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CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt
Trump Makes Third Trip To Texas In A Month Amid Tight Senate Race; NYT: Trump Advisers Helped A Pro-Russian Government Amid U.S. Midterms; GOP Senator Thom Tillis On Trump's Iran Rhetoric. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired October 07, 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: THE ARENA WITH KASIE HUNT starts after a quick break. Thanks for joining us this afternoon.
(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, President Donald Trump headed to the battleground state of Texas -- yes, you heard that right -- for the third time in less than a month, as yet another leaked audio clip reveals that Republican senate candidate Ken Paxton has some unfiltered thoughts.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
KEN PAXTON (R), TEXAS SENATE CANDIDATE: It's the war, it's gas prices, it's diesel. When it's over $6 a gallon for diesel -- I mean, it's -- put money, they have a lot of trucks that are diesel, People are feeling the pinch. So, that's a -- that's probably the biggest problem and that, of course, drives up food prices and everything else.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
HUNT: That audio obtained and shared by "Axios". In a statement to CNN, a Paxton campaign spokeswoman said, quote, "This is a non-story. The attorney general said, what every Texan already knows, gas and diesel prices are too high, and hardworking Texans are struggling at the pump and the grocery store. President Trump is doing everything he can to bring prices down, and Ken Paxton is going to Washington to help him," end quote.
That explanation seemingly good enough for the president who said this before he left Washington today
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: After this week's leaked recordings from Ken Paxton, do you have any regrets about endorsing his candidacy? DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No, no, no, not at all.
He was a great attorney general. I think he'll be a great senator. Ken Paxton was a great. He was considered the best or certainly one of the few best, but the best attorney general in the whole country. And no, I -- I would have no regrets at all.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: The sheer amount of money and presidential attention that the Texas Senate race is demanding. Pretty notable because Trump handpicked Ken Paxton. He endorsed him and ousted John Cornyn in the primary, and early polling showed Cornyn in a much stronger position against the Democrat, James Talarico. Now, the latest polling has Talarico leading Paxton by six points outside the margin of error.
So the question right now is this, with less than four weeks left, is there anything that President Trump can tell Texas voters to turn the tide of what might be the most important race of this midterm election?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Here in Texas, Democrats have nominated James Talafreako for the Senate. And he is a weird looking dude. I mean, I don't like talking about looks. We have to elect Ken Paxton.
I said, I don't really like the way he looks. I don't like it. I don't like it. I don't care as long as he wins, I really don't care.
We got to get this guy elected. You got a freako, you got a freako that's running against him. Give me a break.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: All right. Let's get off the sidelines and head into THE ARENA. My panel is here.
CNN special correspondent Jamie Gangel; CNN political director, Washington bureau chief David Chalian; CNN political commentator, former Biden White House communications director Kate Bedingfield, and CNN senior political commentator Scott Jennings.
Welcome to all of you. Thank you so much for being here.
David Chalian, I'm not sure I'm convinced that Donald Trump doesn't care what Ken Paxton looks like. You're not convinced.
(LAUGHTER)
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: We now have the president's take on the esthetics of both candidates in the race. So, yes.
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Neither come from central casting. When he says that that's what you're in. Yeah, it looks like central casting. You didn't hear that.
CHALIAN: Right. You know, you've heard this multiple times from the president. This is one of his sort of talking points about Paxton.
I will say, you know, whether or not the second half of Paxton's campaign statement about the president, everyone knows the president is working to bring down prices is true. Voters can decide that in November. The first half is clearly true about this leaked audio. Ken Paxton is just sort of speaking the reality, as his campaign acknowledges here, of what is existing on the ground right now, like the fuel prices are really high and that is giving an economic pitch to voters who are expressing real concern about their day to day economic experience.
That is a reality, not just in Texas, but all over the country. That both these both parties are dealing with as the landscape upon which this midterm election is taking place.
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think in addition to that, the other thing about the leaked audio that is perhaps telling on both sides of the aisle, I think you've got an electoral base that wants fighters, right? They're saying it repeatedly. We want fighters. We want people are going to go to Washington. They're going to shake up the status quo, whether that's, you know, on the MAGA base wanting to support Trump Democratic base very much, not wanting to.
I think Paxton essentially admitting in this audio that he is effectively powerless, that forces outside of his control are shaping the race. That's the other piece of this that seems actually pretty damning to me. If you're somebody who's looking to send somebody to Washington to get something done, to hear him say effectively, like, well, I don't really have any control over the things that are impacting your life. Not a great --
HUNT: Right. Well, I mean, and this is, of course, the third piece of leaked audio in as many days. And we can play I think one of the things Kate's referring to is something we heard earlier in -- this week where essentially Paxton said, I have no control over my own campaign.
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Let's listen.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
PAXTON: I've never been in a race where I felt less control over the campaign and like what issues are going to matter because it's all coming, you know, from D.C., and I don't control the message or what we're doing or, and I cant, I have no -- I don't have the ability to change anything. So I have to live with whatever I've got.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
HUNT: Scott Jennings, he just has to live with it. I mean, part of this is he can't raise any money, right? I mean, an outside money you're spending outside money on TV ads. You're spending basically five times as much money for the same amount of impact as, say, James Talarico is actual campaign is spending on the airwaves.
JENNINGS: Well, what he is saying is objectively true in the campaign finance regime in which we live, candidates have no control over what outside groups are doing. And when you're in his position where his campaign is spending comparatively little compared to all the outside money that's coming in, he's telling you the truth.
HUNT: Well, his campaign is spending little because no one will give him any money.
JENNINGS: Yeah, I just said he's spending -- he's spending comparatively little compared to what's having to be spent on his behalf. But just so people know how it works, campaigns cannot call up super PACs and dictate what you can and can't say. So when he says he has little control over it, he is literally telling the truth.
The other thing he doesn't have control over are world affairs and events and circumstances that he's having to message to and around. And, you know, having been on a lot of campaigns, I'm sure this is true for you too, Kate. When candidates feel like other people are sort of dictating how they're, you know, what people think about dictating what they, what people think they might say about an issue, it can be frustrating.
And that's why the campaign finance system frustrates a lot of candidates because they don't like it when other people are basically speaking on their behalf. But the average voter doesn't know that.
BEDINGFIELD: That's the thing. I mean, yes, that's that is certainly true. But I think the problem for Paxton here is what he's articulating is exactly part of what people hate about the campaign finance system.
JENNINGS: Including him.
BEDINGFIELD: And about the way that corporate money and super PAC money and, you know, unlimited billionaire donor money gets poured into these.
JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: Let me say, guys. There -- there's one other problem here. All of those things are true. But I think the gentleman doth protest too much because strong candidates are bringing in money and they are winning their races.
Ken Paxton has a truckload of his own personal problems. He's not a strong candidate. And, you know, it's sort of interesting to see how the Democrats that I talked to in Texas, they don't want to say it out loud. They whisper, but they go, I think Talarico can win.
I mean, it's -- you're really seeing Paxton's weakness here, in addition to all of these other issues.
HUNT: Yeah. I mean, David, where are you on that? And we can put up the 2018 Texas Senate results when Beto O'Rourke ran against Ted Cruz and it was a close race, but Cruz was at 50.9 percent, Beto at 48.3. I mean, this has been, you know, something that Democrats have chased over and over again. And it's never borne out the way it's been promised.
I will say the sources I'm talking to are currently saying these numbers seem different. I think the question I have is like, should I -- should I buy it? Do you buy it?
CHALIAN: I have long said about Texas, I will buy it when I see the votes counted on Election Day. Like that's when ill say, oh, look at that. They flip Texas blue because it's been -- it's been your party's like white whale here for quite some time.
I, but I do think there are a couple of things when you compare to 2018, Kasie. First of all, well, obviously that was a very good year for Democrats. They won 40 house seats and the like. The -- on issue number one of the economy, Trump was much, much stronger in 2018 than he is today. That is a problem. And what we are seeing in the Latino vote, all those gains that Donald Trump made in 2024, not all of them, but much of them are swinging back towards the Democrats in -- specifically in places like Texas.
And so that also can have a different calculation than we saw in 2018, underneath those numbers. That being said, it is Texas, and I will believe that Democrats can win a Senate seat in Texas when I see the actual results in November.
BEDINGFIELD: But I think -- sure. But I also -- look at the gubernatorial race, too. I mean, that's another proof point that there is, you know, perhaps a historic levels of frustration with the Republican Party, probably unprecedented levels of frustration with Donald Trump and the MAGA movement. You see, you know, Gina Hinojosa is tied or ahead of Greg Abbott in a lot of that polling, too.
So, yes, Paxton certainly a uniquely weak candidate, but it does seem like the fundamentals across the board support Democrats in November in Texas.
JENNINGS: The average Republican there has to decide though. Okay, let's just say my nose is out of joint about this issue or that, or I'm dissatisfied about, am I really going to turn to the socialist Democratic Party? Am I really going to turn to the guy who thinks there's six genders?
[16:10:01]
Am I really going to turn to the guy who speaks a language in all of these unearthed videos that don't even recognize as an American citizen? And that -- that is, are Republicans really going to turn towards someone who is nowhere near approaching the middle of the road on anything? That's the decision.
BEDINGFIELD: So far, so far, the money that has been spent trying to make that case, if you look at the public polling, would suggest that they have not been able to successfully define Talarico in that way.
JENNINGS: Well, we got a month to go and the voters have to make that decision. I think there are some Republicans out there, maybe they don't like Ken Paxton, but asking them to turn to Talarico, one of the farthest left, weirdest Democrats in America, in Texas. It feels like a bridge too far to me, even though I acknowledge Paxton's challenges.
GANGEL: There is a third choice. They don't show up at the polls. Who comes out at the end of the day?
HUNT: Yes.
JENNINGS: Are you saying it's all about turnout?
GANGEL: Yes.
JENNINGS: No one's ever thought of that.
GANGEL: Thank you.
BEDINGFIELD: Democrats are motivated to vote in a way --
HUNT: Who knew?
Well, let's watch one of the ads that Talarico is running because again, you're hearing from Scott, right? What Republicans are saying about Talarico, who they tried to dub Talarico. This is Talarico's response. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES TALARICO (D), TEXAS SENATE CANDIDATE: Ken Paxton is lying about my record. Even making fake A.I. videos of me. No, I'm not a member of the Chinese communist party. No, I don't support sex change surgeries for kids. I don't have to use A.I. because the truth about Ken Paxton is bad enough.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: And, of course, let's watch what the president is saying is the truth about Ken Paxton, because he says a lot of not nice things. Now, of course, this list doesn't include many of the things that are part of Ken Paxton's actual governing record, which include impeachment, et cetera. But watch the president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Ken Paxton, you might not like the way he dresses. And I say this, it's so insulting to him, but I might as well say it. You might not like the way he looks. You might not love his look. You might not love his television interviews.
He may not dress right. He may not talk exactly perfectly. And he may not be the best looking guy I've ever seen.
Ken Paxton was at my side more than anybody, and I have to always remember that because he can be a pain in the ass sometimes. I'll be honest.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: I mean, Scott Jennings, with friends like these. JENNINGS: I think what he's describing is an authenticity --
(LAUGHTER)
JENNINGS: -- that you rarely find in a candidate.
(LAUGHTER)
JENNINGS: I'm trying. Stop laughing. Everyone stop laughing right now
(LAUGHTER)
JENNINGS: Valiant efforts. I know.
BEDINGFIELD: The fact that he does not -- the fact that he does not dress well is not what people don't like about Ken Paxton, okay?
They like -- they don't like the fact that he is totally supportive of a Trump agenda that they feel like has made their lives more expensive. They don't like the fact that he was held accountable for ethics scandal, you know, ethics violations by his own party, by the Republican Party in Texas. They don't like the ugliness around his divorce.
I mean, there are -- there are reasons that voters in Texas are rejecting Ken Paxton thus far, if you believe the polls that have nothing to do with the way he dresses.
JENNINGS: Now, his wife did make an ad, one of the PACs that's obviously in control of the messaging here.
CHALIAN: She couldn't bring herself to say his name in the ad.
JENNINGS: She told everybody to vote Republican. And herein lies the strategy. Here's -- herein lies the strategy It's -- you know, if you put Democrats back in control in Washington, do you have any expectation that anything would get any better? They have no record of ever wanting to lower gas prices or help the oil and gas industry in Texas, for instance.
So that is the -- that is the question she's putting before the voters. I thought it was a pretty shrewd strategic move.
HUNT: All right. On that note, coming up next here in THE ARENA, Republican Senator Thom Tillis will be here live. What he's saying today about the race to replace him and what he wants the party to look like after Donald Trump leaves office.
Plus, why two of the president's top political advisers went overseas to work for a government backed by Vladimir Putin less than a month before the midterms?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Well, they're allowed to do that. They have a lot of clients. And that's okay. I'm -- I'm a client of theirs. They have a consulting firm, I guess separately, as all people in Washington do, that's pretty common.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: They don't have a conflict because they're independent people. You know, they don't work for me. They are consultants. And they -- I assume they have a lot of clients. So I don't know who their clients are.
If I thought they had a conflict with here, I would terminate. I'm sure they have many clients, but that would be true with everybody in Washington.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: President Trump there putting some distance between himself and two of his political advisers, James Blair and Chris LaCivita, who are said, according to a "New York Times" report, to have traveled to a small Russia-aligned territory in the Balkans to advise its government on voting issues there.
According to "The Times" report, Blair, who's a former deputy White House chief of staff who now runs Trump's political operations, and Chris LaCivita, who is, of course, one of Trump's 2024 campaign managers, each pocketed hundreds of thousands of dollars from the work.
CNN's senior White House correspondent Kristen Holmes is joining us now.
So, Kristen, we see what the president is saying publicly. What's your behind the scenes reporting on all this?
KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, we are told that President Trump did not know that the small territory was a client of LaCivita and Blair's, or that they had traveled to the Balkans for this last weekend. He learned about this when he was briefed by various officials because of the impending "New York Times" story.
Now, one source said that he was pissed.
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Another said that he seemed annoyed. One thing we know he did was get on the phone and start calling around on Tuesday night, asking people what they thought of it.
And one source pushed back on the notion that he was even that annoyed, saying he just wanted people's opinions. And it certainly seemed by the time that he decided he wanted to respond and dictated this response while he floated the idea of firing them in that response, I want you to hear what he told our colleague Alayna Treene when she caught up with him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Do you think that your advisor, James Blair and Chris LaCivita, should have been in the Balkans less than 30 days?
TRUMP: Well, they're allowed to do that. They have a lot of clients, and it's okay. I'm -- I'm a client of theirs. They have a consulting firm. I guess separately, as all people in Washington do. That's pretty common.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: It certainly sounds like that's something that he heard from many of these advisers that he called, many of whom I assume have their own clients and are in Washington, D.C., because he kept saying the same thing. that's a common thing in Washington.
Just one thing to keep in mind here. I mean, these aren't just any two random advisers. These are his top political advisers. They're James Blair, who left the White House in order to run his entire political operation ahead of the midterms. Chris LaCivita was the co-campaign manager.
But President Trump is right about one thing, a lot of people in Washington or most people in Washington seem to have their own firm and a lot of clients. So I would imagine that was the feedback he was getting from other allies who also might not want their client list made public.
HUNT: Yeah, I'm sure -- I'm sure Trump loves being like one on the list of such, such clients.
HOLMES: Yeah.
HUNT: Kristen Holmes for us at the White House -- Kristen, thank you very much.
All right. I want to bring in Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina. He is, of course, the author of the new book, "How to Lose Friends And Antagonize Presidents", perhaps one in particular.
Senator, great to see you. Thank you so much for being here.
SEN THOM TILLIS (R-NC): Thank you for having me.
I was just thinking I did a pretty good job with Biden and a little bit with Obama, too. That's why I put the plural.
HUNT: That's fair.
So I want to first ask you about this "New York Times" report, because, of course, these are the president's architects, really, of his midterm strategy. And the government that they were advising has close ties to Vladimir Putin.
Is that kosher? Is that acceptable?
TILLIS: No, not at all. Actually, you know, I'm the Republican lead for the Senate NATO observer group. I've spent time in BIH, and over in Kosovo and Serbia, and they -- they're destabilizing the Republic of Srpska is a destabilizing force in the area, very much Putin- aligned.
And the last thing anybody who's interested in protecting the president should be consulting on the side.
These guys were not hurting for money. They don't need to be doing that. They shouldn't be doing that. If reports are true, they should get out of that relationship very, very quickly.
HUNT: So, how would you -- with your understanding of the region, how would you characterize what they are doing here? Who are they helping?
TILLIS: There -- there is a movement there -- to separate -- to tear apart the very tenuous relationship that you have there with the presidency, which are three different leaders. There's a separatist movement. There's an argument that that down the road in Serbia, It's being egged on there because Vucic is more or less Putin aligned. But Vucic likes to make everybody think he's their best friend.
I think it's a -- it's just a horrible look. It's --
HUNT: Do you think they're helping Putin?
TILLIS: I hope -- well, if -- look, this group is very much Russian aligned, so I doubt seriously they're doing it intentionally, but indirectly, they are absolutely doing it.
This is about knowing your customer. And this customer is bad news for that region and certainly for our partners in the region. It's a horrible look.
Like I said, these guys don't need the money. They should get out of that, get away from the appearances, even if everything they're doing is legal, they should get out because the appearances stink.
HUNT: Should Trump cut ties with them if they don't?
TILLIS: I'll leave that up to the president. You know, James Blair is capable. I don't know LaCivita much. The -- James Blair is a very capable political mind. I think he's made good calls for the president.
This is a bad call. And they need to vet their clients better if they're in there.
HUNT: So let's talk about the midterms more broadly. Of course, the president's poll numbers are abysmal. And the bottom seems to be starting to fall out for Republicans across the map, putting the Senate potentially at risk. The president has given himself an A-plus rating repeatedly. Would you
grade him at an A-plus for his midterm efforts?
TILLIS: Not a cumulative grade. I mean, if for no other reason than I don't think we've managed the Iran war well. Epic Fury was a resounding success. Even Democrats stipulated that.
But the -- after that operation, I think that we've meandered and the American people may be more patient if they knew what the objectives were and we were achieving them. After Epic Fury, there really haven't been a lot of measurable results. It's one example.
But I also tell you, I showed you a picture before we went live. I was 10 points down six years ago this week. So Republicans shouldn't give up. Republicans could go door to door, make phone calls, do what they can to get members elected.
I think if Talarico -- Talarico has been calling for the nuclear option for the filibuster since 2022, he's going to be liberal.
[16:25:01]
And he's going to -- he's already said that he's prepared to destroy the Senate institution. That's the sort of stuff we should be talking about in Texas.
And as far as Paxton's concerned, Paxton's a free man. He can say whatever he wants to. For him to say the message is being controlled out of Washington suggest to me he either agrees with it or he doesn't know how to go to a microphone and state his own position. And he needs to, because we need to win Texas.
HUNT: Let's talk for a second about your home state of North Carolina, because, of course, polling does show Governor Roy Cooper up over Michael Whatley. Do you believe that polling, if you're polling --
TILLIS: I think it's overstated, but I would suspect that he does have a majority, and I would suspect the aggregate of polls that were used to exit North Carolina. The thing that's disturbing to me about, not the Republican money leaving North Carolina, but Democrats have taken down buys, and they're more or less relying on Roy Cooper moving forward. That's disturbing to me. That means the Democrats think that it's won.
HUNT: Do you wish that you were on the ballot if you were on the ballot, would that seat be more in play?
TILLIS: Well, you know who's going to sit here and not say they think they were? I think that I would have a better opportunity because I resonate more with unaffiliated voters. I've always been, you know, characterized as a soft Republican. Well, go take a look at my Second Amendment, pro-life, limit government, cut taxes, anti-regulations record and see if that bears out in reality,
It's about tone and it's about respect. And I believe that Michael Whatley needs to assume that the president and Republicans can get out the MAGA base, and he needs to be his own man and speak to the unaffiliated voters, exactly the way that I did. We were supposedly down 10 points. We won by 1.7.
It's not out of reach for Whatley, but he's got a lot of work to do.
HUNT: Broadly, when you think about how the election is going to play out on election night and beyond, do you have concerns about how President Trump has talked about is approaching accepting the results on election night?
TILLIS: Yeah, I -- you know, I can see why people, when they saw January 6th could see that that could be a kind of a redo. If we have close races and you do an automatic recount, is there going to be some pushback? Yeah, but I made a bet on another TV network earlier today that It's going to be a peaceful transition. It's not going to be a thing. And I'm willing to bet anybody ahead of time, because if they double down on the narrative, I'll remind them of that when I win the bet. It'll be a peaceful transition.
Now, keep in mind as late as -- the mid 70s, there was a Senate member that wasn't seated because of questionable circumstances and we may go through some of that drama, but that's -- that's not any different than doing an automatic recount, the other things, if the elections are close.
HUNT: Do you think it's possible that the House Speaker Mike Johnson might not seat the new Congress?
TILLIS: I think if the elections have been certified, it would be a dereliction of duty not to do that.
HUNT: And are you -- is there a concern behind the scenes among Republicans that there would be pressure on Johnson to do that?
TILLIS: You know, there may always be pressure, but I've got a lot of respect for Speaker Johnson in the same way that I think Mike Pence did the right thing on January 6th, I think Speaker Johnson will.
HUNT: All right. I want to ask you about some of the president's recent remarks, because, of course, he was addressing a rally in Nebraska, and he suggested that Iran might bomb Los Angeles, might bomb San Diego. There are, of course, tens of millions of Americans who live there.
The California Governor Gavin Newsom said that this is something that would -- should provoke the invocation of the 25th Amendment. What do you say to Newsom on that? And what do you think those comments say about the president?
TILLIS: Well, you know, if it was said about Charlotte or Raleigh, I'd be really mad. And I'm mad about this, mainly because it's an unforced error.
I don't really think the president meant what he said, or he was saying it in sort of a campaign rally context. But you know what he should be talking about is building a case for why were there, apologizing for energy prices being high, but understanding he has a moral obligation to save us from a terrorist regime that could have a nuclear weapon and an ability to send it to the United States.
So I think we're missing the point there. People are frustrated. They're spending too much money for gas. I think if the president explained in much the same way that Ronald Reagan explained why he walked away from Gorbachev at Reykjavik, because they wanted SDI on the table. And he said, I can't in good conscience put the American people at risk for this concession.
The president needs to build a case for it. And time is wasting. If he doesn't do it soon, it's going to be the single biggest impact, I think, on election results in 27 days.
HUNT: So, of course, Newsom talking about the 25th Amendment, Democrats perhaps on track to take back at least the House and potentially the Senate, right? It means we're probably going to be having a lot of conversations here in Washington about impeachment, potentially, whether it be of officials or of the president himself.
If Democrats are in control and the president does something that they believe is an impeachable offense, do you think that that is a smart way to hold the president accountable?
[16:30:06]
TILLIS: I think the Democrats, like Republicans and Democrats before, if they misread the election result as a mandate, they'll overreach and there'll be political consequences for them.
Look, if they're going to go through the process, the impeachment that they did after January the 6th was a snap impeachment. It didn't have any of the underpinnings of a due process. And that's why I couldn't talk --
HUNT: Didn't that come much closer to -- I mean, there were questions about whether Mitch McConnell was on that.
TILLIS: Yeah. But -- yeah, there were some angry people. There were some people that voted for it.
But I'm a real -- it's a -- process is important to me. And you don't impeach the president of the United States in anger after about a month of discussion that didn't involve witnesses, attorneys, the kinds of things that the impeachment. We'll take a look at the Clinton process. That was a methodical process. If they do that and there's real guilt, fine, and anything could happen.
But on Newsom, let's keep in mind, Newsom's a little bit of a political animal, invoking the 25th --
HUNT: A little bit.
TILLIS: Yeah. I'm not so sure he was talking about that when people were worried about President Biden. So that may have had a little bit of a political motivation to it.
HUNT: As we look to what the president is going to do next, and here after the break, we're going to talk a lot about the future of your party and what you think about that. But President Trump has suggested in the past that he has the right to pardon himself. Do you think that's a plausible outcome here? And what would you say?
TILLIS: No, I hate it. You know, you know, the -- I know we're going to talk about it later, but the whole premise of the book is we keep one upping each other. Keep in mind, President Biden kind of galvanized the concept of prospective get out of jail free pardons.
And then President Trump, you know, we keep on besting each other, but pardoning yourself for offenses that you haven't committed yet sounds a little bit unseemly. Seems a little king-like, to be honest with you. And I would hope he'd use judgment not to do that.
HUNT: Should Congress ban the presidential pardon?
TILLIS: I don't think we should ban it, but I do think to the extent that we can find ways to create contours around it, I think it's pretty important. I heard at one point, it was going around Washington that somebody was trying to petition for a pardon of the corporation Binance, not the CEO, who got a pardon, but literally the corporation.
And I thought that that was fascinating. That's just another example of where I don't -- I think that it's been exploited. I don't think that some of the pardons over the past two administrations have been within the contours of what the Founding Fathers envisioned.
HUNT: All right. Senator, stand by for me, because we're going to have much more right after the break.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:37:11]
HUNT: All right. Welcome back.
We're back with Senator Thom Tillis, who in his new book, writes that he's a lifelong Republican, has no plans to not be a lifelong Republican.
But you, of course, have regularly criticized the current Republican president. My question for you is, as you look to the future of your party, we're headed for an election cycle in 2028, where the vice president, J.D. Vance, sits as perhaps the front runner. You don't spend a ton of time in your book criticizing him. You've got plenty of choice words for a host of cabinet nominees. But you do at one point, deride his, quote, "embarrassing ass kissing" that you saw from him and others at cabinet meetings, Hegseth.
Can you tell me a little bit about what you think about J.D. Vance and what role you think president Trump should or will play in the nominating process?
TILLIS: J.D. -- J.D. is a good guy. I think he's got a good heart. He -- he's politically or ideologically inconsistent. The guy that I served with for a couple of years is not the guy that I see dutifully executing the president's priorities, you know?
HUNT: Is that disqualifying.
(CROSSTALK)
TILLIS: -- those sorts of things.
Well, it's not disqualifying, but at some point, if all you are -- you know, I say in the book, some of these people want to intimidate Trump, but it's like putting on a Spider-Man costume without having been bitten by a radioactive spider. It's a bad luck.
Nobody's going to repeat Trump and his personality. He's got to be his own man. And frankly, the president will have an outsized influence over the selection of the nominee. But I don't think it's a walk in. I believe there's going to be a lot of people going after it.
HUNT: And are you committed to supporting whoever the Republican nominee is in 2028?
TILLIS: I will, I absolutely will.
Look, I am a lifelong Republican. I was a Republican, as I say in the book, when President Trump was hosting fundraisers for Democrats. I like a lot of things the president has done for this party, but now we're exposed and we're seeing it in the polls.
But I believe in conservatism. Now, I don't believe in a Republican Party that thinks equity stakes in corporations is okay. And tariffs, whether you got a trade surplus or not are okay. And the Russia may be a good guy or Putin maybe a good guy, and we should have a win-win in Ukraine. That's not a conservative Republican Party.
So part of what we have to do is get back from the drift we've experienced in this phase of populism and get back to core principles. That's how we start rebuilding. If we have what I think is going to be a bad outcome 27 days from now, at least in the House.
HUNT: So the way that you're framing this is that the party can still go back to a set of principles that you describe as having. What evidence do you have that that's the case that the Republican Party has not been permanently changed by Donald Trump?
TILLIS: Well, I mean, in a populist age, it's difficult. But I think there's nothing like a loss in the elections for people to go back. My whole book is a sort of after action. I was a partner at Pricewaterhouse, did a lot of after actions go back, and the root to most of our challenges are in the drift from our core principles.
[16:40:11] And if we go back to being a limited government, pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, pro-family, limited tax, pro-Western world, pro-NATO, Republican Party will do just fine. Nothing's ever as good as bad or as bad as it seems, and I'm committed to making sure that the Republican Party comes back again, elects presidents and has majorities in both chambers.
HUNT: You criticize the president's -- a number of the president's cabinet members. You refer to them as MAGATS in your book. You've also called President Trump a very strong political athlete, can't argue with that. He's won two presidential elections.
But you voted for a lot of these nominees. And when you look back on the time you've been here in Washington, that has been dominated by President Trump, where and how do you think, if at all, you've enabled his worst instincts?
TILLIS: Well, I do think that in the case of confirming Hegseth, I'm partly responsible for some of the challenges that we're having now with getting funding and succeeding in Iran, because I think Hegseth has failed.
But, you know, I think it's funny. I've talked to some people. I said it was my biggest regret. And they're going, well, we need to do a way back, wayback sort of machine and you can reverse your decision. That's -- that's in the past.
What I can say is I made a mistake, but based on the data I had at the time, I do the same thing again. Knowing what I know now, I would have never gotten him, but of course, he wouldn't have gotten unanimous vote out of the committee if we'd known he wasn't going to consult with Congress. He takes us for granted, and he treats us more like a manufacturing line in his company than his board of directors, which is going to create some problems for him when he tries to get $1.5 trillion in defense spending, because he simply hasn't -- he hasn't shown Congress the respect that he needs to, to get their support.
HUNT: You write in the book about political violence and violence in general. I mean, you write it's in the back blurb that you have a baseball bat in your truck. Do you -- do you have -- you say you carry a knife around in your pocket? Did you bring it today? Is that like an all the time thing?
TILLIS: Maybe.
HUNT: Okay. You write about how you pulled it out on the floor of the Senate on January 6th.
TILLIS: Yeah, I was in -- yeah.
HUNT: I'm going to go with, yes, you probably do have it in your pocket today. You're not going to answer my question. Okay.
(LAUGHTER)
TILLIS: Mitch told me, Mitch trained us all to say, just because they ask the question doesn't mean you have to answer it.
HUNT: He's a smart man.
TILLIS: He is.
HUNT: He has done that to me a number of times.
But I think my question is you write in the book about your own experience with violence and suggests that perhaps some of your colleagues who don't come from a similar background as you don't have that kind of experience.
TILLIS: They have no idea. You see these tough guys, they probably never even got in a fight in their life, and they act like they're tough with all the bravado, but they haven't been.
It's just like people that pretend like they know what affordability feels like if they've never experienced it themselves. You go to bed not eating, not because you didn't have time, but because you didn't have the money to pay for a meal, it gives you a profound experience for what affordability looks like.
HUNT: You say that if you don't know what this violence looks like, you don't maybe don't have an understanding of why -- just why, and how important it is that it not be in our politics, right? And we have seen an explosion of violence, several assassination attempts against the president.
Do you think president Trump has played a role in the increased level of political violence in our society?
TILLIS: I think leaders from both sides, I think when Chuck Schumer went to the Supreme Court desk, I referenced this in the book. This is all about one-upmanship. He called out Supreme Court justice by name and said, you will unleash a whirlwind. You will be held accountable.
This is the majority leader of the U.S. Senate. Maybe it was minority leader at the time.
HUNT: Is there a way back from this?
TILLIS: I hope so. I tell you, the American -- yeah, I do. I think so because at the end of the day, the extremes of other either end of the political spectrum are still when they're combined. And they got a lot in common, are probably only about 20 percent of the electorate.
A lot of the other people are getting tired of all of this, and we need to hold them accountable the same. I've got three people in prison for death threats, threatening me. This sort of there's no place for violence here in any form, even the rhetoric we should say is unacceptable. And I think sooner or later, if we get the right candidate, those who look the other way in the face of violence, they're going to lose. And they should.
And shame on Chuck Schumer for doing it. You know, it was less than two years later that it was said -- HUNT: You wouldn't say, shame on Donald Trump for some of --
TILLIS: Oh, shame on President Trump. Anybody. I don't care who it is. It could be my brother.
You call for violence or you think that that is an effective means to resolve something and you are absolutely wrong, and unpatriotic, in my opinion. The whole country -- I mean, our whole democracy is based on debate. Move on. It's based on peaceful transition of power.
And these people at either end of the political spectrum and some of our elected leaders, like Chuck Schumer, and in the case you cited, President Trump, they're wrong. There's no place for that.
HUNT: All right. Senator Thom Tillis, the book is "How To Lose Friends And Antagonize Presidents" --
TILLIS: Plural.
HUNT: -- today, presidents, plural.
(LAUGHTER)
HUNT: All right. Thank you, sir, very much. Appreciate having you.
TILLIS: Thank you.
HUNT: Ahead here in THE ARENA, we're going to have more on that story that was first reported in "The New York Times". Why two advisors to President Trump are also doing work for an Eastern European government backed by Vladimir Putin.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HUNT: All right. Welcome back.
We're going to talk more now about "The New York Times" reporting that two of President Trump's top political advisers traveled to a small Russia aligned territory in the Balkans to counsel its government on voting issues there.
[16:50:04]
Sources tell CNN that the president was unaware that the two men traveled to the Balkans, or that the pro-Russian government was among their clientele.
One source said the president was, quote, "pissed by the report".
My panel is back now.
I mean, Jamie Gangel, what is the significance of all of this?
GANGEL: So a couple of things. First of all, let's just say President Trump does not like to be surprised. And these aren't --
HUNT: Who does if you're in charge in fairness?
GANGEL: And these are just not some consultants. This is inner circle.
HUNT: And these are literally the top architects of his midterm strategy, and his political operation.
GANGEL: Correct.
HUNT: So, a couple of things. One, they are involved with all the MAGA money going out to candidates, many of whom are now in toss-ups. So I'm sure the president would like them paying attention to those races.
But it's -- it's also just -- we've seen a history with Donald Trump. He doesn't like it when he feels he's being taken advantage of. And people are making money off of him.
HUNT: David, were you surprised to see that these two advisers were doing this, especially given --
CHALIAN: I mean, no, I'm not surprised because I think there's a long tradition in both parties of political consultants who have advised presidents and had had success in presidential campaigns in increasing their international business opportunities with consultants.
HUNT: That happens when they're principals of office.
CHALIAN: Yeah. So I'm -- but I'm not terribly surprised to see that.
HUNT: That's fair.
CHALIAN: I think Jamie's last point here is the most significant one. Donald Trump has been pretty clear in his business life and in his political life. He likes to dictate who makes money off of his name, mostly he and his family. And it's really not for others to get rich off of his successes and his name. And that has just time and again rubbed him the wrong way.
Now, I think earlier today he spoke and downplayed his anger at this and said it was fine before he got on the plane and went to Texas. But clearly, this irked him, not just because it was a surprise, but because, you know, there's money to be made. And he would like that -- he would like to decide who makes that.
BEDINGFIELD: Yeah. Look, I'm not going to hold my breath on him making good on the promise to fire two of his most important political aides a month before the midterms, because they're grifting. I mean, his entire family, the Trump family is grifting off of his role as president of the United States.
And I think, you know, it would be a show of good faith to say, you know, my two most important political advisors should not be going to countries that are adversaries or aligned with major adversary of the United States and making money off of them a month before the midterm elections. But I -- I have no reason to hold my breath that that's going to be the case.
HUNT: This is what the president said about this on his Truth Social platform today. He called Chris LaCivita and James Blair outside consultants. He says they don't work for me other than his outside consultants. I do not have any idea who else they work for, but will, on reflection, ask them if there's a conflict. I will terminate them immediately.
Scott, of course, this raises questions about their ties to Russia. This has come up in other places. For example, who paid for Don, Jr.'s wedding, right. There was a Russian billionaire. The president said that Donald Trump, Jr. paid back said billionaire for the party. But are these sort of lines helpful for the president?
JENNINGS: Well, I don't know how impactful it is. I think it's an agitating story for him because, you know, it is something people are talking about today. But ultimately, is this something voters care about? When I think what's been acknowledged is true, after you run a presidential campaign, you often get international political consulting opportunities. It's been true.
Some of the Obama guys did very well overseas after getting him elected to presidency twice. So I'm not surprised they actually had these opportunities. And I don't look, I know them both personally, I'll just say. I don't think either of them would ever do anything that was in opposition to the United States of America or in conflict of or opposition to the president's agenda.
And my hope is that they get a chance to brief the president on that and tell them that there is no conflict here.
Look, there are two of the most important Republican political operatives in the country. They are extremely influential in terms of how money is being spent. They have a long track record of success. And so, you want your best players on the field.
HUNT: Yeah. Well, I mean, to that point, David, it seems unlikely that he would remove them at this at this point. No?
CHALIAN: Yes. That seems unlikely. I completely concur.
BEDINGFIELD: Almost inconceivable. I would say inconceivable.
HUNT: All right. We'll be right back.
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[16:59:40]
HUNT: All right. Thanks very much to my panel. Really appreciate all of you being here today.
Thanks to all of you at home for joining us, as always as well.
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Hi, Jake.
