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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
Reps. Eric Swalwell & Tony Gonzales Officially Resign; Trump Hints At New Iran Talks Amid U.S. Blockade Of Key Ports; New Criticism Among Christians To Trump's Post Depicting Him As Jesus. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired April 14, 2026 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: Yep, I think so. Can confirm.
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You can catch Donie's series "Devoted" on the CNN app. So don't throw your phone in the ocean like I want to right now and download the app and watch Donie's "Devoted".
HILL: So what I'm taking away from this force is you have no plans for a 24/7 live stream?
SANCHEZ: Oh, I can barely do three hours. It's been a long three hours.
"THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT" starts right now.
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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.
KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Breaking news as we come on the air here, two members of the House just resigned following a wave of sexual misconduct allegations.
Hi, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. Welcome to THE ARENA.
Just moments ago on Capitol Hill, Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell and Republican Congressman Tony Gonzales both tendered letters of resignation to the House Speaker Mike Johnson. Gonzales's resignation will take effect at midnight tonight, while Swalwell's was effective immediately.
The now former California congressman, writing in part this, quote, "I am deeply sorry to my family, staff and constituents for mistakes in judgment I have made in my past. I will fight the serious false allegation made against me. However, I must take responsibility and ownership for the mistakes that I did make," end quote.
Both Swalwell and Gonzales face separate but serious and differing allegations of sexual misconduct, and both faced possible expulsion votes supported by members of their own parties. The congresswoman behind that push warning today that these
resignations are not the end.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ANNA PAULINA LUNA (R-FL): I actually think that there's probably going to be a few more expulsions here. I don't want to serve with these people. I don't think that my Democrat colleagues want to serve with these people, and I think that they're probably not the only ones. And so this is something that the House is going to have to come together on
(END VIDOE CLIP)
HUNT: All right, let's get off the sidelines, head into THE ARENA. My panel is here.
And we're also joined by CNN chief congressional correspondent Manu Raju.
Manu, what more do we know about how this has unfolded? And of course, there are others that are serving have served with them who are being forced to answer questions today.
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, because this has just been a stunning collapse of a political career that seemed destined for higher office. Eric Swalwell was the front runner to be the next California governor. Of course, there are many months ahead in that race, but no doubt about it he had a serious chance of winning. He rose to prominence as an anti-Trump Democrat, but now he has seen his career collapse amid these very serious allegations of sexual misconduct and a complete lack of support within his own party.
One Democrat after another saying it was time for him to go, including his closest friend in Congress, that is Ruben Gallego, the senator from Arizona, someone who chaired his presidential campaign when Swalwell ran for the White House in 2020.
Gallego called a group of reporters into his office today amid questions about what he knew whether Gallego was witness to any of these allegations, whether he knew about sexual misconduct claims, being that have come to light in recent days. Gallego denied knowing any of it, but he also acknowledged that there were rumors about flirtatious behavior that Swalwell engaged in.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. RUBEN GALLEGO (R-AZ): We all heard rumors in Washington, D.C., about Eric Swalwell for many years, and my family, again, was with him all the time with his wife, with his kids. And we saw a different side of Eric that I never saw.
RAJU: Looking back at it, when you first heard these rumors about flirtatious behavior, should you have done something differently?
GALLEGO: I think I should have talked to him about it. I think I should have told him, you know, this is what I'm hearing out there, and I think, you know, you should know about it. And if you're doing it, stop. You know, I fell into the trap again because I think I was too inside the family bubble.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RAJU: And he went on to say that he regrets not calling out Swalwell for his flirtatious behavior. Earlier, though, he said that he had never seen any of these rumors rise to the level of what we have seen in the press in CNN and "The San Francisco Chronicle" in the last couple of days of these allegations of sexual assault, including an alleged rape. Of course, that Swalwell has denied those.
But Kasie as Swalwell and Tony Gonzales both have resigned from Congress, the focus is turning to two other members of the House facing separate major ethical allegations, including Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, a Democrat of Florida, and Congressman Cory Mills, a Republican of Florida.
Members are pushing for their expulsion, and the speaker of the House, mike Johnson, tells me today he supports seeing Cherfilus-McCormick go. He said he still doesn't make a final decision on Mills, who's facing his own ethics investigation as well -- Kasie.
HUNT: All right. Manu Raju, for us on Capitol Hill -- Manu, thank you as always.
My panel is here in THE ARENA. CNN legal analyst, former federal prosecutor Elliot Williams; CNN political director, Washington bureau chief David Chalian; former Biden White House communications director, Kate Bedingfield; and former Trump campaign adviser David Urban.
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They are both CNN political commentators.
Welcome to all of you.
David Chalian, I want to just start with the big picture here, because --
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF: It's not good.
HUNT: Please, take it. Take it away. No, you're fine.
CHALIAN: I'm just saying, as Manu was talking and you're seeing all these members of Congress walking behind him, leaving a meeting or something, and you're thinking, is this really like what they want to be dealing with right now? And obviously neither of these men who resigned their seats today were upholding the traditions that are the very best of what Congress can have, but shows you how each party can be mired in these distractions from this really awful behavior that we have that has been alleged here.
HUNT: I think it's also worth, David, kind of drilling down on the point, you know, if you're the American people and you want to understand whether your Congress is working for you or not, I mean, these -- this Gonzales stuff has been out there for months, right, with Republicans sitting on it because the speaker has such a narrow majority. I mean, in some ways, what happened with Swalwell then gave him the political opportunity to do the right thing, question mark?
CHALIAN: Once it opened up on the Democratic side, and that it would be a net, you know --
HUNT: There's no effect on --
CHALIAN: No net gain for either party and no effect in his margin is going to remain as narrow, but not any worse. Then you can move forward together.
I think -- I think the game is afoot there for the American people. I think they understand that. I don't think they're dumb. I think they get that.
Again, I don't think that really reflects all that well on the way. Congress sort of polices itself and conducts itself.
HUNT: Or doesn't.
CHALIAN: But I also don't think anybody's going to miss these two gentlemen in the halls of Congress.
HUNT: Elliot Williams, can you talk a little bit about the sort of legal travails potentially facing Eric Swalwell in particular here?
ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yeah, they're not good insofar as because you're talking about sexual assaults, often the statute of limitations is really, really long. And one can be prosecuted years after the fact for. And what we're talking about here is potentially a first degree rape in the state of New York. That has a 20-year statute of limitations and a really long jail sentence if he's looking at it.
Even if not prosecuted, he can certainly be sued by any of these people who are accusing him of this really bad misconduct for battery or infliction of emotional distress. So this is not the end we have seen of this. Like, yes, he is resigning from Congress today, but he still faces a lot of legal exposure.
HUNT: Yeah. Kate Bedingfield, I mean, Gallego put on the spot there by Manu Raju and asked about kind of the congressman's reputation, so to speak. You know what people were talking about around town. Gallego essentially saying that he didn't -- he doesn't recognize the person that has -- that these women have alleged he actually is, right? Swalwell denies -- denies that.
But I mean, how much of a problem is it that there are these sort of like openly kept secrets about bad behavior?
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look, I mean, it's -- there's a reason that approval that Congress approval rating is about 2 percent. You know, it's probably the least popular institution in a country where institutions are declining in popularity across the board. And some of it is a sense that there is no accountability.
I think one of the worst legacies of the Trump era is this idea somehow that bad behavior is kind of no longer politically problematic. And I think since the emergence of the Access Hollywood tape, the kind of conventional wisdom has become -- well, politicians aren't held accountable in the way that they used to be for fundamentally bad behavior.
So, you know, I think given that it took an opening on the Democratic side for the right thing to happen, that's not a great sign. But the fact that the two of them, both Swalwell and Gonzales, are now out of Congress, and the fact that Swalwell suspended his gubernatorial campaign is a step in the right direction.
WILLIAMS: You know, I wonder if most people around the country are following closely enough to know that Tony Gonzales' misconduct was out there for a while, and it just so happened that he resigned on the day a Democrat did. You know, that's really, really bad when we really think about it, the fact that, you know, this horrible misconduct really came down to a question of counting votes in Congress.
And a cynical view is that its not about the misconduct. It's about what was best for the political parties. And I think if people really stop to think about it, it's really ugly.
DAVID URBAN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I would just say to Kate's point and push back a little bit, I'm shockingly old enough to have been in this town and was chief of staff during the Clinton impeachment and went to all the depositions and read the Starr report. And so, if you want to be aghast at misconduct, you can just go back and refresh yourself on the -- on the Clinton.
HUNT: I'm dating myself, but my parents would not allow me to read the Starr reports. But my point is it's inappropriate.
(CROSSTALK)
URBAN: No, but my point is my point is that this has been going on for some time in this town. In the Kasie's point, like --
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HUNT: I mean, it's been going on forever.
URBAN: So what -- Kasie's pointed like why is it -- why does it allowed to go on? Right. The -- his behavior was not flirtatious. It was rapey, right? It was like, there's a difference.
Like, oh, he's flirtatious. I don't even know what that would mean. I don't know how a boss could be flirtatious in his --
WILLIAMS: Under the law, he can't.
URBAN: Yeah, exactly, exactly. But so, so to describe it as like flirtatious is really demeaning to the overall to the women involved. It's not flirtatious. This is a sexual predator. This is like Harvey Weinstein kind of stuff were talking about. And it should be called out.
And, there's been hearings on this and there have been payouts, you know, secret payouts have been going on for years. And so the American people have had enough. They're women -- Nancy Mace and Luna and others have been calling for accountability on this.
And, you know, it continues on into this insider trading stuff that that people are allowed to trade on the stock tips. And you see this going on everywhere now.
People just have a great deal of distrust in a really bad taste in their mouth what's going on in Washington.
CHALIAN: And to be fair, I'm not here to defend Ruben Gallego in any way. But I do think when he was using that word, he was saying how he understood Eric Swalwell behavior to be at the time, not -- he wasn't describing and characterizing the behavior of the allegations.
URBAN: Yeah. No, no, I'm just saying -- but for people who say like, oh, it was an open secret that he was whatever, like, well, if it's an open secret, why doesn't somebody call it out? Like --
HUNT: Well, so --
URBAN: Who's there protecting these young women? Like nobody.
BEDINGFIELD: Hey, I'm with you. I don't think it was an open secret that he was committing sexual assault.
URBAN: No, no, no. Okay.
BEDINGFIELD: I think it's an open secret that he was a womanizer who was --
CHALIAN: But still, you just have to ask yourself. So, if all of that is known and you're still choosing to put yourself forward to run to be governor of the largest, most populous state.
URBAN: And he got a lot of endorsements. It wasn't like he was --
CHALIAN: Thinking you have an invincibility to this in some way?
HUNT: Yes, and that's my question. Yeah.
WILLIAMS: And I think to gently push back on all of it, it's not a crime to be a womanizer, right? And so to this question of the rumors swirling, to the extent there was -- there were rumors that he was committing crimes. Yes, that's a problem. But if the rumors were that he's a creepy guy, that's creepy with his staff and creepy with women around him.
URBAN: With his staff, though, is a problem.
WILLIAMS: Right. Well, yeah. No, of course.
HUNT: Right. WILLIAMS: But you see what I mean, though? It's just -- we shouldn't blur --
URBAN: The power dynamic.
WILLIAMS: We shouldn't blur what's not illegal and just sort of shady and icky with what's illegal and what should get you fired from your job.
HUNT: Well, that's sort of the sort of question I was thinking about as I was listening to you, Kate, and to you, David, that there used to be this idea that if you were a public servant, you had the public trust, you were spending the publics money, you were expected to hold yourself to a certain set of standards, and that the public expected, and would -- you would expect that the public would hold you to a certain set of standards.
Kate points out that some of those standards have been thrown into question in the Trump era. There is also a question of modern morality. Is it different from old school morality? And that gets to this, you know, what do we expect now? I mean, what do you think we should expect, David, in terms of behavior?
Because, I mean, to Kate's point, to the extent that people now are saying there was an open secret about Eric Swalwell, I never spoke to a single person who had alleged some of these horrible things that these women say that they suffered at his hand.
Now that is something that would be non-consensual criminal, et cetera, right? If I think -- and this, I think is what Manu was getting at when he was asking Ruben Gallego, if the reputation is that he is going out on the town and stepping out on his marriage, is that where are we putting that line for --
URBAN: Look, I think -- I think --
HUNT: -- the public trust.
URBAN: -- like basic HR training, right? In a lot of these offices, right? Like any other company has, right? You have certain you get -- you know, their courses people take, their HR managers come in and say what's appropriate, what's not appropriate. People should feel free to call hotlines and report things, right?
There should be a real. I think Congress needs to examine themselves and set it and really take a step back. I think these secret deals that are cut, that allow people to get to brush these things under these non-disclosure agreements that the Congress pays out on taxpayer dollars to people so they never get to talk about it again.
A lot of that stuff needs to be reexamined. I mean, there's something clearly wrong, right? With the institution itself that this keeps happening.
WILLIAMS: Yeah, but -- BEDINGFIELD: I wonder if just quickly, I also wonder if the just the
continued degradation of public service and government as you know, less than functional, honorable, noble. I mean --
URBAN: You're attracting worse people?
BEDINGFEILD: Well, you're attracting -- you're attracting -- you're attracting ego. You're attracting people who do it because they want to be famous and want to be big on social media and not people who are interested in, you know, the nuts and bolts of policy.
WILLIAMS: One -- sorry, I'm sorry. One obvious solution, elect more women to office. I'm dead 100 percent serious.
(CROSSTALK)
WILLIAMS: No, women -- women do bad things too. But a lot of these men behaving badly and committing sex crimes on the job. It's a function of the fact that there's not a lot of women in Congress, and we need more.
HUNT: Well, it's just, you know, it would be better for all of us if this weren't the kind of conversation we were having to have today.
Coming up next here in THE ARENA, new reaction coming in today in the battle between the president and the pope. But first, President Trump's new comments today on Iran, what he's talking about when he says, quote, something could be happening.
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SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): We're complying with the law of war, but all hell is about to break loose on this regime.
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He's offering them the ability to exist as a nation, not as a state sponsor of terrorism.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HUNT: All right. Right now, new hope for talks between the U.S. and Iran for new talks with President Donald Trump telling a "New York Post" reporter to stay in Pakistan because, quote, "something could be happening over the next two days," end quote.
A source tells CNN that U.S. officials are looking at potential dates and locations for a second round of talks, despite significant disagreements with Iran over the future of its nuclear program.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: On the first of those things, what some people call the dust, which is the enriched uranium that the Iranians currently possess, we have said that we want that to come out of their country, and we would like to take possession of it. And the second thing is that, again, to this point about verification, its one thing for the Iranians to say that they're not going to have a nuclear weapon. It's another thing for us to put in place the mechanism to ensure that's not going to happen.
Whether we have further conversations, whether we ultimately get to a deal, I really think the ball is in the Iranian court because we put a lot on the table.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: One way the U.S. is trying to gain leverage at the negotiating table, a total blockade of Iran's ports, now in its first full day. Today, Central Command announced that no ships have passed the blockade and six merchant ships have obeyed orders to return to an Iranian port.
At the same time, a small number of ships, including ones linked to Iran, have passed through the Strait of Hormuz, which is itself not under blockade, a U.S. official tells CNN that the navy is communicating with merchant vessels in the region, telling them that the strait is safe and encouraging them to pass through it.
Joining our panel here in THE ARENA, CNN national security analyst, former deputy director of national intelligence, Beth Sanner.
Beth, welcome to the panel. Panel still here with us.
I want to just start with the top lines here for you. Do you think this second potential round of talks is promising, especially in light of this blockade?
BETH SANNER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: I think it's promising almost regardless of the blockade. I mean, the U.S. is trying to use the blockade as leverage, but I don't really think that that is, you know, it's not going to get Iran to capitulate. I think it -- and I'm not even sure, you know, it gets them to lower very much anyway, the terms that they have.
I think that the United States really wants this deal. And I think that Iran would like a deal as well on their terms. But, you know, the United States is also most likely going to have to compromise.
And I think we're misreading, again, that -- this idea that this kind of economic leverage, after all that Iran has been through, is going to somehow be the ticket.
HUNT: Do you think that we can fundamentally reshape the economic situation in this longer time horizon? I mean, how much stress does it put on the U.S. Navy, especially if this blockade has to expand to include additional protections for ships that we want to pass through the strait? SANNER: Exactly. I mean, I think at this point -- you know, this zero
ships going through or, you know, maybe they'll be a handful that that will go through, but they're not going to go through the strait. The main channel, instead of tacking closer to Iran. And, and maybe paying Iran for that.
I don't think that ships are ready to do that without an escort, without more understanding that it really is not going to result in them hitting a mine. You know, you don't clear a strait of two miles in a day. And so I don't think that there's a lot of trust there that this is actually clear. And so something is going to have to give here.
And there's a short term in terms of getting the tankers to move through the strait. And that's going to require more effort by the United States. But over the long term, you know, that's not sustainable. And so ultimately, you do need some sort of deal with Iran. And, you know, of course, what all of us worry about is that in the end, that this is going to end up somehow with Iran, having some control, some threat, some capability to exercise control over the strait.
And I think that given their remaining arms that without a deal, that that's going to be the case.
HUNT: Well, and to that point, David Urban, from a political perspective, I mean, that puts us in a worse position than when the war started, at least from an economic perspective.
URBAN: Yeah. Surprisingly, Iran found out they don't really need a nuclear weapon to control the world, right? They just discovered all they need to do is have somebody sit on a rock on the shoreline with a shoulder fired missile. They could shut down the world. It's basically what they've done here.
And there is no guarantee that, you know, once, you know, we could take all their nuclear material away. I think that's a laudable goal. And I think that's one of the things that this administration is really dedicated to seeing happen.
And -- but as far as the Straits of Hormuz goes, it is a very, very perilous situation. And it can't be -- you can't guarantee that it won't happen again, right? We can take their nuclear material. We can take their ballistic capabilities away. We can take away their abilities to fund, you know, Hezbollah and Hamas and other really, you know, IRGC exporting terror.
But all they got to do, again, is send somebody up on a hillside with a missile to threaten international shipping and Lloyd's and all the folks aren't going to let these billion dollar, very large crude carriers go skating through.
CHALIAN: I think it almost guarantees, sorry, that it will happen again, right? Because as you're saying, they now have what was in theory -- URBAN: They can give up their nuclear -- they can give up their
nuclear weapons. If they were smart, they'd just give it up and say, sure, we don't need it.
BEDINGFIELD: Well, I would also imagine that the increased increasing domestic political pressure on Trump at home is also -- Iran also views that as leverage. I mean, that in itself is leverage as this as this continues to drag out, as gas prices continue to climb, as people across the economy continue to feel the impact of rising oil prices. That in and of itself is pressure on -- and strengthens Iran's hand.
CHALIAN: I think that's why a week into this two week ceasefire, even though J.D. Vance came home and said, you know, bad news, no deal. Donald Trump has been remarkably quiet and even teasing out like today, stick with -- he is -- because of all that domestic political pressure.
I mean, every day we are learning how much worse this is sitting with the American people. And I think the way Trump is behaving inside the ceasefire, which is not his norm -- yeah, it shows how eager he is to find a way out.
URBAN: But you've got to have -- but you got to have the other side, the Iranians have to play ball because Trump's not going to walk away with nothing. Clearly, he's not going to walk away with nothing.
He's got to get the nuclear material. He's got to get something. He's got to get some pledges. And the Iranians could just say like, well, maybe well do that in a month, two months.
WILLIAMS: Yeah. I mean, he agreed. He does to some extent. The reality is we've been talking about this with the gas prices. There's no other good or commodity that we see the price of literally every day at every intersection in America. Go out in your car, you see it there.
And I think even people who aren't buying gas today are reminded of this. And it's a glaring political problem that they're going to have to keep confronting even no matter how badly Iran is.
HUNT: Well, let's watch the Citadel CEO. He's also a Republican, longtime Republican donor, Ken Griffin, who was asked today what the implications of all of this are going to be. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MODERATOR: What is at stake for the global economy if safe passage through the strait is not guaranteed, and if it remains shut down, for all intents and purposes?
KEN GRIFFIN, CEO, CITADEL: I mean, let's assume it's shut down for the next six to 12 months. The world's going to end up in a recession. There's -- there's no way to avoid that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: I mean, that's pretty stark, David. URBAN: Yeah. But I don't think anybody's -- I don't think anyone in
the world thinks it's going to be six to 12 months. Right? I don't think the markets think that. I don't think the way you think things are acting.
And look, to David's point, the president keeps teasing this out, right. And they're talking still. So that's good. The Iranians have not been, you know, shooting missiles or drones. We've not been bombing.
So, you know, the talking thing seems to be working, but maybe they're talking past each other because I'm not sure that the regime in Tehran wants to give up their, you know, their ability to do the bad things they've been doing. Its not like they're going to suddenly wake up and be like, "We love America", like chanting death to America for 47 years.
WILLIAMS: Life to America.
URBAN: They're not going to say -- they're not going to somewhat wake up there. And so what we what both parties need out of this may be incompatible.
HUNT: Yeah.
Well, and Beth Sanner final thought here, how does that put our interests when it comes to the Israelis? Because it started off pretty aligned. It just occurs to me that many of the things David listed off that the Iranians have, or that we have accomplished in this military conflict, definitely benefit the Israelis. Definitely were goals of the Israelis.
But are we still on the same page in terms of our interests?
SANNER: Many Israelis generally are feeling like they didn't accomplish their war aims. They're still thousands of missiles that Iran has. And the nuclear situation isn't solved.
And I think, as pointed out by the panelists exactly right, that Iran has to play ball here. And it's not -- even though they don't need the nuclear, program because it was nascent anyway, and largely destroyed. They being able to give that up is very, very tough. I could easily see us back in a situation where Israel is going to want to strike Iran in six months time, because they are starting to rebuild their program.
HUNT: All right. Beth Sanner, thank you very much for being here today. Always appreciate you.
The rest of our panel is going to stand by.
Coming up next here in THE ARENA, is it just a joke or is it something more serious? What top leaders are saying about the president's post that depicted him as Jesus? We're going to talk with the bishop of Washington, Mariann Budde. She will be here live.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHEN COLBERT, COMEDIAN/LATE NIGHT TV HOST: According to one Italian religious historian, not even Hitler or Mussolini attacked the pope so directly and publicly. It's never great when someone says, you should really be more discreet and respectful, you know, like Hitler.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:34:13]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PASTOR MARK BURNS, TRUMP'S SPIRITUAL ADVISER: The reality is this, the image was offensive to millions of evangelicals, Christians, Catholics all over the world, and many of us who have the ear of the president, implored it to come down and it came down. I said to the president that the image can be easily misunderstood as depicting himself as Christ, and that's why it needed to come down, regardless of what his intentions was.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: That was President Donald Trump's spiritual adviser, Pastor Mark Burns, saying that he was, quote, "grateful" that the president took down that controversial since deleted A.I. image depicting himself as Jesus Christ after he and others reached out to Trump to ask him to remove it. Among those who also spoke to him about the image, the House Speaker Mike Johnson, who said today that he told the president it wasn't being received as intended.
[16:35:10]
The controversy over this Christ-like image coming as the president continues his feud with Pope Leo over the Vatican's criticism of the Iran war.
The vice president, who met with the pope last year and is publishing a book about his own conversion to Catholicism, waded into the spat last night with this message to the pontiff.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I certainly think that in some cases it would be best for the Vatican to stick to matters of morality, to stick to matters of, you know, what's going on in the Catholic Church, and let the president of the United States stick to dictating American public policy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. Joining me now is Bishop Mariann Budde. She leads the Episcopal Diocese of Washington.
Bishop, thank you so much for joining us. I really appreciate having your voice on the show in these times, so to speak. I'd like to start with the administration and the pope.
Pope Leo, he's, of course, an American who speaks English like an American, who wears a Cubs hat. What do you make of the way he is handling the way he talks about Iran on the world stage and other issues as well, and those interactions with the American president? How do you think about it in terms of history and as a faith leader yourself?
BISHOP MARIANN BUDDE, EPISCOPAL DIOCESE OF WASHINGTON: Well, first of all, thanks. Always good to be with you. I would say it's as compelling a news story as it seems to be. I think it's a bit of a distraction, actually, to personalize it between the pope and the president, because world leaders, religious leaders across the country and the world are beginning to say more and more that the administrations policies are problematic, particularly when they are being cast with religious imagery from the Christian faith to justify their actions.
And the pope is being utterly consistent and calm. His position as a global leader gives him a particular authority, which I think he is using with great restraint. It's also clear that this president doesn't like to be criticized by anyone and takes out that criticism in very personal ways. But the pope's actions are consistent with religious leaders, as I said, across the country and the world, and all of us have some real concerns about what we're seeing being played out on the international stage.
HUNT: You mentioned the imagery that the president used. We talked about it a little bit in the introduction. Can you speak to why, if you are a Christian, this is an image that has layers of challenges that are not strictly political?
BUDDE: Well, I'm happy to, but I also want to, you know, widen the camera lens a little bit, Kasie, because its one of many.
HUNT: Sure, go ahead.
BUDDE: Right? It's one of many, many images associations, claiming of spiritual mantles and authority, associating the president and his administration with the teachings of Jesus and the will of God. And so this is just one of many that have been consistent with the administration from the beginning. And when we get into greater fields of influence, either in this country and now on the world stage, they become all the more alarming because it is so clearly associating the president and his administration with the with the assumed will of God and even the likeness of God.
And so in this case, he is taking on not just the mantle of Jesus's teachings, he's identifying with Jesus in a particularly alarming way.
HUNT: And in terms of what Jesus himself taught and the way that he urged people to live their lives, to conduct themselves in the world -- I mean, we have seen moments from President Trump. We saw one at the funeral that was held for Charlie Kirk, where his widow spoke movingly about the people who had harmed her. And she talked about forgiveness. And the president explicitly repudiated that and said it was something
that he struggled with. I mean, how does that align with what Jesus would -- how he would have us live?
BUDDE: Well, you said it yourself. I mean, that the teachings of Jesus are -- look, they're aspirational for all of us. We all struggle to live up to the aspirational teachings of Jesus.
And at the same time as at a Christian, at a Christian gathering to extol a Christian leader, then to espouse hatred is -- well, it's worrisome. It's worrisome when you have someone with the kind of power and authority and sense of self grandiosity that we see in our current president, to assume the mantle of Christ or of his church and to blatantly repudiate his teachings, to point out that contradiction isn't -- it's not a political attack. It's simply an observation that, walking the talk of faith is a lot harder than shouting your Christian identity from the loudest loudspeaker.
HUNT: Indeed. When I've sat at services at the National Cathedral, which, of course, occur every week, but also at particularly elevated moments of our collective national life, they're often our prayers for the president, whoever. It's always been a he, but whoever he may be at that moment -- when you pray for this president, what do you pray for?
BUDDE: Well, when I pray for anyone. Particularly someone that I don't know personally and that I do not understand, I tend to leave the prayer in the will of God, like I pray for him as I pray for anyone, that the will of God and the love of God would surround him, would inform him.
I do pray for compassion. I pray for awareness. I pray for his capacity to understand the implications of his actions, which have the power to affect matters of life and death for literally hundreds of thousands of people every day.
HUNT: All right. Bishop Mariann Budde, thank you very much for your reflections, for your words today. I always really appreciate your time, and I hope you'll come back.
BUDDE: Thanks. It's always good to see you.
HUNT: All right. Ahead here in THE ARENA, more on this topic. What the number two and number three men in the federal government think about the latest controversial post from the man at the top.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Speaker Johnson, can I ask you about the president's post himself, as Jesus? Was it blasphemy?
REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: I talked with the president about it as soon as I saw it and, told him that I don't think it was being received in the same way he intended it.
(END VIDEO CLIP) (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:47:11]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VANCE: But I think the president was posting a joke, and of course, he took it down because he recognized that a lot of people weren't understanding his humor in that case. I think the president of the United States likes to mix it up on social media. And I actually think that's one of the good things about this president is that he's not filtered.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: It was just a joke?
Vice President J.D. Vance, who is the highest ranking Catholic in the U.S. government, defended this A.I. generated image that President Trump posted, depicting himself as Jesus. But the president had a different explanation for the post. Yesterday, he said he thought it depicted him as a doctor.
The fallout was swift and remains ongoing. This is how some key MAGA voices and late night shows took it all in.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R), FORMER GEORGIA CONGRESSWOMAN: I think it was blasphemy. I was offended, I think he should apologize, not -- not act defensive.
MEGYN KELLY, HOST, "THE MEGYN KELLY SHOW": I don't know why the president is getting so desperate for attention that he feels the need to mock 1.4 billion Catholics. It's -- it's enough. Okay? It's enough with this nonsense.
JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE!": This is what happens when you sell bibles instead of reading them.
JON STEWART, HOST, "THE DAILY SHOW": Do you even care about lying to us anymore? Is it over? Is this relationship gone still? Your lies used to have a real spark.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Okay, my panel is back.
David Urban, how big of a -- how big of an error was this?
URBAN: Yeah, I mean, pretty big. I don't -- I mean, I can't -- I'm trying to think like, you know, Megyn Kelly's point. You know, Catholics make up a huge part of the voting bloc in America and in the midterms.
We're coming up here. You really don't want to alienate. You want to give people a reason to vote against you. You know, Biden won the Catholic vote by, I think, a percentage point. And then Trump won the Catholic vote by a percentage point.
If you look at who, you know, Catholics and Christians tend to be there, you know, kind of also skew, you know, white working class Americans. And so, we seem to be alienated a great deal of the electorate.
And I just want to remind everybody, elections are about addition, right? This is one plus one plus one, not subtraction. And I'm not quite sure how either of those attacking the pope or, you know, posting the Jesus imagery -- it was designed to be humorous or helpful. Not sure who he talked to about it, but it's got bad advice. If somebody said, hey, Mr. President, post this, this is going to be funny.
I mean, I think it's -- and again, we, you know, yesterday they had some good -- you know, we had this no tax on tips woman who was at the White House, a great one of the great victories right is Democrats would love to have this issue, right? It's a genius issue. No tax tips. Grandma was there, delivered, DoorDash. Very nice.
And it got overshadowed, right? It got overshadowed got stepped on by all this, this other stuff that the president created.
[16:50:04]
So, a lot of good things going on the White House wants to promote, but yet here we are on day two or three or four talking about this story that just not going to go away.
President should say, "I made a mistake." Move on.
CHALIAN: I think there's a direct relationship between how big of an error it is and how quickly he removed it from his feed, because that happened pretty quickly, which is not the norm, right? He usually sticks things out. So I think --
HUNT: It's pretty rare that he does it at all.
CHALIAN: Yeah, the recognition and the speed of the recognition to act and take it down -- doesn't excuse the post to begin with, I understand, but I'm just saying, I think shows us how big a mistake they think, an unforced error they --
BEDINGFIELD: Well, yeah. And well I think that the condemnation was universal, right? I mean, I can't imagine there was a single person who said to Donald Trump, hey, that was a great idea. Good job.
So I imagine that some of the quick removal of the post was not so much Donald Trump looking at it and going like, yeah, you know what? This is probably going to fracture my coalition and more people he cares about saying to him, this is a problem, take it down.
URBAN: But it really does have electoral consequences. That's the thing, right? BEDINGFIELD: Yeah, sure.
URBAN: This administration, they've got great -- James Blair, very smart person. Susie Wiles. They've got incredible people inside working on how to, you know, cobble this coalition back together again for the fall to try to stave off the inevitable, you know, that every president faces in the midterms.
And so, the things they're doing on a very measured basis daily across the states, different places, all this effort that's going into it. It's kind of washed away in one great tidal wave by this one post. And so, it's a problem some in that regard.
BEDINGFIELD: Yeah. Well, and the coalition is fairly weak right now or is at least damage. I mean, in the wake of a number of these decisions, I mean, Megyn Kelly -- Megyn Kelly criticizing Donald Trump actually isn't new anymore.
But there were, you know, I just, I happened to see on X. Riley Gaines was criticizing him.
A lot of evangelical leaders, it wasn't just Catholics. You know, Catholics were offended when he attacked the pope. And then, you know, evangelicals and others were offended when he posted a picture of himself as Jesus.
So, it is a -- it's a fragile moment for his coalition for him to be doing something like this. It's also just like, can we? It's just appalling. Like it's just gross. It's appalling. Let's just -- can I just say that?
HUNT: Spades -- spade is a spade. That's like what the show is supposed to be for. So --
(CROSSTALK)
URBAN: Again -- again, again, again --
BEDINGFIELD: Just a freaking break.
URBAN: Again, just make a mistake. I made a mistake. Move on.
People -- I think, you know, this -- America is a place of great forgiveness and compassion, right? If you said, hey, look, I made a mistake.
HUNT: Well, that's also very Christ-like -- forgiveness.
URBAN: Well, listen, it's -- you know, it's true. He made a mistake. Just say I made a mistake, I blew it. Move on.
People would be -- people are much more forgiving than I think people realize in America.
HUNT: Yeah. Go ahead. WILLIAMS: I would just say, you know, and to J.D. Vance's comments
about the pope should just stick to morality, I think that's forgetting the last two millennia of world history in which popes are constantly weighing in on political issues. We had in our lifetime Pope John Paul literally working with the CIA and President Reagan with respect to solidarity in Poland and the fall of the Soviet Union. And there's a long history of popes actively being engaged in politics. So the fact that --
CHALIAN: I would bet the pope thinks he was sticking to morality when he expressed his opposition to war.
BEDINGFIELD: Exactly.
(CROSSTALK)
URBAN: I will say this. Listen, like I said, I'm an altar boy, lifelong Catholic, you know?
CHALIAN: Me, too.
URBAN: So I -- I have -- no, I think the pope is in the job description. It's like peace, love and understanding, right? That's what he's supposed to do.
But, you know, in this instance, you know, the church, I would like to hear some, you know, some, some condemnation of an Iranian regime that, you know, murders its own people, holds the world hostage by terror. There are lots of terrible things that the Iranian regime does that should be condemned equally and vocally, that I think that this president and the vice president are pointing out, saying, hey, look, the pope's the pope, he's doing this, but you know, you got to call balls and strikes.
There are bad people, bad regimes. No ones going to say that. What's going on in the Hermit Kingdom is great, or that, you know, the Russians or the Chinese aren't doing bad things. This regime is doing terrible things. It'd be great for the pope to recognize that as well.
WILLIAMS: But I -- you know, I don't think anyone would accuse the pope of being inconsistent of the -- of the point you were making a second ago of, peace and harmony and nonviolence being a big part. So I -- you know, he's called it out in respect to the Middle East and Israel and Gaza, to the great consternation of many people and many of our allies.
URBAN: So let's just, let's just put it this way. I blame Axelrod for all this, right? Just so we're clear.
(LAUGHTER)
HUNT: I got to clip that for social and put it out there.
David Chalian, when you look at our data and, and Catholic voters in particular. Do you see this as something that is going to move them? Or how does this typically interact? CHALIAN: Well, to David's point, I think about a quarter of Donald
Trump's vote in 2024 was Catholic voters. That's a -- that's a big chunk. And when you said also when you described what is that Catholic vote like? And the larger Christian vote, like? You said, white working class.
To your point about the weakening of the coalition, white working class voters, white, non-college educated voters are the -- as we've covered for the last 10 years, have been the very lifeline of Donald Trump's political success, and he's like, even with them now, if not a slight bit underwater.
[16:55:02]
This coalition is not put together right now. And this Catholic piece is a part of it that he has to be worried about, not just for this post.
BEDINGFIELD: Hispanic voters -- Hispanic voters as well, by the way, Catholic voters and --
WILLIAMS: The million dollar question of are Hispanics now permanently Republican across America? Well, it was fragile to begin with. And stuff like this does not help.
HUNT: Yeah. Look, very little is immovable and totally permanent in American politics?
All right. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HUNT: All right. Thanks so much, my panel. Really appreciate you guys being here today.
Thanks to all of you at home for watching as well. Really appreciate you.
Don't go anywhere. Phil Mattingly is standing by in for Jake for "THE LEAD".
Hi, Phil.
