli bullets, he tells us. Walls completely blown out. Bullet holes above where his grandchildren once slept. We want calm, we want security,
we want a state, he says. We want to be protected by the Military. We don't want to fight. But if Israel attacks us, we will attack them.
Abu Ali is far from alone. Among the more than a million people displaced from their homes by the war in Lebanon. Hesam Hashem says he and his family
of four returned to their village as soon as the military gave them the all-clear, after months spent sheltering in a school in Beirut.
Take a look at this scene, the destruction. The Israelis were sleeping here in this room, Hesam says. They even left behind their food and water.
Through shattered glass and concrete, Hesam takes us to what was his children's bedroom. Out in the distance, he says, Israeli tanks are still
positioned.
You can see them right in front of us, just a few hundred meters away, he says.
Across Zawtar, the scars of this deadly conflict remain. Homes left crumbling. Neighborhoods deserted. This monastery, now bullet-ridden and
desecrated. The scale of the destruction here is reflected across southern Lebanon, and the recovery process could take years.
[13:35:00]
While members of this community work to rebuild homes and restore critical infrastructure, some wounds are more difficult to heal. Many have lost
their livelihoods.
Most of the residents here depend on agriculture. There was a harvest season right before the war started. People fled and left it behind, Abed
Ezzeddine, the mayor of West Zawtar, says. I believe there is a big percentage of farms that are not fit for farming anymore, due to shelling
and airstrikes.
For many, this is not the first time they've been forced to flee their homes, nor the first time they have returned to find utter destruction.
Locals here know just how fragile a ceasefire can be, and how quickly everything can change.
And while some say they are putting their trust in the Lebanese army to protect them, others say they remain faithful in their support for another
military force, Hezbollah. The Iran-backed political and military group has long dominated in the south.
I'm proud that my husband, a fighter who defended his land, was martyred in his village, Israr Soor, a mother and now widow, tells us. She and her
children fled the border village of Tair Harfa in October 2023, their community coming under intense Israeli bombardment after Hezbollah launched
a series of attacks on Israel in solidarity with the people of Gaza.
War with Israel, she says, has impacted generations of her family, no stranger to Israeli occupations of the past. They killed my grandfather, my
father was a prisoner of war, she says. All my uncles were tortured, my entire village suffered.
Now, Israr says, she is determined to carry on the struggle.
Eventually, we will return to our village and if we don't, then our children will return and if they don't, our grandchildren will.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NEWTON: Yes, our thanks to Nada Bashir reporting there. These depths of the destruction, they're certainly startling. Stay with CNN. We'll be right
back with more news after a quick break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NEWTON: So, with the Trump administration's immigration crackdown under intense scrutiny, people have been training their cameras on ICE agents as
they make arrests. Now, the agency is apparently trying to turn the tables with a digital surveillance operation. It's left many thinking twice about
what they post on social media after a number of individuals were approached by ICE agents asking about their activity online.
Hannah Critchfield is a reporter at The Wall Street Journal who has been investigating these cases, and she joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss what
she found.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HARI SREENIVASAN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Paula, thanks. Hannah Critchfield, thanks so much for joining us. You wrote a piece recently in
The Wall Street Journal titled "How ICE is Weaponizing Social Media Against Its Critics." What did your investigation find? Walk us through it.
HANNAH CRITCHFIELD, REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Yes, thanks so much for having me. So, I and a colleague found that in recent months, ICE has
deployed this round-the-clock digital dragnet to scour the public internet from Facebook to Instagram to X for speech that could endanger the agency's
mission.
And we found that the government has paid millions to private contractors to help carry out this work. Both U.S. citizens and activist groups that
alert community members about ICE activity in their area have been flagged under this monitoring.
[13:40:00]
SREENIVASAN: OK. Give me an example of people that were caught up in this dragnet.
CRITCHFIELD: Sure. So, we found that the agency has issued hundreds of subpoenas related to online speech to try and unmask anonymous posters. One
of the people that the agency is currently trying to unmask is an anonymous Reddit user. They go by the name TiredThumb on Reddit. And the agency
initially filed a subpoena requesting this person's identity and details about them related to about a month and a half of online speech.
One of the things that has come up in our reporting is that oftentimes, when the agency issues these subpoenas, there's not a lot of detail about
why or what the speech was that brought this person under the government's eye. But we identified that, you know, between January to mid-February of
this year, this anonymous user posted about the agency three times. Each time, it was criticizing immigration agents after a U.S. citizen had been
killed by an immigration officer. One was after Renee Good and two were after Alex Pretti was fatally shot.
And it is a really interesting thing because we find that there are a lot of investigations going on, but oftentimes the people who are being
investigated don't know what exactly it is that they did. But their defense attorneys have repeatedly said that they were posting First Amendment
speech that was critical of the agency.
SREENIVASAN: There was a chief legal officer at Reddit who put out the statement, privacy is central to how Reddit operates. He said the company
routinely objects to government requests that are, quote, "overboard or threaten users' privacy or civil rights, including their First Amendment
rights." He added that, "We also notify impacted users whenever possible so they have the opportunity to seek counsel and defend their interests."
But in any of these statements that ICE is going after these people for, was there specific kind of intelligence that they were sharing, or was it
just that they didn't like what was going on? The agency says that they are experiencing an 8,000 percent increase in death threats against their
officers and their officers' families. And they say that the things that they're investigating are all credible threats. We also know that during
this administration, the agency has embraced a broader definition of what constitutes as doxing. This is traditionally thought of as sharing
someone's personal information.
Under this administration, DHS has said that posting footage of an officer on the job online is doxing. It has heavily implied that news outlets who
publish the name of the officer who fatally shot Renee Good were engaged in reckless, harmful behavior that endangered the life of their agents. We
know that the agency has taken a really hardline stance on doxing. They have asserted that it is a crime itself.
Legal experts we spoke to said the reality is a little bit more nuanced. In order to break the law, to commit a crime, you have to share this personal
information with some sort of criminal intent. That's actually really hard to prove in a court. And some of the civil rights and defense attorneys we
spoke to about these investigations that ICE has opened have theorized that that's partially why you're seeing so few charges being filed. You are
seeing a lot of people be investigated for their online speech, but fewer actual charges. So, they have posited it may be an intimidation tactic. ICE
says that they are doing their job to investigate credible threats.
SREENIVASAN: You said that the spending on surveillance technology and consultants reached $258 million in the president's first full year back in
office, which is a 57 percent increase from the year before. You also point out that they've paid out nearly $50 million since 2020 on these around-
the-clock operations, at least in six different contracts.
Give me an idea of the kind of dossier that they're able to compile during the surveillance. What kind of information about people they're concerned
about can they gather? Do they gather?
CRITCHFIELD: The government has paid millions to these private contractors, and they're tasked with surfacing two types of online
activity, potential threats to agents, to ICE employees, to their families, and speech that could potentially disrupt ICE's operations. They use these
powerful open-source investigative tools to allow for constant monitoring in the background. Then they prepare daily reports for ICE about speech
that they've found online, as well as ad hoc emergency alerts to the agency.
[13:45:00]
For instance, contractors might notify ICE if they're seeing a lot of chatter from a rapid response group in a particular area, so agents in the
field can have this situational awareness about possible attempts to impede their work.
But they're also asked to prepare dossiers on people who have posted speech that's deemed potentially threatening. If they're able to, these reports
include the person's name, their location right down to their home address, their date of birth, social security number, vehicle registration, and
criminal history. They hand these over to ICE's staff who can develop it further. One way this might happen is through the subpoenas that we've
spoken about before. If a threat actor can't be identified, agents might issue a subpoena to a social media company for their identity.
SREENIVASAN: You report out that there have been all these different subpoenas. Who are they going to? What are the platforms that they're ISIS
surveilling? And what do the platforms do in response?
CRITCHFIELD: So, the notice for this specific contract calls for the monitoring of the public internet, which means both the dark web, aspects
that, you know, you and I and perhaps many viewers have never thought about accessing, but also really commonly used social media. The notice for this
particular program calls for the monitoring of more than 20 social media sites. That's LinkedIn, Reddit, Discord, Snapchat, though it may be
monitoring even more than that.
When I say the public web, I mean that law enforcement often has approached social media as an investigative tool, only using things that are available
in the public eye. It's sort of like they can, without a search warrant, observe someone perhaps exchanging drugs in a transaction in the public
eye. If my Instagram is private, they're not looking at me. But if my Instagram is public or I'm posting on a public Facebook group, that is
something that's coming under this kind of monitoring.
And for sites like Reddit, where a lot of it is just open and publicly available, that's all subject to monitoring at any time. In terms of
subpoenas, DHS has issued subpoenas to Meta for Facebook and Instagram accounts. They've issued subpoenas to Reddit, to Google, including for
emails that individual users have written to agency staff.
So, it's a really wide variety of social media companies that we know have been asked to turn over this information about users.
SREENIVASAN: And I wonder, again, what is that level of cooperation, whether it's Meta or whether it's Google? And if they're barraged with 100
of these, do they have kind of a systematic review of every single request the government is making, or did they just say, you know what? We're just
going to trust the government is good for it, and we're going to hand over this data.
CRITCHFIELD: This is one of the things that came up again and again in our reporting. These subpoenas that are sent on behalf of ICE, they request
that the social media company not reveal their existence to anyone. So, it's up to the platform to decide whether or not to comply with that or
alert the user in question.
It's possible people have had their identities turned over to DHS without ever knowing they're the subject of an investigation. That said, companies
we spoke to, they said that they do alert users about these subpoenas when possible, like you mentioned. So, users can then find legal representation
and push back.
Both Reddit and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, also provided specific examples of times that their attorneys pushed back on behalf of
users, when they felt the subpoenas were overly broad or targeting First Amendment speech. But it's unclear in broad terms how often this happens. I
think your question gets to the heart of this.
We don't know how often this is happening to users on a given platform, how often a social media company is notifying users, how often that platform is
pushing back versus expecting the user to find their own legal representation, or even how often it receives requests from DHS related to
speech about immigration or officers overall, unless a company chooses to disclose it. It's entirely optional for them to share this with the public.
SREENIVASAN: So, DHS has said in a statement that any allegation that DHS and ICE are attempting to squash free speech is categorically false and
that ICE investigates all credible threats towards its employees, officers, and families. Tell me a little bit about the poll worker. I think it's
Paigelynn Gonyea, right? What happened to her?
CRITCHFIELD: Yes. So, Paigelynn is working as a poll worker during New York's primaries in June and sees that there is a voicemail from an unknown
number.
[13:50:00]
And she listens to it. And it says that the person who's calling is an agent with the Department of Homeland Security. They just stopped by her
house and someone passed along her number and that they were looking for her to speak to her about an Instagram post where she doxed an agent in
January. Then they deliver this letter to her at the polling site. They ask her to sign it. She says, I'm not comfortable signing. I want to talk to my
lawyer. But she keeps the letter. And it's actually why initially anyone knows about these letters in the first place, she posted it on her public
social media.
She has continued to post publicly but said as a result of this incident that people online have dug up her information, where she lives, things
about her past. Paigelynn has said she has no recollection of ever doxing an agent. And that the only social media post she could find about an agent
from January was one where she said that Jonathan Ross should be indicted. And she shared the original Minnesota Star Tribune article that revealed
his name and that he was the agent who shot Renee Good.
DHS, I should say, provided, they showed me a screenshot of a different post that appeared to be from Paigelynn's account that was redacted. It
said, the killer's name is Jonathan Ross of, and the rest of it was redacted. And they said she shared his address in this post.
We attempted to contact Meta to try and understand -- to see if they would verify the existence of this post or not. It's not currently on Paigelynn's
Instagram. It didn't appear in her deleted folder. It didn't appear in her metadata. I should say sometimes deleted posts do not appear in any of
those places after 30 days. And that's part of the challenge of the agency investigating her more than five months after she allegedly exhibited this
behavior.
SREENIVASAN: So, has the government made successful convictions, indictments against people who they have found through this dragnet?
CRITCHFIELD: Definitely. And one thing that I don't think anyone disagrees about is that vitriol towards ICE and immigration officers online is high
right now. There is a lot of online vitriol. And there have been some instances in the last year of people being prosecuted and convicted for
related to speech that they made online.
There was a man in Oklahoma who was convicted of threatening to kill federal agents because of some of the things that he wrote on X. There's
another instance where two women were convicted in a Los Angeles court of stalking because they were live streaming from an ICE watch account on
Instagram. They were live streaming as they followed an agent in his vehicle. Both of the defendants have said that they thought that they were
following this agent to an immigration raid.
Ultimately, though, the agent was driving to his home and they ended up at his street. And it didn't reveal his address, but it did reveal where he
lived. And so, they were ultimately convicted of stalking for that. So, there have been prosecutions and convictions for online speech,
specifically for endangering or intimidating or stalking immigration agents.
SREENIVASAN: Hannah Critchfield, reporter at The Wall Street Journal, thanks so much.
CRITCHFIELD: Thanks for having me.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NEWTON: And finally, for us, a moment of reflection, marking the 81st anniversary of the atomic bomb in Nagasaki.
The bells in Nagasaki rang on Sunday at 11:02 a.m. local time, the exact moment the bomb hit the city in 1945, only days after the U.S. dropped the
first atomic bomb in Hiroshima. Christiane spoke with one of the survivors of the Hiroshima bombing on the 75th anniversary, back in 2020, announced
that Setsuko Thurlow was only 13 when the bomb hit, and she has been in contact with him since then. And she has been sharing her story ever since.
Here's what she saw on that day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SETSUKO THURLOW, HIROSHIMA SURVIVOR: I saw the bluish white flash, and I still have the sensation of floating up in the air. And when I regained the
consciousness, I found myself in total darkness and total silence. And I tried to move my body, but I couldn't. So, I knew I was facing death.
[13:55:00]
Then I started hearing faint voices of my girlfriends around, and they were asking for help from their mothers, from their God. And then somebody's
strong male voice said, don't give up, don't give up, keep pushing, keep kicking. I'm trying to free you. So, with this man in the dark, I was
rescued.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: Incredible stories of survival there. That is it for us. If you ever miss our show, you can find the latest episode shortly after it airs
on our podcast. And remember, you can always catch us online, on our website, and all-over social media. Thanks for watching, and goodbye from
New York.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[14:00:00]
END
