Return to Transcripts main page
CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
Trump Fires Bondi After Tumultuous Tenure As Atty. General; Trump: "We're Fighting Wars. We Can't Take Care Of Day Care"; Bodycam Video Shows Moment Tiger Woods Is Arrested. Bodycam Video Shows Moment Tiger Woods Is Arrested; Artemis II Launches Into Space On Historic Moon Mission; Meryl Streep & Anna Wintour ... Related. Aired 12-1p ET
Aired April 04, 2026 - 12:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ADRIEN BRODY, ACTOR, "THE FEAR OF 13": -- is incredible. And the words were so moving that they pulled me out of my own apprehension of doing theater for many years.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[12:00:12]
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN ANCHOR: The play is on Broadway right now and you can tune in to this show next week for more of that conversation.
And that is all we have time for. Don't forget, you can find all of our shows online as podcasts at CNN.com/audio and on all other major platforms. I'm Christiane Amanpour in New York. Thank you for watching and I'll see you again next week.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Hi, everyone. Welcome to The Arena Saturday. Kasie Hunt is off. I'm Pamela Brown.
So can anyone make Donald Trump happy? That's the question we're asking after Pam Bondi's firing as Attorney General this week shows that no one in the President's cabinet is safe, even those who seem to do everything that he asks. Under Bondi, the Justice Department aggressively investigated or prosecuted a long list of the President's perceived enemies. You see it right here on your screen.
And she made a big show of the Epstein files aimed right at the President's MAGA base. But it wasn't enough. So now we wonder who will follow Bondi as the nation's next top prosecutor? How long will they last? How will they be different? And can they even be confirmed?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. THOM TILLIS (R), NORTH CAROLINA: The threshold for somebody following Pam Bondi ends the moment I hear they said one thing that excused the events of January the 6th. I've been very clear on that. So I hope whoever they have in mind to follow General Bondi was very clear eyed on my position on January the 6th.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: My panelists here in The Arena, CNN Political Analyst and White House Correspondent for the Associated Press, Seung Min Kim, CNN Legal Analyst and Former Federal Prosecutor Elliot Williams, former White House Communications Director in the Biden administration, and CNN Political Commentator, along with Republican Strategist Melik Abdul. Your name was left out, Kate Bedingfield.
ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Exactly.
MELIK ABDUL, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: That's not me. I'm not --
BROWN: That was not intentional. Whoever wrote the script.
WILLIAMS: I mean, the resemblance isn't panic.
ABDUL: Yes.
BROWN: Yes.
ABDUL: That's not April Fools.
BROWN: Yes, exactly. OK, well, then I'm going to start with you, Kate.
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Great.
BROWN: And let's watch this moment from Bondi's confirmation hearing last year.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAM BONDI, ATTORNEY GENERAL: I will not politicize that office. I will not target people simply because of their political affiliation. Justice will be administered even handedly throughout this country.
No one will be prosecuted, investigated because they are a political opponent. There will never be an enemies list within the Department of Justice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: So she said there would never be an enemies list. But when you look at the cases DOJ has pursued, it sure looks like a list of people who the President views as his enemies. Many of these cases are now in the hands of acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. He was asked about that this week. Let's watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JESSE WATTERS, FOX NEWS HOST: The President reportedly probably obviously frustrated that the cases against Tish and Schiff and Brennan and Comey not really going anywhere. Are you the guy that's going to be able to get that done? TODD BLANCHE, ACTING ATTORNEY GENERAL: Look, I think the President is frustrated. Everybody is frustrated because what we saw happen for the past four years is unforgivable and can never happen again. And so, certainly, I don't mind the frustration.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: So, Kate, what might Blanche or the next AG do differently on these cases? Do you see that happening?
BEDINGFIELD: I think we have every reason to expect that Todd Blanche is going to do everything in his power to pursue Trump's retributive cases. I mean, I think obviously -- and Elliot can speak to this -- the law will confine him in some ways. But I think we should expect that he's going to take everything that Donald Trump wants to see done in this position, which Trump has been very clear.
He wants his AG to be a hard charging tool of political retribution. And I think we're going to expect that -- I think we should expect that Todd Blanche is going to do that. And I think we shouldn't lose sight of the fact, I mean, in all of the discussion of Bondi being let go and kind of how Trump operates.
And I think we should lose sight of the fact that she is being let go for essentially not using the Department of Justice as a weapon in the way that Donald Trump wants it to be used.
BROWN: Well, she --
BEDINGFIELD: And that is not that is not a normal or I would say acceptable thing.
BROWN: Right. I mean, our reporting is that she didn't go after his perceived perceived enemies hard enough. But, I mean, the fact is she tried to prosecute, but it was the judges and juries --
WILLIAMS: Yes.
BROWN: -- who wouldn't let them go forward, right?
WILLIAMS: I think the most important thing Kate had said there is that the law in some ways can find or can finds the attorney general certainly can find Pam Bondi here. A point I would note is that President Trump has only been President for just a little over five years between his two terms. And 10 different people have served in the role of attorney general or acting attorney general in some way.
[12:05:07]
At a certain point, we have to acknowledge that the demands that the President puts on these people, both eminently reasonable people and a lot of people who are not reasonable and should not have been in the role in the first place. But the position he puts them in of having to go after demanding that he go after opponents, gut the Justice Department, start firing public servants who really have no business being fired, puts the attorney general in an awful position and can never make the President happy.
We are going to be here again, whether it's in a few months or a few years or whatever else, with another attorney general who fails to serve Donald Trump because of what he puts -- how he envisions that position.
BROWN: Do you think that's true, Melik?
ABDUL: I think it's a lot of truth there. And what we're dealing with Donald Trump here, it is not -- and I didn't realize it was so many, 10 or so -- it is not a competence issue at play. But you had -- who was that? Jeff Sessions --
WILLIAMS: Jeff Sessions (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Bill Barr.
ABDUL: AG Barr, like, it wasn't --
WILLIAMS: Pam Bondi.
ABDUL: Pam Bondi.
WILLIAMS: Came in as a major prosecutor.
ABDUL: Extremely popular governor, effective -- I mean, sorry, AG of Florida. So it isn't a competence issue. It really is what you said, them being able to live up to the expectations of Donald Trump. And it's really not just Donald Trump, it is the people around Donald Trump also who feel as if that people like Pam Bondi and other people in the administration aren't doing enough to retaliate, if you will, against his political enemies.
WILLIAMS: Yes. And let me say one more thing. You know, it's -- look, the President is entitled to put the people around him that he wants to have around him. He's entitled to have conservatives, a conservative cabinet, a conservative attorney general. But it is at the point at which serious people cannot take that job.
People who wish to work as attorneys or in serious, important roles in the private sector that require a law license can't take that job. He's putting them in the position of literally having to jeopardize their law license for the kinds of actions that he's wanting them to take. It is just awful.
BEDINGFIELD: Well, and there's -- and just quickly, there's I think what you said about the people around him is really interesting. It reminded me that, you know, when Susie Wiles gave that really expansive interview to Vanity Fair --
ABDUL: That was purposeful.
BEDINGFIELD: -- she said -- and she said -- I mean, if you read that piece, she does not think that the sole focus on retribution is good for him politically. It was interesting to see her say that --
BROWN: Yes.
BEDINGFIELD: -- that was one of the kind of more honest things. And one of the more interesting to me political takeaways from that conversation, you know, that there are political ramifications when people feel like you aren't focused on them and you're focused on your own, you know, grinding your own axes. And so I thought that was interesting too.
BROWN: Yes. And thinking over all of this, you know, you have the perceived political enemies, you have the Epstein situation. Obviously, you had Susie Wiles saying that she whiffed on that. And now Todd Blanche was asked about it on Fox. And here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BLANCHE: And so I think that to the extent that the Epstein files was a part of the past year of this Justice Department, it will should not be a part of anything going forward. It's undisputable that nobody talked about the Epstein files for four years during Biden, four years. And so when President Trump said, let's release the Epstein files and the law was passed that allowed us to legally do it, we did it.
WATTERS: OK. I'm not sure you totally get what people feel about that, but I want to move on.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SEUNG MIN KIM, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: See, that level of skepticism --
ABDUL: Wow.
BROWN: Jesse Watters of all people, yes.
KIM: -- is quite something because he's right, like the Epstein files and the politics surrounding them and the questions that we have surrounding the files are not going away. I mean, there are investigations continuing on Capitol Hill into Jeffrey Epstein. Pam Bondi, even though she may not be attorney general at this point, she's still scheduled to show up before the committees and testify.
And I would point out that Todd Blanche had actually taken a lot of the front facing roles over the last several months as it related to the Epstein files. He was the one who was writing the formal letters to Capitol Hill when they were laying out the disclosures. He obviously went on television a lot to defend what the Justice Department had done.
So this is going to be part of his dilemma, too. And it has been already about what, you know, the ongoing fallout, if you will, for the President and for the administration.
ABDUL: And can I just say something real quickly about the Epstein files and to push back a bit on Blanche here? It's not -- yes, most people weren't talking about the Epstein file, but who the person who was talking about the Epstein files is Dan Bongino. It wasn't Pam Bondi even, Dan Bongino built a cult following on the issue of the Epstein files.
Yes, Donald Trump talked about it at different points. But it was Dan Bongino who kept pushing the conspiracy theories. And in many ways, many people feel as if he brought this to Donald Trump's door. And now Pam Bondi is the one --
WILLIAMS: Real quick, real quick. Number one, Pam Bondi is Dan Bongino's boss. And number two, when you walk out --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Was, was her boss.
WILLIAMS: Was her boss.
ABDUL: Yes. No, that was bogle (ph).
WILLIAMS: And people binders that say --
ABDUL: Yes.
WILLIAMS: -- these are the Epstein files and they're on my desk, you've screwed up. And this is on her. She owns it. She failed. She failed the President. The President has failed us in this area. And here we are.
BROWN: All right. On that note, coming up in The Arena, pictures that you will not want to miss. We're going to show you the first images of planet Earth taken from the astronauts aboard the Artemis II mission to the moon.
[12:10:07]
But first, what the White House is now saying about a comment the President made that's become our quote of the week.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The United States can't take care of day care. That has to be up to a state. We can't take care of day care.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[12:15:10]
TRUMP: We have to take care of one thing, military protection. We have to guard the country. But all these little things, all these little scams that have taken place of, you have to let states take care of them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: Well, President Trump at the White House on Wednesday speaking at an Easter week lunch, he spoke for more than an hour about both the Easter holiday and a range of other issues, including the war in Iran. The White House is fighting an uphill battle trying to sell the war to the American public.
Our latest CNN poll released this week finds growing disapproval with 66 percent of Americans opposing the U.S. military operation against Iran. And those numbers are coming as the White House weighs asking Congress for another $200 billion for the war, which brings us to our quote of the week, the President's comments on what the country should and should not be spending money on.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I actually said to them, I said to Russell, don't send any money for day care because the United States can't take care of day care. That has to be up to a state.
We can't take care of day care. We're a big country. We have 50 states. We have all these other people. We're fighting wars. We can't take care of day care.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: All right, Melik, thoughts as the Republican?
ABDUL: (INAUDIBLE).
BROWN: Well, you are the Republican here.
ABDUL: Yes. You know, I'm a contortionist, like in my part time and I tried to twist myself into a pretzel to try to figure out exactly how to get my way out of this. But look, this is one of those sort of tone deaf. I've heard the White House's response to this explaining when you're trying -- when you get to the point that you're trying to explain the explanation, you get into a real problem here.
Donald Trump -- this is similar to what he's done and it's -- I don't know what this is. I don't know if it's just the wealth thing where he really is out of touch, more out of touch than we realize. But when you talk about the economy, you know, saying that people's economic anxiety, it's a hoax and all of these type of things, what this looks at, what this looks like as you head into the midterm cycle where many people are upset for various reasons, whether it's the economy, the Epstein files, in the Iran war, any number of things.
Donald Trump saying these type of things, it's enough to make some people not necessarily MAGA, but it's enough to say, you know what, I don't even know if I want to go to the polls. They don't have to vote Democrat. They just don't have to come up in the same numbers that they did in 2024 supporting Donald Trump. And the more that he says those type of things, people will just kind of throw up their hands and say, well, why should I go vote?
BROWN: And I wonder, Kate, your perspective on this, just how insular the White House can be and how you really can be in a bubble and perhaps out of touch with the everyday person. BEDINGFIELD: And you can and you have to -- when you're in the White House, you have to really work hard to make sure that you're not losing touch -- to this, this to me is less about Trump losing touch and more about Trump just always saying -- stating his priorities. He is focused on the war. He believes the war is righteous. He is struggling to sell it in a major way.
But he doesn't believe that a focus on day care or Medicaid, by the way, or Medicare, which he also mentioned in this litany, is important. So he's -- he is giving -- he's giving the American people a very clear sense of his priorities. And I think what's interesting to me about it. -- well, there are many things about it that are interesting, but one is that his -- one of his biggest political vulnerabilities right now is that people feel they elected him to write the economy.
And he hasn't done that. And he has instead been focused on a whole range of things that they don't feel are pertinent to their lives now including this Iran war, a war of choice, by the way, that he, you know, he took this action. So, you know, laying out of it in an incredibly crystal clear language like this, I'm focused on this war, I don't think it's my responsibility to help you pay for day care, that's a pretty devastating frame for Democrats to drive into the midterms.
BROWN: Well, and it was followed up by this -- the White House budget proposal, which --
KIM: Right, right.
BROWN: -- included $1 trillion -- asking Congress for $1 trillion. And we should note often these are wish lists from the White House. They don't get approval from Congress, but it does say a lot about the priorities.
KIM: Right, right. And setting aside the budget proposal that was sent earlier this week, the White House is going to ask for real dollars when it comes to funding the Iran war. We know at least about $200 billion set aside for the Pentagon. And that doesn't count the emergency spending requests from, for example, the State Department or intelligence agencies.
But I do think the fact that the White House was very quick to clarify his comments, you know, they are saying in the context of the speech, he was talking more about fraud issues as it relates to the states. The fact that they felt the need to do that when this was supposed to be a private conversation. We should note that this was accidentally uploaded to their YouTube account and then taken down.
We know this wasn't really for public consumption. They know that that interpretation of what he said could really be problematic.
BROWN: And I just want to read the direct quote from Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary at the White House. She said, "President Trump was talking about the importance of stopping the scams and rooting out the billions of dollars in fraud in these vital programs that elected Democrat officials that have allowed to happen."
[12:20:09]
So that is -- Elliot, you seem very skeptical --
WILLIAMS: No, no, no, no, no. I'm not skeptical in that -- maybe that's --
BROWN: Oh OK.
WILLIAMS: Why I sort of grimaced is, if your answer is on Twitter and that most Americans are not on, what people saw was the President saying, I don't care about your day care. That's what people heard and perceived. And to sort of echo some of the points that have been raised here, you know, the President's two great strengths for most of 2025 were immigration and the economy.
That's why in many regards he was elected. That's what people thought he was coming in to fix. Both of those -- his numbers are not that good on at the time when the nation is at war and gas prices are high. It is a very difficult position the President is in right now. And like Melik had said, if you're explaining, you're losing. And they're there trying to explain.
BROWN: And of course, as you noted, Democrats were seizing on this. JB Pritzker, the governor of Illinois, retweeted the comments saying Donald Trump doesn't care about you. And let's keep in mind Donald Trump's campaign explicitly, you know, he said he didn't want to spend money on foreign wars. Let's take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We are never going back to a party that wants to give unlimited money to fight foreign wars that are endless wars, that are stupid wars. But at the same time, demands that we cut veterans benefits and retirement benefits at home.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: So how do you explain that to midterm voters, Melik?
ABDUL: I think it's one of the -- we all know that in campaigns, people promise a lot of things. And I think what the problem that the administration has had is one of those you over promise and then you end up under delivering. And in a midterm cycle, and that's what the motivation, because the motivation will be on the ballot this time around.
Democrats at this point seem to be more motivated. And with the number of things that Donald Trump continues to do, and people talk about the MAGA, whether or not there's a split in MAGA, it's not so much as whether or not there's a split in MAGA. Even if you shave off a couple of percentage points of the coalition that supported Donald Trump in 2024, if they say we're going to stay at home, it's going to be a problem.
WILLIAMS: Yes.
ABDUL: And that is something that, you know, the White House is focused on that. But I'm really hearing that in conversations with members on the Hill.
WILLIAMS: Yes. And to add to that a little bit, you know, it's part of what created Donald Trump as a candidate. This is going back to even before 2015, was this idea that America was getting locked down --
ABDUL: Yes.
WILLIAMS: -- in these forever wars that people didn't --
ABDUL: The Bushes.
WILLIAMS: The Bushes, no.
ABDUL: Yes.
WILLIAMS: But I think the --
BEDINGFIELD: Neocons.
WILLIAMS: -- rejection of neoconservatism --
BEDINGFIELD: Yes.
WILLIAMS: -- was largely what gave sort of the rise of MAGA and the rise of Donald Trump and --
ABDUL: Yes.
WILLIAMS: -- even the Tea Party to some extent. And so it's fascinating now to see what comes next if some of those folks are just philosophically sour on --
ABDUL: And we're seeing that. We're seeing that.
BROWN: Broadly, the polls show it's unpopular. But, I mean, the MAGA base seems to still be --
ABDUL: Right.
BROWN: -- with Trump on this. I mean, you have some outspoken conservative voices, right?
ABDUL: Yes. But people read MAGA wrong. So, yes, there is absolutely a constituency that supports Donald Trump. That is MAGA. I would probably say that's about a third of the 77 million who supported Donald Trump. Because when you look at the numbers on the Iran war, MAGA supports it at 90 percent. I think the latest number from CNN, just your average Republican, that number is about 77 percent.
That's actually a pretty significant gap between MAGA and the rest of the Republican Party. And that's what we have to be concerned about. And I think oftentimes, and it happens on both sides, but definitely here, they're just doing a lot -- giving a lot of red meat to MAGA that the 77 million actually aren't so supportive of.
BROWN: All right. Thank you all.
Coming up in The Arena, we're going to be going back to the future with the Artemis II moon mission. But first, the new details on the arrest of golfer Tiger Woods, including the new police body cam video at the time of the incident.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Place them behind your back. There you go. So at this time, I do believe your normal faculties are impaired, OK? And you're under that unknown substance, OK? So at this time, you're under arrest for DUI. Yes, sir.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you going to chase my car? (INAUDIBLE) place it behind your back. Can you place them behind your back? There you go. So at this time, I do believe your normal faculties are impaired, OK? And you're under the unknown substance, OK? So at this time, you're under arrest for DUI. Yes, sir.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[12:29:09]
BROWN: So this week we saw the police body camera footage of the recent arrest of Tiger Woods. Officials say the golfer struck a trailer while driving north on March 27th, causing his SUV to flip on its side. He has been charged with driving under the influence, property damage, and refusal to submit to a lawful urine test. Woods has pleaded not guilty.
This was the moment officers questioned him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) today?
TIGER WOODS, PROFESSIONAL GOLFER: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How much (INAUDIBLE) today? Do you take any medication?
WOODS: I think yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE).
WOODS: (INAUDIBLE), ibuprofen and (INAUDIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you take all of them today? WOODS: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes? At what time? In the morning?
WOODS: In the morning.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How many milligrams for each?
WOODS: No, but ibuprofen, 8.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: According to the affidavit, Woods made multiple errors during his failed sobriety exercises, such as starting before being instructed to do so, and not counting steps correctly.
Officers also searched Woods' pockets, finding cash, headphones, and two pills they placed in evidence. At another point, we see Woods walking along the road after the crash, appearing to get off the phone with, who he says, was President Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Woods, I just keep you down here with us, please.
TIGER WOODS, PROFESSIONAL GOLFER: Thank you so much. All right. You got it. Bye. Thank you. Bye. Say again?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just keep you down here with us, please.
WOODS: Yes. I was just talking to the president.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: All right. My panel is back. We actually reached -- asked the White House about that.
SEUNG MIN KIM, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: You know, like, the President and Tiger Woods do have a relationship, and I believe the President expressed sympathy for him after this incident happened. You know, I would like to know more about that conversation if it did occur. I mean, we all know the President is very accessible by his own personal phone. But this is -- it's a tough moment to watch, for sure.
BROWN: It is.
KIM: It is clearly, something is going on.
BROWN: It's really sad.
KIM: Right.
BROWN: You know, he's had a rough few years, but then you want to see him come back and really win in the end. And --
MALIK ABDUL, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: The guy has had a storied career.
BROWN: Yes.
ABDUL: It seems as if -- and I can imagine with a divorce, because it seems as if ever since, was it Elin? I think that was his wife's name.
BROWN: Right.
ABDUL: Elin. Ever since the divorce, it just seems as if he's kind of spiraled. And it's so unfortunate. And at this point, and many people have said it, you know, first of all, get you a driver. And I understand, you know, people want to drive their own cars, but definitely get yourself a driver. But more importantly, and this is something that Donald Trump referenced himself. Get some help.
BROWN: Yes. And he had said in his statement, Tiger woods, that he was seeking help. We should also note that he pleaded not guilty. He's asking for a jury trial. And I'm wondering what you think, Elliot, about the legalities here and how much trouble woods could really be in.
ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, certainly trouble, probation, and maybe jail time, but perhaps not. Now here's -- and the law there does allow for some jail time. Hard to say what would happen. Now, if you're Tiger Woods' lawyers, you actually have a bit of a defense here because, number one, as we saw in the video, he acknowledges that he's injured, he has injuries. Number two, they don't take a breathalyzer of him, so there's no, you know, they've established there's not alcohol in his body.
He doesn't take a urine test. So what Tiger Woods' attorneys can go into court and say is, you know, ladies and gentlemen, look, let's be clear, all we know is that a bunch of officers think they saw Tiger Woods impaired, but there isn't a toxicology report of what's in his body. Again --
BROWN: But him refusing that urine test, I mean, couldn't --
WILLIAMS: Yes, and that's the crime. That's ultimately what he's charged with.
BROWN: Right.
WILLIAMS: Now, again, all you're doing as a defense attorney is attempting to poke holes in the case, not necessarily say that there aren't substances in Tiger Woods' body or that he's not struggling or grappling.
BROWN: Right.
WILLIAMS: I just think they have to be very careful here with all the admissions they make about his troubles -- struggles he's going through with substances and so on because you could be admitting something that could come up in court and that could be seen as an admission of being high or drunk. BROWN: Right. But how much will his history here, his troubled past, I think, was it 2017 when he pleaded guilty to driving under the influence?
WILLIAMS: Absolutely. That could come in certainly for sentencing if he is convicted because you could establish that there's a pattern of that kind of behavior, but also could come in at court because it's a prior bad act. It's a similar act to this one. And so it's going to be a lot of legal fighting back and forth about the kinds of things about his history that can come in. But it's not all lost for him.
We've seen it play out on camera. But again, there is a defense here. It's above all else, set aside the legality, and I think we're all in agreement here. This is a troubled individual who I think more than anything else needs help. Now that help may come in prison, but he still needs help, whatever it is.
BROWN: Right. And I think a lot of us might be watching to see how this will play out given the relationship he has with President Trump. He can't get a part in these. These are state charges.
Yes.
BROWN: But it's unusual to have the president comment on your own case.
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It is. It is. And I would hope that the independence of our justice system would mean that the President's relationship with him one way or the other doesn't play out in terms of how the case is adjudicated. But, you know, I guess we'll see. A court of public opinion matters tremendously, too, here in terms of what his actual, what his future looks like. And I think, as we've all said, I mean, I think it's a sad moment. I think people want to root for him.
He's a great American icon. I mean, you know, he has been a figure that people even, you know, I'm not a golfer. My husband is. But, you know, I love, we grew up with him. And we were rooting for him. And he's Tiger. And, you know, we'd watch the Masters. And so, you know, I think, I think we're all just rooting for him.
[12:35:02]
BROWN: Yes. Melik, final words to you.
ABDUL: No, I think, and even with the relationship with Donald Trump, I'm not sure they're -- even if he were talking to Donald Trump, clearly it was a flex because you don't have to mention that he was the President.
BROWN: I was just talking casual.
BEDINGFIELD: We don't know which president he was --
ABDUL: Well, that is true.
BEDINGFIELD: Could be, like, president of his homeowner's association, you know?
BROWN: Fair point. Fair point. And don't be here for the White House. Fair point. All right. Thank you all so much.
And still ahead here in The Arena, history in the making as America returns to the moon after more than 50 years. Ahead, what this spectacular mission means for a nation looking to the stars.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: First and foremost, we all wanted to give a shout out to our families first because we are pretty far from Earth and we have not gotten to say hi to them yet.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[12:40:42]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Four, three, two, one, booster ignition. And liftoff. The crew of Artemis II now bound for the Moon. Humanity's next great voyage begins.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: Can -- never watch that enough. Chills every time. This week, four astronauts on NASA's Artemis II lunar mission took a historic step in space exploration. They will become the first astronauts to return to the vicinity of the Moon since the end of the Apollo program over 50 years ago. And if all goes to plan, this 10-day Moon mission could take them further from Earth than any human has ever gone. And lay the groundwork for future missions to land astronauts on the Moon.
The crew releasing these stunning first photos of Earth from aboard the capsule and sharing this message from thousands and thousands of miles up above.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VICTOR GLOVER, NASA PILOT: The first thing I would say is trust us, you look amazing. You look beautiful. And from up here, you also look like one thing. You know, Homosapiens is all of us. No matter where you're from or, you know, what you look like, we're all one people. We call amazing things that humans do moonshots for a reason. Because this brought us together and showed us what we can do when we put, not just putting our differences aside, when we bring our differences together and use all the strengths to accomplish something great.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: I love that message. What a great message, right? I mean, this is such a historic mission in so many ways. WILLIAMS: Yes, and it's fascinating whenever you hear astronauts and including these folks talk, they sort of hit two big points when they look down at Earth. And one of them is look at what we can accomplish when we work together. And it feels like a little bit of kumbaya and so on. But no, it is true. We, humanity, have on several, the United States, have put people on the Moon and are seeking to do so again. And that's a powerful and beautiful thing.
The other one, we haven't heard them say this yet. I actually heard someone on this network making this very point, an astronaut, saying that you look down at Earth and almost think about the smallness of humanity. Like we fight about --
BROWN: Like little ants running around on this Earth all fighting in our tribes. And we think, gosh, we're --
WILLIAMS: The things that we regard as so consequential and meaningful and powerful are ultimately meaningless in this big, vast universe, right? And --
ABDUL: And to consist of what he said, Dr. Glover, because he was interviewed, he was asked a question about what does it mean to be one of the first black, you know, astronauts in space? And the point that he made is really consistent with what he said there, is that this isn't a black story. This isn't just an American story. It's a human story.
And when you look at that picture right there, the picture of the Earth, like, you do, you realize how, like, small, like, human life is, but that we're all into this together. And I hope that people take moments like this to celebrate American ingenuity, to celebrate humanity, that we can get out of this kind of toxic stuff that we're always in.
BEDINGFIELD: Another thing that I think is so cool about this is astronauts, in so many ways, they're this amazing blend of both nostalgia and looking to the future and innovation. So it's like this incredible -- I think that's part of why it's so uniting for people, because it does kind of tie you to, you know, the great advancements of the United States in the 60s and 70s and the space race and this kind of, like, beautiful nostalgia for what we were able to accomplish. But, of course, they're also, you know, they're up there quite literally taking science into the next generation. So I think it's very -- I think it's cool, and I think that's part of what's so powerful about it.
BROWN: Yes.
WILLIAMS: And just think about how mundane -- something that we think of as so mundane, the 4K camera in this phone, those are the first truly high-definition photographs taken of the Earth since, I think, the 1970s. Well, pardon me, in the 1970s, it was a film, literally, it was a 35-millimeter film.
BROWN: Right. Yes. And here it is. Imagine just being up here and looking back at Earth. WILLIAMS: It's high-def, it's 4K. That didn't exist before, and it's just something that we think of the evolutions in these four or five decades since then that are so basic to us today but are now such profound things that are happening in outer space.
BROWN: And I always think, like, Earth looks so big there, but we're one speck of one galaxy of billions of galaxies. I could go on and on about this, but I do want to get to also, you know, the realities of this mission. It's an expensive endeavor. "Politico" interviewed NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman about that cost, and this is what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JARED ISAACMAN, NASA CHIEF ADMINISTRATOR: And when Neil and Buzz walked on the Moon and then came back to Earth, it says, wow, I wonder what else America is capable of doing. No, I don't think we should just spend for the sake of spending, but when you do these big, bold endeavors, it has the opportunity to change the world. There is good economic return from it. There is good scientific return as well.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[12:45:16]
BROWN: What do you think, Melik? Is there enough momentum behind this mission to quell any criticisms about the costs?
ABDUL: I think it is, because as everybody is saying, you know, this is one of those uniting moments. Many people, you know, I remember, I'm probably aging myself a bit here, that what was at the Space Shuttle Challenger, like this was back in the 80s and stuff. You know, we -- at this -- the technological advancements that we've had over the years and the fact that America, the United States is actually leading this, I think this is just a good moment.
Politics is going to always get in the way of everything, unfortunately, but from what I've heard, and you've seen so many people across the board waiting for the moment of the actual liftoff. This is something that we're all participating in together, and that's why I think that even on the matter of cost, I'm hoping that people would be willing to just say, here, good job.
BROWN: How much has President Trump been invested in this?
KIM: The White House told us that he was definitely very much attuned to what was happening with the launch. Obviously, he wasn't there, but he had his NASA administrator there, and Mr. Isaacman was talking about how, you know, there was a brief intermission between the last time we went to the Moon, but this is going to be a much more regular thing. But, I mean, going back to our point about how this could just be such a uniting, inspirational moment.
Look, the President spoke with the Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney, and while obviously the two men who have been at odds over many things, so in the President's second term, you know, and they obviously discussed the other issues such as the conflict in Iran, the conflict in the Middle East, they also talked about the fact that there were American and Canadian astronauts on the Artemis II, and just that uniting fact together.
And I would -- and I really like to think that they bonded over that moment, and just with that sense of pride over what their citizens are doing right now for the world to watch.
BROWN: All right, so here's my key question for you all. Jared Isaacman said that NASA wants to eventually send humans to Mars. Would any of you sign up for that?
KIM: No.
BROWN: No? Elliot? Elliot might.
KIM: Well, he's thinking about it.
WILLIAMS: Honestly, you know, talking about how old you are, I remember Challenger very vividly.
BROWN: Yes.
WILLIAMS: It's just hard for me to even now look at rockets. And --
BROWN: I know. And which makes me nervous, even with this rocket launch, you can't help but think of that and just --
ABDUL: I'm afraid of heights, believe me. I don't know.
BEDINGFIELD: I'm claustrophobic.
ABDUL: I couldn't even go look out this window, let alone the New York studio.
BEDINGFIELD: I do not have any fraction of courage requires.
WILLIAMS: It's like a nine-year-long trip, right? Did you not see the movie 2001?
BROWN: Wait, nine years?
WILLIAMS: It's a long-ass time to get out there. It's, you know, I'm just saying.
BROWN: I don't know about -- yes, that's totally changed my calculation. Besides the claustrophobia, the time commitment. That's a whole other story.
All right, well glad we got all of your positions. Coming up, something totally different. The surprising genealogical connection behind a beloved movie.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[12:52:38] ANNE HATHAWAY, ACTOR, "THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA": Hello.
STANLEY TUCCI, ACTOR, "THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA": Well, look what TJ Maxx dragged in.
MERYL STREEP, ACTOR, "THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA": Sorry, who is this? Do you know her? Do I know her?
HATHAWAY: I'm Andy Sachs. Andrea.
TUCCI: She was one of the Emilys.
STREEP: One of the what?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: Meryl Streep's iconic character, Miranda Priestly in "The Devil Wears Prada" has long been speculated to be inspired by Vogue's former editor-in-chief Anna Wintour. Well, it turns out the devil is in the details. Meryl Streep and Anna Wintour are actually related. I'm sorry, what?
Ancestry.com went through their more than 70 billion records and family trees and discovered that Streep and Wintour share a bloodline. They're actually six cousins, linked by shared fifth great- grandparents. The genealogical discovery comes ahead of the much- anticipated sequel to "The Devil Wears Prada." How about that? The timing of this. In a statement to "Entertainment Weekly," Meryl Streep says, "Well, that explains everything, as our ancestors would say, I'm chuffed."
I actually didn't know what that word means. It means being delighted in British slang. There you go. Anyone related to someone famous on the panel?
BEDINGFIELD: I am not, but I always because Bedingfield is a fairly unique name. This is what I always get. If I make a restaurant reservation, I'll often get, oh, like Natasha. So when Biden won in 2020, Daniel Bedingfield, Natasha's brother, also a musician, DMed me on Instagram and said we're so excited. There's going to be a Bedingfield in the White House. And he brought Natasha into the chat. And so --
BROWN: Oh my gosh. Wow, this is a great story. Natasha Bedingfield?
BEDINGFIELD: Yes. So we --
BROWN: Are you definitely not related?
BEDINGFIELD: Well, we talked about it and we don't know that we are, but we agreed that, because sometimes people spell Bedingfield with two Ds, and so usually if I meet another Bedingfield with one D, we are related somewhere. And so we have shared English bloodline, and so we agreed that somewhere along the way, we're probably related. But we did get to chat, and it was very, very cool.
BROWN: OK, well that's a really cool story. I don't have anything near that cool.
KIM: I searched up my family trajectory.
WILLIAMS: No. And my family's from Jamaica. You don't want to know anything that's going on in the 18th or 19th century in the West Indies, so I'd rather just stay out of that one.
[12:55:02]
BROWN: I went back when I was -- when I had kids, I was looking for names. I did ancestry.com. And I found out that both sides of my family, my mom and dad originated in Kentucky. So I'm like strong. My mom's family migrated to Texas, but I thought wow, I've got some strong Kentucky roots there. You know? So it's not really a claim to fame, but whatever. I'm a proud Kentuckian, so.
ABDUL: Are we going to watch the movie? Are we going to go to the movie?
KIM: I feel like I have to buy tickets now. Apparently they're selling out.
BROWN: Oh my gosh. All right, well we better wrap up and get on it then on that note.
All right, thanks so much everyone. It was really fun chatting today. Thanks to you for watching. You can see The Arena every weekday here on CNN at 4:00 p.m. Eastern. You can also catch up by listening to The Arena's podcast and follow the show on X and Instagram at The Arena CNN. Enjoy the rest of the weekend. The news continues next on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
