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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
Now: Texas House Debates GOP Redistricting Plan; Judge Denies DOJ Bid To Unseal Epstein Grand Jury Docs; Trump Aide Says Museums Have "Overemphasis On Slavery". Aired 4-5p ET
Aired August 20, 2025 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: -- weekend, kids blurted out their best mom calls.
[16:00:03]
And there was actually a three-way tie for first place. You heard the actual winners there. The kid with the teeth. I think to me is the champ.
They each got a blue ribbon and five bucks to spend on anything that they wanted. Of course, as long as it was all right with their moms.
Ma, the meatloaf. Ma!
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Did you do that to your mother?
SANCHEZ: I would do Ma. Ma. Yeah. I have a nickname for my mom. She watches. I'm not going to say the nickname because I would definitely get a text message. She'd be very upset about it.
KEILAR: Well, karma's a thing for me.
SANCHEZ: What would you say?
KEILAR: What would I say? I would say it's come back to me full.
THE ARENA with one of our favorite mas. Kasie Hunt starts right now.
DANA BASH, CNN HOST: The redistricting wars are on as Texas and California move one step closer to redrawing their maps.
Hi, everyone. Welcome to THE ARENA. Kasie Hunt is off. I'm Dana Bash.
Right now in Austin, Texas, state legislators are on the brink of passing a Republican bill that would redraw maps to make five Democratic congressional districts lean heavily Republican. The bill is all but certain to pass in the state senate could vote as soon as tomorrow. This follows a series of ultimately futile stalling tactics by state Democrats, who left the state for weeks in protest.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TODD HUNTER (R), TEXAS STATE HOUSE: You're not going to like this, but for 18 days, things could have happened. You all chose to walk out to me. You damaged the process. You kept people away. You kept work from being done. Don't use that as an excuse to belabor this bill.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: The creation of five new deep red districts is a major gift to President Trump. What he asked for, as he hopes to hold on to both chambers of the U.S. Congress in 2026. In the midterm elections, Texas is likely just the beginning of this fight, as other states to look to -- look to redraw their own maps.
The next battleground is California. In fact, this afternoon, a state assembly committee advanced a bill allowing voters to decide whether to adopt a new congressional map that would create five new Democratic districts. Republican Republicans filed a lawsuit to try to prevent that from happening. California Democrats, though, argue that they're just trying to play by Texas's new rules.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ISAAC BRYAN (D), CALIFORNIA STATE ASSEMBLY: Let's also be very clear. The person who drew this map is the authoritarian in the White House who called for destruction of the foundations of our democracy by clawing back five seats that don't belong to him in Texas and forcing the people of California to respond? The people of California will draw this map on November when they have their voice heard.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: And this just in to CNN. Barack Obama says he approves of the approach that California Democrats, led by Governor Gavin Newsom, are taking on redistricting. He spoke last night at a Democratic event, and the former president said, quote, I'd love to see the people of Texas reject what's happening, but it doesn't look like. Unlike in California, they're being given the option of deciding whether this is a smart thing to do or not, end quote.
My panel is here, along with CNN correspondent Arlette Saenz, who is live inside the Texas state capitol in Austin.
Arlette, bring us up to speed. What's happening right now on the floor?
ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Dana, right now, we are hearing lawmakers speak out in support and in opposition to this redistricting bill, which appears is on its way to passage, potentially from both chambers in the coming days. Now, Texas House lawmakers have been in the House chamber, just down the hall from where we are for about five hours now, considering this bill. Democrats introduced a number of amendments, none of them were eventually adopted, and now they are moving on to the floor speech part of this day.
But there have certainly been a number of tense moments between Democrats and Republicans, Democrats or Republicans, frustrated about that 15-day standoff that Democrats had taken to block this bill. While Republicans have tried to argue why this map should not be passed, saying that it could disempower black and Latino voters, they are preparing some of the legal arguments they will make when lawsuits are filed in the coming weeks and months.
But here was one of those tense exchanges between a Democratic and Republican lawmaker during the amendment process earlier today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, what I don't respect is an obvious racist move on what we're trying, what you're attempting to do. But --
HUNTER: But we disagree 100 percent.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When you lose two African-American leaning seats, then that tells you there is a race issue going on.
HUNTER: And Rucho gave the exact same argument.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Rucho, bucho, mucho.
(CROSSTALK)
HUNTER: You can make fun of the U.S. Supreme Court representative. I don't think that's right. Let's not demean the process.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[16:05:00]
SAENZ: Now, lawmakers are currently continuing that debate with speeches. It's expected that the House will need to vote two times before they can pass this bill. Then it would need to go over to the Senate, which is set to meet tomorrow evening at 7:00 p.m. Central Time. Texas Governor Greg Abbott has said that he could sign this bill in a matter of days, potentially by the end of the week. As Republicans are moving closer and closer to making this map that could net the GOP up to five U.S. House seats in next midterm elections, a closer to reality.
BASH: Arlette, thank you so much. Appreciate it.
And my panel joins me now in THE ARENA. CNN political analyst and investigative reporter for "The New York times. David Fahrenthold, CNN political commentator and former Trump White House communications director Alyssa Farah Griffin, CNN global affairs commentator, Sabrina Singh, also a former press secretary for lots of presidential candidates, including Cory Booker and Kamala Harris. And also the one and only Shermichael Singleton.
SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I love that. The one and only. So, thank you, Dana.
BASH: Do you know other Shermichael Singleton?
SINGLETON: I will take that.
BASH: Okay. Not -- needless to say, you are a Republican commentator for -- for CNN. I do want to start with kind of the big picture of this as we head into these series of votes in Texas and likely later today in California.
Alyssa, I'll start with you. Youve seen a lot both working in the House as an aide, working in the Trump White House, working in politics for a long time. We saw Tom DeLay do a version of this back before you were born, but this is so brazen. And it did start with Donald Trump and likely his political director.
ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Listen, this is more brazen than usual. But partisan gerrymandering is much like dark money in politics. Everyone agrees it's bad for democracy. It's probably not a good thing.
But both sides still move forward and do it. I'm old enough to remember when my friend Adam Kinzinger's district was written out of Illinois. Democrats did not throw him a bone. They threw him into Darren LaHood's district and he no longer had a seat to run in. So, I think that's kind of what you're seeing where California is basically responding in kind by acting similarly.
And the reality is, Texas has the legal right to do this. We don't -- we don't decide these things at the federal level. They are decided within the state. But I think the fact that there's this push now is because the midterms are coming up.
And listen, Republicans have a razor thin majority. I actually don't think that they're on par right now to get absolutely swept. If you look at Democrats unfavorability, but this is a boost that they need a few extra seats is exactly what they would need to keep control of the house.
DAVID FAHRENTHOLD, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: To me what's interesting about this is the Democrats, the way that they're fighting this in Texas, and it's appeals to rules. You know, we want to -- we're going to sue in the courts. You're doing this the wrong way. It's not an appeal to the public.
BASH: Isn't that -- oh, go ahead.
FAHRENTHOLD: I think that's what's really interesting. This is a challenge for them. But as Alyssa said, it's legal. What this is also an opportunity for them to go out to their own voters and say, look, Donald Trump is stealing your votes. He's taking away your chance to vote for the things you want, things you're going to help you.
And there's none of that that I'm seeing of actually trying to build support in Texas, because these are going to be razor thin seats. They could win if they build that sort of support. Instead, it's all sort of inside baseball.
BASH: So, the Democratic lawmakers, state lawmakers argue that the reason they left isn't because they thought they could actually stop the vote. Ultimately, it is to get attention. And as we're talking about this, I just want to put up on the screen in Texas what we're talking about to be specific, the current districts, of course, this is a very red state already, so it's slim pickings to even find, even though they can probably do more, find a Democratic seats. But you see what it is currently and then what the proposed districts are.
SABRINA SINGH, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Yeah. I think what you're seeing here is a power grab by Texas and the Texas governor to exactly what Alyssa said, to increase the house majority because they have such a razor thin majority right now. And what you're also seeing in California is Democrats willing to fight back.
And I think this is exactly the fight that is going to galvanize not only the base but we are fighting fire with fire now and I think that is a good thing and you're seeing that not just in California but you're potentially seeing that with other Democratic governors that could look at the maps and redraw seats.
At the end of the day, we're ratcheting up the tensions and this is something that you really don't want to see. And I think to Alyssa's point, you know, dark money being in politics, this -- these hyper- political gerrymandering, it's not good. But we also can't go down without a fight.
BASH: I want to read more of what former President Obama said last night when he was at a fundraiser. He said, quote, I've had to wrestle with my preference, which would be that we don't have political gerrymandering. But what I also know is that we don't respond effectively if we don't respond effectively, then this White House and Republican controlled state governments all across the country, they will not stop because they do not appear to believe in this idea of an inclusive, expansive democracy.
[16:10:08]
He's blessing what California is doing.
SINGLETON: He is. But I just wonder what reality the former president lives in. I mean, California, you currently have 43 seats that are held by Democrats. Only nine are held by Republicans. In the state of Illinois, only three seats are held by Republicans. The rest are all Democrats. I think it's 14 seats held by Democrats.
And so, this this notion of gerrymandering that that solely benefits one particular party in charge in a state already exists. Now, maybe people don't necessarily like the way that Texas Republicans are going about it. That's fine. Let's have that argument and debate.
BASH: You think because it's the middle of the decade.
SINGLETON: Sure. Let's have that debate. But this already exists, Dana. And I don't know how many more seats my friends in California can try to pull from the very limited number that Republicans already have.
And so, this is not a new phenomenon. Look, in my ideal world, I'd love to see Republicans and Democrats run in purple districts and make your argument to the voters and let your arguments rise and fall based on their merits. That's not the way electoral politics work. And so, both sides will do everything they can to gerrymander districts to their own benefit. And that's what you're seeing, Republicans.
SINGH: The argument to that, and I think what the president is making is that California wouldn't do this if Texas wasn't doing it as well. And so, we have to fight and we have to fight back. And I think what Democrats would be -- would propose is, you know, nonpartisan gerrymandering, nonpartisan boards that would be in place in states to redraw lines in a fair manner. But that's just not a reality right now.
SINGLETON: Quick, quick rebuttal. You guys have already done that in California.
BASH: Right, well, let me get to that. That's right. And the whole reason its not so easy in California is because California has done that. Thanks, you know, and in large part to Arnold Schwarzenegger, who pushed this former governor.
And because of that, let me just put on the on the screen the California maps and what we're looking at, the current districts in California and what the proposed districts are for Democrats. There to do the for tat to bring the five-seat majority back, they hope.
But to do that, they have to pass -- what they're going to pass in the legislature is the ability to put this to voters. It's a ballot measure because of the independent commission. So, it's going to be a more of an uphill climb there.
Meanwhile, you have the governor, and I'm really dying to get your take on this, Alyssa, as a communicator and as somebody who had a keen eye to Donald Trump's social media what Gavin Newsom is doing and has been doing for many days now is trying to imitate the president in how he uses social media. Just one example here.
He put a picture up of him with the president. Tiny hands is out here copying me, but without the stamina. Sad. And certainly without the looks. Total beta. GCN, obviously putting his initials there like Trump does. DJT, obviously, you see there in all caps.
And by the way, this is one of many, many that we're seeing here. And then just today, we have this from also Governor Newsom's press office responding to the White House saying that they're not paying attention. The White House, we don't think about Gavin Newsom. Also, the White House sends "Politico", real news, a meme about Gavin Newsom -- triggered, weak, sad cry emoji.
GRIFFIN: I personally hate it, but it is incredibly effective. So Gavin Newsom has been kind of in the lower echelons of the 2020, or 2028 race of potential presidential candidates. He's been moving up since he's taken this more aggressive tone. We are living in a moment, call it that. Theres this moment that we're living in. People want fighters.
And I think something the Democrats have been struggling with since they lost the 2024 election is feeling like somebody is hitting back as hard as Trump is hitting, and that's what Newsom, he's trying to step into that role. He's trying to get into that viral space of hitting back and showing he can be tough.
It won't work for everyone. But I will say this, if you look at members of Congress, the most recognizable names, especially in the House, are not people who pass the most bills and are the most effective legislators. Its people who are effective on social media and appear on cable news.
That's the world we live in. And he's realizing that's how you break through, not necessarily by solving every policy.
BASH: As a Democratic communicator, what do you think?
SINGH: I think -- I cringe a little bit at some of these tweets, but I also cringe when I see the president of the United States doing it. But I think you're right. I think people want to see a fighter. I think people live online right now, and I think they enjoy the entertainment.
And he is taking a page out of Donald Trump's book. I mean, whether it works for ambitions down the road that I can't -- I can't tell, but it is raising awareness around the fight in California, which is a good thing.
BASH: And he says that one of the things he's trying to do is hold a mirror up and show everybody this is not normal.
[16:15:02]
And everybody has gotten used to these kinds of posts from the president of the United States. And now you see somebody else doing it, and you see, this is weird.
SINGLETON: But I suppose -- I don't know if what the overall efficacy of this is going to be, though. Does it translate to Democrats improving their numbers with younger men, particularly men of color, who are black and Hispanic, who lets just remove Trump or moving more to the right? Does it improve Democrats standing with a certain sector of young women who have slowly started to move more to the middle? I'm not necessarily certain.
And if I were to go to the roster of political, positions that Gavin Newsom has taken since being governor, I could say that this is definitely someone who's going to have a very difficult time running in 2028.
So, this is great. It appeals now. We're talking about it on the show, but this is not going to lead to electoral successes. I would say.
BASH: Real quick, one of the things that will make it even harder for Gavin Newsom in 2028, if this doesn't pass, if the people of California, when this is on the ballot, say, no, we don't want to do this and just look at some polling that we just saw from "Politico" this morning. Question keep independent redistricting, which is the law of the land
right now in California, 64 percent return redistricting to legislators, which they are asking to do. There you go. And again, they're saying it's just temporary. That's what they say. Arnold Schwarzenegger says he doesn't believe it. Only 36 percent.
FAHRENTHOLD: This is going to be an uphill battle for them because they've spent so many years talking about the value of this. And liberals believe in this. Liberals, as you said, Barack Obama, they believed in this in California. Liberals believe in the idea that that maps should be fair.
And they've been talking -- Democrats have been talking for so long about making democracy fair, playing by the rules, and now they're going to pull that message back and say, hey, let's not play by the rules because we want to win. It's a hard message to sell. It's whiplash for your own base.
BASH: To be fair, as Alyssa said, one of the most gerrymandered states in this country is run by Democrats.
FAHRENTHOLD: In Maryland. Lots of them.
BASH: And Maryland. Yeah, yeah, one of not the only.
Up next, new details on the latest ruling against the Justice Department's effort to unseal documents related to Jeffrey Epstein. The judge today suggesting that the Trump administration is trying to create a, quote, diversion.
Plus, a live report from North Carolina, where the governor has declared a state of emergency ahead of some of the biggest impacts from Hurricane Erin.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:21:42]
BASH: A federal judge in New York today is rejecting the Justice Department's request to unseal grand jury materials related to Jeffrey Epstein. This marks the third time a federal judge declined to release Epstein related information. Judge Richard Berman said the DOJ failed to demonstrate any special circumstance to justify making the documents public. He also noted, quote, the instant grand jury motion appears to be a diversion from the breadth and scope of the Epstein files in the government's possession. The grand jury testimony is merely a hearsay snippet of Jeffrey Epstein's conduct.
Joining our panel to help understand what this means is former assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, and, of course, our senior analyst, Elie Honig.
Elie, what do you think?
ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, Dana, this is not just a vanilla rejection of emotion by the judge here. This is a rebuke aimed at DOJ because what Judge Berman says here at its heart is essentially this is much more about the appearance of transparency than actual transparency. He says in the snippet, you just showed that this is a diversion because what the judge says here is we're talking about a tiny percentage of the file.
We got some interesting data actually. I've been telling everyone who will listen, the grand jury transcripts are going to be a fraction of a fraction of the file. Now we know what the numbers are. The judge says there's about 700 pages of grand jury transcripts out of 100,000 or so total pages. That's 7/10 of 1 percent.
And what the judge says here is all the rest of it, the remaining 99.3 percent. You DOJ have the ability to turn that over without my permission of a judge. And so, the judge basically says this is all for show, and you haven't made the showing you need for me to unseal these records.
BASH: That is so interesting. I didn't see that part of what he said, that it's that small. The grand jury information. And I just want to say that you said it's a rebuke of DOJ, and it's also a rebuke of the president of the United States because he is the one who asked, told his DOJ to try to get these grand jury testimony released.
We can show some -- some of his posts from July, July 19th, July 24th. This is when everything started to blow up and people, who had been told in his base that this was a conspiracy to end all conspiracies, got really mad at him. This is one of the moves that he made. And I guess that was the point, without saying it, that the judge basically said, like, this is not real.
HONIG: Yeah. The notion that this was going to somehow give us meaningful answers, these grand jury transcripts, was ridiculous from the start, because the way these grand juries work federally is you take an FBI agent and this is what happened here. You have the FBI agent summarize the case, essentially what the FBI agent says is what we've already seen in the indictments. And the FBI itself issued a memo back in July that said, essentially, there's no new information. There's no third parties implicated, and there's no Epstein, quote/unquote, client list.
So this is really more of a show than a meaningful effort at actual transparency. The other thing that I think is really important, the judge notes here, is that the victims were ill-treated by DOJ yet again. Judge Berman notes that the victims actually had different perspectives.
[16:25:03]
Some wanted the grand jury information released, some did not. But what the judge says is DOJ failed to notify the victims of this motion in a timely manner. And given the way the victims have been mistreated throughout this case, I think that's completely inexcusable.
BASH: That's heartbreaking.
Shermichael, what do you think? SINGLETON: I mean, look, I think the administration has tried
everything possible to get away from this. As Eliot stated, it's true that there isn't an official list. I think it's fair to just come out and say, look, we've looked into this. We had assumed there was a sort of a formalized list of names. That is not indeed the case. We'll release what we do have, but we want to move on.
If that doesn't occur, they're going to still be some Republicans in the base that are going to believe that there's still more, that some people are trying to hide.
BASH: Well, listen to -- it's not a Republican. He's an independent. But he voted for Donald Trump. Listen to Joe Rogan on this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE ROGAN, PODCAST HOST: What do you do? I mean, you definitely can change the way you vote. Like if it comes up again. But the problem is this is a bipartisan issue.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Bipartisan, isn't it?
ROGAN: Yeah.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know, I heard as a as a Democratic hoax, that's --
ROGAN: Yeah, I don't think that's true.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But --
ROGAN: Well, it's certainly not a hoax if you go to jail. Certainly not a hoax if Ghislaine Maxwell's in jail, too.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRIFFIN: This is one of those rare moments where the House Republican conference is at odds with the Trump administration. We've seen sort of early indications that the House Oversight Committee and DOJ have reached some level of cooperation. They're going to turn over some documents.
But what that is, is kind of the million dollar question here. If there was really an appetite from the White House or the DOJ to turn over everything they could, that's not law enforcement sensitive and that protects victims, that would have happened by now. This has been really dogging Donald Trump.
And I'd be curious what Elie thinks, what do you expect to the degree that you could even say will actually be most likely to be turned over to the oversight committee?
BASH: Elie?
HONIG: Yeah, well, that's a great question. So there are two filters here, right? Theres what's DOJ giving to the oversight committee then? What's oversight going to give to us? And I think the thing that people are most interested or ought to be most interested in is -- are there other people who have not been criminally charged? Of course, Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, the only people who've been criminally charged.
Are there other people who did wrong, who committed criminal acts, who've not been charged?
It's hard for me to believe that those were the only two coconspirators. Those were the only two true wrongdoers in this whole thing.
So, look, there's going to be a lot of stuff in there that's irrelevant or indecipherable. And I hope that both DOJ and Congress make an effort to show us the actual, meaningful stuff that actually matters to all of us.
BASH: Yeah. I mean, that is one of the many good questions, including yours.
And, you know, to that point, we do know, at least according to James Comer, who's the chairman of the Oversight Committee, they're the ones who subpoenaed DOJ for the information. They said they're going to get it on Friday. He said that he will make it public, but we don't know what exactly the it is yet.
FAHRENTHOLD: And everything we've seen about Comer shows that his goal is not truly oversight, but protecting Donald Trump and helping Republicans. I don't think I've seen any evidence from Comer that he is going to be an independent actor and release something that hurts Trump, or makes the Trump administration look like it lied.
SINGH: I also think the reason why this is not going away for the Trump administration is Donald Trump ran a campaign basically saying, release the files. I mean, you have people that built their careers on this with Kash Patel and Dan Bongino and the FBI, that talked about it on their podcast time and time again. And so now, it's coming around of like this issue of transparency and release all the files, and they actually can do it.
The judge, you know, said today that in -- the 93 percent of that could be released by the Justice Department, and yet they're not. And so that's why there's actually bipartisan support both within the Republican conference and the Democratic caucus to release these files. But what they actually get, I think, remains to be determined.
BASH: I don't want to lose sight of something that Elie said. It's important. Our colleague Randi Kaye spoke to an Epstein victim, Haley Robson. And so, let's play a little bit of what she said about what's going on.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HALEY ROBSON, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: Situation right now with our government. I am you. Got the government has me in a position where I can't continue my healing journey because I have to process and address every day what's going on in the media, and they won't rip off the band aid and just unseal everything that needs to be public.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: Shermichael?
SINGLETON: That's a bit of a conundrum, right? Elie mentioned this. You have some survivors who say, hey, let's release everything, and there are some who are saying, I just want to move on. I'm trying to heal.
I've seen other interviews that we've showed on this network of women talking about how they've had to talk about this with their children. Imagine that. I mean, I have a number of women in my life who've experienced sexual assault and abuse, and it is something that women have to deal with forever. It's not an ending thing.
[16:30:00]
And so, my advice to the administration on this one, you got to be transparent because it isn't going away, but you have got to talk to the survivors and figure out what is the best approach to moving forward here, because more than anybody else, it's their opinions that matter most.
BASH: All right. We're going to take a quick break. Elie, thank you so much for giving us all of that incredible insight.
Up next, a live report from North Carolina where final preparations are underway ahead of Hurricane Erin. Plus, we're following what's unfolding in Texas. Republicans in the state house are getting closer to passing a plan that would give the GOP an edge in the congressional midterms. One Democrat who will be impacted, Congressman Lloyd Doggett, will be here next.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HUNTER: You left 7 to 18 days leaving this state. My view, the public could have been involved. The whole caucus could have been involved. All 150 people.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: With all due respect.
HUNTER: I'm not finished.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now, let me get finished.
HUNTER: You're not letting me talk.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:35:18]
BASH: Turning back now to Texas and the first battle in the war, President Trump waged over redistricting ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Tonight, the Texas house is expected to pass a bill that would redraw the states congressional districts, eliminating five blue districts, creating red ones in their place.
It's a move already, prompting a for tat in California and likely similar gerrymandering attempts in states across the country.
I'm joined now by one of the Democrats slated to lose his seat, and that is Texas Congressman Lloyd Doggett.
Thank you so much for being here.
So, as I said, you've -- there's every reason to believe that if and when, not if when this passes your district, as it is now, will no longer exist. And what it will do is pit you against another Democratic representative, Greg Casar. This morning, "The Austin American-Statesman" reported on an email that you sent to your supporters saying that you should run in the new safely Democratic district and Casar should run in one of the new Republican ones.
And "The Statesman" also quotes an email response from one of his aides, who wrote, quote, other than other than the fact that Republicans arbitrarily assigned this seat the same number as Greg's current one, there's no reason it would make sense for Greg to run in that district. Fewer than 10 percent of Greg's constituents would be in it.
So, my question, sir, is have you discussed what is going to happen with Congressman Casar? And would you run against him in a primary if it came to that?
REP. LLOYD DOGGETT (D-TX): Well, I think it's a little different than you presented it.
BASH: OK.
DOGGETT: My district was largely unchanged. I represent congressional district 37, representing only the city of Austin and a suburb. The only city I've ever called home. And over two thirds of the people that are in CD 37 will remain there under these bad Trump maps. Greg's district, he represents about a fourth of the county. He has a district that I once represented that goes all the way down to San Antonio.
And the question is whether he decides to run in his own district or surrenders it. It has been changed dramatically, and it's more difficult whether he surrenders that to Trump, which I hope he won't do. I hope he'll reconsider that, because it's a district that Joe Biden got 49 percent in. It's an overwhelmingly Hispanic district, 57 percent.
I think the appeal that he's carried around the country with Bernie Sanders of appealing to disaffected Americans, particularly in Texas, disaffected Latinos, would be an important message to deliver there. And I hope we won't see that kind of conflict that Republicans are always trying to encourage, where Democrats fight each other rather than fighting Trump. BASH: I just want to go back to the point that you made at the
beginning. You say that your district isn't going to change that much.
DOGGETT: That's right.
BASH: Okay. So --
DOGGETT: Two thirds of it remains exactly -- over two thirds of it remains the same. It's still congressional district 37. It has most of my constituents and only a few of those constituents, about a third, as Greg ever represented.
BASH: Okay, so that sounds like an argument that you're making to him, to your fellow Democrat. Have you spoken about it?
DOGGETT: It is. Well, we've been on multiple programs together where the issue has come up. I think both of us have tried to direct our attention to fighting the maps. We were just together at a rally in the Capitol only a few minutes ago, trying to speak out to the very end against these maps.
But I made it clear from the outset that I plan to seek reelection where my constituents have reelected me repeatedly before, and to say that this is not the time to surrender to Trump in a in a race we need to get.
You mentioned that we would lose five seats in Texas. We will lose five seats to Trump only if we yield to him. They drew these districts so that Trump had won each of them by 10 percent. I think that's a high water mark in a district where Biden did so close, and where even our senate nominee last time, when Trump had a landslide for himself, came within a couple of points. Thats a district that we need to contest, and we need to win.
BASH: I'm just playing devil's advocate here. If I'm Greg Casar --
DOGGETT: Clearly.
BASH: -- and I hear what you say, that you need to fight, I might say, okay, so you go fight. You go into your old district and you run against Republicans where they have the advantage.
DOGGETT: I am in the district that I was elected to beginning in 2020 and again in 2022. And I think that defending that district and representing those folks, fortunately, the decision would be made by people here in Austin.
[16:40:07]
And I'm confident that they will support my reelection. But I submit a job application every two years. I'm submitting it to the same place, and I'll be out there working hard to win their confidence.
BASH: What if --
DOGGETT: Greg is in a difficult position? There's no doubt about it, because they drew this district to elect a Republican. I just believe if there's a determined effort not to surrender it, that we can win it, and that becomes all the more important, as you pointed out, in prior programs, as Trump marches across the country in Missouri and Ohio and Indiana and Florida.
He's picking up seats there. California won't be enough to offset it. We need to limit his gains in Texas. And Greg's CD 35 is probably the most winnable seat they've left us with.
BASH: What if he says, I don't want to do that, and I want to run again against.
DOGGETT: Well, that's his choice and the voter -- yeah, it will be unfortunate. It will divide our community, but I'll try to keep it on a very professional level. We've never had a unhappy word between us.
He recruited me to be a vice chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and I campaigned for him the first time he ran for city council in Austin.
BASH: You know, one of the arguments and one of the debates that is going on in the Democratic Party is a generational one. And you are 78 years old. He is 36 years old.
DOGGETT: I am.
BASH: You were one of the first, maybe the first Democrat to call on, former President Joe Biden to step aside after his debate performance. What would you say to members of your party who say, we want to keep Greg Casar in, and he's the next generation? You had such a wonderful run, 30 years in Congress. Thank you for your service?
DOGGETT: Well, I would say I want to keep him in, too, and I want to keep him in by defeating Donald Trump in a district that he created to try to perpetuate his one man rule. But as to my service and my comments about President Biden -- yes, I was the first member of congress to speak out and ask him to step aside not because he was too old, but because he was too ineffective. He couldn't perform well either with the electorate or in the debate.
I'm ready to have my performance evaluated, but I think what I did with Biden is a real strength here, because there were many people of all ages, many concerned about their future career, perhaps, who were unwilling to stand up against the president of their own party. I did that, I think it was right. I wish it could have been done earlier, and I think we would have had a better chance of winning the election.
BASH: When they say politics ain't beanbag, they were probably thinking about situations like this.
Congressman, thank you so much. Appreciate your time so much.
DOGGETT: It could be. Thank you, Dana, so much. Good talk to you.
BASH: Up next, what a top White House adviser is saying today about slavery after some controversial comments from the president this week.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:47:17]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LINDSEY HALLIGAN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE STAFF SECRETARY: The fact that we had -- our country was involved in slavery is awful. No one -- no one thinks otherwise. But what I saw when I was going through the museums personally was an overemphasis on slavery. And I think there should be more of an overemphasis on how far we've come since slavery.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: That was President Trump's senior associate staff secretary this afternoon, pushing the president's view that there is too much talk about slavery in the Smithsonian. In a recent Truth Social post, Trump railed against the national museums, saying they are, quote, out of control and only focus is how bad slavery was.
My panel is back.
Alyssa, I'm going to start with you. And I'm actually going to start going back in time to the first term.
You were working for the vice president, I think, at the time, in 2017, you eventually moved over to work for President Trump. But listen to what Donald Trump said in his first term after touring the African American Museum.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's a new beautiful Smithsonian Museum that serves as a shining example of African Americans incredible contributions to our culture, our society and our history. It also tells of the great struggle for freedom and equality that prevailed against the sins of slavery and the injustice of discrimination.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: And now he is saying that this whole conversation with regard to what the White House is doing came from a post with the president talking about, talking too much about slavery. Kind of what we just heard from the staff secretary.
GRIFFIN: I'm really curious where this came from, and I'm just going to speculate. Abby Phillip had a kind of heated moment on her show with Jillian Michaels, a sort of right wing commentator, self-styled about this specific issue. We know Donald Trump is a cable news watcher.
I have never heard him before at length. Talk about concerns over what's in the Smithsonian. In fact, I remember that. I also remember Vice President Pence traveled to the history of African American museum, the African Museum of History, and he was raving about it and glowing. And it very much echoed those remarks.
And to me, that speaks to a couple of things. In the first Trump term, there were people surrounding the president and the vice president who talked about this is the way we talk about our nation. We have a history. We have to acknowledge. We have to learn from. But there's also so much good that we've accomplished since then, and we should highlight those, those struggles and that overcoming.
It seems very different this time. And what's interesting is Anderson did a great breakdown last night. If you actually go through the Smithsonian, there's not what I think anyone could frame as an overemphasis on the struggle of slavery.
[16:50;03]
Many -- most of the stories are that of overcoming, people like Harriet Tubman and others who came from the worst circumstances and became American icons and heroes. So, I think, if anything, id love to see the president just go, maybe tour some of these sites and see if he leaves feeling the same way.
SINGLETON: I mean, look, I wonder, I text a bunch of my friends about this all black, and I said, did you guys see this? And one replied and said, who in the hell is talking about this, Dana?
BASH: The president.
SINGLETON: But who's the constituency that's asking for some changes to the Smithsonian? What numbers will that move in terms of midterms? I have no idea.
BASH: What do you think the answer is?
SINGLETON: I mean, look, I think -- I think -- I think we're the sum of our experiences, right? So, you got a little bit of bad. You got a little bit of good. Do we want to wallow in the past? Of course not. But you got to acknowledge it. You have to learn from it.
But then you also have to acknowledge all of the good, amazing progress that that we're making in this country. I mean, African Americans today. I mean, you think about when my grandparents were in high school, they just desegregated their schools in the south.
And here we are several decades later, and I'm educated. My wife's educated. Their children did exceptionally well. So, the story of the black experience is one of significant triumph. And as a conservative, I mean, were all about that old aphorism, pull ourselves up from our bootstraps, right? Well, to me, if you want a more American idealistic story of that, look at the African American experience.
BASH: And what about the museum? Because he's talking about the way that its portrayed. Do you think that there's an overemphasis?
SINGLETON: I've been to the museum? No, I don't. Again, I think if you look at the stories in that museum and I'm again speaking as a conservative here, and we talk a lot about triumph, we talk a lot about tradition. We talk a lot about protecting certain norms and customs of behavior that we believe are important. Then I cant think of any other experience from a group. There are a few that are similar, but not exactly the same, that you could point to as a conservative. As a Republican, to say, if these are our contextual views and ideals as Republicans and modern day America, holy smokes. Look at what this group overcame. This represents the best of what we believe.
And that's just the way I view this. And I think the average person out there would probably view it the same. So I would say to the president, Mr. President, move on. No one is asking for this. Theres a lot of triumph that comes from the black experience.
And Republicans, particularly in the past, should be very proud of. And, you know our history. Republicans played a big role, and being on the right side of this issue. And so I would -- I would honor that. I would hold that up to say this is a moniker that we want to be proud of as a Republican Party.
SINGH: I think you touched on an important point is, is why are we spending time on this? This is the president of the United States. He has a whole list of things to do, including keeping our nation safe, revisiting history. That is something that the curators, the historians are there to do. And independent boards that put together these amazing exhibits.
And, you know, you go to the African American History Museum and other museums and you see the progress that different communities have made. So, you know, for the president to be spending his time on this for taxpayer dollars to be devoted to re -- sort of doing exhibits, I just don't understand what its going to do and how it's going to move us forward.
BASH: This is a version of -- I mean, just to sort of say it out loud, this is a extreme version of the war on DEI.
FAHRENTHOLD: The thing that strikes, the contrast that strikes me is president Trump's doing all this work to put Confederate names back on military bases, to bring Confederate statues back.
And the argument for that is, let's tell the full story of our history. Let's erase people because we don't agree with their politics. Now, it's such a contrast to this, which is like, let's go back and erase part of our history because it doesn't -- it conflicts with my politics now. It just feels so contrasting that they want to go back and change history at the same time as they're sort of reviving these monuments to some, to that part of the --
BASH: Shermichael's -- the answer to his question about who's -- who's the constituent constituency here.
GRIFFIN: Listen, I do think there's a big part of the American electorate, especially on the Republican side, who feel like we are told we have to apologize for being Americans. We have to constantly apologize for our original sin. That's very real. But I don't think this decision represents or rectifies that. If
anything, you go to the Smithsonian and it is a triumph of American history. It's overcoming our worst struggles.
And again, to Michael's point, that's why I think it might be good if the president just went and saw it. It really is not. Woke displays that fly in the face of what he stands for by any means. I think he would leave and feel very similarly to how he did in 2017.
BASH: Anyone around him right now who will say, let's go check out the museum, sir?
FAHRENTHOLD: I can't imagine. They might go to see the national guard outside the museum, but not to go to.
SINGLETON: Dana, if I could just say quickly.
BASH: Yeah.
SINGLETON: I think it's one thing -- if you're white, no one wants to constantly be told everything your people did in the past is terrible. No one wants to hear that over and over again. I completely understand that.
But I don't know if the American people who happen to be white also want to go as far as to say, well, let's completely ignore or reform or change or diminish or minimize what we experience in the past. I just think most people want to acknowledge it. It happened, it occurred. But can we keep moving forward? I think that's the bigger question for me.
BASH: I mean, I know this is going to sound Pollyanna, but what about a balance?
[16:55:04]
SINGLETON: There we go. How about that? How about that?
BASH: I know, I know, that's like, does anybody even think that way?
SINGH: Well, I mean, I also think this is distracting from the issues that he doesn't want to talk about, like the economy, the big beautiful bill, which is going to be very hard to sell in districts.
BASH: All right, everybody, don't go away.
We'll be right back.
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BASH: Thank you so much to the panel for some terrific -- terrific discussion. Yes. Thank you. Thank you for that. Thanks, I agree. Thanks to you.
And you know what? Phil Mattingly, you're going to have so many great discussions, so many great reports on the show that you're doing, "THE LEAD". It's so good to see you, Phil.
