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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
Dem Socialist's Win In Florida Sends Shock Through Party Establishment; New Questions About Darline Graham's Candidacy After Debate Flop; Trump Spends 32 Minutes Showing Off New White House Driveway, Helipad, Lawn. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired August 19, 2026 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[16:00:00]
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: And that's when I know I got to trim this thing.
ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: Right.
SANCHEZ: You know, it's obscene.
HILL: That's a lot of beard.
SANCHEZ: That's -- yeah.
HILL: Congratulations, sir.
SANCHEZ: Good for him. I wonder what --
HILL: You're not entering next year?
SANCHEZ: I mean, if you give me time to grow it, I'm not sure the bosses would enjoy that.
HILL: They may not like that.
SANCHEZ: A Rip Van Winkle kind of, ZZ Top.
THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT starts right now.
(MUSIC)
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.
Right now, a shock and a warning for the Democratic establishment following yet another win for the far left.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANGIE NIXON (D), FLORIDA SENATE CANDIDATE: We went up against the political establishment, against millions of dollars out-of-state spending. We were outspent 16 to 1, and we won.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Democratic socialist Angie Nixon last night easily defeating the more moderate Alexander Vindman. Emphasis on easily. It wasn't even close. Nixon is on track to win by about 12 points.
This despite the fact that Vindman was the choice of the party's establishment. They seem to view him as a rising star. He's an Army veteran, and he was a key witness during Donald Trump's first impeachment trial. Vindman raised and spent significantly more money than Nixon.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALEX VINDMAN (D), FORMER FLORIDA SENATE CANDIDATE: Stakes couldn't be higher. In this election, the future of the country and the state hanging the ballots, we came up short. But we have Angie Nixon, and we congratulate her on her win and be able to take this battle forward to win in November.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: The results in Florida showing yet again where the energy is right now in the Democratic Party. Nixon's platform includes Medicare for all, a national rent freeze, and ending military support to Israel. Of course, those very policies and Florida's red-leaning electorate make it highly unlikely that Nixon will win in the general election.
But her primary victory, it carries a message for the Democratic establishment, especially here in Washington, watch out, because the energy, these policies, these candidates who are running on them -- well, they seem to be coming for you.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NIXON: They told us to get in line, but we knew better. They tried to intimidate us. They told us to step aside, but we knew better.
And we, the hardworking, everyday people of Florida, sent a shockwave to the Washington, D.C. establishment. And they better get ready because they ain't seen nothing yet.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right, let's get off the sidelines, head into THE ARENA. My panel is here.
Senior politics reporter at "Axios", Marc Caputo; CNN political analyst, national political correspondent for "Axios", Alex Thompson; CNN political commentator, former Biden White House communications director Kate Bedingfield; and former Republican congressman and governor of South Carolina, Mark Sanford.
We are also joined by CNN political commentator Bakari Sellers.
Welcome to all of you. Thank you so much for being here. Marc Caputo, you are our resident Florida man. No pun intended or
something.
MARC CAPUTO, SENIOR POLITICS REPORTER, AXIOS: Pun taken.
HUNT: So, I want to start with you just because I'd be interested to hear the texture you would add to this. I mean, obviously, it's a piece of the puzzle in the national narrative on this debate among -- between inside the Democratic Party. What actually happened in Florida?
CAPUTO: Well, I think there's a narrative in search of facts to a degree. What happened in Florida was well summed up by Vindman's speech that was just featured there, which was terrible.
He's a terrible candidate. He ran a terrible campaign. And terrible candidates who run terrible campaigns usually lose.
HUNT: Lose elections.
CAPUTO: And that's what happened here.
And Angie Nixon, a state rep who I covered a bit in Tallahassee, is clearly a card-carrying progressive. She's not as much of a card- carrying Democratic socialist. At a certain point in June, she decided to sign up, and if you read some of the coverage at the time, that was more particularized. She had decided to do this because she's a progressive, they're essentially fellow travelers.
This morning on another interview in another network, she had ticked off the things where she disagrees with the Democratic socialists on. So, there's a -- she's sort of a quasi-accidental, opportunistic democratic socialist is what she is. So, she now is going to --
HUNT: In the context of a primary, but not necessarily, you're saying, in the context of the election she's about to run.
CAPUTO: Correct. Well, in the context of the election that she's about to run, she's going to have to decide sort of what lane she's going to be in. She hates being defined and labeled, she said, but guess what happens when you join a group? You get labeled.
And the socialist label in a general election, especially in Florida, can be problematic, especially with the complex and cultured history of the Hispanic vote -- voting --
[16:05:05]
HUNT: When you talk to Cubans in Miami, socialism has a very distinct meaning. And Venezuelans also.
CAPUTO: It's Cubans, it's those of Cuban descent, Venezuelan descent, Colombian descent, and Nicaraguan descent, different communities that left fled socialism, communism, or the threat of leftism under different sort of political circumstances. Socialism to them sounds like the way you would say national socialism, except in German. Same with a number of pro-Israel voters. They hear Democratic socialists, they think Nazi.
ALEX THOMPSON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: To add really quickly to that, like the last CBS/YouGov poll over this weekend, the group of Americans with the lowest approval of socialism in the country, Latinos, at 30 percent.
HUNT: Yeah.
Kate Bedingfield, what would you say about this race? I mean, I take Marc's assessment. I mean, you can -- you can see it in the windows clips lined up. OK, but it's true that Democrats in Washington helped recruit Vindman for this race. He has a national profile, which is increasingly important and, you know, attention grabbing.
But she seemed to -- I mean, she was driving all over the state with her cell phone. You know, she live stream changing a tire at one point, right? She was able to capture attention in a different way.
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, she was. And she very -- she very -- give her all credit. She very clearly hustled. She also I think did a good job really making the race localized. I mean, she was also very aggressive in taking it to Ron DeSantis around redistricting. And I think while Vindman was sort of coasting a little bit on his national kind of anti-Trump celebrity, she really -- she really hustled.
So, to me, one of the lessons here, and this is true from time immemorial, but one of the lessons for incumbents here is complacency will kill you, not that he was an incumbent, but for, shall we say, establishments, establishment figures. Complacency will kill you. She certainly proved that.
But also, I was talking to Steve Shale last night, an old friend of mine who was a longtime Democratic operative, knows Florida very, very well. And he was pointing out that Vindman has $8 million left in the bank. I mean, this was not a campaign that frankly ran hard enough or that ran effectively enough and ran efficiently enough. And so, I do think you have to take -- again, not take anything away from Angie Nixon, I think you do have to take that into account as well.
HUNT: Yeah. Governor, what would you add?
MARK SANFORD (R), FORMER CONGRESSMAN AND GOVERNOR OF SOUTH CAROLINA: I'd add two things. I think one, it's a reminder of how all politics are local. That people -- I mean, I think there's an interesting juxtaposition between that race and the fact that they also, on the Democratic side, elected David Jolly to represent them. I mean, he's very much a centrist candidate, very opposite of some of the echo of what we're hearing. But it's a reminder that politics is local, a reminder that candidate quality absolutely always matters.
But it also is a reminder, people -- it was interesting what she said a moment ago, the hardworking people of Florida think. There's real unrest in the working class of America on both sides, Republican and Democrat. And people are pissed off in the way the system is not working for them. And there's rebellion against it on both right and left.
HUNT: Yeah. Bakari Sellers, I mean, when you watched the way Angie Nixon was campaigning there, you could hear the passion and in many ways what the governor was just addressing there, being willing to fight seems to be the primary criteria for Democratic voters these days. She clearly also had Black support in Florida, which you could also see there.
How would you look at the results out of Florida and apply them going forward?
BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: So, first of all, let me just say this is going to be a weird moment for me agreeing with both Marc Caputo and Mark Sanford. I took pride in trying to override that Mark Sanford put before legislature, but I have to throw some cold water on your premise here, Kasie.
I mean, the simple fact is this isn't a -- Florida is not some display that DSA is on the rise. The fact is, we sent Debbie Washman Schultz back to Congress, Moskowitz -- Jared Moskowitz back to Congress, elected David Jolly.
You saw a poor candidate lose a race because he ran poorly. This isn't some referendum on the far left or this left versus establishment narrative that people want to talk about.
And I'm also just going to have a blunt message for Democrats. We won't be wasting money in Florida now. We were going to be spending tons of money on a Senate seat that we were not going to win in Vindman instead of spending money in North Carolina and Ohio and maybe even Iowa, Senate seats we can win and now you're going to see that money not go to Florida. It's going to go to the places that are necessary that we have a fighting chance that we have an ability to win, and so the map has a funny way of realigning itself on primary night, and that's what happened last night.
CAPUTO: I wanted to add something, just some particulars about Vindman. He spent $9 million. $2 million of that was on TV.
To Bakari's point of how expensive Florida is, it's 10 TV markets.
[16:10:03]
It costs $3 million a week to run a saturation ad campaign where your average TV watcher sees a commercial 10 times. And that's a lot of money. He only spent $2 million. So, though people think Vindman is some sort of national figure, no one knew who he was in Florida.
HUNT: Yeah. Big picture, Kate Bedingfield. I mean, when you look at the way things are playing out for Democrats heading into these midterm elections, the sort of big picture question I have is where the party is currently thinking it's going to land and what that means in terms of the takeaways. Because while we may be setting up for a major blue wave or even a blue tsunami, that can sometimes paper over actual issues that are going on. It's not like the Democratic Party's brand is popular at the moment. BEDINGFIELD: It's true. That is true, unfortunately. A true statement. No, look, I think the big questions to look at in terms of where the party lands, how can the Democrats and what kind of Democratic candidates can make inroads again with non-college educated voters?
Where are Black voters lining up? Black voters are the heart and soul of the Democratic Party. They are the base of the Democratic Party. And questions about which kind of candidates are winning support from Black voters will tell you a lot about where the party is potentially going to go in 2028 and what kind of candidate is going to be successful in 2028.
I think -- I agree with Bakari. I don't think that anything that happened in Florida last night is a referendum on kind of where the party stands right now. I think, as he noted, if you look at -- you look at Debbie Wasserman Schultz, you look at Jared Moskowitz. I mean, these are candidates who -- there was a lot of energy on the far progressive left to try to defeat them in primaries, and they won overwhelmingly.
So, you know, the idea that Florida suggests that the progressive left is ascendant, I'm not sure that's so true, just based on the facts. But I think if you're trying to look at where the Democratic Party is going to net out and you look at the primary calendar across the course of the 2028 contest and you look at what kinds of voters are going to be central, who can make inroads with non-college voters? Who can win black voters? And that's going to tell you a lot about who will be the Democratic nominee in 2028.
THOMPSON: I think it's also very clear that the Democratic Party primary voters have shifted since eight years ago, where just being the chief Trump antagonist is no longer sufficient.
BEDINGFIELD: Yeah, certainly, I agree with that.
THOMPSON: You need a second argument.
BEDINGFIELD: I certainly agree with that.
HUNT: So, Congressman Moskowitz had this to say, to playbook, after he, of course, won his election. He said, quote, Democrats shouldn't play hide the Hasan Piker now, Moskowitz said. For all those people who thought it was a great idea to campaign with him, as J.C. once said, bring him out, bring him out, they shouldn't be hiding him now -- Marc.
CAPUTO: Oh, well, that's just a very Moskowitz type of phrase. He's always been very good with that.
He took -- you have to understand about one thing about Jared Moskowitz. His father, Mike Moskowitz, was one of the OG financiers of Florida's Democratic Party back in the day where there was no question about support for Israel, big AIPAC guy. And Moskowitz is now the face of that sort of older Democratic Party that's looking at the ascendant Angie Nixons, who called Netanyahu a war criminal, and wonder what's happening to their party. This tension is going to be playing out for quite some time.
HUNT: Yeah. Governor, on one other note, the Trump-backed candidate in the governor's race in Florida, Byron Donalds, didn't crack 50 percent. of the vote. Do you take anything away from that in terms of the power of Trump's endorsement or not? Because, you know, there's been this big question in many cases for there were Republicans that they couldn't win with Trump. They certainly couldn't win without him. But if there was a primary and they were going up against a Trump-back candidate, it was very hard to overcome. This result's a little bit mixed.
SANFORD: Yeah, I don't think there's a particular takeaway there. I mean, you have a multi-candidate that feel it's tough to get past 50 percent period. But I do think there's serious erosion as to what the Trump endorsement means. His numbers now, I think he's at about 10 losses. He's rivaling where he was in '22. And so, I think you're seeing real erosion there. I think it's going to be a more sustained and pronounced erosion.
HUNT: All right. Bakari Sellers and our panel all going to stand by.
Coming up next here in THE ARENA, new grass, a new driveway, a helipad to host cocktail hour. Ahead, new details on the White House projects that President Trump spent his morning showing off.
Plus, job interviews are scary, a televised debate to be the next senator from South Carolina apparently even scarier, which, you know, it's important to come prepared.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MODERATOR: Are Taiwan and the South China Sea national security issues for the United States? And if so, why or how?
SEN. DARLINE GRAHAM (R-SC): I'm just going to be honest here. I'm not on national security. I'm not that informed on national security, so -- but I do support the military.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:19:24]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. RALPH NORMAN (R-SC): She's running for the United States Senate. It's a six-year term. You need to get -- you need to get fully versed in what issues you're going to be dealing with. This isn't a train -- you know, get trained on the job.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Congressman Ralph Norman piling on South Carolina Senator Darline Graham after her tough debate performance last night. The pair vying to fill the Senate seat that was once held by Graham's late brother, Lindsey Graham.
President Trump appointed Darlene Graham to finish her brother's term, and will campaign alongside her in South Carolina this Friday.
[16:20:02]
Last night's debate now raising questions about whether the president's endorsement is going to be powerful enough to overcome moments like this one.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MODERATOR: Are Taiwan and the South China Sea national security issues for the United States? And if so, why or how?
GRAHAM: I'm just going to be honest here. I'm not on national security. I'm not that informed on national security. But I do support the military.
My brother was in the Air Force for 33 years, so I will do everything I can to support the military. My dad was in the Army.
I'm not a polished politician up here. National security is not my thing. not my area of expertise, but I do support the military.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. My panel is back.
Bakari Sellers, you're a former South Carolina state rep. Lindsey Graham was a lion of a figure. Obviously, his sister has been through a difficult time.
That moment, what do you think it will mean for her candidacy?
I'm not sure Bakari realizes that we're talking with him. OK, sorry about that.
So, what do you think this moment means for Darline Graham's candidacy?
SELLERS: Well, first of all, it was. It was utterly embarrassing. I mean, I. I have a great deal of respect for someone going through a grieving process and someone who loses a family member, particularly with the relationship that she and Lindsey had.
With that being said, man, that was the worst answer I've seen in a debate in a very, very long period of time. And we see people screw up debates all the time. The fact is, Donald Trump's about to go over three in South Carolina I do believe.
He lost the governor's race. He lost the redistricting battle and now he's about to lose this race with Darline Graham. We're in a country that's in a poor time. I mean, you're talking about Ukraine, you're talking about Iran, you're talking about Gaza and Israel. And for you to get up there and not have some fundamental grasp, everyone in South Carolina has this secret that no one wants to say out loud, but her only qualification for being in the United States Senate is she was related to Lindsey Graham, which we all will tell you should not be a qualification for being elected to the United States Senate.
I think Ralph Norman is going to be more in the line of Jim DeMint, so God bless South Carolina as we move forward. They should have elected Mark Sanford, but here we are.
HUNT: Mark Sanford, do you agree?
SANFORD: I think it was Bakari on this one.
But, you know, it is tragic. You feel for her as a candidate. That's a very humbling moment. All the things that Bakari said, his prelude is right.
But it -- I think it's a very damning moment in not only the debate but in the campaign.
THOMPSON: She confirmed many of the things that her opponents have been arguing, that she's not necessarily a nepo baby, but a nepo sister, and she's not qualified for this. And you also have to remember, Lindsey Graham was always at risk of being primaried for basically the entire Trump era, and he just very deftly played his politics with Trump in order to avoid that.
But, you know, there is not necessarily super warm, enthusiastic feelings for Lindsey Graham among the Republican electorate. Now, maybe Trump's endorsement can overcome that, but she confirmed some of the biggest critiques herself.
BEDINGFIELD: I think one of the things that was most damaging about it, just purely from a communications perspective, she seemed so uncomfortable. And voters, audiences will forgive you a whole lot. And frankly, the I'm not a polished politician, I don't -- that can actually be effective. And sometimes, voters kind of rally behind that and say, great, you're plainspoken. I don't need you to give me a treatise on the South China Sea.
But she didn't pivot in a way that made it work for her at all. She didn't move to affordability or any other topic. She just kind of stood frozen. And that's -- if you're a viewer watching that at home, it's actually the emotion of that that is what kind of sticks with you and makes you feel uncomfortable on her behalf.
HUNT: Well, and especially when her brother had such a focus on national security. And honestly, she had an easy answer available to her, which is he's got people around him, his former staff, she has people she can learn from.
But to the point about to forgive some moments we have. And maybe this will help somebody like a Darline Graham today feel better. She's not the first person to screw up this way. Let's watch a selection of people having these tough moments.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: General, I can name the general. General.
KATIE COURIC, HOST: What specifically, I'm curious that you --
SARAH PALIN (R), FORMER ALASKA GOVERNOR: All of them, any of them that have been in front of me over all these years.
[16:25:01]
SEN. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D-MN): I know that he is the Mexican president.
INTERVIEWER: But can you tell me his name?
KLOBUCHAR: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What would you do, if you were elected, about Aleppo?
GARY JOHNSON, FORMER NEW MEXICO GOVERNOR: About?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aleppo.
JOHNSON: And what is Aleppo?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're kidding.
JOHNSON: No.
RICK PERRY (R), FORMER TEXAS GOVERNOR: It's three agencies of government when I get there that are gone. Commerce, Education, and the -- what's the third one there? Let's see.
MODERATOR: But you can't name the third one?
PERRY: The third agency of government, I would do away with the education, the -- Commerce, and let's see, I can't. The third one, I can't, sorry.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Oh, man, I remember covering that. For Kate's sake, we didn't include the Biden Medicare --
(LAUGHTER)
BEDINGFIELD: I wasn't working for him at the time.
THOMPSON: There were a few when you were working for him, but he did, but he's the one.
BEDINGFIELD: I was going to say, we can pull up the ones I was looking for because he won. SANFORD: I think the difference here, though, is, to your point, it is reinforcing a precondition in terms of worry, like, wait a minute, a lot of people, when you move around, that's kind of like, okay, Lindsey, you like him, you didn't like him, The idea of political nepotism I think scares a lot of people at home.
CAPUTO: There's another aspect that women candidate, unfairly or fairly, I'll let people say it on their own, face a higher bar often from voters because they need to communicate that they are strong. And in that situation, her body language, her stammering over her words, she looked weak, and she's standing next to Ralph Norman, who's not well-liked by a lot of Republicans in Washington, by the way, but is sort of a big, imposing character, and that reinforces that weakness of hers and that relative strength.
BEDINGFIELD: And it is true, women candidates tend to face a higher hurdle also just in credentialing, in credentialing themselves. So, there's the strength question, and then there's a credentialing question, which sort of goes to what you were saying, she's already at a bit of -- a bit of a disadvantage on the idea of whether she's credentialed for this job. Kind of hard to argue she is, in my opinion.
And so, this is the kind of mistake that reinforces that.
HUNT: And, Governor, where do you think the Trump endorsement is with the Republican electorate in South Carolina right now? I mean, his approval ratings are very low. He's lost advantages on some of -- if you look at the polling on immigration even, which was one of his strongest issues, it's now kind of got away from him. But that said, obviously South Carolina is a very conservative place.
Do you think Trump endorsement for Darline Graham can overcome the moments like what we saw?
SANFORD: I'm beginning to doubt it. Make no mistake, he still has real juice in South Carolina. But if you look at what happened with the past governor's race and the fact that she didn't make it, you look at what happened with redistricting, both the things that Bakari just mentioned, they're already signaling trouble.
If you look at what's going to happen on Friday with this presidential visit. Unlike the normal 20,000 folks in a hangar routine, it's going to be totally wound down to 600 people, totally selected in a small, you know, hotel conference room.
I mean, it -- a lot of signals are coming that they're already sort of backing away. I mean, they may bomb somebody to avoid going down there on Friday. I don't know what's going to happen, but it's getting weird.
HUNT: Bakari, you want to jump in?
SELLERS: You should know never to go after Mark Sanford, but it is. It is getting weird and I do believe it -- look, I mean, Annie Andrews on the Democratic side has raised $10 million. I mean, you make it a race when you elect someone like Darline Graham who doesn't have the credentials who they're basically going to have to put away during the general election and not have her out on the campaign trail. And you have Ralph Norman, who at the end of the day, Ralph Norman actually stands for something.
The question that they're going to have about Darlene Graham is what do you stand for? Like, who are you? What do you stand for? You can't just say I'm going to go up there and support Trump.
People know what Ralph Norman stands for. I mean, he's been in the legislature. He's been in Congress. He's been a businessman.
And if nothing else, Ralph Norman marches to the beat of his own drummer and he's conservative as all hell. And so, I do think that that know what that -- what that is versus then unknown quantity of someone just being someone's sister.
HUNT: All right, Bakari Sellers, thank you, sir. Always appreciate it. Good to see you.
Rest of our panel is going to stand by.
Ahead here in THE ARENA, more on the big win for Democratic Socialists in the South. Jason Carter, the grandson of former President Jimmy Carter, will join us live to talk about the DSA surge and the new line of attack that some and his party are rolling out ahead of the midterms.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:34:02]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANGIE NIXON (D), FLORIDA SENATE CANDIDATE: It's not necessarily a socialist message or a progressive message. It's not about labels. It's actually just about the needs of people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Fresh off her upset victory in Florida's Democratic Senate primary last night, State Representative Angie Nixon, who did join the Democratic Socialists, is brushing aside concerns about how that label might sit with general election voters this November. Nixon's surprising win fueling the flames of the debate that's roiled the Democratic Party this primary season. To what extent should the Democratic Party embrace its far-left wing? Will they have success taking cues from the Democratic Socialists of America who sound like this on some of the key issues?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHANNON BREAM, FOX NEWS HOST: Replace the presidency and Supreme Court as we now know them?
MEGAN ROMER, DSA NATIONAL CO-CHAIR: Yep. BREAM: Abolish ICE?
ROMER: Absolutely.
BREAM: Abolish borders and give amnesty to anyone currently in the U.S. illegally?
[16:35:02]
ROMER: As a long-term plan, yep.
BREAM: Defund the Pentagon?
ROMER: Absolutely.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Or do Democrats want their candidates to sound more like Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff, who sounded like this even way back in the old days of 2020?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
INTERVIEWER: Do you support the Green New Deal?
SEN. JON OSSOFF (D-GA): No.
TALEV: Do you support Medicare for All?
OSSOFF: No.
INTERVIEWER: Do you support D.C. statehood?
OSSOFF: Yes.
INTERVIEWER: Do you support Puerto Rican statehood?
OSSOFF: Yes.
INTERVIEWER: Do you support defunding the police?
OSSOFF: No.
INTERVIEWER: Do you support abolishing ICE?
OSSOFF: No.
INTERVIEWER: Do you support expanding the Supreme Court?
OSSOFF: No.
INTERVIEWER: Do you support ending the filibuster?
OSSOFF: Maybe.
(END VIDEO CLIP) HUNT: All right, joining me now in THE ARENA is the grandson of President Jimmy Carter, former Georgia State Senator Jason Carter.
Jason, thank you so much for coming back in THE ARENA. Really appreciate it.
That is an enormous contrast, right? And if you ask Americans, and if you ask Democrats specifically, I do think it's worth noting that 34 percent did tell us that they would identify as Democratic socialists.
My question to you is, where do you think the party should be? I mean, you are Georgia through and through, and it is increasingly a state that tells us where the country may be going.
JASON CARTER, PRESIDENT CARTER'S GRANDSON, FORMER GEORGIA STATE SENATOR: Yeah, look, I mean, Georgia is a state that Donald Trump won once. He lost the next time and then he won it the next time, right? I mean, this is a swing state.
And what that means is that the people who decide this election are voters who change their minds. And I think that's something that Jon Ossoff certainly knows. I think Jon Ossoff is doing a great job, as you see.
And I think that the Fox News clip that you played, it's almost comical, right? I think that if 30 percent or whatever the number is that people say they identify in that way, that would be surprising to me. But at the same time, you pick one person who says one thing, another person who says another thing.
I think people make up their own minds. And the Democratic Party has been fighting over who it is for time immemorial, right? My grandfather was the sitting president, and Ted Kennedy ran against him from the left. So, this is not a new thing. It might have new labels. But I think people like Jon Ossoff, who are talking about the things that matter in people's lives, are the ones who are going to ultimately be the leaders of the party.
HUNT: It's interesting to me that you reference your grandfather and Kennedy in that context, because I was wondering about how someone like a Jimmy Carter, and he obviously comes up again and again when we have conversations like this, because he was from a conservative part of the country, you know, in many ways, his win was, I don't want to say unexpected exactly, but it really showed the way a Democrat could carve a path that was palatable for people. How do you think he would look at what we're seeing in the party today?
CARTER: Well, it's funny, right? Because you talk about what we're seeing in the party, and there's a variety of things that are happening, right? People are winning primary elections for congressional races, or they're winning primary elections for statewide office. And that's some definition of what the party means.
But you think about what our party has been nationally, we haven't had an establishment candidate get elected president that I can remember. I'm only 51, but, you know, every single person that's really been a successful Democratic candidate has come from nowhere in a lot of ways, right? They've caught on. They haven't come through that party structure. And I think that you see in both parties --
HUNT: Well, that's not so true of Joe Biden, I would say.
CARTER: -- voters are kind of fed up.
Well, Joe Biden was in a very unique situation, very unique. But Joe Biden also was coming -- right? I mean, let's think about that, right?
HUNT: Yeah.
CARTER: Joe Biden, you're right, was the last example. But you've got Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton. Those are the ones who sort of defined the party in my lifetime, and they've all came from nowhere.
HUNT: Yeah, no.
CARTER: I just think people on both sides are fed up with the establishment. Nobody likes their party establishment right now.
HUNT: One of the things that Jon Ossoff said recently was to go after Natalie Harp, who is an aide to President Trump. She's been referred to as the human printer, and he jabbed at her and at them in a way that many people reacted to as kind of gutter politics, if you will.
And David Axelrod, who, of course, was a longtime Obama strategist, said -- he praised Jon Ossoff, but then he also said, two words in it, with Natalie seemed gratuitous and unnecessary. They juiced the virality of it, I'm sure, probably thrilled some in the bass, but they distracted and detracted from the power of the message.
Donald Trump has really redefined the way we do politics in this country.
[16:40:01]
Do you think Democrats need to fight dirty the way he has, often with words, but in other ways as well, if they're going to keep up? Or do you think keeping it clean is the way to go?
CARTER: Look, I think Jon Ossoff is basically the opposite of Donald Trump when it comes to distractions, right? I think Jon Ossoff has been as disciplined as any candidate maybe ever. I mean, you saw that clip of him from 2020 just a few moments ago where he is just, he knows what he wants, he does it, he bangs it out, and he focuses on things that matter to people.
I think that this whole thing, if it is a distraction, it's the first time Jon Ossoff has ever caused a distraction. And I think what's funny is that the White House has responded to it with this giant response, right? They didn't really effectively respond to Ossoff on Iran. They haven't effectively responded to Ossoff on prescription drugs. But they crave the distraction. And so, as soon as there's one two words in anything that he says,
that's what the White House wants to talk about. I think he is doing a great job staying focused on issues that matter. He's got Republicans in South Georgia that love him.
And I think he's going to -- he's going to sort of wipe the floor with the folks that they've got down here. I mean, they're going to spend an enormous amount of money, but I like where Jon Ossoff is, and I think he's a good example of how we should be.
HUNT: Do you buy into the 2028 chatter around Jon Ossoff?
CARTER: I mean, I buy into it just because nobody knows anything. He's a talented guy, but I know that his discipline and his work ethic is hyper-focused on Georgia right now, right? If he thinks being a good senator is going to get him in that chatter, fine, but I think he's focused on being a good senator, and it shows in his constituent services, it shows in the blocking and tackling of his campaign, and this guy is hyper-focused, hyper-disciplined, and he's trying to be the good senator for Georgia.
What happens after that? I honestly think he's not even talking about it or thinking about it. And that's hard to do if you're in his position, but I believe it.
HUNT: Well, you may believe it. I take it. I'm not sure I believe it, but we can agree to disagree. Jason Carter, thank you so much, sir. I really appreciate it. I hope you'll come back.
CARTER: Likewise, anytime.
HUNT: All right. Coming up next here in THE ARENA, it was show and tell at the White House today. President Trump sure had a lot to tell the press about his newest construction projects.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If you take a look at the stone, look how perfect the stone is. If you grass, you're very happy. And this grass will look so beautiful. You look at the lettering and you look at the joints, they're like flawless. We put in the finest marble that you can get.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:47:06]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Like I'm fixing the country, we're fixing the White House too. It's ridiculous the way this place was taken care of. Nobody, including other presidents, they didn't see it. But I see it because I was very good at real estate, like maybe the best in a lot of ways. And I love construction. (END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: I love construction, he says.
President Trump showing us just how true that statement is. This morning, he took the press on an impromptu tour of his various White House construction projects, including one that was previously unannounced. It's worth noting, the president's schedule initially said he was participating in a policy meeting during that time.
Instead, he spent 32 minutes -- yes, 32, we counted, and you are currently watching part of it at double speed with some jumps so you can get a sense of just how long this went on for, with the president explaining in painstaking detail the changes that he's bringing to the people's house.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Every stone is two degrees rounded. This granite has a million-year life. It's a very strong stone. We put topsoil, brand-new earth on top. It's a tapered ball, great. I'm very good at flagpoles.
The ballroom is so much a military component with the drones and the bomb shelter. It goes down five stories. It goes down almost 65 feet.
You look at the lettering and you look at the joints, they're like flawless. Those are called shear walls, and they're of the greatest strength concrete. You look how fine that's cut, these are three different coins, all different. Like that. And like that. They're going to be flipped.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: President of the United States, Marc Caputo, construction foreman?
CAPUTO: He loves it. He is the builder in chief. But if you wonder why his approval ratings have been slipping even among Republicans, it's that they're constantly reminded that he ran to tackle inflation. Inflation hasn't been tackled. And he's talking about the ballroom and beautiful marble.
We wrote a story the other day in "Axios" about the president's approval rating falling among Republicans in the most recent YouGov poll. It's down the approval rating to 79, and it's fallen 12 points. And that seems like a lot. But the real movement is when you look at the internals, those who had a very strong approval of him, they've ticked down 20 points.
So, the thrill is gone for Republicans. They're increasingly like, ahh, and stuff like this is part of the reason why.
HUNT: Yeah, I mean, if you look at the polling among -- now, this is all Americans. That's an interesting stat among Republicans. But 58 percent of Americans feel dissatisfied/angry about Donald Trump's construction projects. Only 17 percent are satisfied/happy with them. [16:50:04]
Governor, what is the president hoping to accomplish? I mean, 32 minutes -- and Kate, I would like you to weigh in on this as well, 32 minutes in a presidential day is an enormously long amount of time. I mean, it's like maybe it doesn't feel -- I mean, you can easily waste 32 minutes on Instagram like the rest of us, but he's running the country.
SANFORD: Right, right. What he hopes to achieve is immorality (ph). I mean, I'm serious. I look at that and it's frightening in that none of us are wild about dying, but I think he's preoccupied with it. Because whether it's the Triumphant Arch, whether it's renaming the Peace Center, whether it's the ballroom, you just go down the list, name on Kennedy Center.
I mean, it's endless in wanting to put a mark that I was here, that I existed. It ought to be your actions in the governance role that stand out. And these accoutrements, this is sort of Marie Antoinette and let them eat cake kind of moment.
I mean, this is scary when people -- the price of gas, inflation, things are really impacting working people's lives and you're worried about the marble on the helicopter landing pad.
HUNT: Yeah, and the sheer cost of the things that he is doing, which is not on display as he should.
BEDINGFIELD: Yeah, well, there's the 32 minutes of his time internally when you think about how the president's Time is scheduled. It is scheduled within minute increments. And there were decisions made that gave him the time to do this rather than other things.
There's the internal impact. But then there's also the external impact. You only get so much voter attention every day. If you're lucky, you get a couple of clips as they're scrolling or a few minutes on their local broadcast at night on TV.
And so, for Trump, who is -- I would never argue is not somebody who knows how to command the attention economy. To use the time to focus on projects that feel very, very divorced from people's lives and very, very divorced from a focus on anything that makes their lives better is just it's you know, if I were a Republican running in the cycle, I mean, I would just be absolutely ripping my hair out because he's not helping them by doing this.
THOMPSON: Well, and some Democrats running into competitive seats are jumping for joy because they see an advantage with this focus on the Mar-a-Lago-fication of Washington, D.C. and the White House in particular. I mean, you know, just even anecdotally, you go out in the country just with voters. If you talk about a ballroom, they immediately think about the White House. Like, that has broken through in like a unique way.
And to the broader point, it's not really about the ballroom. It's about the focus and the energy being put on the ballroom. HUNT: Yeah.
CAPUTO: Yeah, but to Mark's point is Donald Trump doesn't so much see himself as a Marie Antoinette. He sees himself as a Caesar, as Augustus, who famously found Rome, brick, and left it marble. This is what he's thinking about. Now, I guess I could get more literary and say maybe he's like Ozymandias and think, look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair.
(LAUGHTER)
CAPUTO: But in the end, he is very much thinking about legacy in a variety of ways. He has stamped his legacy on the GOP. and altered its DNA for a long period of time to come. And now he's doing it in Washington, certainly doing it in the White House grounds, but even more broadly, he's even talking in these empirical emperor-like ways about we put water back in the fountains, right?
You've gotten rid of the homeless who were like encamped all over the parks. You know, to some people, they like that.
THOMPSON: To your point, I mean, some ways he is successful you know there were a lot of Democrats very early on talking about we're going to tear down the ballroom, we're going to reverse all these things he's done so many things to this city to the White House to everything that no Democratic president is going to be able to reverse all of it and that's part of the point.
CAPUTO: Who's going to take the gold off of the wall like the next president gets in especially as a Democrat one of the questions we're going to ask the president -- like, what do you do with all the gold? And if they do, well, there's his legacy.
BEDINGFIELD: They won't, I bet. I think there's a lot. I agree, certainly, that he's done so much. No president's going to come in and spend the time. I mean, to this point, no one else is going to invest the time that they could be doing other things to help people across the country to do this. But I do think the gold in the White House that's visible now in every camera shot, I think a Democratic president's going to pull that down on day one.
It is a visual representation of Trump that's very much identified with him. And it's also just, I mean, historically, the White House hasn't been, you know, it hasn't been Versailles. It hasn't been a place where the leader of the country is constantly, like, you know, adorned with gold. And I don't think any Democratic president's going to want that image either. So, my prediction is day one, that all the gold is coming down.
THOMPSON: Yeah, one Democrat to me called it Saddam Sheikh.
HUNT: Yeah, Saddam Sheikh.
BEDINGFIELD: Yeah.
SANFORD: But it's ultimately a mark of disconnect. The average working person out there.
[16:55:00]
BEDINGFIELD: Certainly.
SANFORD: Their humble abode, how they lived. Wait, we're getting more and more disconnected.
The whole point of the White House in original format was the people's house. I mean, it wasn't that long ago in the grand scheme of things that people were walking in and out without gates. We live in a different security environment, but I find it scary.
HUNT: All right. On that note, we'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HUNT: All right, thanks very much, my panel. Really appreciate you all being here.
Thanks to you at home for watching as well. Don't forget, you can now stream THE ARENA Live. You can catch up whenever you want to in the CNN app. Scan that QR code below. You can also catch up by listening to our podcast. You can follow us on X and Instagram @TheArenaCNN.
"THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER" starts right now.
