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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt

Trump: Call On Whether To Strike Iran Within "Next Two Weeks"; Hospital Strike; Dodgers & DHS At Odds Over Agents' Presence At Stadium Grounds Amid Tensions In Los Angeles Over ICE Raids; White House: Supporters Against U.S. Involvement In The Middle East Should "Trust In President Trump". Aired 4-5p ET

Aired June 19, 2025 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:02]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: It's adorable. I wanted to do this story last week when I first saw it, and I'm so glad that it's airing now.

Shout out to Milo. Saving lives out there.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Shout out. Do you think Harley could do that?

SANCHEZ: No. My dog is kind of scared generally of any kind of action. She's a rottweiler. She weighs 100 pounds, but she's a scaredy cat.

KEILAR: Listen, there was a first for a poodle, and there could be first for a scaredy cat rottweiler.

SANCHEZ: I do feel like Milo needs a slow motion running through the beach. Curly hair.

KEILAR: Poodle.

SANCHEZ: Yeah.

KEILAR: For sure. Let's work on that next.

THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT starts now.

KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: It's deadlines versus decisions.

Will two weeks make any difference in holding off all out war in the Middle East?

Let's head into THE ARENA.

(MUSIC)

HUNT: Right now, inside President Trump's latest and very familiar decision. Why he's now letting talks with Iran play out and holding off on a U.S. strike.

On the ground, news signs of an escalation in the conflict. A new wave of Iranian missiles hitting a major hospital in Israel, prompting new threats to Tehran from Israel's top leaders.

Plus, breaking news in California, the new reaction from homeland security after the L.A. Dodgers say immigration agents descended on Dodger Stadium today.

(MUSIC)

HUNT: Hi, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to THE ARENA. It's wonderful to have you with us on this Thursday.

The White House today imposed a very clear, very familiar deadline on itself as the conflict between Israel and Iran enters its seventh day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Based on the fact that there's a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future, I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: There you have it. Two weeks. Two weeks? Where have we heard that before?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'll let you know in about two weeks. Within two weeks.

I could answer that question better in two weeks.

And I'll do this at some point over the next two weeks.

I'll announce it over the next two weeks.

You know, in about two weeks.

It'll be out in about less than two weeks.

(END VIDEO CLIPS)

HUNT: Right. We heard it from the man himself. We have heard it before, many, many, many times on everything, from infrastructure to Russia to tariffs. The president often promises answers or solutions that are just two weeks away, and then the deadline passes with no change to the status quo.

This time, though, the stakes are particularly high. They are enormous. The entire world has spent this week wondering, what is the president going to do.

And this afternoon, the White House was clearly saying two weeks to try to buy time without generating any headlines that would say that the president has decided not to act, not to use American force because let's be clear, that is what is actually happening at this writing. The president is currently making the decision for now to keep the status quo, not to get Americans involved. Not yet.

So, what might be driving the presidents thinking? What might be taking us to this point?

We know that the president is often driven by the most recent conversation that he's had, by the last person who has grabbed his ear. So this man, Steve Bannon, was spotted, there he is, at the White House earlier today.

Bannon, alongside Tucker Carlson, represents what -- what should we call them? The skeptics, okay? And that's putting it mildly. The skeptics of military involvement.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE BANNON, FORMER WHITE HOUSE CHIEF STRATEGIST: The president should take his time and think this through with his advisors.

I think leveler heads will prevail.

We don't want any more forever wars.

We can't do this again. We'll tear the country apart. We can't have another Iraq.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: "We can't do this again," Bannon says.

Now we also know the president was in the Situation Room again today, listening to his advisers.

And we know that American defense officials tell us that they have taken steps to protect American assets in the region. They have relocated aircraft and ships. They have evacuated nonessential personnel. They have even pre-positioned extra supplies of blood in the region. We know our sources have told us that this is to give the president options.

We also know that privately, the Israelis have been pushing the president to act. Here was Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: President Trump will do what's best for America. I trust his judgment.

He gave them the chance to do it through negotiations. They strung him along.

[16:05:00]

And you don't string along Donald Trump. He knows. He knows the game.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HUNT: All right. Our panel is going to weigh in in just a few moments.

We're going to get started, though, in the region with CNN's Clarissa Ward in Tel Aviv. We also have Nick Paton Walsh live for us in London. Kristen Holmes outside the White House.

Kristen, we actually are going to start with you because of course, we heard most recently from Karoline Leavitt, telling us what the president has not decided here. He has decided that he is going to in the next two weeks, make some sort of decision.

Take us behind the scenes.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, that's right. And we asked a lot of questions about this, particularly two weeks. What does that mean exactly? Does that mean he's going to pull the trigger and approve some kind of an attack plan on Iran in two weeks if there is no deal made, or he's just going to come to a conclusion within those two weeks?

And we do know behind the scenes that there is a belief that there's still a chance for diplomacy. And that's obviously what Donald Trump here is trying to get at, he's trying to do because, as you said, he doesn't want to act in this moment.

Now, remember, this is not the first deadline that the United States has given Iran. We had 60 days. Now, we're adding two weeks. And I asked Karoline Leavitt specifically about that, that extension, why we think we could get something done in two weeks if we weren't able to get it done before. Here's what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: We have heard from a number of U.S. officials who say that Iran doesn't want to make a deal, that they are just stringing the United States along. What is to say that they are not going to continue to do so if we don't -- if we continue to give them extensions now, two weeks, before 60 days?

LEAVITT: Look, Iran is in a very weak and vulnerable position because of the strikes and the attacks from Israel. And with respect to the president's statement, I shared that with all of you.

And he has been very direct and clear. Iran can and should make a deal. We sent a deal to them that was practical, that was realistic, or they will face grave consequences.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: So, you hear her there talking about how they believe that Iran has become weaker because of these strikes, which might bring them to the negotiating table. Now, there is something else that we know, which is the Middle Eastern envoy, Steve Witkoff, has been in touch and his team has been in touch with their counterparts in Iran at this time during the last several weeks, during even the last several days.

The question now is, will they come to the table? Because both sides seem to say that they don't want to budge. And one thing to note is that Witkoff did meet with the United Kingdom's foreign minister today. That is important because that foreign minister is actually going to Geneva to meet with Iran's foreign minister on Friday.

HUNT: All right. Kristen Holmes of the White House for us.

Clarissa Ward, let me put this to you. How do you see this time frame as likely being received by the Israelis? I mean, if you listen to what Benjamin Netanyahu was saying, there, it's not clear to me that this is something that they're necessarily going to be happy about, because it's really putting this off.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Oh, I think it's pretty clear, Kasie, if indeed it comes to pass, that this will be a two week window of waiting, that the Israelis will not be happy about it. But I do not think you will hear them articulate that publicly. We've been trying to get some comment from anyone on the record to react to this news. And essentially, the feeling here is that they're pretty much intent on keeping their mouths shut and not saying anything that could be seen as interfering, as putting pressure, as trying to strong-arm President Trump into intervening more forcefully in this conflict.

However, when I have spoken privately to people, they have previously expressed optimism that the U.S. would join this fight. They believed they were looking at a timeframe of maybe 24 to 48 hours, not two weeks. And of course, the concern on the Israeli side will be that the longer you give diplomacy to play out and, by the way, they are not in favor of any form of ceasefire or anything. While those diplomatic, that diplomatic wrangling goes on.

But their fear is that the longer you let that play out, the more you lose the momentum, the more difficult it also becomes for Israel to sustain that current level of strikes on Iran. While they have made the Israeli public aware that this could be weeks, realistically, what would that entail to keep up that level of bombardment for the next two weeks? And do you then lose the momentum? Does it become more and more, or I should say less and less likely that you would intervene?

So publicly, taking it on the chin. Privately, I would think some real disappointment here.

HUNT: So, Clarissa, I -- all points well-taken. If you could also kind of walk us through what has been going on just on the ground in Israel, as this conflict has continued. I know that major hospital in the south of Israel was hit by an Iranian strike.

What impact has that had? How has the night been so far?

[16:10:03]

WARD: The night has been quiet, but the morning certainly was not. And it was interesting because the past couple of days had definitely been much calmer, fewer impacts, fewer barrages.

This morning's barrage was significant. That impact on the hospital hitting the fifth floor of the urology department. Obviously, the hospital had largely been evacuated because all of these hospitals have effectively moved their patients underground.

The Iranians, I should add, were saying something quite different. They were saying that this was a military sort of intelligence command center that was struck, and there was only secondary damage done to the hospital. But we certainly saw an escalation in the rhetoric following that hospital hit. The defense minister, Israel Katz, saying that Khamenei cannot be allowed to exist on the back of it.

And Netanyahu, the prime minister, when he was pushed by a local TV here on that issue later on, he said, I will let actions speak louder than words, but no one deserves immunity.

HUNT: All right. So, to that point, Nick Paton Walsh, you've been covering what the Iranians have been doing here. And Clarissa obviously outlined what Netanyahu said about what he wasn't going to say. But he did say out loud that Israel is going to strike all of Iran's nuclear facilities and did not rule out targeting the supreme leader.

What have we heard from the Iranians today in response to these threats?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, I mean, look, there is clearly, obvious concern about how this could continue indefinitely, potentially. We are seeing an Iran where they've just appointed the third successor in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps' command in the last week, clearly seeing their military hierarchy deteriorate.

And the fact that Trump hasn't made a decision either way and is leaving this diplomacy, which will be engaged with Abbas Araghchi, their foreign minister in Geneva tomorrow with essentially European proxies, who I understand from a Western diplomat will be in close consultation with the United States.

Indeed, one of those three European powers, the United Kingdom's foreign secretary, David Lammy, was meeting with Marco Rubio, the U.S. secretary of state, and indeed, Steve Witkoff today in Washington. He will obviously bring back their kind of ideal scenario. Diplomat I spoke to, though, said these Geneva talks are essentially going to be about feeling the room for indeed what might be possible, what Iran or even the United States possibly might accept.

The fact Trump hasn't made a decision about whether to get involved or not leaves greater focus on this diplomacy. But it's not diplomacy. It's fair to say where Iran has extraordinary agency. Weve seen over the past days their missile volleys against Israel be lesser. Some success, some might say, in terms of Iran's goals when they hit that hospital overnight, that may have been an anomaly. We don't entirely know. But Iran is dealing with a very limited capability here after the last

week's worth, almost of Israeli strikes, and that will inform what they think they can get out of these talks, which is very little, frankly, if they get something better than, quote, the unconditional surrender Trump was talking about, that might be a win.

They are in a very weak hand right now and looking towards Geneva, perhaps for a way out. Whereas Israel feels it has air superiority, possibly time on its side, not the U.S. intervention that it wanted, but a very distinct moment here where it can kind of pursue targets at will -- Kasie.

HUNT: All right. Nick Paton Walsh for us. Clarissa Ward, Kristen Holmes, thanks to all of you for getting us started today. I really appreciate it.

And our panel is here in THE ARENA. CNN political and national security analyst David Sanger, CNN global affairs analyst Kim Dozier, former Democratic congressman of South Carolina, Joe Cunningham, and CNN political commentator and Republican strategist, Brad Todd.

Welcome to all of you. Thank you all for being here.

David Sanger, let me start with you. Just in terms of where we are here, the president saying two weeks, but in many ways, this is non- decision is a decision.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: It is, but it also, the time gives him a couple of different things. First of all, I think it was probably a big relief to a lot of people in the White House who were afraid that he was being driven by Bibi Netanyahu's own schedule here, how long Netanyahu wanted to go fight this war, what help he needed so that he could say, I've destroyed all the major sites and gone off.

And then the question became, did you want to be led around by Netanyahu's schedule, or did he want to set his own? I think the second thing that's going on is obviously, I think Witkoff wanted to go back. Steve Witkoff, his special envoy, speak to foreign minister Abbaschi -- Araghchi, the Iranian foreign minister, and see whether or not six days of bombing have changed their view about whether they want to keep enrichment only on their territory.

And the third thing it does is it opens up some new military options for him. It will take a few weeks to get that second carrier group in place, which of course is important because if the Iranians react to the dropping of one of these weapons on Fordow, they're going to take off after U.S. forces or U.S. bases. You want to have that missile interception capability.

It also forces the Israelis -- you could see this in the prime minister's statement, to think about whether they want to try their options on Fordow, a commando raid, covert action, cyber, getting into the electrical system, which turned out to be, in the end, the bombing of the electrical system, how they crippled the other enrichment plant at Natanz. HUNT I -- Kim Dozier, I mean, to that end, fascinating. By the way,

David, to kind of think through all that from a from a tactical perspective, from a strategic perspective, has the president -- I mean, how does Iran feel about whether they have a way out of this that is acceptable to them? Can they save face in a way that would allow for diplomatic de-escalation or not?

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: I sure don't see it right now. I don't know if these diplomatic efforts by the Europeans, by the Arab League would create something.

But even if President Trump's team does manage to get Iran to agree to denuclearize or to stop enrichment, will they be able to get the Israelis to stop? Because I don't think Israel is going to stop, to David's point, until it has Fordow incapacitated.

At this point, we know there's something like 440 kilograms of refined uranium in a few different. It was at the three different facilities. The IAEA believes it's been moved around the country. Don't -- they don't know where it is.

So, say the U.S. says, okay, we've got a deal. Will that be good enough for the Israelis to stop looking for that fissile? Well, it's not yet fissile material, nuclear material.

HUNT: So potential material.

DOZIER: Exactly.

HUNT: Right. So, Brad Todd, let's talk about the presidents thinking here, because, again, this is a guy who, you know, famously is on his phone all the time. He is influenced by who's in his ear. Most recently, he earlier this week had seemed to be listening to more hawkish voices in the party, to Lindsey Graham. We had reporting here at CNN that he was open to these American strikes.

And now, we have this sort of, you know, tempering or walking back. Steve Bannon is spotted at the White House. How do you understand the landscape of who he's listening to right now?

BRAD TODD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well. First off, the Republican primary electorate, which is the president cares about his electoral base as any president would, our CNN polling shows 69 percent of Republicans support airstrikes on these nuclear facilities in Iran by the United States, 79 percent support Israel's own attacks on Iran. So, the Republican electorate is pretty united on it. And in fact, Democrats are pretty united that Iran can't have a nuclear missile or a nuclear bomb.

So, I think the politics, the true math of it is, is pretty solid. There are a few people who I think are off key, Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson and their ilk represent a distinct, tiny minority, but they have a big online voice, and it's pretty easy, I think, for people in Washington to overstate their what their viewpoint means.

I don't think the polling shows it doesn't really reflect where Republican voters are. And I think the presidents being prudent. He's trying to weigh all his options, see what comes next. Democrats said he should try diplomacy first. So he's doing that.

HUNT: So, what you're saying, in short, is that Twitter isn't real life.

TODD: Yeah.

HUNT: Yeah, it's a good life lesson.

Congressman, I mean, how do you see this? I mean, look, you represented the first district of South Carolina. Youve got a lot of military veterans. It obviously is held by a Republican. Now, you have an understanding of where the party needs to go.

Obviously, you're kind of in the wilderness here. There's a lot of opposition.

JOE CUNNINGHAM (D), FORMER SOUTH CAROLINA CONGRESSMAN: Is that an understatement there, Kasie?

HUNT: Maybe a little bit. We'll have you on another day. We'll talk to your politics.

CUNNINGHAM: Yeah, plenty of time for that.

HUNT: More fun for you.

CUNNINGHAM: Yeah.

HUNT: But how do you think Democrats should be looking at this? And what do you hope to see from the president?

CUNNINGHAM: Well, look, I hope he takes those two weeks and really considers that. And honestly, I would hope for Tulsi to be in the room and voicing her opinion.

HUNT: Really?

CUNNINGHAM: Yeah. Well, I mean, I served with Tulsi and Tulsi is a friend of mine. Look, we may not agree on every single issue, but I do feel like those people in my generation who grew up with Iraq and Afghanistan wars, this just happened. And so, we are very cognizant of being pulled back into another war.

And you may be right about the 69 percent who would support airstrikes, but we all know that's a slippery slope. What percentage of the Republican base would support having troops on the ground, when an asset is attacked? I mean, because that could just be around the corner from that. And so, whatever that first, next step is, is going to be an important one.

HUNT: Yeah. And that's I think why that detail that -- and this is standard operating procedure when there's something like this, but that they're putting actual blood in the region in preparation for who knows what might happen underscores, I think the point that you're making.

TODD: But we've been at war with Iran for a long time. This -- I mean, this is -- whatever happens next is not new. We've --

HUNT: Well, we have not bombed Iran ourselves with the bunker busting bomb, but we have much more to talk about here in the next hour. We've got to go for now.

Kim, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

DOZIER: Thanks.

HUNT: Everyone else is going to stand by for us because up next, CNN is going to go inside an Iranian TV station hit by an Israeli airstrike. We're going to show you that remarkable footage.

Plus, the president confronting something that he's not used to. Republican pushback inside the growing movement against U.S. involvement in the Middle East, with one lawmaker urging the president to stay out of it. Congressman Tim Burchett will be here live.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Where do you come down on this? And Tucker Carlson has called some members of your own party warmongers.

REP. TIM BURCHETT (R-TN): Yeah, well, I call them war pimps.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:25:23]

HUNT: All right. Welcome back.

We are now getting an inside look at what is left of the Iranian state news station that as you just see, there was struck by an Israeli airstrike earlier on this week.

CNN's Fred Pleitgen is the first Western journalist on the ground in Tehran. He filed this report for us.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We're inside the Iranian state broadcasting company IRIB, which was hit by an Israeli airstrike a couple of days ago. And you can see the damage is absolutely massive. I'm standing in the atrium right now, but if you look around this whole area has been completely destroyed. All of the offices, all of the technology that they have inside here, the broadcast technology, everything has been rendered pretty much useless.

All right. So we're going to go inside the building. Now, they have told us that we need to be very careful because obviously there might still be unexploded parts of bombs in here or something like that. What we see here is the actual studio where an Iranian state TV anchor was sitting and reading the news when the strike hit. You can see here that is an anchor desk right there.

And of course, when it happened, the anchor was reading the news. And then all of a sudden there was a thud. The studio went black at the beginning. She got up and left, but then later apparently came back and finished the newscast and is now being hailed as a champion of Iranian media.

Some of the main bulk of the explosion must have been here because this place is absolutely charred. And if we look back over there, that's actually seems to be the main part of what was the newsroom with a lot of the desks, computers, printers, phones.

You can see how much heat must have been emitted by the impact and by the explosion. The phones that they had here are molten here. Also, the keys molten. The screen.

And there's actually someone's lunch still at their desk standing here, which probably they would have been wanting to eat until they had to evacuate the building. You can see there's a spoon here that's also been melted away by this explosion.

All of this is playing very big here in Iran. Theres a lot of public anger that the Israelis attacked this site, and certainly, the Iranians are saying that they condemn this and that there is going to be revenge for this.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Tehran.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HUNT: All right. Our thanks to Fred for that remarkable reporting there.

All right. Joining us now to discuss the very latest in this conflict, how involved the United States should be, Republican Congressman Tim Burchett of Tennessee, a member of the house foreign affairs committee.

Congressman, thanks very much for being with us today.

So, you've been very clear that you do not think that President Trump should use military force against Iran at this point. What's your reaction to the news today that he is planning to make a decision one way or another in the next two weeks. What do you think that says?

REP. TIM BURCHETT (R-TN): Well, I think that's good. That's thoughtful. He's taking his time on this thing. We've got -- look, we've got 40,000 American fighting men and women in that area. He has every right to be there.

I worry about us leaving our friends in Taiwan a little vulnerable. I could see China taking full advantage of this. They would love nothing more than to have us fighting a war on three fronts. Ukraine, Iran and of course, China, defending Taiwan.

So, there's a lot of things that are playing into this. I would -- I'm glad he hasn't just rushed to judgment on this thing that the Israelis do an excellent job. They have the best intelligence in the world, bar none when they took out the three top leaders in Iran and those nuclear installments, I worry about the fallout, not the political fallout, but the literal radioactive fallout to our friends like that are 90 miles from there, and Bahrain and other areas.

So, there's a lot of things going on there. I think Iran is pretty much as has spent as has been the most they can. Their missiles are putting up or decreasing numbers. Their aircraft are destroyed on the ground. Again, Israeli intelligence was excellent.

You know, we give Israel about $4 billion a year on auto check every year in military apparatus. So, they're doing a good job. I say we let them finish the job.

HUNT: So speaking of the Israelis, sir, Israel's defense minister earlier today said that Iran's supreme leader cannot be, quote, cannot, quote, continue to exist.

Do you think the United States should support the Israelis taking out the supreme leader, so to speak, or should we discourage the Israelis from doing that?

BURCHETT: Well, of course it's Israelis' position. But what I'm afraid will happen is an older man. He is the religious leader. When they threw out the shah, they brought in the ayatollahs, and he is one of those that is ascended into power, I guess you could say, and I'm afraid if you take him out, he would just be a martyr, and it would turn into more of a religious war.

I think that you're seeing on the ground and from reports I've gotten that, that there are Iranians that that that would like regime change. We just don't have a good record with regime change. We put somebody in and it doesn't seem to always work out for us.

I would -- I would use a lot of caution in that area. And maybe through diplomacy, he can just get the hell out of there and put it -- they can put a real leader in like, like we had before when, you know, under the shah, Iran and Israel were friendly. They were allies to us. And that has changed.

And I worry about them having nuclear components because it's not for energy. They're sitting on the largest oil supplies in the world. So, anybody that tells you otherwise is not telling you the truth.

So, there's a lot of moving parts to this thing.

HUNT: Quick, yes or no question for you, sir. Should Tulsi Gabbard, the DNI, be in the room when President Trump makes this decision?

BURCHETT: That's up to President Trump.

HUNT: All right. Congressman Tm Burchett, thanks very much for your time, sir. Really appreciate it.

All right.

BURCHETT: Thank you, ma'am.

HUNT: Of course.

Coming up next here, we're going to have a live report on the scene, breaking news out of Los Angeles, the latest on a growing back and forth between the L.A. Dodgers and Homeland Security.

Plus, the surprising person who turned up at the White House today isn't so surprising as the president tries for a ceasefire in the now very public split among his supporters on the Middle East.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN COLBERT, TV HOST: In an argument between Tucker Carlson and Ted Cruz, I'm rooting for a sinkhole.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:36:49]

HUNT: All right. Welcome back.

We've got some breaking news on a developing and frankly, confusing situation. It's playing out in Los Angeles right now between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Department of Homeland Security, ICE.

CNN national correspondent Natasha Chen is live for us at Dodger Stadium.

Natasha, what's been going on? What are you learning?

NATASHA CHEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kasie, it was just a few hours ago that there was a line of vehicles parked right outside this gate with people dressed in tactical gear, bandana style masks, and the Dodgers organization had said on X that ICE agents asked for entry to the parking lots, which are expansive here at the stadium, and that they were denied entry.

Now then, we hear from the Department of Homeland Security, who also posted on X, saying that this has nothing to do with Dodger Stadium, that in fact it was CBP trying to use this spot briefly. So, the team and the feds right now are at odds with the message of what actually was happening.

And we're trying to get to the bottom of it as well. I reached back out to my contact with the Dodgers. They said they're working on a response for me. Obviously, this is in the midst of a lot of anxiety and tension around Los Angeles, with a lot of immigration enforcement over the last couple of weeks that have put stoked a lot of fear into the heavily immigrant community, especially in these neighborhoods right around the stadium and such a huge part of the Dodgers fan base.

And tonight, there is a celebrity softball game ahead of a 7:00 p.m. game against the San Diego Padres. And they're expecting a lot of fans to file through here in just a little bit of time.

Meanwhile, the protesters that had gathered out here to try and prevent agents from coming into the stadium, they have dispersed at this time, Kasie.

HUNT: All right. Natasha Chen for us on scene in L.A. -- Natasha, thanks very much for that report.

All right. We're going to turn now to the other breaking story that we have been covering throughout today.

The White House press secretary earlier was asked, what message does she have to Trump's supporters who want the president to end U.S. involvement in foreign wars?

Here's her response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEAVITT: Trust in President Trump. President Trump has incredible instincts, and President Trump kept America in the world safe in his first term as president, in implementing a peace through strength foreign policy agenda.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right. Our panel is back. CNN special correspondent Jamie Gangel also joining us.

Jamie, wonderful to see you.

I want to play a little bit of what some of Trump's supporters said to CNN over the course of the presidential campaign, because I have to say, when I traveled the country, when I went to campaign events, when I was at the convention, this is something you would hear about regularly that voters would bring up kind of on their own. They would say, I think Trump is going to keep us out of World War III or similar. Let's listen to a little bit of this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All this world war stuff that's going on. And, you know, I don't feel like we've been participating the way we should.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm interested in giving less money to foreign wars.

[16:40:03]

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If Harris gets elected, we are going to go into World War III.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Trump is an anti-war president.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need somebody who's going to stand up for the American people, like everybody focus on this war.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: I mean, sort of, there you have it, right? And what do you make of that?

JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: Lindsey Graham was none of those people. Look, I think that what we're going to see here if Trump decides to move ahead is that he thinks he can bring the base along with him. There's no question that that's the way they feel.

At the end of the day. I've spoken to several former Trump administration officials from Trump, 1.0 people who watched him make difficult situations in, in, in high stakes moments like the Soleimani assassination and what they say to me is Donald Trump is risk averse. And yes, people, the last person who speaks to him, yeah, in his ear. But at the end of the day, Donald Trump trusts his own instincts.

And what we should watch for is, does he think at the end of the day, this will make him a loser or a winner?

HUNT: David Sanger, one of the things one of the people that has been talked about as a central figure here is Tulsi Gabbard, the DNI, right? Now, our reporting from our Katie Bo Lillis is that she basically has been exiled from the White House. Trump's annoyance apparently peaked, this is according to our colleague Katie Bo, when she posted a three-minute video warning the world is closer to the brink of nuclear annihilation than ever before.

SANGER: It was quite a video, to look at it.

HUNT: Yes, blaming political elite and warmongers, Trump viewed the video as thinly veiled criticism of his consideration to allow Israel to strike Iran, and many inside the White House agreed Gabbard was speaking out of turn, the person added.

You know, obviously, she -- we know where she stands on expansive wars or, you know, ending foreign wars. But she also is the keeper of American intelligence. How are those two things interacting?

SANGER: Well, not well right now. I mean, the director of national intelligence is not there in a policy role. They are not there to give policy advice. They are there to give the best assessment of the intelligence community.

And boy, did that come up today in the briefing, because the very last question that was asked of Karoline Leavitt at that briefing was, how long would it take the Iranians to build a weapon? And she said, well, there's been a lot of confusion on this.

And then she went on to say it would just take a few weeks, which is essentially a Israeli analysis. The U.S. analysis, which really hasn't changed much in the past few

months or even the past year, is it would probably take them a year. Maybe they could carve 4 or 6 months off of that if they built a faster, cruder weapon that didn't have to fit on a warhead.

I've never heard, except at the White House podium today, anybody in the intelligence community, and, Jamie, you tell me if I'm wrong here, say that they could build a weapon in a few weeks.

GANGEL: He is right, as always.

HUNT: That's why we invite him as well.

TODD: Everybody -- everybody knows you don't put off the hard work till the last day of the semester. And so, we shouldn't wait to take out Iran's capability to make a nuclear weapon the day before. They can do so.

Israel has done a great job of taking out their nuclear facilities. What the president has to decide right now is, is this the cheapest time to do it? Is this the easiest time because Iran is on their knees right now.

HUNT: So, let's watch a little bit. You mentioned that the video is remarkable. And we talked about, you know, the reporting. But let's watch a little bit of it.

Congressman, you said that, you know you served with Tulsi Gabbard. You know her, the director of national intelligence.

Let's watch some of this video that she posted recently.

Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TULSI GABBARD, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: This is the reality of what's at stake. What we are facing now, because as we stand here today, closer to the brink of nuclear annihilation than ever before, political elite and warmongers are carelessly fomenting fear and tensions between nuclear powers. We must reject this path to nuclear war and work toward a world where no one has to live in fear of a nuclear holocaust.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: I mean, that is a remarkable statement from a director of national intelligence. From a political candidate, fine. But that is -- that is not that what that was.

CUNNINGHAM: Some showmanship in there, too, right? You know, I think you know, what Tulsi's concern is -- at least I'm not going to speak for her. But there is hesitancy in engaging in something over in the Middle East after we just withdrew from two wars. I think that hesitancy is shared by a vast majority of Americans, especially those people who grew up in those two wars and spent trillions of dollars. [16:45:00]

Our nation is buried in debt because partly because two of those wars.

And so, I think there's a lot of hesitancy in engaging in something like that. And I think that comes out in that video.

GANGEL: From a political perspective, though, that is not what you do in that job at all. And I think all you need to hear -- what were Donald Trump's words? I don't care what she said. You -- if you are in one of these treasured intelligence positions, that's not the way to use it.

HUNT: I mean, it's not -- it's unlike anything --

GANGEL: I've ever seen --

HUNT: -- we've ever seen from an intelligence professional.

Okay. Coming up next here, one on one with retired Admiral James Stavridis, what he thinks of the president's newest timeline on Iran.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:50:07]

HUNT: All right, welcome back to THE ARENA.

We've been following breaking news out of the Middle East. The White House saying today that the president is going to make a decision about action on Iran within two weeks.

Joining us now to discuss, CNN military analyst, retired Admiral James Stavridis, of course, the former NATO supreme allied commander.

Admiral, always grateful to have you here. Let's start with this two- week deadline, pause, interregnum. Interested to know kind of what you think it represents because its clearly status quo for two weeks potentially. What were your takeaways?

ADM. JAMES STAVRIDIS (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Three things came to mind right away. One is that it's simply a means of telling the Iranians, hey, there's two weeks here, and that, frankly, could be cover for we decide to strike almost immediately or that it is a means to shadow something like a commando raid, as a friend of mine with good pipe into the intel community suggested.

So, point one, I take away is, hmm, maybe this is a very clever ruse in order to lull the Iranians into some sense of security about U.S. participation.

Point two would be, and I kind of hope it's this, legitimately give the Iranians a little more breathing space to think through consequences and perhaps come back to the administration and say, let's restart talks. And you cue up Marco Rubio and Steve Witkoff and maybe you give diplomacy another chance. And then third, Kasie, the operator in me, the former combatant

commander of the United States, says, hmm, that's two weeks to really set the table carefully, move all the forces precisely where I want them, maybe do some mirror rehearsal kind of work, where you run the mission, but you run it over the ocean, just so you know exactly how you're going to put it all together. Rehearsal time.

So, bottom line, nobody knows. And it could also be Occam's razor. The simplest explanation is often the best one is simply President Trump hasn't made up his mind and he wants more time to think about it. It's a big decision indeed.

HUNT: Indeed. And, of course, this time frame, one that he uses pretty frequently.

Admiral, we're just learning, Steve Bannon was spotted at the White House today, and were now learning that he actually had lunch with the president today, apparently had been rescheduled from a previous time. What do you make of the fact that Bannon landed on the president's schedule? And what impact do you think that might have on his decision making?

STAVRIDIS: Well, it's indicative of the back and forth within the Republican Party at the moment between those as reported, like Steve Bannon, who were cautioning the president, don't get distracted away from your domestic agenda. Youve got big things going on here in the states. We need a war in the Middle East like we need. I'll use a technical term here, a hole in the head.

I think probably Steve Bannon carried those thoughts to the president. I hope so, because personally, I think that launching now, which I think is probably 70 percent chance that president ultimately does so. But I think it's very hard to predict the consequences that come after that.

Hopefully, Steve Bannon laid on that discussion. The distraction factor that I think would have a negative impact on what the president is trying to do here in the States.

HUNT: Really interesting perspective.

Admiral James Stavridis, thank you so much. So grateful for your expertise, as always. I'm sure we'll be talking to you soon. Thanks.

We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:58:45]

HUNT: All right. Our panel is back with some final thoughts in this incredibly busy breaking news week.

David Sanger, the Admiral James Stavridis just put the chances that President Trump, in his view, is going to strike Iran at 70 percent.

Where would you put it?

SANGER: Probably a little lower than that. At the at the danger of arguing with Jim Stavridis, who knows more about this than I ever will. But I think the president's real hope here is that the Israelis use these two weeks to get it done themselves, and he just doesn't have to make a decision.

HUNT: Jamie, what do you think?

GANGEL: To quote Donald Trump, it may or may not be 70 percent, but who I really want to quote is Paul Rudd in "Anchorman". Sixty percent of the time it works. Every time. I don't exactly.

HUNT: Congressman, what do you think?

CUNNINGHAM: You know, absent a U.S. target or an asset being targeted -- I mean, I think the chances go down the longer we get into it probably.

HUNT: What do you think, Brad?

TODD: I'm a political analyst, so I think there's 100 percent chance that Donald Trump understands Republican voters more than Steve Bannon, and Tucker Carlson.

HUNT: You -- okay. And do you think he's taking them into account at all?

TODD: I think, of course, he's -- he listens. He canvasses. That's -- this is part of how he makes decisions. But in the end, he understands his base and he understands that they like strength.

HUNT: Always the calculation, right? Strength versus weakness. How it looks on the international stage, and also here at the domestic political one.

Thank you all very much for joining me today. I really appreciate it.

Thanks to you at home for joining us as well.

Do not go anywhere. "THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER" starts right now.