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The Lead with Jake Tapper
Trump Orders Navy To "Shoot & Kill" Mine-Laying Boats In Strait; DOJ Watchdog To Investigate Handling Of Epstein Files; Traders Place $430 Bet On Oil Just Before Ceasefire Extension; Trump: Israel- Lebanon Truce Extended Three Weeks; How A.I. Is Transforming Medical Decision Making; GOP Pressures Gov. Ron DeSantis To Redistrict In Florida After Virginia Democrats' Win. Aired 5-6p ET
Aired April 23, 2026 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: -- remains to be seen.
KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: Yes, well. And of course, flying is so miserable these days. I mean, I understand why people who can in the case.
MUNTEAN: I personally like Spirit. I don't mind flying on Spirit. I don't think the airlines differ all that much one to the other. And so, you know, if you can fly a Spirit flight so long as it's nonstop and it's going to where you need to go and it's nearby to where you need to fly from, then go for it.
HUNT: Yes. Well, you can fly yourself places, so, you know, you win. Thank you.
MUNTEAN: It's not that luxurious.
HUNT: I appreciate you. Thanks to my panel as well. Thank you guys for being here. Thanks to you at home for watching as well. Don't go anywhere. "The Lead with Jake Tapper" starts right now.
[17:00:35]
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: The president has given shoot and kill orders in the Strait of Hormuz. The Lead starts right now.
President Trump tells the U.S. Navy to take out any Iranian boats placing mines in the Strait of Hormuz, which risks not only escalating tensions, but actuality -- in actuality causing oil prices to rise what again -- once again. When will this crucial waterway reopen? When will consumers see some relief at the pump? Plus, a new investigation, investigation launch today into the Justice Department's handling of the Epstein files. But what exactly will the DOJ's internal watchdog be looking for as part of the probe?
I'm going to ask a lawyer who represents multiple Epstein survivors what she is hoping for in this probe. And the next installation in our new series, AI: Friend or Foe, tonight, I'm going to talk with the founder of an AI platform built specifically for physicians, one that is already being used by more than half the doctors in the country, he says, and we're going to put the technology to the test with a case close to my heart.
Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper.
The developing story in our world lead tonight, President Trump claiming that the U.S. is in total control of the Strait of Hormuz despite the total maritime standoff that appears to be the reality in the Middle East.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We have total control of the strait. And the fact that it slows, you know, they would have opened it up three days ago. They came to us and they said, we will agree to open the strait. And all my people were happy. Everybody was happy except me.
I said, wait a minute, if we open the strait, that means they're going to make $500 million a day. I don't want them to make $500 million a day until they settle this thing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: The President's comments coming after a series of Truth Social posts about the war, including a directive to the Navy to shoot and kill any Iranian boat laying mines in the strait. President Trump also continuing to air out what the White House calls divisions among the top Iranian leadership, leading to a disruption in peace talks and, according to Trump, a disruption in the Iranian economy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: They're not doing well economically, financially. They're not doing any business because of the blockade. They want to make a deal. We have been speaking to them, but they don't even know who's leading the country. They're in turmoil.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: But as is said in wartime, the enemy gets a vote. To assert that the U.S. has total control over the Strait of Hormuz is not accurate because Iran, too, is exerting control in the strait with mines by charging tolls and by seizing and firing upon vessels. There are currently 19 U.S. naval ships in the Middle East, part of the U.S. Navy's blockade of Iranian ports that appears to be holding for now. CENTCOM says the blockade has turned around at least 33 vessels, mostly oil tankers.
And oil prices continue to rise globally, though analytics show Iranian oil continues to flow towards China. Iran's top negotiator today touted the first revenue from tolls in the Strait of Hormuz, a system that top U.S. and other international officials have rebuked. Iran's president and parliament speaker today also issued identical statements in response to Trump and the White House's claims about turmoil among their leadership, touting iron unity in the ranks or at least in the tweets. So the clock ticks off -- ticks on for an off ramp for the war between the U.S. and Iran.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I don't want to rush myself, you know, because every source, oh, Trump is under time pressure. I'm not. No, no. You know who's under time pressure? They are.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: However much the president's trying to act as though Iran is the only one under pressure and the only one looking for an off ramp. That's quite clearly not the case.
Joining us now, CNN Special Correspondent Jamie Gangel and CNN National Security Analyst Alex Plitsas.
Jamie, let me start with you. So --
JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
TAPPER: -- Trump is really emphasizing he's under no pressure to end this war. My -- I'm under no pressure, sure it is, prompting more questions than it's answering. He is the least pressured person ever to be in this position, but he has been saying that the war is over for weeks.
GANGEL: Right. I went through a timeline. We won in the first hour. We're short excursion. It's over.
Now -- the strait was going to open, naturally. Now it's, don't rush me. Look, there is an old saying in the Middle East that in the west, time is money. In the Middle East, time is time. It may be true that the Iranian government is fractured.
We do not have a lot of insight into what's going on. But it is also true that every national security expert I talked to says, do not underestimate Iran. They may be stringing us along playing Donald Trump and that they feel time is on their side.
[17:05:17]
TAPPER: What are your sources telling you, Alex?
ALEX PLITSAS, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: So what I've heard recently today is they do believe that there is fracturing inside. I'm hearing that from Gulf partners. At this point, Ahmad Vahidi, the head of the IRGC is -- appears to be playing hardball and at this point maybe holding the straits at risk actually to give himself some leverage over the civilian portion of the government. So the -- that is in fact it seems to be true according to multiple sources that we're hearing.
Also, it's not clear really what's going on with Mojtaba Khamenei. It's -- he is either severely wounded, possibly need a prosthetic, multiple surgeries on a hand face severely burned and others are suggesting that perhaps this is still a ruse by the IRGC. So we made a joke about "Weekend at Bernie's", which is not funny given the context, but just to give people an idea of what we're, you know, potentially talking about with the IRGC using his image and authority to continue to act. So that's an unclear picture at this point, but that's what we're hearing from some.
TAPPER: What was behind the president's shoot and kill order when it comes to any Iranian ships putting out mines in the strait?
PLITSAS: So I think the Iranians have been holding the straits at risk so far using largely projectiles and drones and that meant that the waterway was still effectively open. U.S. ships have been in there transiting and quite quietly actually starting to clear the straits using equipment. So it was a warning to the Iranians of making it clear that the U.S. will take action if they catch them doing so.
TAPPER: And Jamie, it's notable that this order shoot and kill comes after the president was responsible for firing the secretary of the Navy, John Phelan, last night. Sources tell CNN there was tension between Phelan and Secretary Hegseth partially over Phelan's direct line of communication with Trump. Hegseth and Trump agreed to dismiss him. What does that leadership shakeup do to this operation in the Middle East Now?
GANGEL: It's never reassuring to be letting go top Pentagon officials during a war.
TAPPER: Right. This is hardly the first one.
GANGEL: Right. And this is -- but that said, the secretary of the Navy, apparently President Trump said he was too hard charging. Today he was getting into fights with people. I think the real question here is not the secretary of the Navy, the real question here is President Trump who does want desperately an off ramp and he appears to be stuck right now.
TAPPER: Alex, the White House and the president both seem certain that there are these internal divisions among the top ranks in Iran. I have no reason to doubt that. But we did see these coordinated posts from the parliamentary speaker and the president in Iran today. What is the reality in terms of unity, in terms of what's going on? There were also questions earlier this week about who was going to show up for the peace talks, parliament seemed to suggest they were going to show up, the IRGC was like, no way, what are you hearing?
PLITSAS: So the U.S. had obviously asked to meet with Ghalibaf and that was because he's seen as a pragmatist based on comments, interactions with people, but he's not the Supreme Leader. And at the same time, the Iranians had asked to meet with Vice President Vance because they thought he was the most pragmatic and the most anti-war member of the cabinet. And having had two previously failed negotiations with Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, they wanted a new actor in the room. You know, it's not confirmed, but the IRGC, basically there's divisions in terms of what they're willing to accept. There are factions who want their 10 point policy proposal, their maximalist demands held to. There are others who don't. The one thing that there is unification on, I'm hearing is that the U.S. blockade they're seeing as an impediment. The problem is if the U.S. lifts that at the Iranians request, it looks like they're calling the shots. So the GCC partners I'm talking to are saying that the -- probably the best ways that this has to be lifted sort of simultaneously where everybody can save face to get back to the table.
TAPPER: Yes, I mean, well, we've heard so much rhetoric, not just from the Iranians, from our side too. President Trump threatening to blow up the whole country, threatening to wipe out the entire civilization. What are the risks here?
GANGEL: So when I speak to military national security sources, they say the thing that keeps them up at night is actually that this is a protracted development. There are unintended consequences. When you are at a stalemate like this, you can -- mistakes get made, accidents happen. We don't know what those are, but they're really concerned that there could be some inevitable military, you know, accident that happens, that costs lives.
TAPPER: Yes, well, we've already seen that happen --
GANGEL: Right.
TAPPER: -- with the strike against the Iranian schoolgirls. Other civilians have been killed. And then of course the refueling operation, 13 U.S. service members have been killed in various incidents.
Thanks to both of you. Really appreciate it.
Some good news for you in our world lead. I usually don't have a lot of good news for you in the world lead, but the Kuwaiti-American journalist detained in Kuwait for two months after sharing Iran war videos in social media has been acquitted of all charges and is now awaiting release. Ahmed Shihab-Eldin's 52 day detention has highlighted how restricted media coverage has been in the Persian Gulf since the war began in late February, even among U.S. allies. Some of the images that Shihab-Eldin had shared include a CNN video of a U.S. fighter jet crash over Kuwait.
[17:10:08]
Coming up, the Justice Department's watchdog is launching a new investigation tonight into how the Justice Department handled the release of the Epstein files, including the redaction mistakes that revealed the names of some of the survivors who had previously stayed private. What could we learn from this new probe? I'm going to ask an attorney representing multiple survivors of Epstein. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TAPPER: In our law and justice lead, the Epstein files are getting a second review at the Justice Department from an internal watchdog at the Justice Department, launching an investigation into how the DOJ handled the Epstein files. Focusing on the department's process for redacting and withholding material. The inspector general will also look into how the department addressed issues following the release of documents such as all the personal information of victims that were left unredacted.
Here to discuss Jennifer Freeman. She's an attorney representing survivors.
Jennifer, how are the survivors you represent responding to the news of this inspector general probe?
JENNIFER FREEMAN, ATTORNEY REPRESENTING EPSTEIN SURVIVORS: Well, thank you for having me, Jake. They are positively responding. It is very welcome and we are supportive of this kind of examination of what went on with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, since it looks like there are items that are missing.
[17:15:16]
If you just look at the FD71 for Maria Farmer in 1996, it certainly looks like her full report is not there. So I don't know what else they've got in their files they haven't yet produced. But there are other documents that aren't there, such as deliberative process documents, attorney client privilege documents which were not supposed to be not produced that were supposed to be produced. There was no basis on which not to produce them. So there are items like that.
So we're very glad that there's going to be this examination. I think -- we think this is great, along with looking at the redactions which were disturbingly over redacted for things like law enforcement, identification of law enforcement and under redacted for victim information, survivor identifying information and the production of nude photographs. So we are very happy that there's going to be some oversight on this.
TAPPER: The acting inspector general, William Blier, is leading the investigation. According to the New York Times, Justice Department lawyers have argued that the inspector general's office have overlooked potential wrongdoing by the Trump administration. Are you concerned at all about the independence of this investigation under Mr. Blier?
FREEMAN: I certainly am concerned and I am hopeful that there will be some independence, that there will be some true oversight. But we welcome the effort and we'll see what goes on because it is of concern that this remains within the executive Department.
TAPPER: Yes. There's something that the acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, said on Fox earlier this month I want to get your response to, take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TODD BLANCHE, ACTING ATTORNEY GENERAL: I think that to the extent that the Epstein files was a part of the past year of this Justice Department, it will -- should not be a part of anything going forward. (END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: It's not going to be a part of anything going forward. That sounds like an effort to move on from this quickly, not to have any prosecutions, not to have any investigations having to do with this. What's your response to that?
FREEMAN: This is what we've been hearing from the very beginning, that there's nothing to see here. There's no credible information here, even though certainly other countries have found enough to investigate. For some reason, this particular administration doesn't see what we see, doesn't listen to the survivors or doesn't believe them, which is deeply disturbing.
TAPPER: The chairman of the House Oversight Committee, James Comer, Republican in Kentucky, told POLITICO on Wednesday that some members of his committee are open to the idea of a pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's convicted accomplice who's currently in prison, if it would lead to her providing information for their investigation. Now, Comer has not said that he is one of those and he has not identified who is open to it. But what was your reaction to that?
FREEMAN: That is deeply offensive and insulting and a betrayal to the survivors. There is no good faith basis on which to believe that Ghislaine Maxwell is going to provide credible information. She was pledge -- she was perjuring herself already and accused of perjury and she has never expressed any remorse whatsoever for what she did. So why she should be believed, I don't know. So to give her a pardon in exchange for her, quote, "cooperation" is a betrayal to the survivors.
TAPPER: All right. Jennifer Freeman, thank you so much. Thanks for joining us.
There's a new push to figure out whether people are betting millions of dollars on insider information about the Iran war and making buck. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:23:26]
TAPPER: Curiouser and curiouser in our money lead. Just 15 minutes before President Trump said he would extend a ceasefire with Iran on Tuesday, some traders placed a series of bets totaling $430 million that crude oil prices would drop. And then they dropped. Take a look at this chart from Reuters. You can see the moments following Trump's announcement.
Following the trade executions, crude futures fell from nearly $101 a barrel to a low of $96.83 a barrel. This is not a one off. This is the third time just this month that large well timed directional bets on oil have been made right before a major announcement having to do with the war. Amanda Cooper helped break the story for Reuters. Also joining us is CNN Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig.
So, Amanda, this has sparked major concerns about insider trading, so much so that Congressman Ritchie Torres has called on the CFTC, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the chairman, to expand ongoing investigation into suspicious oil trading. Tell us about this pattern that you reported on.
AMANDA COOPER, EUROPE FINANCE AND MARKETS BREAKING NEWS EDITOR, REUTERS: Hi, Jake. Yes, that's right. I mean, to be clear, when we report these trades, what we are doing is simply that we're taking a look at the chart, taking a look at the movements and saying, look at this, a big chunk of volume has gone through at a time, you know, say 15 minutes, 10 minutes, sometimes, you know, a couple of hours before a major announcement. And I suppose, you know, big trades go through all the time, don't they? I mean, the oil market is one of the biggest, deepest, most liquid in the world and oil producers and consumers use it to hedge risk and so on.
[17:25:06]
But I think what stood out with these trades is they were trades betting on the price falling on a day when the price was rising. And there didn't really seem to be a good reason for that sort of size of trade to go through. And, you know, something happens once and, you know, you wouldn't even notice it, but it sort of happens two times, three times, four times. You know, as market reporters, we inevitably start to look for patterns and, you know, that's what we've noticed.
TAPPER: Elie, what would prosecutors have to show in order to make a case for insider trading?
ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: So you need three things if you're going to prosecute someone for insider trading, you need to show that the person is trading on material information, meaning information that's important and non-public information. So hypothetically, if somebody knew that there was about to be a major announcement about the war, about, about the strait, about something that impacted oil prices, that would certainly be material, that would certainly be non-public if you knew it from inside government. And then you need what we call a fiduciary duty, meaning is this a person who has some responsibility to protect this information. If you're a government official, you absolutely would have that fiduciary duty.
So if you take those three elements and overlap them on what appears to have happened here, based on Reuters reporting, there could absolutely be a case for insider trading if you could show those three things.
TAPPER: How do these laws apply to Congress and to public officials?
HONIG: So in 2012, Congress passed this thing called the STOCK Act, the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act, which we were told now these laws apply to members of Congress as well. Do you know how many members of Congress have been prosecuted under the STOCK Act in the 14 years since its passage?
TAPPER: I'm guessing none.
HONIG: Zero. TAPPER: Yes.
HONIG: Exactly. So it is not often used. There are civil penalties that attach as well, which are up to $200. So talk about a toothless law.
TAPPER: But let's say it was somebody from, and I have no knowledge --
HONIG: Yes.
TAPPER: -- so this is completely hypothetical. But let's say it's like some aid at the White House and they send an encrypted information to somebody, is there a law against that?
HONIG: Yes. So the STOCK Act doesn't just cover members of Congress, it covers executive branch employees and officials as well. If we use that example, if they have knowledge of something that's material, important, that's going to impact the stock price. And a duty, which you would if you were a White House official and you sent it out to somebody, yes.
TAPPER: Yes. But of course, you would have to have somebody investigated.
Amanda, for those who don't follow oil futures trading, and you alluded to this earlier, but who's gaining and who's losing when there are these major swings in the market?
COOPER: Well, I think number one of markets is somebody is right, someone is wrong, someone's going to win and someone is going to lose. I've had a couple of people respond to some of our articles to say, you know, you know, you say they're selling, but for every seller there's a buyer. What do you have to say to that? And -- but I mean, yes, of course they're right.
I would say, let's say the example that we saw -- and again, at no point are we saying, you know, all the -- you know, it's our role to point out that these are trades that are well timed, that if you executed them, you would have done well. So on the trade, that sort of chunk that went through on April 22, that was going into a rising market. The, you know, and you think, well, let's say you thought, you know, even if you had no prior knowledge and no nothing, that you had a suspicion that, you know, there would be something to suggest there'd be progress in negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, that there'd be some movement towards increasing flows to the Strait of Hormuz, you might say, well, you know, prices above $100 a barrel again now would be a good point to perhaps sell, go short, which means you sell it now with a view to buying that back later at a lower price. So in this case, if somebody did, whoever did put through those sort of $430 million worth of, sort of, sell trades would probably have done well for themselves if they were then buying those back later, you know, $4 a barrel or lower.
TAPPER: Yes. Maybe some of the Justice Department investigators looking into journalists just writing stories might want to take a look into this. Elie Honig, Amanda Cooper, thank you so much.
[17:29:03]
We do have some breaking news from the White House, President Trump just announced an extension of the Israel-Lebanon cease fire. We're going to share those details next. Plus, our second installment in our new series, AI: Friend or Foe, we're going to dig into how doctors across the country are using AI to help them treat you and your family better.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TAPPER: Breaking news out of the White House. President Trump just announced an extension of the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon. Let's get straight to CNN's Kristen Holmes who's at the White House for us. Kristen, what did the president say?
KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jake, currently he is in the Oval Office. He announced that the ceasefire is going to be extended another three weeks as they continue these negotiations. Of course, a reminder here that this ceasefire is supposed to be a holding place for a longer peace deal. He also implied that the president of Lebanon and the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, would be here in Washington together within the next couple of weeks at the White House.
So this is a three-week extension. And of course, this also is a key part of any kind of negotiations that are going to happen or likely happen with Iran given that Iran had said they wouldn't even come to the negotiating table if Lebanon was not part of the ceasefire. The fact that President Trump's administration had been able to negotiate that first ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon did give a lot of grace to the Iranis who then started to come back.
But of course, as we know, there are no talks currently scheduled, so unclear if this is going to play a role in perhaps a second round of negotiations with Iran as well. But this in itself is a big deal. Another three weeks of the ceasefire as the two sides are trying to have negotiations on perhaps a long-term peace deal.
[17:35:07]
TAPPER: All right, Kristen Holmes at the White House, thanks so much.
Another three weeks of the ceasefire as the two sides are trying to have negotiations on perhaps a long-term peace deal. All right, Kristen Holmes at the White House, thanks so much.
Now to the latest installment in our series, "A.I.: Friend or Foe?" Now, we've done a lot of stories on the potential dangers of A.I. on The Lead, but today we're going to take a look at the potential positive. ChatGPT, Grok, Gemini, other A.I. applications have exploded in popularity recently. They're used by tens of millions of Americans, businesses, the military. Here's a question, though. How are physicians using A.I. programs like these? And what could that mean for your health care? Well, I spoke with the founder of a leading medical A.I. app to find out.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DANIEL NADLER, FOUNDER & CEO, OPENEVIDENCE: There's two new medical studies published every minute, 24 hours a day. That's 20,000 new medical studies published every week. It's obviously impossible, inconceivable even, to think that physicians could possibly read all of those and keep up.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): That's Daniel Nadler, founder of a fast- growing artificial intelligence platform called OpenEvidence, built specifically for doctors. Nadler says it's designed to help physicians keep up with an overwhelming and constantly expanding body of medical research. Nadler notes that if you narrowed down the material to just one doctor's one specialty, it would still take each doctor nine hours a day to keep up.
NADLER: OpenEvidence is an A.I. that is essentially a brain extender for these physicians that machine reads on behalf of these physicians a lot of these papers in near real time and helps them look up and ultimately answer very complex medical questions.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): Nadler says that a majority of doctors in the U.S. are already using OpenEvidence. But in a field where the consequences can be life or death, relying on A.I. also raises serious questions.
J. TAPPER: So, Daniel, how do you prevent OpenEvidence from the hallucinations we see of OpenAI? How do you prevent that in this world, which is the stakes are so much higher?
NADLER: We struck official A.I. partnerships with the New England Journal of Medicine, with the American Medical Association, with NCCN and ACC, which are the leading medical societies in cancer and heart disease.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): Instead of generating answers from the open Internet, Nadler says OpenEvidence is designed to pull only from trusted human written research.
NADLER: It's actually much closer to search engines like Google, which have a much longer history than A.I. does of being able to rapidly find the right reference or rapidly find the right snippet of information in human written text.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): Daniel Nadler says one of the key benefits of OpenEvidence is helping doctors think beyond the standard diagnosis, especially in complex or unclear cases. It's a scenario my own family knows all too well.
ALICE TAPPER, SURVIVED APPENDICITIS MISDIAGNOSIS: I showed unusual symptoms, so I had pain all over my abdomen instead of just my right quadrant, which is normally the standard appendicitis pain. J. TAPPER (voice-over): In 2021, my then 14-year-old daughter, Alice, nearly died after doctors misdiagnosed her perforated appendix.
A. TAPPER: The way that they ruled out appendicitis was by a jump test. I was asked to jump and I was able to maybe get one inch off the ground. And just that ruled out appendicitis for all the doctors. And that's when they just declared it was a viral infection.
J. TAPPER: Theoretically, how would this have helped my daughter back when this happened to her in 2021?
NADLER: If you type some of the factors that she experienced into an A.I. like OpenEvidence, it's not that it's going to identify the nonstandard case as the most likely case. But what it's going to do is it's going to very quickly in the answer list the other things to look for, the other things to test for, the other things to consider.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): To show how that works, Nadler ran Alice's case through OpenEvidence himself.
NADLER: And in the case of your daughter's experience, it listed as one of the things to test for and consider. In your daughter's case, appendicitis, something that the physicians, in primarily considering the standard presentation of symptoms, would have not necessarily immediately thought of.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): Here's what the A.I. returned when asked about Alice's case, "For a teenage female with generalized abdominal pain and a negative jump test, the differential diagnosis should include viral gastroenteritis, but also appendicitis."
NADLER: It's never going to take a nonstandard presentation of symptoms like your daughter has and say to the physician, you know what, with certainty, it's definitely appendicitis. It's definitely this nonstandard thing to look for. But what it will do is rapidly fill in in maybe the second sentence or the third sentence or the fourth sentence that you should consider this.
[17:40:09]
J. TAPPER (voice-over): So not a diagnosis, but a nudge, a second set of eyes in a system where doctors are already overburdened.
NADLER: If you have a very smart colleague, you make sure to sort of bounce things off of them, to sanity check things with them. And I think that's the best use of these technologies, the best use of OpenEvidence as essentially a digital colleague.
J. TAPPER (voice-over): For Daniel Nadler, that's the role of A.I. in medicine, not replacing doctors, but backing them up. And in cases such as Alice's, where a misdiagnosis can turn critical, that could make all the difference.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TAPPER: Tomorrow, we continue our series "A.I.: Friend or Foe?" The Florida attorney general this week said the ChatGPT maker OpenAI bears criminal responsibility for a deadly mass shooting at Florida State University a year ago. We're going to dig into some of the very disturbing messages to see just what this chat bot told the gunman.
A new report claims that a Republican member of Congress is simply missing in action. He's missed dozens of votes. He hasn't been seen by his colleagues in weeks. What is going on with New Jersey Republican Congressman Tom Kean Jr.?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:45:43]
TAPPER: Politics now, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is facing pressure from Republicans in D.C. to push back on Virginia's Democratic gerrymander, which voters approved on Tuesday, giving Democrats a 10- to-1 advantage in the Commonwealth. Republicans view Florida as their last best chance to forge an advantage in the redistricting wars, the gerrymandering wars, to be precise, set in motion by President Trump's pressure on Texas last summer. Here in studio is our panel.
We should say redistricting, gerrymandering. This is a not proud American tradition that dates back to the founding fathers. Gerry is named after a founding father. It's the mid-decade redistricting push for the clear advantage of a party that's new here. So apparently President Trump and Governor DeSantis have made up after their bitter 2024 primary fight. One Florida Republican operative familiar with Governor DeSantis' thinking tells "Politico," "DeSantis would still like to get something done on redistricting, but he realizes it will be tough for Republicans to retain the House, regardless of what happens in Florida."
And there's also questions about whether you water down some of these districts in Florida, whether you're actually creating more competitive seats. What do you think's going on here?
JONAH GOLDBERG, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I also thought it was interesting that we've seen these stories about how much Ron DeSantis would like to be Secretary of War, or maybe on the Supreme Court.
TAPPER: At the same time that this is happening.
GOLDBERG: At the same time this is happening, which is also a grand old tradition in American politics of trading favors of these sorts of things. I think so far this has really blown up in Republicans' faces, and I don't think that the Virginia gerrymandering hit is a gerrymander, right?
TAPPER: Of course.
GOLDBERG: Is actually going to withstand legal scrutiny.
TAPPER: You think the Virginia Supreme Court's going to overturn it?
GOLDBERG: Apparently this 90-day thing is like hardcore black-letter law. But I'm not a lawyer. I can still see my reflection in mirrors. But I think this needs to stop. And I think DeSantis, if he's actually thinking about running for president again in the future, he's in this terrible bind because on the one hand the base of the party really wants him to come to the rescue in the redistricting wars. On the other hand, it puts him back in sort of MAGA lackey mode, which I don't think he likes to be in.
TAPPER: Yes, although it's not to say that will hurt him in the primary. Listen to the Democratic House Leader, Hakeem Jeffries, for whom this would actually mean, theoretically, a promotion to Speaker. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. HAKEEM JEFFRIES (D-NY), HOUSE MINORITY LEADER: And we're going to keep the pressure on them in Florida. The Trump-Republican gerrymandering scheme has failed. Why? Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: That's a Mike Tyson quote, I believe. So the fight's headed to Florida. What do you think is going to happen with Florida and Virginia?
KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, look, I think Ron DeSantis would probably be foolish to take this on in Florida. I think, first of all, the Florida Constitution makes it very challenging for him to draw a map that nets Republicans the kind of seats that I think they would need to make this worth the effort. But I think the politics across the board on this are bad.
I mean, I think Democrats got this over the finish line in Virginia, in part because they really effectively messaged that this was their pushback against Trump's efforts. But across the board, gerrymandering, not popular. And I think that, ultimately, you know, somebody like Ron DeSantis, who presumably has eyes on 2028 and beyond, taking this on as the partisan mantle right now, I think, is probably not a smart thing for him to do.
TAPPER: A concerning story about the governor's debate for Democrats, which is "The Atlantic" is saying that this is not a particularly strong field. And let's turn to the debate in California, the first since Eric Swalwell, one of the Democratic frontrunners, dropped out of the race. I don't know if you caught that. There's a story about Swalwell.
BEDINGFIELD: I heard. I heard.
GOLDBERG: He spent more time with his family.
TAPPER: Anyway, Xavier Becerra, Biden's former HHS secretary, had said that he, "Heard rumors of the allegations about Swalwell," was asked why he never followed up on them when he was the chair of the Democratic caucus. Here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) XAVIER BECERRA, HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY UNDER BIDEN: Rumors are not facts. And the caucus, the Democratic caucus, is not a place that adjudicates those things. It's law enforcement that does. If someone had come forward, we could then have investigation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[17:50:08]
TAPPER: Kate?
BEDINGFIELD: He's right about that. I mean, I think there are -- there were rumors about Swalwell's infidelity, that in and of itself is, while repugnant, is not a crime, nor does it fall on members of the Democratic caucus to investigate it.
I think, you know, the sum total of the debate yesterday showed us that there isn't really a frontrunner in this race yet. I think there was not a particularly standout moment, really, for any of the candidates. They're obviously all in the wake of the Swalwell disruption, shall we say, trying to both define themselves and also prevent their opponents from taking up that space. So it was sort of a forgettable debate, frankly, and we have a month to go before California voters vote. We'll see.
TAPPER: So, Leibovitz writes in "The Atlantic," even with Swalwell's exit, "The Democrats' flailing field might be narrowed slightly and perhaps improved by subtraction, but very much remains a bottleneck of B-listers." Do you think anyone had a standout moment? Do you think that there's any potential for any of these guys or Katie Porter to rise?
GOLDBERG: Well, I don't think, because God's not that generous to Republicans, that it'll come down to two Republicans, right? Which was a scenario that people thought was possible. So one of them will rise, there's a fact of math. I think it is astounding. California, if it was an independent country, I think would have the fourth largest economy in the world. It is this amazingly serious state with massive industry, huge population, and it is a perfect example of how being controlled by one party breeds sort of just subpar political classes. The state needs real competition.
TAPPER: Thanks to both of you. Appreciate it.
An investigation is underway tonight in Israel after a man says police took him in custody because they didn't care for the Palestinian flag on the yarmulke he was wearing. He eventually got it back, but says the Palestinian flag on that yarmulke was cut out of it. Does this say something more significant about politics in Israel today? Well, we're going to talk with that man, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:56:31]
TAPPER: A shocking story today of extremism in Israel. A Jewish man was harassed and had his yarmulke ripped apart by Israeli police. Alex Sinclair was minding his business. He was wearing a yarmulke, which had knit into it both the Israeli flag and the Palestinian flag. He said he did this to promote peace. Israeli police approached him. They detained him. The police later, according to him, cut off the Palestinian flag portion of his yarmulke before returning it to him. It's a small thing, but certainly illustrative of a bigger problem in Israel. And Alex Sinclair joins us now. Alex, walk us through exactly what happened.
ALEX SINCLAIR, ISRAELI MAN ARRESTED FOR WEARING YARMULKE WITH PALESTINIAN FLAG: Hi. Thanks for having me on the show. Great to meet you. Yes, here's the yarmulke in question. You can see it's been ripped up. As you can see, I've been wearing it for many years. It has an Israeli flag here on one side. It did have a Palestinian flag on that side. And as you say, I wear this, or I used to wear this kippah, this yarmulke for many years as a way of expressing my desire as a religious Jew, as a religious Israeli, my desire for peace, my desire, my belief that as a Zionist, that the Jewish people have a right to a flag and a right to self-determination and a historical, a legitimate historical connection to this part of the world. And also, so do the Palestinians.
The Palestinians are a people and have a legitimate historical connection to this part of the world and also the right to national self-determination. So having both sides of this kippah, a flag on both sides of this yarmulke, to show that was my way of kind of saying that to the world. And that's how I've been walking around that way for almost 20 years.
TAPPER: So obviously, there's much more shocking things that come out of the Middle East beyond that. I mean, what's going on, for example, in the West Bank, the settlers that are committing horrific acts of violence against Palestinians there. But this story caught our eye because this is officially sanctioned by the Israeli police against just a flag. And what does this say to you about the state of Israel today that this would happen?
SINCLAIR: Well, first of all, I would say that I have put in a report against the policewoman who did this to me. I'm hopeful that justice will be done and that she'll be called up on it. But yes, look, Israel is unfortunately going through a period where there is extremism and the government is turning a blind eye to all kinds of things in the West Bank and in Israel.
There are many, many Israelis, including me, who want peace and who are very furious with this government and will be having elections soon and really hoping to create a change in the regime in the government. So, but yes, Israel is a country right now which is struggling as many countries are pulled into extreme directions.
TAPPER: Yes.
SINCLAIR: And as a Zionist, as a Jew, as an Israeli, this worries me. And I think that people who want peace in the Middle East, people who want peace for Israelis and for Palestinians, need to be calling out extremism on the Israeli side and extremism on the Palestinian side. There are people on both parts of the conflict who want to delegitimize the other people's rights to exist, the other people's rights to self-determination, the other people's legitimacy as a people. There are Palestinians who do that to Israelis. And I think that we in the world need to call that out. Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran and people who say that anti Zionists who say that Israel has no right to exist is outrageous. And it's outrageous when the Israeli police come and say that that's the same thing as the Palestinians.
[18:00:17]
We need to grasp and hold that middle ground, that center ground that really holds up. But both peoples have a legitimate right to exist in this part of the world. And there won't be peace until we really enable that for both peoples.
TAPPER: So I want to note for the people who are not necessarily following all of this, one of the reasons why I think that policewoman may have felt empowered to do what she did is because the national security minister, a horrific anti-Arab racist bigot and zealot named, Itamar Ben-Gvir, he ordered police to ban Palestinian flags from public spaces in 2023. I interviewed Prime Minister Netanyahu in 2023 and I asked him about these two right wing bigots, Smotrich and Ben- Gvir, who are part of his coalition, who are doing things like this, not just to Jews wearing, you know, Palestinian flags on their yarmulkes, but, you know, much more horrific things to Israeli Arabs and West Bank Palestinians. And take a listen to some of this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: Gvir is now in charge of the security apparatus in Israel. One of the first things he did was to ban Palestinian flags being used in demonstrations. That seems completely contrary to any notion of a free speech or free demonstration. Do you agree with that, banning Palestinian flag?
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: That's actually a law. That's been on the books in Israel for quite some time. I'm controlling the government and I'm responsible for its policies and the policies are sensible and they're responsible and continue to be that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: So I guess my question is Netanyahu, they are trying to reassure people out there listening that Smotrich and Ben-Gvir again who are right wing zealots and racist against Arabs, that they're not going to be in charge of his government. It's him in charge of his government. Who is in charge of his government?
SINCLAIR: Well, look, unfortunately I'm skeptical. I think that unfortunately Ben-Gvir and Smotrich have inordinate influence over Israeli politics in Israeli society right now. I agree with you. They're right wing bigots, they're racists. They're people whose Judaism is not my Judaism. They're people whose Zionism is not my Zionism. They're people who I think have pervert and bastardized Judaism, as I understand it. And my work as a peace activist and many, many Israelis like me who go under the radar and who are not reporting on are doing everything we can to try to create a different kind of Judaism, a different kind of Zionism, a different kind of Israel. But so I really hope that we'll see a change. But, yes, I can't defend Ben-Gvir and Smotrich and I won't defend them. I think that they're taking my country in a terrible -- terribly dangerous and horrific direction.
TAPPER: Alex Sinclair, thank you so much. Appreciate your time.
SINCLAIR: OK. Thank you so much.
