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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt

Trump Blames Biden, DEMS, Fed Chair And Immigration For Economics Woes; WSJ's Peggy Noonan: "Trump May Be Losing His Touch" Amid Economic Woes, Low Poll Numbers And GOP Losses; GOP Rep. Nancy Mace: "What's The Point of Congress?" Aired 8-9a ET

Aired December 13, 2025 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:42]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: Hi everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to The Arena Saturday. It is day 327 of Donald Trump's second term. And just like basically every commander-in-chief before him, James Carville's words apply here, too. It's the economy, stupid.

This week the president began a public campaign like push around his policies and the issue of affordability. And what we're seeing is a presidential blame game with more finger-pointing than pointing to a fix.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: The Democrats caused the affordability problem. Jerome, too late. He's too late with his interest rates for a reason. He's a bad guy.

When Biden and congressional Democrats had power, they blew up our economy, sent prices soaring. Their entire agenda is about robbing working people to fund their far-left cronies and give lavish benefits to foreign migrants and illegal aliens.

The Democrats created the worst crisis of inflation that this country has ever had.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right, my panelists here in The Arena, New York Times journalist, CNN contributor Lulu Garcia-Navarro, editor of the Dispatch. Also, CNN political commentator Jonah Goldberg, former Biden White House communications director Kate Bedingfield, former Trump campaign adviser David Urban. They're also both CNN political commentators.

Welcome to all of you. It's wonderful to have you here on the inaugural edition of The Arena Saturday.

David Urban, you have worked in and around --

DAVID URBAN: That was me.

HUNT: -- Donald Trump's orbit for a long time now. And he's often succeeded at convincing people, especially his supporters, to blame somebody else. To blame, not him. It doesn't seem to be working this time. Why?

DAVID URBAN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, this will listen. I think this time people feel it in their pocketbooks. It's much more real, it's much more tangible, the affordability issue. I think the president wants to change the dialogue, the discussion, and not talk about affordability, but really kind of frame this on an inflation kind of debate, right?

So inflation has gone way down in the Trump administration. I think he's very frustrated. We keep talking about prices as opposed to the amount of inflation he's reduced. And I think that's what he's talking about. This like, you know, we're not going to call it a hoax anymore. We're going to call it a scam.

I think if the debate got changed to be, we're doing much better on inflation, he'd be happier. But listen, you can't tell people that when they take money out of their pocket, there's less money in there than there was a week ago, a month ago, a year ago. They know, okay.

You can't tell people that what is real is not real. And so I think that this administration, they're going to be doing it. They did it last week. They'll do it next week. They're going to roll people out. They're going to talk about issues, things that they're doing to try to address this. They understand it's an issue and they're going to try to attack it head on.

They're going to, you know, talk about gas prices, food prices, and the things they're doing, try to attack it. I think that's what they need to do. They need to kind of change that, change the page, change the message.

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, NEW YORK TIMES JOURNALIST AND HOST OF "THE INTERVIEW": David Urban for president. I mean, that was good.

URBAN: I feel your pain.

HUNT: Kate, you learned this the hard way, working for President Biden, right? Because they tried to use numbers to say things were better than people were feeling that they were.

KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Certainly. And I watch what Trump and his team is doing, and I see many of those same mistakes because I think, you know, the blame game, it doesn't work when you're President of the United States. I mean, very famously, the buck stops here. The buck stops here.

You don't get to say, two years ago, four years ago, my predecessor did something that's making your life harder now. You own that. And I think, you know, you saw Trump in the Oval Office with Zohran Mamdani, acknowledging that part of why Mamdani won that campaign was because he was so focused on affordability. So I think deep down, Trump knows that this is politically a problem

for him. I think the Trump ego won't allow him to say things aren't as good as they should be. And I'm fighting for you. That's the message. But he won't -- he won't do it.

URBAN: But -- and to take what Kate says, I don't want to step on you guys, but this is why President Trump got elected. Remember, he talked to working-class, black, brown, white folks saying, I'm going to make things better for you. It's not going as quickly as I like to see. I think things are improving, but not as quickly as they'd like to see.

And so that's -- they got to recapture that narrative.

HUNT: Well, I mean, I will say it's a much different vibe, Jonah, Lulu, you know, jump in, than the guy that we saw in the campaign trail who was riding around in a garbage truck and who was, you know, putting fries in the fryer at McDonald's. Instead, we've got a gilded Oval Office as he's giving tours of an enormous ballroom that he's building. In some ways, it's like the everyman's millionaire is now an out-of-touch billionaire president.

[08:05:20]

BEDINGFIELD: The campaign wasn't authentic.

HUNT: Let's say.

JONAH GOLDBERG, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, I would say we've talked about. This a bunch, about how, you know, the most effective ad that the Trump campaign had was she's for they them, he's for you. And in the last 327 days, it's been, I'm so awesome. Look at this cool stuff that I'm doing. You know, I've saved everything.

I think David's absolutely right. I'm not sure it's going to work, but it's absolutely right. That's the right strategy to have. The best time to have done it was 327 days ago. The second best time is right now.

And when, you know, like when Reagan was elected, he said he inherited a lot of inflation, and he said, Look, it's going to take us some time to deal with this. And that was the right strategy because it meant that he wasn't taking full ownership of the current economy.

Trump, particularly with that Liberation Day thing, took complete control as a political issue of the economy. He said, new golden age. Everything is changing. I own this. I'm brilliant.

Just the other day, he gave himself A plus, plus, plus, plus, plus on the economy. It's much more difficult to do the message strategy that David wants after that's already been baked into the cake for nearly a year.

HUNT: Lulu, here's how Peggy Noonan put it in the Wall Street Journal this week. She says this quote, "People on the ground feel tremors that presidents can't feel. They see Mr. Trump flying around the world on his missions and tearing up the White House East Wing to build a ballroom. All that feels like what presidents do when things are going well, in a boom everyone is experiencing. People don't feel that way right now."

And to underscore how they do feel, I mean, right now his approval rating on the economy is sitting at 31 percent.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yes, I mean, we've talked about what people are feeling, and I think it's clear. We all spend money. We all know that it's really expensive right now.

I think what this shows is that this is a president who's increasingly out of touch and doesn't have his pulse on the people anymore. And that might because of what he watches on television. That might because of the people that he's surrounding himself with. That might because he's not getting out there as much. But this does --

HUNT: He's not listening to David Urban (inaudible).

GARCIA-NAVARRO: He's not listening to David Urban and should. But I also think -- but I also think there's something else, you know, fundamentally going on. This is also a president who is in his last term. And every single president we have seen make a turn like this, right? In their last term, they start focusing on their legacy, on foreign affairs. They take their eye off the ball because they think, what the hell. I'm not going to be here. It's some, it's some other person's problem. And I do think we are seeing a bit of that with Donald Trump.

HUNT: Jonah, do you think that Republicans are going to feel more freedom now to continue to break with the president? I mean, is this -- we have talked over and over again for the decade that the president has been on the public stage about how he could, you know, he defied all laws of political gravity. Is that era over?

GOLDBERG: It's ending for sure, right? I mean, we saw the Indiana state legislature buck the White House with a very intensive campaign on this redistricting stuff, the Marjorie Taylor Greene thing. I personally think that the war on Mike Johnson in the House was with the House Republicans is partly a desire for this antiestablishment populist party to rise up against the establishment. But they still can't quite attack Trump yet.

So we're going to have some ritual human sacrifice with Mike Johnson. But, you know, you cannot have a president with a 36 percent approval rating for very long before Republicans start running for their own personal interest rather than for the president.

URBAN: I would just say real quickly. And those numbers, the president's numbers are still with Republicans 70 percent. Now it's come down in that and that poll. It was 78 in March and now it's 70 but it's 70.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: The Republicans are 35 percent of the total population.

HUNT: Hold on, hold on. Hold on, because this is our next conversation. Let's not -- let's not cannibalize it. We're going to take a quick break and we're going to come right back to this.

Coming up in The Arena. Call it the miserable majority. Why Congressional Republicans are becoming even more frustrated with their leadership and with each other.

Plus, kids in one country finding out what it would be like to be a kid. When I was a kid, those of us sitting here, we're all kids. Thanks to a new nationwide ban on social media, people are now asking could, should that happen? Here in America.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think if you can get a job at 14, if you can take care of someone's kid, like do babysitting and stuff, I think you should be able to have social media and have the government, like, trust you on it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:14:43]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY MACE, (R) SOUTH CAROLINA: We just saw President Trump run on his policies and win in a landslide in November. And we have yet to implement and codify his executive orders. I blame our party for not doing that.

REP MAJORIE TAYLOR GREENE, (R) GEORGIA: The process is broken. You're seeing Republican women lash out directly at the speaker because he sidelines us.

REP. ANNA PAULINA LUNA, (R) FLORIDA: I think that this frustration goes to really how slow the process has been on legislation. And I don't think it's just women.

[08:15:12]

HUNT: This week on Capitol Hill, the people in charge in Washington seem, well, more miserable than ever, especially within the GOP, where cracks in Speaker Mike Johnson's House conference seem to be expanding and complaints about his leadership style. Johnson's job is likely to get even harder due to the dozens of Republicans who've decided to retire amid widespread questioning of whether if the job at this point is even worth it. And that brings us to our quote of the week.

It comes from Congresswoman Nancy Mace, who raised this question in a New York Times op ed, quote, "What's the point of Congress?"

Jonah Goldberg, our favorite constitutional aficionado, shall we say. The Constitution, and you know, the Congress is in there.

GOLDBERG: It is.

HUNT: It's in the constitution.

GOLDBERG: The Congress is the first branch of government. It is the supreme branch of government. It is the only branch of government that can fire members of the other members of other branches of government. It writes the laws. It is the power to tax, which the founders kind of cared a lot about. And this is a trend that has been going on for a while now, at least a quarter of a century of power concentrating in the leadership, but also when the president and the Congress are of the same party, basically, the leadership of Congress become vassals to the White House.

And that's a real problem when you have a president with 36 percent approval and the members of Congress having to get elected on their own merits and they have no accomplishments to talk of because Trump has not wanted very much legislation to come out of the House and Mike Johnson has been sort of, he's been like Gunga Din. He's carried so much water for this White House.

URBAN: Yes, listen, I'll take it to 100,000 feet and go back further at Jonah's point. When I worked in the Senate in the 90s, late 90s, my former boss, Arlen Specter, used to bemoan the, you know, abrogation of congressional authority over and over again. And they cede more authority each Congress. And so --

HUNT: It's way worse now than it was.

URBAN: It is. But let me just point out a few things. And these kind of people don't really think about this. But when the Congress gave up the right to earmark, to give earmarks, right? They turned over an entire -- a ton of power to the executive branch. When the Congress operated, when the U.S. Government, both under Republican and Democratic control, operated under authorization use of military force, which was put in place in 2001 for 25 years to fight in Afghanistan, Syria. The Congress gave up more power to the executive branch.

And so it's not shocking that somehow they wake up one day and say, wow, we have no power. We don't do anything. Because they're afraid to do something because there'S repercussions. Every time --

GOLDBERG: They don't know how to do it. They've lost the muscle memory of how to legislate.

HUNT: Absolutely.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But there's, I think, a number of things going on here. I mean, I have today, Saturday, an interview coming out with three members of Congress who left at different periods or are leaving currently, Senators Flake, Manchin, and Smith, and, you know, they really talk about how this has been supersized in this moment. We have seen hundreds of executive orders, far more than any president has put out before being, you know, laid out. We've seen this president --

GOLDBERG: Because unilaterally declared war.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: This president now with Venezuela, you know, kind of taking action that hasn't been taken. Tariffs, something that should be, you know, kind of taken by the Congress has been completely given over to the administration. And this is now being decided by the judiciary instead of by Congress.

URBAN: But is it a chicken and egg --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And it's also seeing this over and over and over again.

URBAN: -- thing or the Congress, they've not passed a spending bill. They don't know how to pass -- when I was in the Senate, we passed 13 individual spending bills every year. This is how it's supposed to work. I'm just a bill on Capitol Hill.

HUNT: I mean, David, I covered Congress for going on 20 years, and I don't think I have. There's been a single year where that has happened in the -- by the time that done --

URBAN: No. But -- well in 19, I left in 2002. So you're probably right. You're probably right. But that's how it's supposed to work, right?

The House passes bills, the Senate bills. They --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But don't you think Speaker Johnson has been completely subservient in a way that I personally have not seen any other speaker would be to the president?

BEDINGFIELD: Oh, no question.

URBAN: So there is no data.

BEDINGFIELD: No question. But this is also where gerrymandering has continued to erode the authority of Congress. There is no -- there's no impetus. There's no incentive for members to do anything but chase the far reaches of their base. And that is somewhat true on both sides of the aisle.

It's particularly true, frankly. On the Republican side of the aisle when you have a president like Donald Trump in his leadership style who commands complete and total authority and does not suggest that he has any desire to work with the Congress at all, that leaves members, when the president is at 36 percent, scrambling to say, okay, where do I find identity outside of just White House?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But the problem is the president. Anyone that steps to the -- just a little bit outside of him, he'll say, I'm going to send someone to run against you. And that leads for a lot of party unity, but it also leads for a lot of people.

[08:20:04]

BEDINGFIELD: And he do that in part because districts are so gerrymandered that sending somebody in, you know, to the right of somebody who disbelief Donald Trump.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: They're afraid. They are afraid.

BEDINGFIELD: It's usually the solution. And that is part of why Congress is so broken.

URBAN: I think we're forgetting the fear that Nancy Pelosi reigned that struck into the hearts of her delegates. Like nobody. Nancy Pelosi would cut your throat if you are a House member, right?

She was ruthless. She was a great leader. Donald Trump admired Nancy Pelosi for how she led her caucus, right?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Except he is not the head of Congress.

GOLDBERG: This also gets to one of the problems, the dynamics that we have where we basically vote like we live in a parliamentary democracy, where we vote for a party rather than individual candidates.

And so, like, you guys know, every single midterm election, they'll say, so and so voted 100 percent of the time with Nancy Pelosi. So and so voted 99 percent of the time with Mike Johnson. The reason they did that is because leadership brings these bills at 11:59 p.m. and says, you have one hour to read this thing and agree to it. If you don't, Trump will kill you.

And so, of course, everyone votes in lockstep. There is a defense of Mike Johnson. He will claim, and his defenders will claim that he does stand up to Trump, but he does it in private because he's a team player.

I think sometimes that might actually be true on some specific things. But when you do it in private, no one sees it. And so you don't look like you're an independent operator, even if you may be one so --

URBAN: Listen, I can tell you firsthand. I've witnessed, I've been in the presence of the presidents where he's talking to the speaker, and they do have a give and take. And so to Jonah's point, I do believe that occurs. It may not occur in the front pages of New York Times, but it's happened.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But wait a second, he --

HUNT: Last word.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Speaker Johnson actually took his caucus, sent them home for weeks, because he didn't want to take a vote that his caucus wanted to take. That's where you lose control of your caucus.

GOLDBERG: That's why there's some of this outrage, because it was like a COVID lockdown. And they all went home and got yelled at for six weeks. And then they come back, and they're like, they hit us.

HUNT: And they're like, oh, actually, we are entirely miserable. All right. Still to come here in The Arena a quarter century since the Supreme Court decision that forever changed American politics.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: While we yet hold and do not yield our opposing beliefs, there is a higher duty than the one we owe to political party. This is America, and we put country before party. We will stand together behind our new President.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:26:53]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For me, it was my community and my lifeline. Social media was the place that I went to when I needed people to talk to who understood me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're just going to create, like, new ways to get on these platforms. So, like, what's the point, you know?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Maybe we'll make people go outside more, but not really.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: For the past four days, kids in Australia have been adjusting to life without social media after the country enforced a world first law that bans anyone under the age of 16 from accessing some of the world's biggest platforms. And it's ignited a debate here in the U.S. Should we be following suit? The former Chicago mayor, potential 2028 presidential candidate Rahm Emanuel, said here on this show earlier this week. The answer is yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAHM EMANUEL, FORMER CHICAGO MAYOR: We have taken steps appropriate designated driver, banning tobacco, putting it behind the Counter, and locking it up. Kids under 16 can't get it. This is as addictive a behavior, as alluring a behavior, and is destructive technology onto the kids mental and physical health and well-being. And we as adults, have to protect them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right, so this conversation about social media but also phone use in general, and I think most of the people here have kids. Mine are thankfully too small for this yet. But Lulu, this, it's almost an existential question, right?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: It is.

HUNT: Is this something that where the tide has turned so much against these companies that it is a realistic possibility we may ban social media here, or are we so far from that because of the power that they have that it's not even a reasonable conversation?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Oh, it's such a hard question. It makes me sad to even contemplate it because I guess my head says we're too far from it in this country because of the way that it works. They have a lot of power, money, and influence. Someone we saw who goes to all these dinners at the White House now. And so I don't think we're going to see that in this country.

That said, I can tell you that there is a groundswell of support among parents for some help with this because what ends up happening, I have a 13-year-old, and I feel like it's me fighting against Silicon Valley the whole time. I am -- every argument is about how much screen time my child has and I am constantly saying, please let me limit it.

In fact, I just got like one of those things that you tap and it's supposed to block everything on the phone because I'm like, it's going to be like the mezuzah in our house. She's going to come in, and I'm going to be like, tap that thing because that's it. And you just feel absolutely helpless.

BEDINGFIELD: Yes. I often feel like a person who has a board up against a door and the deluge is coming to the door, and I am just trying to fight it. My son's 11, and it is. You were just -- you are incessantly trying to prevent your kids from participating in this behavior that every study shows has negative impact on their well- being, on their cognitive development.

[08:30:07]

So look, I think as a political matter, I think, you know, for Rahm to kind of try to put this front and center and make this an issue, I think, I actually think it's a smart political fight.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: I do too.

BEDINGFIELD: Because there are parents all across this country who are living this every day. It feels very tangible.

HUNT: Yes.

BEDINGFIELD: They want help with it. And it puts him and any Democrat or Republican who takes up this position up against Silicon Valley. I think that's a good place.

URBAN: Now, word from the libertarian in the crowd, right? How about -- and I hear you guys, but I'm in favor of less government, more personal responsibility. People in America make bad decisions all the time. How many times have you sat down in the night on a Friday night or whatever night with a thing of Ben and Jerry's and you say, I'm just going to have a bite.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: These are children.

URBAN: No, no, I understand, but listen, but you're doing a great job. You're a parent. That's what we're supposed to do. You're supposed to talk to your kids. People are supposed. The government is not the solution here. Right? The government may be --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: We regulate alcohol for children. HUNT: I was going to say.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: You can't regulate cigarettes. You regulate all sorts of things for children. And --

URBAN: You can go on your phone. Like you said, and you can limit the amount of screen time they have. You can limit how much time you're on TikTok and Meta and all these things they have.

HUNT: But David, it is quite literally an attempt about to get them addicted.

(CROSSTALK)

GARCIA-NAVARRO: We know now how this works. And these are -- and this is -- we know that the algorithms are there to actually change the way your brain works.

HUNT: Yes.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: We know that we have been experimented on.

URBAN: There are video when --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: With the release of all this technology and now with AI the same. We are being experimental.

URBAN: What Netflix did they determine. Netflix did a study. And you know the end. It says if you would like to watch in the next five, four, three, two, one, they've done studies to show what that optimal number would be to show on the screen. So that Jonah keeps watching "White Lotus" over and over.

HUNT: But Jonas --

(CROSSTALK)

GOLDBERG: Yes, I'm a pretty libertarian guy too. Libertarianism is in fact the greatest political philosophy ever conceived of. It only has two weak points. Foreign policy and children. Children are not adults. They are not citizens in local parenthesis. Important. And the power of parents to actually -- if you told me you could come up with a technological fix that allowed parents to just turn a switch and do this, I'd be OK with that, but that doesn't exist right now.

I bought a lot of beer when I was 16 years old when it was against the law. It was hard. Right. And it should be hard. There will still be kids who get on social media. But giving parents a little help in this regard, I think Lulu's too pessimistic. I think it's a real political issue.

HUNT: I was at an event at the National Cathedral this week where Spencer Cox and Josh Shapiro sat down. And this is one of the things that Spencer Cox, Republican governor of Utah, said. He said, this is a problem. These companies have too much money. We need to ban social media. He's on the same exact page as Rahm. Shapiro wouldn't go there, Kate. And I actually thought to myself as I

listened to him give that answer that the train is leaving the station in no small part because, and no disrespect, David, of course, you're a slightly different generation than I think Kate and I are. I --

URBAN: Hey, hey, hey.

HUNT: I came of age. I was an adolescent. There was no Internet.

BEDINGFIELD: Yes.

HUNT: But when I was about 12 or 13 years old, it got involved. I didn't have a smartphone. I know the difference between living with one and living without one. I cannot imagine having been a middle school girl with social media.

BEDINGFIELD: Oh, my God.

HUNT: And under no circumstances do I want my children to have it.

BEDINGFIELD: Yes. Yes. All of the challenges of middle school just exacerbated, effectively made public. It's like, take your worst kind of middle school memory and then have it made public for all of your peers.

Look, I agree with you that parental choice is the first -- is the first piece. But I think there's a lot of appetite here for a bigger fix.

HUNT: Yes. All right. Coming up next here in The Arena, the anniversary of a landmark Supreme Court decision. How presidential politics have never been the same.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:38:40]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The United States Supreme Court justices have ruled in Bush versus Gore. CNN's Charles Bierbauer is outside the high court. Charles?

CHARLES BIERBAUER, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Bernie, the bottom line of this ruling, which came to us around 10 o' clock this evening, was that the judgment of the Supreme Court of Florida is reversed. I'm reading. And the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. After that, it gets complex.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: And boy, things sure did get complex. This week in history, a quarter century ago, if you can believe it, the Supreme Court issued its ruling in Bush versus Gore. The landmark and deeply controversial 5 to 4 decision stopped the Florida recount and it made George W. Bush president elect. A day later, a defeated Vice President Al Gore addressed a deeply

divided nation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AL GORE, FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: Now the U.S. Supreme Court has spoken. Let there be no doubt. While I strongly disagree with the court's decision, I accept it. I call on all Americans. I particularly urge all who stood with us to unite behind our next president. This is America. Just as we fight hard when the stakes are high, we close ranks and come together when the contest is done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:40:07]

HUNT: So, to recap, the loser of one of the closest presidential elections ever publicly urged his supporters not only to put the results in the past, but to unite together in support of the winning opponent. It's a moment of political civility that stands in strong, stark contrast to what we see in our country today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We did great in 2020, by the way. I won that election by so much. It was a rigged deal. The 2020 race was rigged. And it was. It was a rigged election. We won in 2020 big.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: We won in 2020 big, he said. I mean, we've come so far. We've fallen so far. When you think about where we are today versus where were then, what are your reflections?

GOLDBERG: I don't want to start a can of worms, but I actually think the court decided correctly. And if the Gore lawyers had gotten their way, all the studies show that they would have lost those recounts.

But I think Gore will be -- it was the high watermark of Gore's career as a statesman. He did the right and honorable thing, and he did it well. I think a lot of this red versus blue stuff, starting with this red versus blue crap, right?

The reason why we say the Republican Party is the Red Party comes from the maps from that election. It used to be that they flipped depending which party was the incumbent and which one wasn't. And so now the supposedly conservative parties. The color of the Communist flag drives me crazy. Anyway.

HUNT: This is what makes you special.

URBAN: Johnny Spoon (ph).

GOLDBERG: Look, I think this was a hugely significant moment in the sort of partisan wars. So we're talking in the first block about Congress stuff. So was the Contract with America. Newt Gingrich's decision to reform Congress is part of the reason why Congress doesn't work anymore. So there are a lot of these things that you look back on and you're like, gosh, if we had just gone sort of a different way, but I don't know what the solution to Bush v. Gore is that we wouldn't be here now.

BEDINGFIELD: So this was the first election that I voted in. I was a -- I was my first year in college. And so it was, you know, I won't say it was radicalizing because I was already very engaged in politics and interested in politics, but --

GOLDBERG: That's not shocking.

BEDINGFIELD: But I remember -- I know, I know. It's shocking to me. Funny that you ended up here. Weird, right?

But I remember being just absolutely devastated and heartbroken, and I think some people would look at that moment and say, given where we are now, that Gore should have handled it differently. He should have been more aggressive. I don't think so, and maybe I'll probably get pilloried for saying it.

But, you know, I think it does matter that we have leaders who acknowledge facts on the ground, who view the civility and, you know, the ability of our government to continue to function as the high water mark and not whether they have won or lost.

And I think he handled it as he should have. And I want to believe, maybe naively, that we are not so far down the line that we will not get back to a place where the Constitution and the integrity of our elections is actually more important.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: I'm the panel pessimist, clearly. Take that man.

URBAN: Two unrelated observations. One, when Kate says she was 18, I was Arlen Specter's chief of staff. So I really old now.

BEDINGFIELD: I won't tell you how old I was.

URBAN: I'm really old. Really old. And to watching that clip, I missed Bernie Shaw. Yes. Bernie Shaw was a great guy and a real pillar here at CNN for so many years, who I watched in the first Gulf War.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yes. I mean, I just think we are in a place where it is hard to put the genie back in the bottle. And part of that is because our leaders talk in a certain way. We're seeing this just ramped up and up. And we know that the population takes their cues.

Study after study has shown this from the rhetoric that they see at the top, it's not bottom up, it's top down. So we're seeing, that's why you're seeing political violence. That's why you're seeing people at each other's throats. And this is again, not to refer to this other thing that we just talked about, but that's being supersized by our social media.

So we are in this vicious cycle at the moment where everyone, there is no incentive anymore, none, to reach across the aisle, to have bipartisanship, to try and work together to make a better America. In fact, all the incentives are there for exactly the opposite.

HUNT: Or to trust each other. I mean, let's -- David, I want you to jump in. But let's put up, we can show you how trust has plummeted among Americans in government. I mean, it was still, you know, well, less than 50 percent in 2000 when George W. Bush took office.

But look at that. It's just, you know, completely fallen off the charts. I mean, and I think, David, it seems to me that is the biggest difference between, you know, what Gore was saying there.

[08:45:02]

Yes. Obviously he had lost it from a personal perspective. You know, he had to do something that was very difficult. But what he was telling Americans was that you can believe what the system tells you is true. Right?

URBAN: yes.

HUNT: And president doesn't do that.

URBAN: Yes. And I think it's been eroded by lots of things. I think, you know, the 2020 election did that to some extent. I think COVID had a huge impact on that. Right. I, you know, I've had a thousand vaccines. I was in the military. I got vaccines left and right, up and down. So it wasn't such a big deal for me.

But I know a lot of people who it was, you know, they trusted the government. They followed blindly, say the government saying we have to do this. The government said. And then it turned out well, maybe that wasn't all true. And so I think that eroded a great deal of trust in America. And you're never going to get that back.

I think the next crisis we have in a health care crisis, we or national crisis for the government saying something, Americans are going to be a lot less or a lot more reluctant, less hesitant and it'll be a real follow. Yes.

HUNT: It's going to be a real test. All right, coming up next here, something totally different. The strength of the secretaries. What exactly is going on here? We'll explain.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:50:52]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN DUFFY, TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY: I'm announcing at DOT that we have $1 billion in funding for grant programs to make the experience better in airports. Maybe I want a workout area where people might get some blood flow and doing some pull ups or some step ups in the airport.

By the way, now Bobby and Paul are going to do pull ups if you want to watch this. (END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Cabinet secretary is doing pull ups at the airport. I am sorry. What? Looks like an SNL skit. This was a real thing. It happened at Reagan National Airport this week. It was a press conference that turned into a pull up contest between RFK Jr. seen here, and the Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, seen there.

The $1 billion in grant money for airports is an effort to make air travel smoother and healthier. The secretary tweeted this quote, having pull-up bars in airports means you can stay fit while traveling. Now, if you happen to be concerned about spending your flight seated next to someone who is post workout and really sweaty, the Transportation Secretary has issued this guidance.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DUFFY: I don't want you to have a full body sweat going on, so you staying. But if you do, you know, do a few pull ups, you know, get your blood flowing, I think that's positive. So again, I'm not -- this is not like go to the gym, sweat and then get on an airplane.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: OK. We're lucky enough to have David Urban who has apparently spoken to the Transportation Secretary about this very topic.

URBAN: I happen to be friends with the Transportation Secretary. I will say as a graduate of West Point who's done a few pulls, by the way, today's the Army Navy game. Go army beat Navy. You watch -- look at Secretary Duffy's. He's doing them correctly. RFK, he's OK.

HUNT: He's doing it wrong.

URBAN: He's not. These are -- you're supposed to go -- your chin is supposed to be well above the bar. OK? He's doing OK. You know, he's -- look, he's older than me and he's doing a lot. But look at Duffy go. Oh my gosh, look how much better. So there's a little analysis.

I'd say Sean Duffy does a little bit better pull ups. He's a lot younger. He was a lumberjack, you remember. So listen, I think it's a great idea. They put -- they have these little gyms and airports now for kids to go through. I think his idea of people not wearing pajamas on airplanes, he said, let's have some civility. If people start acting and dressing civilly, maybe you won't have so many fights on Spirit Airlines that go viral on social media. I don't know if you see people dress like they're -- they're rolling out of bed instead of --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Come on. Drives me bananas. I mean, I am sure that you fly first class, but for those of us who do not, my friend, I want to be as comfortable as possible. I am not going to be dressed up in my Sunday best because I am squeezed into a tiny bed with people like this and people screaming at me if I happen to go my half an inch, you know, push my chair half an inch back.

This, you know, I understand the need for civility on airplanes. But you know what would be lovely, would be so nice if you got a little bit more seats if your airplane left on time, if you weren't treated like cattle.

HUNT: Yes.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Just --

URBAN: I can't control the airlines. I'm just saying I just don't wear swimwear or pajamas.

HUNT: So you never wear soft pants on an airplane?

URBAN: Never.

BEDINGFIELD: I guess you never wear soft pants ever.

(CROSSTALK)

URBAN: Listen, Kate knows. Kate and I travel a lot together.

BEDINGFIELD: We book together a lot.

URBAN: And he knows I wear -- I pretty much wear --

BEDINGFIELD: He puts his money where his mouth is in terms of on an airplane.

URBAN: I dress up.

BEDINGFIELD: You're going to see David Urban.

HUNT: Would you wear soft pants on an airplane?

BEDINGFIELD: Absolutely. All the time. Are you kidding me?

HUNT: I'm glad that there's another scene sitting here.

BEDINGFIELD: Yes. Yes.

GOLDBERG: I just think there's an inherent contradiction in these two policies. Right. Like on the one hand, you want people to wear a jacket and tie or a nice dress and do pull ups. Right. These things don't work together. Pick a lane.

URBAN: You said don't break a sweat. Just knock out a couple.

GOLDBERG: Yes.

HUNT: So yes, you -- Lulu mentioned all -- there's the -- the things that are very unpleasant about flying. Pete Buttigieg was on Jimmy Kimmel reacting to this. Let's watch what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST AND COMEDIAN: Are you jealous when you see your successor and RFK Jr. in the airport doing pull ups and you think, why didn't I think of putting jungle gyms in the airport?

[08:55:09]

Is that something you go, oh stupid, why wouldn't you do that?

PETE BUTTIGIEG, FORMER TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY: You know what -- of all the problems you could be trying to solve with the aviation system right now, why are you doing that while dismantling the protections we put in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: We are going to have to leave it there today. On that -- on that happy note, I would be interested to see how you do in a poll.

URBAN: OK. Just good.

HUNT: Yes. Come on. We got -- we got a bar here.

(CROSSTALK)

URBAN: I'm going to show you. I'll show you.

HUNT: Thank you all very much for joining. Thanks to all of you at home for watching. Don't forget you can see The Arena every weekday right here on CNN at 4:00 p.m. Eastern. You can also catch up listening to our podcast, follow the show on Instagram and X at The Arena CNN and you enjoy the rest of your weekend. The news continues next right here on CNN.

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