Return to Transcripts main page
CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
U.S. Escalates Iran War, White House Questioned On Decision To Strike; Soon: Senate To Vote On Wars Powers Resolution; Talarico Wins Dem Senate Primary In Texas, GOP Goes To Runoff. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired March 04, 2026 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: -- denial in some ways.
[16:00:02]
And the question is, will he actually deny it when he addresses the allegations today? We shall see.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: We shall.
Manu Raju, thanks so much for that reporting.
THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT starts right now.
ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.
KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Hi, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to THE ARENA. It's great to have you with us on this Wednesday.
As we come on the air, the U.S. is escalating its war against Iran, even as Tehran looks for an off ramp and Congress weighs limits on the president's war powers.
Just moments ago, President Trump addressed the war now in its fifth day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're doing very well on the war front, to put it mildly, I would say. Somebody said, on a scale of 10, where would you rate it? I said, about a 15.
Their leadership is just rapidly going. Everybody that seems to want to be a leader, they end up dead. And it's -- it's an amazing, amazing thing that's taking place
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Right now, on Capitol Hill, the Senate about to take its first vote related to the war with Iran, as Democrats look to restrict President Trump's ability to wage war without congressional authorization.
As that happens, sources tell CNN that Iran's intelligence service has sent word to the CIA via a third country. Their message that Iran could be prepared to open talks on how to end the war.
U.S. officials, however, say it's unlikely anything concrete will materialize anytime soon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETE HEGSETH, U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: We have only just begun to hunt, dismantle, demoralize, destroy and defeat their capabilities, just four days in. We are just getting started. We are accelerating, not decelerating.
The only limits we have on this is President Trump's desire to achieve specific effects on behalf of the American people. And that's why we don't talk about. You can say four weeks, but it could be six. It could be eight. It could be three. Ultimately, we set the pace and the tempo.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: That uncertainty over how long this war will last, a source of concern for some in the White House. Sources familiar with the matter tell CNN some of the president's advisers and allies are worried about the political consequences of a prolonged war and are urging him to declare victory as soon as he can do so credibly.
All of that coming as the Trump administration offers yet another explanation for why this war started, when it did. Remember on Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the U.S. knew that Israel was going to strike first. Then yesterday, President Trump said it was his opinion that Iran was going to attack first.
And now the White House says the president had a feeling.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I think the president, prior to that phone call, had a good feeling that the Iranian regime was going to strike the United States assets in our personnel in the region. This decision to launch this operation was based on a cumulative effect of various direct threats that Iran posed to the United States of America, and the president's feeling, based on fact, that Iran does pose an imminent and direct threat to the United States of America. The president had a feeling, again, based on fact, that Iran was going to strike the United States, was going to strike our assets in the region, and he made a determination to launch Operation Epic Fury based on all of those reasons.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: He's got a feeling.
Let's get off the sidelines, head into THE ARENA. My panel is here.
We're also joined by CNN senior White House correspondent Kristen Holmes and CNN chief global affairs correspondent Matthew Chance. He is in Beirut for us. But, Kristen, let me start with you. What more can you tell us about
the president's feeling?
KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, and President Trump just said this again inside of this event that he had when he was talking about this 15 out of 10 on the war front. He also ended up saying this, that he believes Iran would have attacked Israel, and maybe the U.S. had they not attacked first.
Again this apparently marries this seems to marry all the different things that we have heard other than what we heard originally, which was that there was an imminent threat. Now, you have this feeling, you have Israel. But it goes to what President Trump was saying, that it was him who forced Israels hand because of his feeling.
But it also weaves in all of the senior administration officials saying that they had a lot of intel that showed that Iran was building up its response or its retaliation. So clearly, this is where they seem to have landed, was that President Trump had this feeling based on fact. And that is why the United States ended up in this war.
The other thing I want to address that, he said, and we actually heard from the White House on this, too they just continued to suggest that they don't have any idea who is going to be in control in Iran, who's going to come to power?
President Trump, just moments ago, also said that most of the leaders that they were considering are dead.
[16:05:00]
He said that now twice. And the White House just said that they would wait and see who the next supreme leader was going to be.
That, of course, all goes to the end game question that you just talked about. Pete Hegseth saying, we're just getting started.
Those two things at the same time are having Republicans incredibly uneasy. The idea of just getting started with no real end game, even though they have been saying four to five weeks, they are clearly trying to open up and hedge on that by saying that they can go as long as they want. The White House said that and Pete Hegseth saying they determined the timeline -- lots of questions around this.
HUNT: Lots of questions indeed.
And Matthew Chance, on that point. The conflict has, of course, spilled over into neighboring countries. And this question of just how far and wide this might expand has been a really critical one.
What is the latest on that?
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CHIEF GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, you're right. I mean, it has an impact on lots of the surrounding countries, but I think its probably fair to say none more so than Lebanon because unlike other locations, for instance, the Gulf states, Lebanon has faced an intensive Israeli air campaign -- the Air Force of Israel carrying out airstrikes on Hezbollah controlled areas of south Lebanon -- south Lebanon and of this city of Beirut as well.
There's a ground operation that's been underway, being carried out by the Israelis are actually moving in to areas of southern Lebanon ordering the complete evacuation of towns and villages across that area, tens of thousands of people being told to leave their homes and make their way north to make way for Israeli military operations. And that's created an enormous sort of internally displaced people problem as well, with all these people sort of getting in cars, clogging up roads, the reports of traffic jams lasting 18 hours as people try to move out of the line of fire into areas that are in some cases only fractionally safer.
And all this is because Lebanon is home to a militia, Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, and which was always one of the more powerful, more reliable proxies of Tehran. And in the hours after Israel and the United States killed the Iranian supreme leader, Hezbollah chose to fire rockets and drones across the border into Israel its the first direct attack since 2024.
And Israel's response has been absolutely devastating. It seems that they're using this opportunity to finish what they started in 2024, when there was a really concerted campaign by Israel against the Lebanese militia. And that's brought up all sorts of frustrations and anger here in Lebanon against Hezbollah.
HUNT: All right. Matthew Chance for us in Beirut, Kristen Holmes at the White House, thank you both very much for starting us off today.
My panel is here in THE ARENA. CNN political national security analyst David Sanger, CNN political analyst, national political reporter for "Axios", Alex Thompson; Democratic strategist, former senior adviser to the Biden and Harris presidential campaigns, Adrienne Elrod; the former speaker pro tem of the House, Patrick McHenry. We're also joined by retired U.S. Army officer, the Colonel Peter Mansoor.
Thank you all very much for being here.
And I'm going to get to the colonel in just a moment on the very serious aspects of this. But, David Sanger, how many wars have U.S. presidents started on a feeling?
DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL & NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: You know, we don't know the answer to that question, but we do know that in international law, as you're trying to justify an act of war, feeling doesn't count for much. Facts count for everything.
HUNT: And a feeling based on fact is what Karoline Leavitt --
SANGER: And a feeling based on fact, it reminds me during the -- during the war against Saddam Hussein in Iraq that they came up with the phrase anticipatory self-defense, right, rather than saying it was an offensive operation.
And that gets to all of what you've been hearing in the past three days with all of these different explanations.
The White House needs a way to say that this was a preemptive attack, which is to say they saw Iran preparing to attack the U.S. and so the U.S. attacked them first, or the U.S. interests bases and so forth. The problem is, none of the intelligence seems to point that the Iranians are going to do that, nor should they have, given the weakness of Iran, right? They -- their economy is in trouble. Their military was degraded by the war with Israel. Politically, they were facing people on the streets.
They were in tough shape. They were not about to go pick a fight openly with the U.S. And so, that creates a problem.
And now, we've suddenly heard -- well, maybe they could have built a nuclear weapon quickly.
[16:10:02]
Well, we know they couldn't have. The fuel goes buried back in June by the U.S. attacks.
They wanted to do a missile that could reach the United States and be able to soon, except the Defense Intelligence Agency concluded that would be basically a decade away.
So this is the latest explanation.
ALEX THOMPSON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, in some ways to David's point, they're trying to find an America first explanation, and they keep going to different ones. You saw J.D. Vance go on Fox News and basically just talk about -- well, the nuclear weapons program. Then you also have Rubio talk about, well there was an imminent threat against Israel, which would have sucked us in.
And the White House is on every single potential side of this issue. And the Republican Party does not know how to message this because they're getting conflicting signs from various parts of the White House. And it is also I can tell you, like some frustration among Republicans, that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, they don't think is the most effective spokesperson for this, given some of his messaging.
HUNT: Yeah.
PATRICK MCHENRY (R), FORMER SPEAKER PRO TEMPORE: And Marco Rubio has shown to be the most effective spokesman for this administration on international affairs. That's what we saw in Venezuela being front and center.
And this is a very Trumpian thing. The feel, right. He takes in information, he has a feel. And that's what the administration is built on.
What Hill Republicans need to know, and the Republican Party needs to know is the key set of messaging on the justification here. They don't yet have it. That's the reason why we've heard multiple stories. What you've heard from the international community is very
interesting, though. Everyone's saying, well, thank you. This is a net positive to the world right? The most the neighbors closest are completely relieved that we took this action. And so, there are multiple things that are true here.
But the domestic politics of war politics have started very fast this time, unlike previous international actions at a rapid rate, and I think that will define the rest of the political side.
HUNT: Yeah, no, its an interesting point and possibly because, you know, the president didn't try to sell this ahead of time to the American people. And so, we're talking a little bit about the messengers here and I want to bring the colonel in here to talk about what this really means.
But I want to show you some of the difference sir, between the various messengers that the president has out there, including a pretty sharp contrast between what the Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, said right out of the gate the first thing out of his mouth today, talking about this versus the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Caine.
Let's watch that. We'll talk about it on the other side.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HEGSETH: I stand before you today with one unmistakable message about Operation Epic Fury. America is winning decisively, devastatingly and without mercy.
GEN. DAN CAINE, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: I'm here today to provide the American people and those of you in this room, an update on Operation Epic Fury. First, it's with profound sadness and gratitude that I share the names of four of our six fallen heroes, all from the 103rd Sustainment Command.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: So, Colonel, we should note, Hegseth did go on to mention these fallen soldiers. But you are someone who led troops into battle when we invaded Iraq. You then later basically helped write the book on counterinsurgency, which it ended up -- you know, we ended up needing for years longer than we ever imagined that we might.
When you listen to those two things, a leader who is saying we're winning decisively and another who is saying we've lost Americans. And behind the scenes, they're telling members of Congress they anticipate more American casualties, how do you take in this claim that the administration keeps making this is not Iraq? We're going to go in then were easily going to get out. Does it work that way?
COL. PETER MANSOOR, U.S. ARMY (RET.): Well, probably not, but the problem here is that the administration never went to Congress to ask for a resolution funding the war, approving of the war. The Congress has Article One authority from the Constitution to declare war or to give the administration some sort of go ahead. And the administration simply didn't do it, nor did the president even go before the American people and explain what he was doing.
So, now, in retrospect, you have all sorts of administration figures making all sorts of different claims about why the war is being waged, and they're trying to think of, you know, they're trying to figure out which one is going to stick with the American people, because right now, they've got less than 25 percent approval among the American people for the action that has been taken, as successful as it's been, you know, it could all turn to dust and ashes in the end if -- if the airstrikes don't cause regime change in Iran because Iran will be at war with the United States in perpetuity after this action.
[16:15:05]
HUNT: And one piece of this, of course, sir, is the drones that Iran have seem to be more effective than perhaps was anticipated. What do you read into that?
MANSOOR: You know, we should have paid more attention to the war in Ukraine, where Iranian built drones and designed drones are being used to Ukraine. Ukrainians have figured out how to shoot them down and shoot them down cheaply. And that sort of capability needs to be sent to the Middle East. And it should have been done before the conflict began.
But now, we're playing catch up because were going to run out of the very expensive, high tech air defense interceptors that are in the region pretty quickly.
HUNT: David Sanger --
MCHENRY: I was going to say, one key thing that -- just building on what colonel had said, achieving regime change, which is a political goal through the military steps of an air campaign in history, an air campaign alone with no ground troops. I can't find a single example in modern history where that has happened because to control regime change, you basically need to be on the ground. And even then, it frequently doesn't work. Think about our recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
So that's part of the issue of going into this on a feeling. Because while you may come in on a feeling, you need to go out on a plan
THOMPSON: Well, they're talking more about leader change than regime change. You're not hearing any of the democracy talk or nation- building talk that you heard in Iraq. But at the same time, they did use the term regime change.
SANGER: The president said he wanted people to wait in their homes. So, this was done and then rise up against their government. So, we asked him on Sunday, how were they supposed to do this? He said, well, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps should take their arms and basically turn them over to the people. I'm not sure that's likely to happen.
HUNT: Indeed.
All right. David Sanger, Colonel Peter Mansoor, thank you both very much.
The rest of our panel is going to be with us throughout the hour.
Coming up next here in THE ARENA, the Senate now voting on whether to limit the president's war powers in Iran. The House expected to hold its own vote as soon as tomorrow.
Democratic Congressman Pat Ryan is here with us live.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. RAPHAEL WARNOCK (D-GA): Aside from his own ego and hubris, his authoritarian tendencies, Donald Trump has refused to come before the Congress and make his case because he has none.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:22:02]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEN. DAN CAINE, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: To our Gold Star families, to our wounded warriors and their loved ones, we will never forget your sacrifice. Our nation stands with you and we are eternally grateful for your courage, your resiliency your devotion to this mission, and to our nation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: That was the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Dan Caine, honoring the six U.S. service members who were killed in an Iranian drone strike in Kuwait on Sunday. Among those killed, Captain Cody Khork, Sergeant Declan Coady, Sergeant First Class Noah Tietjens, and Sergeant First Class Nicole Amor. Two other slain service members have not yet been publicly identified.
In a statement, the family of 35-year-old Captain Khork said that he was deeply patriotic and had a love for history they say that, quote, "lived with purpose, loved deeply and served honorably," end quote.
The youngest, Sergeant Coady, was just 20 years old. His older sister tells CNN that Declan was an Eagle Scout who enjoyed swimming fencing and video games. She says that upon being informed that her little brother had been killed, she tried calling him, hoping that it had been a horrible dream. She told us, quote, "I wish I had called him one more time and told him I loved him."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEIRA COADY, SISTER OF DECLAN COADY: I just remember all of our conversations about what he was going to do when he came back. I just wish he could know one more time that we all loved him because he was so amazing and kind. He was just like a brother you could have.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: This morning, at a Pentagon briefing, the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, hailed the successes of the operation and suggested that prominent media coverage that highlighted those brave fallen service members was meant to make the president look bad.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HEGSETH: This is what the fake news misses. Weve taken control of Iran's airspace and waterways without boots on the ground. We control their fate, but when a few drones get through or tragic things happen, its front-page news. I get it the press only wants to make the president look bad. But try for once to report the reality.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt later today defended Hegseth's comments.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LEAVITT: The press does only want to make the president look bad. The secretary of defense cares deeply about our warfighters and our men and women in uniform.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. Joining me now, Democratic congressman from New York, Pat Ryan. He served two combat tours in Iraq and is a member of the House Armed Services Committee.
Congressman, thank you very much for being here.
REP. PAT RYAN (D-NY): Thanks for having me.
HUNT: The secretary of defense said that the only reason there's been such coverage of these fallen service members is to make the president look bad. You're someone who I'm sure has lost. You've lost friends.
[16:25:00]
It could have been you. You could have lost your own life. And -- I mean, I'm honestly asking you, what do you think? What do you -- someone in your shoes. What do you want from the press back home? From people who are covering the war, trying to explain it to the American people. What? What should we be saying about these fallen service members?
RYAN: Well, what you just did right there, Kasie. I mean, making them humans, patriots. Hearing from the sister. I mean, that especially knowing how my family felt when I was deployed, I did two Iraq deployments and how hard it is on those families.
And look, the president makes himself look bad with no help, especially on this, when there's just no plan and no humanity from him in the loss. I mean, this morning he said he would rate this operation 1 to 10 as a 15. Why don't you tell that to those family members of those six brave Americans? And having some humility in combat is one of the things I most learned.
And so, it absolutely needs to be front page news in the United States of America, when our most precious resources are assets, our young men and women lose their lives that that is our obligation. And especially because the president and his administration have been so deceptive and confusing, frankly, about what's happening.
HUNT: Is it not also true that, I mean, if the mission is one that's worth dying for it, it's worth elevating those who died to achieve it?
RYAN: I remember writing a letter to my parents right before my first deployment saying, if, God forbid, I didn't come home, I was doing something I believed in. I was proud of my team and my unit and my country, and I'm sure those six felt the same way. And they absolutely -- they're heroes and they should be elevated.
And for the president to somehow personalize that about him shows you -- tells you everything you need to know about how Trump thinks about all things, including war. It's about his own ego rather than the protection of the American people.
HUNT: So, let's talk about what might be next for our troops on the front lines, the ones that are fighting this war. You were at a briefing with the president's national security team yesterday. What did they tell you about whether we can anticipate more American casualties as this goes on?
RYAN: Well, they were -- I was very concerned on a bunch of fronts including the fact that they reiterated over and over, as they have publicly, that they expect potentially significant additional casualties. I was actually lined up to ask a question. They ran out the clock.
And my question was going to be, well, what should the American people expect? What should we expect in our blood? More -- how many more flag draped coffins? And in our treasure and hardworking Americans, taxpayer dollars.
And they couldn't answer a single question about either of those, which just reflects, as we've seen in the shifting rationales from this administration that this seems like just an ill-conceived, open- ended regime change war in the Middle East. And having been on the receiving end of one of those myself in Iraq, it is infuriating that the country I love is repeating history here.
HUNT: What did the administration officials tell you about the casualties that already we have seen? About four of them obviously have been identified. And we've, you know, understand the location there. But there also have been people wounded so far. What do you know about that?
RYAN: Well, I'll say, without going to specific classified information there's -- there were there are additional casualty numbers that were shared with us that are different and larger than what were publicly reported. And that's obviously wrong and concerning.
We were not given a lot of detail about the individuals that have been killed in action. Other than that --
HUNT: Are you saying more than six have been killed in action?
RYAN: No, no. When I say casualties, I mean casualty technically is both killed in action, wounded in action.
HUNT: Okay, I apologize there are no additional kill that we have been briefed on. What is very clear and needs immediate investigation and transparency is the force protection posture of those soldiers from the overhead imagery that I've seen that's now public, makes clear that there was not a plan to account for these one-way attack Shahed drones, which we've known for years, are incredibly effective. We've seen that on the battlefields of Ukraine. We should have expected that and protected these troops better.
HUNT: Did they give you any insight into when they said they're going to be more American casualties? Are we talking about pilots in the sky, ground troops in Iran, troops on bases facing these drone attacks? Do you have any idea what it could mean?
RYAN: That didn't -- I mean, there were dozens of questions that we all were prepared to ask that we're not -- we were not even able to ask. And the ones that we did ask were not answered sufficiently. There's a lot more oversight required.
That's why I think this war powers resolution vote tomorrow is absolutely critical as well. But I think given the chaos that we've seen so far and what appears to be a lack of thinking and planning for second and third order effects, we need to be concerned on all those fronts.
[16:30:03]
And now, we're hearing reporting, which I'm concerned about, of potential special operations forces and Kurdish and other militias on the ground level.
That is not confirmed yet, but is something that would be logical in this situation, which ups the risk vector for more Americans.
HUNT: Yeah, speaking of the war powers vote, there of course is one from Congressman Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie, Republican. Then there is also a group of centrist Democrats have introduced an alternative resolution. They are arguing that the Khanna-Massie resolution would require the withdrawal of U.S. forces.
They say it's unwise to act in a precipitous way and endanger America's security. Where do you come down on this?
RYAN: Well, I think it was unwise to act in a precipitous way, as the president did, with no consultation with the Congress, and what appears to be increasingly not a fully thought through plan and shifting rationales. I think we owe it to those soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, guardians and their families to not keep them in danger without a plan one additional day.
And so, I disagree respectfully with my colleagues and I say that with some hard-earned firsthand experience, and a lot of my fellow veterans today said the same thing and support this resolution to end this now and not let it turn into another forever war in the Middle East.
HUNT: Well, we're grateful for your service, the service of all of your fellow members of Congress who have served in uniform. It's moments like these when your voice has become more important than ever. So, thank you for being on today. Appreciate it. Congressman Pat Ryan.
All right. We are keeping our eye on that War Powers vote in the Senate. We're going to keep you updated on the result.
But first, we're talking midterm politics. Republicans and Democrats do agree on one thing, this might possibly be the year Texas turns blue.
Our new reporting about why top leaders are pleading with the president to endorse a candidate in the Texas Republican Senate runoff, or risk losing the seat.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOHN BARRASSO (R-WY): The Democrats in Texas are motivated. They are motivated to turn out. John Cornyn wins that race for the Republicans.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:36:35]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES TALARICO (D), TEXAS U.S. SENATE CANDIDATE: This is proof that there is something happening in Texas. Tonight -- tonight, the people of our state gave this country a little bit of hope, and a little bit of hope is a dangerous thing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: James Talarico now officially the Democratic nominee for Senate in Texas. He has been saying for months that this is the year that Texas will turn blue. Today, Republicans are warning that he might be right.
To that end, top leaders in the party, including the Senate majority leader, John Thune, are today publicly asking -- I mean, honestly, they're basically begging the president to endorse Senator John Cornyn, fearing that if State Attorney General Ken Paxton wins what is expected to be a pretty ugly runoff, it will risk putting the long held Republican seat at risk.
Just this afternoon, the president now says he will make an endorsement soon, although he doesn't say who.
So why are Republicans expressing so much worry about this 36-year-old state representative? There is, of course, the alternative in the Republican race who's got a lot of problems. But James Talarico is also a unique candidate, and it could be because of moments like this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TALARICO: My faith teaches me to love my neighbor as myself, not just my neighbor who looks like me, not just my neighbor who prays like me. Not just my neighbor who votes like me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. Congressional reporter for "The Washington Post", Marianna Sotomayor, is joining our panel now.
The rest of my panel is back with me.
Alex Thompson, you cover the Democratic field, extensive and Democratic politics extensively. What is your read on James Talarico and why what he brings to the table might -- again, I mean, we have this conversation over and over. I feel like every single cycle we have this conversation and it never quite pans out. Why might this time be different from the perspective?
THOMPSON: Well, on Texas, the reason it might be different is if Ken Paxton is the nominee. He's a toxic nominee in a bad year. Beto O'Rourke in 2018 came within just two or three points of beating Ted Cruz, came up a little bit short, in part because Republicans believe he nationalized the race.
There is the opportunity to turn Texas blue in the right scenario against the right opponent. That's why some Democrats are very excited about Talarico nomination.
HUNT: Congressman, what's your read on this?
MCHENRY: Every Democratic donor in the country should send their money to Talarico. And they should do it today. They need to do it right now.
(LAUGHTER)
ADRIENNE ELROD, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: They're actually already doing it. You don't have to worry.
MCHENRY: Because this is the high water mark -- this is high water mark for Texas Democrats. Do it now, please, I'm begging you. Okay?
It's the most partisan thing I can possibly say. But this is Charlie Brown. The football all over again. Texas is an R plus 12, 13, 14 state. This has become a reliably Republican district.
The Cruz situation with Beto O'Rourke was a very unique situation -- unique situation, just like raising money against Mitch McConnell for the Democrats was a great, worthy and losing task. Raising money against Ted Cruz, likewise.
So I think I'd put that in the same category and what we'll find out is that Talarico sales point here, that he's very moderate and all this stuff will ring very hollow to Texas voters after a few million dollars are spent.
[16:40:03]
ELROD: So, a couple of things. First of all, fortunately, for you, your wishes come true. People across the country and in Texas are giving their money to James Talarico. That's happening in droves. We're seeing that.
Look, I worked in Texas on a number of campaigns, Kasie, and my heart has been broken millions of times because that state has. You know, we've thought we've gotten close as Democrats and we haven't. We haven't elected Democrat, elected a Democratic statewide candidate, statewide governor since, I think Ann Richards. So that goes back to the '90s.
HUNT: Yeah.
ELROD: And of course, Senator Bentsen as well.
But look, this is a different situation, right? We have Trump, whose numbers are extremely low. We have a number of people in Texas who are -- who are independent and who are also what we consider swing voters, especially in this moment, suburban voters, in particular, people are frustrated about the war. They're frustrated about affordability.
And then you look at Talarico. I mean, he's got the it factor. He stands almost at the bully pulpit. He can talk about religion and faith in a way that most other Democrats can't.
I went to college in Texas. I have a lot of friends who have been longtime Trump supporters who actually voted in the Democratic Party primary because they wanted to vote for Talarico.
So, I look at those little anecdotes here and there and I do have some hope and faith that this could actually be --
HUNT: Always careful to declare it. Anecdata, okay?
ELROD: Yeah.
HUNT: You can't take it to the bank.
ELROD: Thank you, clarification.
HUNT: Okay? But it's interesting nonetheless. Marianna, how -- how alarmed are Republican leaders on Capitol Hill about this situation? And how convinced are they that Trump is actually going to put his finger on the scale for John Cornyn?
MARIANNA SOTOMAYOR, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Well, they have been worried for some time, and I think they really did think that Jasmine Crockett would probably win. And if that were the scenario, they would be like, okay, great, Texas is done. I don't care if it's Paxton, I don't care if it's Cornyn, Republicans will win.
As of last night, there were freak outs. That's what I was hearing from some Republicans on the Hill. And, you know, leadership was pretty clear. Like, hey, we need Cornyn to be the guy. We need Trump to put his finger on the scale.
And he's teased that he might do that. And the reason why is because really, Cornyn can beat Talarico. I think there's a lot of Democrats, if you ask them, they're very excited, as you said, and as a political observer, also very excited to just see a horse race in Texas.
HUNT: Again, the assumption is that Cornyn would be Talarico, right?
SOTOMAYOR: Yes.
HUNT: Like we'd all stop talking about it if that happened.
SOTOMAYOR: Exactly.
HUNT: But let's show why -- okay, you know, for anyone who's just tuning into this in the wake of the results. Cornyn's own attack ads against Ken Paxton will show you why it's such a potential problem for Republicans to have Paxton win this nomination. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
AD NARRATOR: Crooked Ken Paxton cheated on his wife. She's divorcing him on biblical grounds. So, now, Paxton's wrecking another home, sleeping around with a married mother of seven. Think of the Paxton dirty deeds we don't know about yet.
The wife cheater and fraud, or the Texas workhorse.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Now, of course, we should note that CNN has not independently verified those claims but, Congressman --
MCHENRY: Heck to the person who has to verify it. But having said that, you saw the attack ad. The bag against Paxton is so extensive that it's very difficult to have just one theme against him. He is such a grab bag of criminality. It's -- it is absurd, even for our crazy politics.
Yet he's still got 40 percent in a Republican primary. Wesley Hunt was a big disappointment of the night by many political observers on Capitol Hill. Many friends saw it as a disappointment and yet, Cornyn who we just talked about would, would put this race away outperformed expectations that was not where we thought this race would be as early as a month ago, and he was -- he came in first in the primary.
Still a dog fight, and without Trump weighing in, it's going to be a very, very nasty runoff for the Senate Republican nomination.
THOMPSON: Cornyn had to spend a lot more money even to get there, and he only outperformed Paxton by a point. And there's a reason why Republican leaders are seizing on the Talarico win today. Its because they are using the idea that you could lose Texas to try to sway Trump, to finally back Cornyn.
The thing -- the fact is that Trump has not backed Cornyn in part because Paxton was the lead state attorney general fighting the 2020 election results. And that is the key to all of this. As we can hear, when Trump talks often, the 2020 election is his key grievance, and that's why he has not endorsed this race.
ELROD: Well, can I also say, Kasie -- I mean, you mentioned that Cornyn has spent a lot of his own money in this race, but so has the National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee, and they are spending money in Texas to defend an incumbent that Donald Trump won't endorse. And they're not spending that money in other places. So, it's a dangerous situation.
HUNT: I mean --
MCHENRY: It's March. We got eight months.
HUNT: If Trump endorses Paxton for the reasons that Alex says, how much money does the NRSC have to spend defending the Texas seat?
[16:45:00]
MCHENRY: I think -- I think. It's --
ELROD: I agree.
MCHENRY: Well, yes, my prediction. Your prediction is it should be a Republican sink, right? We should go sink a bunch of money into it.
Look, I do welcome Democrats playing hard in Texas. It's one of the most expensive places on the planet to go win an election. So come on in. The water's fine. It's a complicated Senate map, but favorable to Republicans. In the House map is also favorable to Republicans, but for the environment, which is overwhelming. What are mostly Republican districts, if they get back to a presidential norm of the last presidential election.
SOTOMAYOR: Can I add to that point? I mean, redistricting was a major gamble for Republicans. And if we saw no primary nights or different than general election nights, but something to look past, even the runoff. I mean, Democratic turnout was insane. Usually, Republican turnout in Texas is higher than Democrat. That was the opposite last night. Also, the bet that the White House was making and saying, oh my God,
Latino voters, we won them in 2024. They're going to come out in droves the same way in the midterms. It's not going to happen.
I mean, we saw those numbers last night and if anything, it's more that that base is depressed. They're not really turning out in the same numbers. And they did turn out slightly more for Democrats.
HUNT: Really interesting.
All right. Marianna Sotomayor, thank you for joining our panel. Come back soon.
All right. The rest of our panel, standby.
Coming up next here in THE ARENA, the president gives himself a grade when it comes to the war effort in Iran. We'll tell you how he thinks it's going.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:50:46]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We're doing very well on the war front, to put it mildly, I would say. Somebody said on a scale of 10, where would you rate it? I said, about a 15.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Fifteen out of 10. President Trump there giving his assessment of U.S. military operations in Iran as the war enters its fifth day. The presidents rosy take sounding quite different from the thousands of Americans who have been stranded in the region now for days. Today, the White House is defending the lack of an explicit warning to U.S. citizens to leave parts of the Middle East before the start of the war with Iran.
The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, arguing that Americans had ignored travel advisories from the State Department.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LEAVITT: There was many signs put out by the State Department, and I wish that everyone in this room would report on them. The secretary of state issued level four travel advisories dating back to January for many of these countries in the region.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: It's worth noting here only three countries had the highest travel advisory before the military operations started. It wasn't until Monday, days after the strikes began, that the State Department called on U.S. citizens to leave. More than a dozen countries in the region. Our panel is back. We're also joined by CNN anchor and chief national
security analyst, Jim Sciutto.
Jim, it is worth noting the original State Department hotline message said, do not rely on the U.S. government for assisted departure or evacuation. Now, they quickly updated that and said, the U.S. is committed to helping U.S. citizens who want to leave.
What changed?
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Listen, I mean, they're putting the onus on the many thousands, tens of thousands of Americans who live in the region, not acknowledging the fact that four of the countries weren't on that list of advisories the UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Israel. So, they had no warning.
The other folks living out there had a few days warning, right? Which is if you're living in that part of the world, it's not easy to move your family or your job out of a country very quickly, particularly when many other folks want to do that.
Now the options are just frankly, not great. I heard Mike Huckabee talking the other day for folks who want to leave Israel, you know, to take a bus to Egypt, right? And this is, you know, I've been there many times. You can do that, but it's not the easiest way to get out of the country.
Listen, the administration was in a bind, right? Because you don't want to advertise to the world that you're about to carry out military action on Iran. But you might acknowledge that at this point, rather than saying that anybody who didn't leave, it's their fault, right?
It's -- there are many people who live there. Your roots are deep. You got jobs, you got kids in school, all that kind of stuff. It's hard to just pack up and move.
And the other thing I would just say is there are dozens of travel advisories that come out all the time. I've lived in that part of the world. It's hard to keep track of them. If you -- if you moved every time a level was elevated, you'd be moving every other week, right? It's just -- it's hard to keep up.
THOMPSON: It doesn't take a political savant to tell you that tough -- like "tough luck. You're on your own" is not the winning political message.
MCHENRY: Yeah, but I -- respectfully, we had the largest armada in the Middle East we've ever had, more air power in one part of the world we've had in generations. There were signs.
HUNT: If you were paying attention here in Washington, I mean, this felt pretty inevitable for weeks.
MCHENRY: Yes, for weeks. But also, then we're hearing the stories and I wish the administration would come out with a throughline on all this stuff where they knew of a gathering, they took action and decapitated the government, which is a great societal global good. That is enough of a statement to say you don't have to justify it with other pieces of information. But when you knew they all gathered together at breakfast and you can eliminate them with one shot, that's a very big thing.
ELROD: Can I also just say that that president Trump had the State of the Union, what, about 10 days ago? And he's dedicated three minutes of 100 and something minutes to talking about this. He could have, at least to Jim's point. You don't want to, like, let the entire world know what you're about to do militarily. But he could have at least told the American people and given them a story as to why, if military action does take place, it's warranted.
SCIUTTO: Well, the reason its urgent as well is because some of those missiles and drones are getting through the air defenses. So, if you're living in one of those cities and it hits a major hotel, that could have been your apartment where you and your kids live. So, it's a reasonable -- it's reasonable for folks out there to be somewhat upset that they didn't have fair warning.
[16:55:01]
And I get it. The armada was there. But as you know, there was great public debate as to how big the military action was. There was not a lot of advertisement about a weeks-long, extended, open ended war, right? Which we would -- would be a different calculation for you and me or me if we were living there at the time as to whether we judged it was time to, you know, pack up the bags and go.
THOMPSON: Yeah. At the same time there was the armada. There were also peace talks happening at the exact same time.
HUNT: Indeed. All right.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HUNT: All right. Thanks to my panel.
Jim, it's lovely to have you through THE ARENA. Thank you for being here.
Jake Tapper is standing by for "THE LEAD".
Hi, Jake.
