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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) Is Interviewed About Critics Warn Trump Speech Laid Groundwork To Challenge Midterms; Trump Orders Renewed Probe Into 2020 Michigan Voter Registrations; Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) Is Interviewed About DHS Chases Voter Fraud After Trump Speech Revives Election Claims; Dangerous Wildfire Smoke Blankets Major Cities; WSJ: Top Treasury Official Out After Clashing With WH Over Audits; Sen. Tuberville Claims Without Evidence Four To Five Senators "Didn't Legally Win" Their Elections. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired July 17, 2026 - 17:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KASIE HUNT, CNN HOST: All right. Thanks to my panel. Really appreciate you all being here. Have a wonderful weekend.

Thanks to you at home for watching as well. Do have a wonderful weekend. And don't forget you can spend some of your weekend with us. You can watch more of The Arena tomorrow. The Arena Saturday airs at noon and again at 4:00 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN.

I would be honored to have you spend some of your weekend with us. In the meantime, don't go anywhere. Jake Tapper is standing by for "The Lead."

Hi, Jake. Happy Friday.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Happy Friday to you, Kasie. We'll look for more next week in "The Arena."

HUNT: Have a great weekend.

[17:00:30]

TAPPER: The Homeland Security secretary just threatened state election officials with time behind bars. The Lead starts right now.

Our way or prison time. That ultimatum today as the Trump administration pushes new narratives about election security, alleged foreign interference and what could happen if states don't use Trump's way to secure your vote. Hear from one state leader calling it all a distraction and says she's ready to fight back.

And suffocating smoke from with wildfires in Canada drifting down more than 1,000 miles and blanketing practically half of the United States, how long will this thick, dangerous air stick around?

And also, it's possibly not just Taco Bell. We're learning how widespread the problem of this tainted lettuce causing explosive diarrhea might be.

Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. And we begin in our Politics Lead. New election related threats today from the Trump administration on the heels of last night's primetime, shall we call it an address from President Donald Trump, which some critics see as a predicate to his possibly interfering in the 2026 midterm elections. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin today sending letters to the secretaries of state in California, New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania alleging that there may be more than 250,000 non-citizens illegally on those states voter rolls.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARKWAYNE MULLIN, HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: If you are an illegal or you're voting illegally, we will hunt you down, we will find you and we will prosecute you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Mullin even threatened fines or prison time for election officials who do not comply with DHS methods to determine whether non- citizens are on state voter rolls. Mullin was following an order that President Trump laid out in his speech last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I've also ordered DHS to notify every state about non-citizens on their voter rolls and direct them to remove all ineligible voters from the lists immediately.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Now, preventing non-citizens from voting has been a big part of the SAVE America Act push by Republicans. We should note it is already illegal for non-citizens to vote in federal and state elections. And there's very little evidence that non-citizens, undocumented immigrants, vote on any scale of any significance.

Election experts say documented cases of voter fraud, especially voting by non-citizens, are exceedingly rare. The right leaning Heritage Foundation's database of confirmed fraud cases, for instance, shows fewer than 100 examples of noncitizens improperly casting ballots between the years 2000 and 2025.

That's a quarter century, less than 100. So what were the other takeaways from Trump's primetime address that we were told would shock us? Well, to be frank, it could have been an e-mail. There wasn't much new evidence, and his big reveal was a series of newly declassified documents that he claimed had been hidden from him and the American people and that showed that the election system is, quote, "catastrophically short of the standard required."

A CNN review of the documents he's referring to finds that they largely discussed previously known issues that were included in a 2021 assessment from the U.S. Intelligence Community.

Trump cited China allegedly obtaining hundreds of millions of U.S. voter files. But again, the 2021 Intelligence Community assessment alluded to this and found that China did not actually interfere in the 2020 election.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't take it seriously, but it's just not the shocker we've been told. Trump did not dwell too much on his 2020 loss. He did not call Georgia's two Democratic senators illegitimate, as many Republican insiders were expressing fears he would. But with the 2026 midterms underway, the president did seem to be previewing a potential new episode of falsely claiming stolen elections.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Put together, these disclosures reveal an election system so broken and so vulnerable that no one can possibly defend it. It is not defensible.

There's no third world country that has elections like we have.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[17:05:03]

TAPPER: The president also made it clear that he's happy to call the next election rigged, especially if Congress doesn't pass his legislation, The SAVE America Act.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Addressing this crisis of election security, demands that Congress must pass the SAVE America Act. How easy is that to do? Unless you want to cheat. The only reason you wouldn't do it is you want to cheat because your policies are so bad and your candidates are so pathetic that you can't get away or can't get elected any other way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: I mean, that's just factually inaccurate. There are Republicans in the Senate who do not support this bill because it will make it harder for people to vote who are legal voters. They're not looking to cheat. Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska is not looking to cheat. She's looking to protect the rights of people who live in far off places in Alaska to vote.

And heads up, the SAVE America Act has basically no shot at passing. The President hasn't even convinced all 52 Republicans in the Senate to support it. So it's pretty easy to imagine what Trump is going to say if Republicans lose big in the 2026 midterms.

But there's something else from Trump's speech worth keeping an eye on. We've been telling you to keep an eye on this for weeks, if not months now. Recall in the book "Regime Change," reporting that says when tensions were rising between the U.S. And Venezuela last year, before Maduro was captured, Tucker Carlson served as a go between for President Trump and then Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro. "Regime Change" says, quote, "As bait, Maduro had claimed to Carlson

that he could furnish proof U.S. voting machines were tampered with in 2020, a transparently calculated appeal to Trump's unfounded, stolen- election grievances, and he had told Carlson he wanted warmer relations with Washington. Maduro did," unquote.

Now, shortly after that, the U.S. captured Maduro, and he now sits in a New York detention facility while facing federal charges in the U.S. and there have been questions about what Maduro might be willing to say in order to get out of prison, or at the least, to get a better deal. We should note that because Trump, in his speech last night, did happen to bring up Venezuela. Now, he stopped short of accusing Venezuela of interfering in the 2020 election, but he said Venezuela was able to manipulate its own voting machines.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: The CIA obtained reporting of a specific plot to do a big number in favor of the corrupt Maduro regime in Venezuela. And that's exactly what happened. Conspiring to digitally rig their own country's elections in 2020. We must take urgent action to ensure that our own system can never, ever be hacked or compromised like it was in the past.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: All right, just keep an eye on what he just said there. Put a pin in this. We must take urgent action to ensure that our own system can never, ever be hacked or compromised like it was in the past. There's no evidence it was hiked or it was -- it was hacked or compromised to change an election. None.

So I don't know what the urgent action is. But let's talk about it with Democratic Congressman Jim Himes of Connecticut. He's the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee.

And Congressman, you said last night that in your view, the president was establishing a basis for interfering, stealing even the 2026 election. Explain what you mean by that. What specifically did you hear that brought you to that conclusion?

REP. JIM HIMES (D-CT): Sure. Well, the bald face, easily disprovable lie that our elections are corrupt. You just played the audio, right? That is a lie. I never imagined that I would be so nakedly accusing the president of United States of lying, but his own intelligence community.

And Jake, as you know, as a member of the Gang of Eight, I see pretty much all of the intelligence. There is a publicly available intelligence community assessment of the election of 2020, which he insists he won. And basically the first paragraph, you can Google it, anybody who's watching can check it out, the very first paragraph of that thing says that there was no attempt at all by any foreign power to interfere in the election, that is, to change voter rolls, to steal voter rolls, to change the tallies, et cetera. So that's established. And by the way, he presented no evidence to suggest anything to the contrary.

It was all bizarre stuff about Venezuela wanting to -- wanting to compromise their own elections. Duh. You know, you've had two dictators ruling the place for 30 years. Of course they have. But again, no evidence at all.

And it's important to hear this, too. And then let me answer your question directly. You said it. There is -- let me quote the Heritage Foundation. As you know, the Heritage Foundation is a fire breathing, right wing organization that usually does exactly what Donald Trump wants Heritage to do.

[17:10:07]

And they looked at foreigners voting in our election, illegal aliens, if you will. And here's their quote. It is so rare as to be statistically non-existent. And yet, you know, the secretary of Homeland Security, the SAVE Act, this is all premised on an absolute falsehood. So why?

Why? And here's the answer. Number one, Donald Trump is so broken that he cannot accept that he actually lost the election in 2020. 2016 and 2024, those were fine elections, of course, but 2020, when he lost, had to have been corrupt.

But here's what really worries me, you know that he's not going to accept the results of the election if the Democrats take the House of Representatives and if the Senate switches hands to the Democrats, he simply won't accept it. So what he's doing now is he's laying the foundation so that in November, on election day, when his people are telling him that he is about to face a united Democratic Congress, maybe, he says you can play out any number of scenarios.

But he starts with, I told you in July that our electoral system was inherently compromised. I have just heard from my director of CIA or somebody that the Iranians are presently undertaking an operation against our elections. And I have deployed Department of Homeland Security guards to Michigan, to North Carolina and to Georgia.

Now, I'm just making that up, right? I don't know exactly what it's going to look like, but every American needs to ask themselves, do you want to subscribe to the lies and do you want to be party to the trajectory which gets you to, you know, perhaps because voting, you know, machines are in the back of Department of Homeland Security vans, you know, our election simply not being dispositive. And that's what happened last night. The president is setting the platform to abrogate, to basically scotch the elections in November if he doesn't like the way that they have come out.

TAPPER: We're almost out of time. But I just want to ask you quickly. In 2021, after January 6, 2021, after these lies led to death and insurrection of sorts on Capitol Hill, where the president and his minions were trying to overturn the results of the election that he lost, even though, by the way, he was in charge of the government at the time, I mean, everybody running the intelligence communities were his picks, but there were leaders of the Republican Party, leaders of the Pentagon, leaders of the Justice Department, willing to tell the truth. Do we have that today?

HIMES: We have that a lot less. And it's those leaders and it's those many Republican senators and Republican congressmen who you didn't hear a peep from today, who know that the president's speech last night was full of lies, and they're just rationalizing it. And so, no, in 2024, he has a lot less constraints than he had in 2020 and in January, when he set (ph) a mob of people on the capital of the United States.

TAPPER: 2026, you mean? I think we're in 2026, right? Yes.

HIMES: Sorry, 2026. He's got a lot fewer constraints in 2026 than when he --

TAPPER: It's all a big blur. The last 10 years.

HIMES: Look, you're going to hear the language again.

TAPPER: Yes.

HIMES: You have to go and fight. Fight, fight, fight or you're not going to have a country anymore. But this time, it's going to be directed at polling places in North Carolina, in California, in Michigan, et cetera.

TAPPER: Yes. Democratic Congressman Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, thank you, sir.

One state that Trump singled out in his speech was Michigan, referencing FBI files citing potential voter registration fraud in the state.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: In 2020, Michigan State Police raided a Democrat get out the vote organization corrupt group in Muskegon. And we're so concerned by what they found.

The documents state that some canvassers admitted to FBI agents that they signed voter registration forms and other people's names, submitted fraudulent registration for people who did not exist, and received gift cards tied to their number of applications that they produced.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: The Democratic Attorney General of Michigan, Dana Nessel, joins us now.

Attorney General Nessel, so this issue has been known about for years. Trump suggests it had been covered up. What can you tell us about what's accurate about what he just said?

DANA NESSEL, (D) MICHIGAN ATTORNEY GENERAL: Well, first of all, let's note the fact that in the DOJ filings, they couldn't even spell Muskegon correctly, let alone get all the other information correct. But Muskegon was an example of the system working and things going exactly as they should. Yes, somebody tried to submit fraudulent applications for registration, but the clerk immediately flagged it, and as a result, no one was improperly registered. There were no ballots that were improperly distributed or sent out. Nobody cast those ballots, and no fraudulent ballots were counted.

[17:15:01]

So there essentially was a, you know, an example of everything going as it should, having various different types of structures in place to ensure that we have safe and secure elections. And that's exactly what happened in 2020. This happened, I should note, when it was the FBI under the Trump administration, so they had the opportunity to investigate that case.

Clearly, there was very little to be done in regard to that. And again, you know, no fraudulent ballots cast. The system works.

TAPPER: Speaking of the FBI, President Trump said he would ask the FBI director, Kash Patel, to look into the alleged voter registration fraud in Michigan. Have you heard from Patel or anyone at the FBI?

NESSEL: Well, I certainly haven't. But, you know, I'm not sure if the director is aware of something called the statute of limitations. If they were interested in that particular matter, they've run out of time because they've blown the statute of limitations. They would have had an opportunity to look into it last year. But again, the statute has now made it impossible to bring any criminal charges.

But again, you know, I really want to focus on the fact that this is merely a distraction from how deeply unpopular Donald Trump is in our state right now. And I think that, you know, Trump wants to distract people with this because he doesn't want people to see what the price of gas is over here.

You know, he doesn't want people to hear about his forever war in Iran. And he doesn't want to know about how many times the Democratic attorneys general has, you know, beaten him in court time and time again from his illegal, unlawful, unconstitutional executive orders. But, you know, more people than ever voted in 2024.

And Trump ought to be happy about that because he won Michigan in 2024. In fact, he won by more votes than he did when he won the state in 2016. So I really don't know what he's complaining about, but this is just in advance because I think he knows that it's likely that several congressional districts are likely to flip from red to blue, and he wants to do everything in his power to prevent that from happening.

TAPPER: Michigan Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel, thanks so much for your time.

NESSEL: Thanks for having me.

TAPPER: What are Republicans saying, if anything, about this new push from the administration on, quote, unquote, "election security?" Will enough senators ever back the president's SAVE Act, which he so desperately wants? I'm going to talk to a House Republicans who voted in favor of the bill. And later, a terrifying scene, a massive landslide captured on a driver's dashboard camera. The aftermath, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:21:47]

TAPPER: Continuing in our Politics Lead, the Trump administration is escalating its push to reshape what it calls election security. Today, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin echoed President Trump's remarks from Thursday night, warning states they could lose federal funding if they don't adopt the Trump administration's voter registration and election security requirements.

Joining us now, Republican Congressman Don Bacon of Nebraska, retired Air Force general.

Congressman, thanks for joining us. What did you make of Secretary Mullin's comments today?

REP. DON BACON (R-NE): I'm not as familiar with his comments today, but let's just back up and say, for starters, 2020, the elections were not stolen. We probably do have some element of cheating at some elections, but not enough to change the results. We should ensure that we want to prosecute those that we ever catch cheating, and we should look forward to see how we can maybe do things better. I think most Americans support voter ID.

I think the president keeps saying it was fraud that shaped 2020. I don't think it was the -- 2020 was not stolen. The biggest factor of 2020, in my view, was the president told Republicans not to vote by mail. And so they were not doing that. They weren't getting their low propensity voters out.

The Democrats were voting by mail, which was legal in 2020 across the board, mainly because of COVID. And they were able to run up the score and get low propensity voters out. And I think, Jake, that shaped or, you know, was a big factor in four or five of the closest states that, you know, with their results. And I think there should be some more looking in the mirror what happened in 2020 and not just keep bringing up this fraud thing.

TAPPER: The president seems to be preparing for something in the midterm elections. There are all these odd steps. Bill Pulte is acting Director of National Intelligence. This guy, Kurt Olsen, who was an election liar fined in Arizona for his role in bogus accusations, now he was serving as a special election security guy at the White House. He signed this subpoena or signed this document to seize the voting machines from Atlanta.

Now he's with the Justice Department. There's all this weird stuff going on with whether or not the Postal Service is going to even participate with mail in ballots. Do you hear the concerns from your fellow Democrats about that any other president in any other era, people might think, oh, that's a little wild, but this is a post January 6th world now, do you have any concerns?

BACON: Well, I had concerns about putting Mr. Pulte in at DNI. He was not qualified and by law he had to have intelligence experience. And as I was already mentioning, you know, the President is convinced 2020 was stolen and he works on that assumption. I think he does believe it.

I think a lot of the base may agree with that. But I also know a lot of Republicans, a lot of swing voters disagree with that. And I think it's a costly focus. It's going to hurt the president and the folks that are talking in this way because the swing voters, and I would say pragmatic Republicans, Reagan Republicans, see it differently.

[17:25:02]

And there's things that the President could be doing that make a lot more sense for the election. For example, the Election Assistance Commission is vacant. There's four seats on that and all four are vacant right now. That could be his way of helping the states get ready for the elections. CISA is the primary agency to defend against cyber-attack. And he was talking about, you know, chaining saber activity last night, but he has cut it by a third and may the leadership positions at CISA are vacant.

And so I think there's practical things that could be done to ensure that our elections stay secure and we should be looking forward and not backwards.

TAPPER: Congressman Don Bacon of Nebraska, thank you sir. And as always, thank you for your service. Appreciate it.

BACON: Thank you.

TAPPER: Next some U.S. cities are shutting down outdoor activities because the Canadian wildfire smoke is just that bad. How widespread is this problem become? And the lettuce producer linked to the nasty widespread cases of explosive diarrhea all over the country. That lettuce producer worried about its supply well beyond what it supplied to Taco Bell. What we're hearing today from Taylor Farms, that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:30:35]

TAPPER: In our National Lead, another day of thick wildfire smoke blanketing major cities across the Great Lakes, Northeastern United States and Mid Atlantic, turning skies hazy and pushing air quality to dangerous levels for more than 100 million people. This afternoon, President Trump said he's holding Canada responsible for it all and suggested that the, "cost of this pollution," could be added to tariffs that Canada is already paying.

As we also look live in Milwaukee and Detroit, CNN's Brian Todd is in Arlington, Virginia. And Brian, what's it like there right now?

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, standing out here just for a few minutes, it really does kind of hit you physically, the burning sensation from these particles. It hits you in the back of the throat, it hits you in the eyes. That's what it feels like. Here's what it looks like. Our photojournalist Jay McMichael is going to zoom past me and that's what the haze looks like as you're taking a look at the view from here across the river to the monuments.

Now, only about an hour ago when were live on the air, you could really not see the Washington Monument and the Capitol. You can now see them a little bit better, but you can still see the haze that's there and it is still very dangerous. We caught up earlier with a tourist from Scotland who was at the Lincoln Memorial, Yanoula Dobson.

She was here with her husband and two daughters. They had been in New York for just a couple of days before this. So they had to deal with the smoke and haze there. It followed them here. And she talked to us about what it's like to deal with all of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

YANOULA DOBSON, TOURIST FROM GLASGOW, SCOTLAND: My daughter's asthmatic, so she's finding really tricky. And her breathing is really bad. So we've been taking lots of breaks and going in and out of cafes, restaurants just to try and get a bit of relief.

TODD: And you mentioned how it kind of takes away from the tourist experience. Talk about that. What does this do to the tourist experience?

DOBSON: Well, as you just mentioned, you know, she could photograph. She can't see many of the sites. And so we're walking to the site to site just to get really close to it as best as you can.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TODD: And even with all that, the vast majority of the tourists we saw at the Lincoln Memorial and here at the Iwo Jima Memorial were not wearing masks. Experts say that's not a good idea. If you have to come out and you have to be exposed to this stuff for some hours, wear one of these from the COVID era.

This is an N95 filtration mask, a respirating mask. This is a good piece of equipment to wear. This N95 mask is also good to wear. What they also say, though, Jake, do not wear a cloth mask. It cannot protect you from wildfire smoke.

TAPPER: All right, Brian, thank you so much.

In our Health Lead, just hours ago, the shredded lettuce supplier linked to the cyclospora outbreak told CNN that they're removing all of their iceberg lettuce grown in central Mexico from the U.S. market. Taylor Fresh Foods is the supplier specifically, and its lettuce was in some Taco Bell restaurants. Taco Bell says it has removed that lettuce. The CDC has urged consumers to not eat shredded iceberg lettuce served at Taco Bell locations Indiana and Kentucky and Michigan and Ohio and West Virginia. The company also says none of its Taylor Farms salad kits contain iceberg lettuce. This is not the first time Taylor Farms has been connected to a major food safety investigation. Its lettuce was linked to cyclospora cases in 2013. And in 2024, onions from Taylor Farms were tied to an E. coli outbreak involving McDonald's quarter pounders.

[17:33:50]

Coming up next, what "The Wall Street Journal" revealed about a top Treasury Department official who was at odds with the White House and now finds himself out of work.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: In our Money Lead, have you ever heard the name Kenneth Kies? Kenneth Kies was a seasoned top Treasury Department official. You probably never heard of him, but you should know his name because he's been forced out of his job because he warned White House officials they risked breaking the law in their attempts to meddle in IRS audits.

"The Wall Street Journal" exclusively reported this. And when reaching out to the White House and Treasury Department, they were told, "several administration officials and Trump allies reached out to privately criticize Kenneth Kies, arguing he was difficult to work with and didn't do enough to advance the president's agenda," to advance the president's agenda.

Wall Street Journal reporter Richard Rubin, who broke this story, joins us now. Thanks so much for joining us. So you know, Kies was a Trump nominee confirmed along party lines a year ago. He also had decades of experience. So do you get the sense that the President and the Trump administration thought he would be more of a yes man and just willing to do whatever the President wanted?

RICHARD RUBIN, REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: It's hard to know what they thought. I think one important thing to remember is he did do a lot of things the President wanted. The big responsibility in this job was implementing the tax law that the Republican Congress and Trump passed last year. The regulations on the overtime deduction, the tips deduction, the Trump accounts, all of those things were under his stuff.

TAPPER: All the stuff that President should be talking about instead of elections. But keep going.

RUBIN: Right. Yes. So all that was under Kies, right? So he had that job of pushing out all these regulations. He was also acting IRS chief counsel. And in that job, your job is basically the nation's chief tax lawyer. And you're responsible for making sure the IRS and the government is following the tax law. And I think that's where some of the conflict happened here.

[17:40:01]

TAPPER: So as a fun Friday treat, explain what Section 7217 of the IRS code is and why 7217 matters to the story.

RUBIN: Yes. So Congress created section 7217 in 1998, a couple years after some of the Nixon recordings had come out. So it's like it's a post-Watergate thing, but it was delayed until after the -- we all heard that audio of him essentially ordering up audits.

TAPPER: Ordering audits of his evidence. Yes.

RUBIN: Yes. And so what it says is sort of list the President, the Vice President, White House staff, and then a bunch of senior agency heads are prohibited from directly or indirectly requesting that the IRS start or cease any audit or investigation of any particular taxpayer.

And so it's there to kind of create a bit of a firewall between political officials and the IRS, and it's punishable with prison time and fines. And it's something that IRS officials take very seriously. They're actually required to report to the inspector general if they get improper requests. And so 7217 is really there as that kind of bulwark between political officials and the tax law, which is supposed to be handled impartially.

TAPPER: Yes.

RUBIN: Yes.

TAPPER: So your story goes on to say that Kies was at odds with White House officials over several issues during his tenure, including taxation of income from fantasy sports. He cited IRS rules about audits when asked questions about policies, even when officials weren't asking about particular companies or audits. So it does sound like he rubbed some people the wrong way for other reasons, not just his standing by 7217 in the letter of the law.

RUBIN: Yes. And so what we reported is he raised this issue in a recent White House meeting, and shortly after that, he was forced out. He's still in the job. He's leaving in a couple of weeks. So you don't necessarily know who exactly pushed him out. We don't know what the particular matter was that came up that he warned them about. And you don't know what all of the causes are for someone being pushed out of any particular job. We just know that this came up, and shortly afterward, he's gone.

TAPPER: So Congressman Don Beyer, Democrat, Virginia, says, this is major. "This warning brings to mind Trump's attempts to direct IRS investigations of his enemies during his first term and his recent license to steal agreement with Justice Department to permanently exempt himself from audits." As a tax reporter, what's your sense of Trump's overall influence at the IRS?

RUBIN: It's hard to tell. I mean, this is the taxpayer information is protected. So officials at the IRS aren't able to talk about particular taxpayers. So we're always kind of looking around corners and shadows and trying to figure out what's happening. He's obviously like with any President has installed his officials over the IRS. Frank Bisignano is the CEO of the IRS, is a Trump appointee. Scott Bessent, the Treasury Secretary, oversees him. So there's always this tension where the President, any president, is in charge of enforcement directives and can guide what the agency is doing.

President Biden pushed all sorts of resources into the IRS to try and get them to go after high income people much more than they've been doing in the past. So what we don't have a great sense of is whether some of these red lines, about 7217 have been crossed, whether the President has actually successfully said, go after this person, stop going after this person. That's like, we don't --

TAPPER: You don't know that. But --

RUBIN: We don't know that.

TAPPER: -- it wouldn't be out of character though, based on what we know.

RUBIN: It's hard. We know that others have reported that in the first term he talked about doing things like that in meetings. It's unclear whether it ever filtered further than that.

TAPPER: Richard Rubin, thanks so much. Really appreciate your reporting.

Coming up, the major questions for a Republican senator who basically recently accused some of his Democratic colleagues of not being in the Senate legally.

[17:43:45]

Plus, President Trump's grand new plans for the Lincoln Memorial reflecting Pool.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: In our Politics Lead, a rather astonishing claim from Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville just before President Trump's speech last night on Election Security.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TOMMY TUBERVILLE (R-AL): We probably have four or five senators that didn't legally win. They shouldn't be up here. And it's just unfortunate that that's happened.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Per huge, Senator Tuberville did not back up that wild claim with any evidence. But it comes the day after his Republican colleague, Senator Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, said she didn't know if Georgia's Democratic Senators Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock were legitimately elected in 2020.

Here's our panel. Ashley, first to you. I mean, this is the problem with conspiracy theories is that people just regurgitate them even if there's no evidence. I mean, there was a rumor Trump was going to say this about Ossoff and Warnock. He didn't. But it's out there now. And now, you know, these wild allegations.

ASHLEY DAVIS, G.W. BUSH ADMIN. HOMELAND SECURITY OFFICIAL: These people are -- yes, I don't like that at all. And also I think for Cynthia Lummis, listen, she's leaving, so it's not going to really matter anymore. And then for Tuberville, I was just thinking, I actually hadn't heard that. But for him, that probably plays at home and that's probably what he was thinking about as he runs for governor.

But to your point, I don't think it's a good thing for election integrity. I have to say, and I was saying this to Chuck earlier, I actually had a little sigh of relief last night because I thought it was going to go much further than it did. I still am tired of the election issues since even 2016 when it started with Russia. So and I think the rest of the country is as well. So I'm hoping this is like it. But then today with Markwayne coming -- Secretary Mullin coming out and talking about, you know, prosecuting some of these people, it's going to -- it's going to continue.

TAPPER: So, Chuck, I know that Jon Ossoff, who's running for reelection, he kind of likes this because this --

CHUCK ROCHA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Raising a lot of money.

[17:50:00]

TAPPER: -- it reminds Georgian or he raises a lot of money off it. But like, it reminds Georgians as to what they don't like about President Trump because they know that their elections were legit in 2020 and 2024, for that matter. How does this place -- how does this play in a place like Texas where you're advising Talarico, the Democrat running for Senate there? Does this -- is this just good red meat but it doesn't really do anything in terms of voters?

ROCHA: We talked about the primary in Texas, the Republican primary, and I think that's a good distinguishing factor in the Republican Party there. You have this long standing, me and Ashley talk about it, John Cornyn, who is like the prototypical Republican senator from Texas. And then you had Ken Paxton.

There's a whole lot of folks who voted for Cornyn who, I don't know, at the end of the day will run over to vote for James Talarico. And I'm not saying that, but there's a lot of them that are disgusted with what they're seeing with their own party, who just want low taxes and the government to stay out of their life. That I think will skip that on the ballot. I think that's the biggest effect it's going to have on the elections.

TAPPER: Do you agree? Do you think it actually could cause, you know, not voter suppression, but depression?

DAVIS: I don't know. First of all, I don't know how many people were paying attention yesterday about this, to be honest with you. I mean, it's summer vacation and who knows? But I actually think I'm not convinced. First of all, I think Talarico is a good candidate and I think Paxton's a bad candidate, but I'm not convinced that people leave it blank. I just think people don't vote for anybody. And does the governor's race really bring enough people out on the Republican side? And Talarico's number -- fundraising numbers, sorry, were astronomical this quarter.

ROCHA: But him and Ossoff and others have captured that energy that's out there and the grassroots fundraising. And lots of folks who can't vote every day can give $5 every week, and that's what you're seeing.

TAPPER: So one time Trump ally, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie went. He went on the podcast of Gavin Newsom, who is a governor and also a podcaster. He said this about a conversation he had with Trump after the 2020 election. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), FORMER NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR: And he called me and he said to me, yes, I'm probably not going to win this thing. Like, what do you think I should do? And I said, there's really no nothing else to do, Mr. President. I said, you need to call Biden, congratulate him. And we have not spoken since.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: What was your reaction to that? First of all, it's interesting that the President privately is telling Chris Christie that he knew he lost even though he has not said that publicly.

DAVIS: Yes. Yes, I don't know. I mean, I do think that Chris's job right now is to criticize the President at every turn. And I'm a huge Chris Christie fan. But listen, I don't know why this is such a big deal to him, but I think that it hurts. I even know several Republicans that like the President's policies, but just have always said, why can't he get over this? I think it's time to turn the page.

However, I do want to say that I've heard a lot of Democrats on T.V. and reading today that if there is more money, people need more money in the states to upgrade their systems in regards to voting machines and everything else. The SAVE America Act doesn't give money for that, ironically.

TAPPER: Right.

DAVIS: But I think that there is a general consensus that there does need to be a modernization of elections, but it's not -- we can't talk about 2020 still.

ROCHA: There's also what you said when you started, Ashley, is like setting a new bar. Is that where we are? Where you were like, well, I was kind of relieved because good and crazy didn't happen. We just had crazy. My words, not yours. So I think that that's where folks are like, is this really the realignment of those that are paying attention? I get your point. TAPPER: On the subject of crazy, after the speech on election security, President Trump turned back to again to the issue of primary concern among the American people. And that's the renovation of the Reflecting Pool. He continues to blame vandals despite photos that don't show any signs of a 300-foot rip.

Trump posted this morning, "We're looking for a vandal proof material, but such a thing should not have been necessary. The scum in court will hopefully be prosecuted to the max." Now, obviously, election security is theoretically important and the Reflecting Pool, I don't know. Again, he's making claims that aren't backed by facts and also he's making claims that are not why he was reelected.

DAVIS: Right. And again, when I saw this kind of coming up again today was like, oh my God, this is the gift that kind of keeps giving because he concentrates on it, which I don't understand. However, people are getting angry if you see some of the polls that came out today about how people are still concerned about the economy, he needs to pivot to that if we're going to have a shot.

TAPPER: The percentage of people who strongly support the President is shrinking.

ROCHA: Right. And as we're heading to a midterm election, Jake, you've done this enough to know that in a midterm election, there's a smaller electorate because it's just the people who really, really care. So it becomes a motivational game. I'm working in congressional races all around the country. And is what's the message that will really move them off the couch because folks are feeling anxiety on both sides of like, gas costs, too much ground beef has doubled. Like, people are really angry.

TAPPER: Thanks to both of you. Appreciate it.

This programming note, next week, CNN's going to host a Democratic Senate debate in the great state of Maine. Guess what? I'm going to get to moderate that alongside CNN's amazing Dana Bash as well as Michael Shepherd from the Bangor Daily News. That's coming up next Thursday night, July 23rd, 8:00 p.m. Eastern. Watch it live here on CNN or CNN.com or if you have the streaming CNN app, you can watch it there too.

[17:55:11]

As the Trump administration threatens prison time if states don't comply with its efforts on "election security." I'm going to talk with a top election official who's been accused by the President of having non U.S. citizens registered in his state. He's going to respond to the allegation, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. This hour, just how strict are states when it comes to keeping non-citizens from voting in U.S. elections? In minutes, I'm going to talk to one top election official defending his state laws after strong accusations today from the Trump administration, even threatening prison time if states don't crack down.

Plus, all that smoke making it so hard for so many of you to breathe today. President Trump has a threat for that. How he says Canada should be held responsible.

[18:00:04]

Also, the countdown to Sunday's World Cup final.