Return to Transcripts main page

The Lead with Jake Tapper

Democrat's Identity Crisis Provokes Warning About Bernie Bros; DOJ Agrees To Withdraw Subpoenas for New York Times Journalists; Trump signals little immediate appetite for ceasefire with Iran; Trump Admin Announces 10-12 Percent Tariff On 60 Countries; Rep. Jamie Raskin (D- MD), Is Interviewed About House Judiciary GOP Chair Asks DOJ To Consider Charging Jack Smith, House Dem Seeks To Force Bill Banning Weaponization Fund. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired July 23, 2026 - 17:00   ET

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

[17:00:00]

JENNINGS: How do you know he's not working on U.S. Senate business while he's --

HUNT: He's not voting, Scott. He's not --

(CROSSTALK)

HINOJOSA: And he's getting paid. And he's getting paid.

JENNINGS: Well, we've had senators that have taken medical leave before. I do know that he's routinely meeting with his staff and going over issues and I think maybe even talking to other senators.

I -- look, I'm not in there every day, but, you know, he won the term.

HUNT: All right.

JENNINGS: I think a statement in the next few days would be prudent.

HUNT: More on Monday. You heared it here first.

JENNINGS: Yeah.

HUNT: Thank you all very much.

"THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER" starts right now.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Is the White House about to start another economic earthquake? The Lead starts right now. A brand new tariff rollout happening right now at the White house after the U.S. Supreme Court kicked their old plan to the curb. What signals does this send as the president slaps new tariffs on more countries that he feels are doing wrong? His top trade representative will join us live.

Plus, a top banker hauled before House lawmakers today, a man who once called his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein profound. What he told Congress today that has lawmakers calling him a liar. And a nun in Texas detained by ICE. She's out now, the nun, and talking about her time in custody.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN Breaking News.

TAPPER: Welcome to The Lead. I'm Jake Tapper. And we begin with breaking news on our Money Lead as President Trump's 10 percent global tariff is set to expire at midnight tonight, the Trump administration has a new tariff plan at the ready to take its place. In moments, Trump's Trade envoy, Jamieson Greer, will join me live with all the details.

The Trump administration is praying that the third time's the charm when it comes to the president's tariff agenda. You might remember the U.S. Supreme Court struck down his first round of tariffs in February. That led to the current temporary second round, which is a 10 percent import levy that can only last 150 days. As we've gotten closer to day 150, the Trump administration has not just been -- not just been standing on the sidelines when it comes to the future of their tariff agenda. Earlier this week, President Trump announced an additional 50 percent tariffs on what totals close to $20 billion in Canadian imports, items such as wine and hockey sticks and cement.

The president claiming the duties will offset Canadian mistreatment of the U.S. auto, dairy and alcohol industries. Those are scheduled to go into effect on August 19th. The president also posted that starting August 1st, quote, "All generic drugs being brought into the United States will have a tariff of 0 percent for a two year period of time," unquote, and then a 100 percent tariff in 2028 and an eye popping 200 percent in 2029. So that's a one to 200 percent tariff on cheaper drugs that will fall upon people such as you.

Separately, back in June, U.S. trade Representative Greer proposed issuing 10 percent to 12.5 percent tariffs on 59 nations and the European Union using a legal authority known as Section 301 over the, quote, "failure of to address the importation of goods made with forced labor."

So let's talk about it. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer joins us now from Mexico City.

Thanks so much for joining us. Talk us through the details of this new tariff plan that has to do with forced labor.

JAMIESON GREER, U.S. TRADE REPRESENTATIVE: Thanks for having me, Jake, and for the opportunity to explain what's going on. So for over 100 years, the United States has had a law on the books prohibiting the import of goods made with forced labor. This is common sense and we've enforced this law to prohibit it. What seems like common sense, I think, to you and me, others haven't done.

In other countries, no one really has these types of laws. And even in that small handful of countries that have them, they don't really enforce it. And so we have gone to the world over, frankly over years and across administrations to try to get other countries to act on this. Finally, we have put our foot down and we have told countries you need to take action, you need to prohibit the import of goods made with forced labor and you need to enforce these laws so that we all have a level playing field. And so we're taking action to do that.

And if countries are on the right path, they have a certain level of tariff, about 10 percent. And if they're not on the right path, it's a slightly higher tariff of 12.5 percent.

TAPPER: So it sounds great. How does one determine which countries are using forced labor? Because I assume the pushback from other countries is this isn't forced labor. We just have a different labor market and people, you know, work for lower wages, but no one's forced. Who decides what forced labor is?

GREER: So really each country -- each country does. So we're not really going into each of these countries and we're not assessing whether they have forced labor in their borders. What we're trying to do is we're trying to stop trade in those types of goods.

[17:05:00]

So in the United States we have processes, we have agencies that go through do investigations and we identify companies and countries that have a prevalence of forced labor, and we stop those goods at the border, and we don't let them in. Other countries don't have these processes.

So we're telling them, you need to establish this process. You need to go. Even if you're a country that probably doesn't have forced labor yourself, if you're allowing the import of goods made with forced labor, that makes it harder for my goods to compete. Because I'm -- you know, we're following labor rules in the U.S. We have labor unions, we have protections for our workers.

And so we're trying to get every country to have the same kinds of protections we do to make sure that trade and forced labor isn't occurring so that our workers, our exporters, our companies don't have to compete against that on an unlevel playing field.

TAPPER: On a philosophical basis, no doubt, forced labor is an issue. It's horrific. It's been one for as long as humans have been alive, probably. If this is a case that the president truly cares about this issue, then why not introduce this plan earlier? 2025?

GREER: Well, I would just say, Jake. So in 2018, when we redid NAFTA, one of the new provisions we forced Canada and Mexico to take was their own prohibition on forced labor. So in USMCA, we obligated them to do that. A few years later, we're finding that they aren't actually enforcing that, so they're included in this action.

And then over the past year, as we've done, new trade agreements with parties, we have 10 agreements on reciprocal trade. We've been requiring these countries to commit to implementing these laws. And even within the past week or two, we've seen a number of countries come in to implement these laws. So this is something that's gone on for a long time. It's not about something that happened a few months ago.

It's a -- it's a bipartisan concern, and American law provides for it. The president, since his first term, has put it into his trade agreements to try to get countries to do this. So it's -- unfortunately, it's not new. We've been trying for a long time. And finally, you know, we're not in favor of sweatshops, and we don't want anyone else to be in favor of it either.

TAPPER: So this is a tariff against countries if they don't have laws against the import of products made by forced labor. Is that right?

GREER: That's exactly right. That's exactly what it is.

TAPPER: So can you name countries that manufacture goods with forced labor? I mean, I can think of some off the top of my head, but I mean, we know of places where --

GREER: Sure.

TAPPER: -- you know, sneakers are made and smartphones are made, and it's suspected to be forced labor. So name some countries.

GREER: Sure. So, for example, just a couple of weeks ago, U.S. Customs and Border Protection came out with findings of a company in Jordan where there were forced labor conditions found. And so the Customs and Border Protection put out a statement that said, we're going to have -- we're going to withhold entry of these items. So that's one example. Malaysia is another one.

A couple of years ago, there were some findings that some of the palm oil orchards or groves in Malaysia had that. And so Customs and Border Protection regularly does these investigations. And so those are some U.S. findings. One thing that's interesting is Jordan and Malaysia are both countries that agreed as part of their deals with us over the past year to implement new forced labor laws. So this is -- this is really encouraging for us to see progress after many years.

TAPPER: If we are taking action to shut down or to try to eliminate as much as possible forced labor, why would we not just as a country say, OK, Jordan and Malaysia, you now have 200 percent tariffs until you pass laws that eliminate forced labor in your country. Instead of what this path is, which is putting tariffs on countries that don't have laws against the importation of products from places like Malaysia or Jordan?

GREER: Because we have an existing law like that, Jake. And instead of saying, if you don't eliminate forced labor, we just prohibit it. So if we find that a company or goods from Jordan are made with forced labor, we prohibit it. There are goods that come in from China where there's forced labor, we prohibit those goods. So we already have that law.

And that's part of the point of this investigation, is we're actually doing that in the United States. We're the leaders on this issue. But if I'm -- if I'm shipping into a third country, you know, even a place like Australia, where maybe they don't have a robust law like this, you know, they might accept goods made with forced labor from, you know, China or Malaysia or wherever, and then our goods exported from the U.S. have to compete with that, that's not fair to our workers. It's not fair to our unions. And that's why we've had Democrats and Republicans for many years call for enforcement action on this very issue.

TAPPER: But you don't actually think that the United States doesn't import products that were made with forced labor. Of course we do.

GREER: Well, Customs and Border Protection has a very robust division that is focused on this, where they will -- they will investigate companies, they stop them. I mean, that is the law.

[17:10:00]

So we do that. Do things slip through? They probably do, but we have a very robust investigation.

You can look back and you can look at articles from the past few years of, you know, solar panels being stopped at the border, car batteries being stopped at the border because they're suspected of having been produced using forced labor in China and other places. So this is something where the United States has actually been really ahead of the curve, again, across administrations. Biden enforced this, President Trump enforced it in his first -- in his first term. And now it's something that we regularly do.

And, you know, I understand your surprise. You would expect that other countries do this and they don't. And we're trying to -- we're trying to get them to take the same view -- same view of sweatshops that we have. We don't approve of it.

TAPPER: On the -- on the matter of what the president announced the other day on social media, can you explain the wisdom of taxing generic drugs, imports at up to 200 percent? That's going to hurt a lot of six sick Americans who are struggling with brand name drug prices and can't afford brand name drugs and can't afford that tariff, that tax.

GREER: And that's why that type of tariff doesn't come in for several years. The point is a lot of these generic drugs we're talking about, Jake, that are so important and you're exactly right, they're coming from China, they're coming from India, but we want to make more of those here. And so what the president has laid out is a ramp up, a phase in, an opportunity to send a signal to the manufacturers, you know, to big pharma and big generic pharma to say, listen, you need to make here in America because in a few years you're going to face a tariff. And it gives them that on ramp because you have to take time to build the factories. And so it sends a very strong signal that we need to reshore here so that we can have security of supply.

What I don't want to have is a situation where grandma somehow can't get her generics because, you know, there's a -- there's a pandemic or there's some supply shock and all of this stuff is coming from Asia. So we have to reshore here. And the president has laid out a long term phase in to facilitate it. TAPPER: U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer joining us from Mexico City. Thank you so much for joining us.

GREER: Thank you, Jake.

TAPPER: Breaking late today, the Justice Department reversing course, pulling back its subpoenas targeting not only reporters at the New York Times, but their families in some cases. What's their reason for standing down? Also today, Republicans call on the Justice Department to prosecute the prosecutor, specifically former special counsel Jack Smith, who launched two criminal cases against Donald Trump. I'm going to talk to a top Democrat who said -- who says a judge is going to laugh this case out of court.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:16:29]

TAPPER: In our Law and Justice Lead today, Republican House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio is seeking criminal charges for special counsel Jack Smith, claiming that the prosecutor misled his committee last year when talking about calls and texts between Trump administration officials and members of Congress While investigating Trump's 2020 election loss and the insurrection thereafter. The criminal referral Jordan sent to the Justice Department alleges that during Smith's deposition, he was asked, quote, "Did the toll records that you requested from the senators, did they include the content of the phone calls?" To which Smith replied, "No."

He was also asked, quote, "Did the records that you requested, the toll records from the members of Congress, include the content of text messages?" To which Smith again replied, "No."

The criminal referral says, quote, "Mr. Smith gave the impression that neither Mr. Smith nor his team had access to the content of members' privileged text messages. We now know this to be false," unquote.

Here is Republican Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri pressing Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to bring charges against Jack Smith. This is during Blanche's confirmation hearing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO): I hope that you will investigate Jack Smith for perjury, and I hope to possibly go prosecute him.

TODD BLANCHE ACTING ATTORNEY GENERAL: Yes, Senator.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: A Justice Department spokesperson confirms that they have received the referral from Jim Jordan and, quote, "will investigate all evidence of criminal conduct," unquote.

Here joining us now to discuss is the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin from Maryland.

Congressman, thanks for joining us. So you say that this referral from Jim Jordan and the Republicans deliberately distorts and misstates facts. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan was asked about that earlier today on Fox. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OH): When you ask him, did you get contents of members of Congress's communications and he says, no, that is not telling the truth. Again, we think it's pretty darn clear from his deposition, from his public testimony that he misled Congress. And 18 USC 1001 says you cannot do that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Your response?

REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): I mean, this whole thing is a joke. In his 14 hours before our committee, Jack Smith honestly and truthfully answered every single question posed to him. And this absurd claim rests on the idea that Jack Smith made false statements because he did not volunteer information that was never asked of him.

And so, you know, I saw my friend Chairman Jordan today. I said, look, the guy may be telegenic, but he's not telepathic, much less is he clairvoyant. He can't see into the future to see the questions that you wish you had asked him, but you didn't. He honestly, indirectly answered every question that was posed to him. And they just didn't ask other kinds of questions that would have revealed that he got information from the archives, information that was also available to President Trump.

So what he -- what they wish he had told him was that there was other publicly available information in the picture, but he directly and truthfully answered their question.

TAPPER: So what question should they have asked that would have gotten him to admit that he did have the content of some text messages?

RASKIN: Did the National Archives provide to you the same information that was available to President Trump containing information that may have had some contents in it.

[17:20:08]

But in any event, that is a very different question, because what they were after was the idea that Jack Smith had abused the subpoena process in order to get the contents of people's calls. But the law was such that those communications were turned over to the archives, and President Trump's people knew it because it was divulged to them, too. So, you know, when my friend Mr. Jordan says he gave half-truths, that's not right. They gave a half question, and he gave 100 percent truthful answer to their half question. You know, and if that had been their interest, they should have posed that question.

In any event, it's not perjury to truthfully answer the question that you're actually given.

TAPPER: So President Trump reacted with this post on social media in which he wrote, quote, "Justice at last?" You've said that this referral is going to get laughed out of court. Why are you so confident?

RASKIN: Well, look at just what happened today. The Department of Justice withdrew in another case, the subpoenas that they had for New York Times reporters, another harassment suit they had, and they were in court. This is the one where they went after the New York Times reporters who were investigating the unconstitutional jet plane that was given from Qatar to America. And so they wanted to crack down on them and they said, go and invest -- investigate those guys. Go subpoena those reporters.

They did, and of course, they had to withdraw it. And this Department of Justice is losing case after case because they're bringing completely specious political prosecutions against everybody from James Comey to Adam Schiff to Letitia James to a bunch of my colleagues who just said that people in the military have a duty to reject unlawful orders. But if they don't like something somebody says, they decide they're going to investigate them or prosecute them. In this case with Jack Smith, they want to prosecute him because they asked him the wrong questions.

TAPPER: Yes. You posted last night on a separate matter, that every House Democrat has signed onto your motion to formally block the creation of Trump's anti weaponization fund, that's what he calls it, from going into effect. This is the 1000 -- I'm sorry, $1.776 for people like, I guess -- yes, the January 6th rioters, et cetera, et cetera.

Here's what Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said about that fund during his confirmation hearing. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BLANCHE: It is a moot issue. Meaning there is no weaponization fund. The weaponization fund is dead. It's not moving forward.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Why is your bill necessary, given what Blanche said there? And do you think Republicans will sign on?

RASKIN: Well, yes, I certainly hope Republicans will sign on. Both Democratic and Republican senators were all over Todd Blanche about that because they said, OK, if you're not moving forward on it because this is a written agreement, a settlement that you made with Donald Trump, will you say in writing that it is moot, as he's saying, and that nobody has any intention of moving forward with it? And he refused repeatedly to commit to writing. And the settlement agreement itself says that any changes to it must be reduced to writing. So in other words, it's a perfectly valid legal agreement in any event, although Todd Blanche keeps forgetting this. It's an agreement they pretend between the government and Donald Trump. So he can't speak for Donald Trump, who's the plaintiff here. Donald Trump would also have to say that he's withdrawing the settlement agreement.

TAPPER: Congressman Jamie Raskin, Democrat of Maryland, thank you, sir.

RASKIN: You bet.

TAPPER: A shocking moment moments ago in Wisconsin. A protester interrupted a news conference about the man shot and killed by police. See the moment and the background on the case causing so much tension in Madison, Wisconsin right now. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:28:30]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF JOHN PATTERSON, MADISON POLICE: I'm saying --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's right.

PATERSON: I mean --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Give me this microphone then. Excuse me. That's right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: We have some breaking news in our Law and Justice Lead. There was a news conference moment ago, a news conference held by the mayor and the police chief of Madison, Wisconsin, and it was interrupted by an angry protester, a demonstrator, who took over the microphone. Officials were trying to give an update about the fatal shooting of a man by police. Shouting match for almost 15 minutes ensued until the Madison police chief calmly told them that there would be a full investigation and amid interruptions, came back to the lectern and tried to answer questions, saying everyone can feel what the chief called the thinness of trust in the city.

As CNN's Whitney Wild reports, video shows part of what happened during yesterday's shooting. But since the officers were not wearing body cameras, many questions remain unanswered.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Holy (BLEEP).

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Disturbing video showing police shooting and killing a man they say pulled a knife and injured an officer during a struggle in Madison, Wisconsin. According to police, officers were responding to a report of a person checking parked vehicles Wednesday afternoon. CHIEF JOHN PATTERSON, MADISON POLICE: They attempted to contact him, but he fled on a bicycle and then traveled through some nearby backyards. We think an attempt to get away.

WILD (voice-over): Officers later tracked the man down. Four officers and the man began to struggle as police tried to arrest him. Police say one of the officers was injured after the man pulled out a large fixed blade knife, seen here in a photo after it was recovered by the Madison Police Department.

[17:30:02]

CHIEF JOHN PATTERSON, MADISON POLICE: A less lethal device, a taser, was deployed. Unfortunately, it was unsuccessful.

WILD (voice-over): The injured officer then pulled a gun and fired three shots, according to police. The man was transported and pronounced dead at the hospital. A witness says he was about 10 feet from the incident.

MICHAEL DOUBEK, WITNESS: One of the officers then draws a Taser, yells, taser, taser. Tasers him. He falls to the ground and the three continue to struggle for a second or two. And then one of the officer stands and just a couple feet above his head, shoots him three times.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Quit your job. Quit your job.

WILD (voice-over): The incident sparked protests as news of the shooting and cell phone videos circulated within the community. The Madison Police Department doesn't have a body worn camera policy and none of the officers involved were wearing cameras.

PATTERSON: I'm aware of cell phone video that has been shared and circulated online depicting this incident. I ask the community recognize that there is other video that they have not seen that's not circulating online that will be reviewed as a part of this investigation.

WILD (voice-over): Police acknowledge the city of Madison has a history of controversial shootings. In 2015, a white police officer shot and killed Tony Robinson, an unarmed biracial teenager.

CROWD: No justice, no peace.

WILD (voice-over): Three years before that, Paul Heenan was killed after a scuffle with police when he mistakenly entered the wrong house. Actions by officers in both cases were later found to be justified.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can hear my neighbor crying.

WILD (voice-over): As a community confronts the aftermath of another contentious shooting, Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers urged, quote, transparency and accountability. Whitney Wild, CNN, Chicago.

(END VIDEOTAPE) TAPPER: And our thanks to CNN's Whitney Wild for that report. Coming up next, the notable Democrat who says today that the Bernie Bros could spoil midterms for the Democrats. Why does he think that? We'll talk to him, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:36:25]

TAPPER: The Democratic Party's current identity crisis is our Politics Lead today, a Wall Street Journal op-ed by former ambassador to Japan and White House chief of staff for Barack Obama, Rahm Emanuel has the eye catching headline, the Bernie Bros could spoil Democrats midterms. He's here to explain.

Thanks so much for joining us, Rahm Emanuel. What's your response to Democrats who say, hey, the progressives, the Bernie Bros, they're the ones bringing all the energy to the Democratic Party right now?

RAHM EMANUEL, FROMER WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: No. Well, look, I would say this, look, this election cycle is setting up exactly like 06, very unpopular war, very unpopular war. You have in corruption, like under Tom DeLay, like under Abu Ghraib and then you have corruption here under Donald Trump. It's set up perfectly to be a referendum on Donald Trump and the corruption and also very unpopular war.

Also in this summer of '06, gas had hit record prices and you're seeing that we recruited a bunch of candidates that took national security, the cultural issues off the table and made it about prosecuting always George Bush and the corruption around the administration in a very unpopular war.

Here, the distraction from the Democratic socialists actually adds a weight and the party doesn't have a deep bench of support. You want this to be totally about Donald Trump, his corruption in this war. And they have policies from defunding the police to decriminalizing the prison system to open borders. And we've tried that. And it's politically, electorally a failure. And the policies are wrong. They're not Democratic Party policies.

Now I just came back, as I say in the piece from Omaha, a great candidate Denise Powell, we lost three times, is one of the few districts, Kamala Harris, one that had a Republican congressman and they're calling her DSA Denise, and she's a moderate. Now, she can either prosecute the race on the fact that the city council member she's running against voted against the minimum wage or take her precious resources and try to distinguish herself from the DSA. But you can't do both.

And so my point is, what happens in New York 13th district doesn't stay in New York 13th district. And that's a burden on us who want to see Donald Trump have a checkmate from Congress, not a rubber stamp from Congress.

TAPPER: So you write this about the Democratic Socialists of America or the DSA. When the DSA attempts to turn safe Democratic states and districts a darker shade of blue, Democratic candidates in swing districts are put at a distinct disadvantage. How so? How does a Democratic socialist, a DSA candidate in say, my home district in Philadelphia, how does that impact the Omaha race?

EMANUEL: Well, I just told you they're calling her DSA Denise. And it's a burden because in that one, she shouldn't have to. She should be able to spend her resources and prosecute the race on the fact that he voted against a minimum wage that was a referendum where 70 percent of the district voted in the referendum for an increase in the minimum wage and he voted against it, one of the only alderman to do that or city council members.

To me, that's a big deal. And that's what the race should be about. It should be about the fact that he would go be a rubber stamp for Donald Trump and his corruption when in fact the public wants a checkmate on the Donald Trump, his corruption and this war. It's a distraction for a party with only 32 percent favorable rating. We don't have a deep bench to draw on.

But I, you know, I say this in contrast, Jake, in '06, we took all the problems and burdens, moved them to the side with your candidate. Your messenger is your message.

[17:40:05]

TAPPER: Yeah.

EMANUEL: And here we have a case. We have very good candidates with now a distraction from prosecuting Donald Trump on an unpopular war and unpopular corruption.

TAPPER: But isn't your issue really here with the voters, the Democratic voters who are voting for these individuals over more centrist Democrats? An example might be of somebody who was elected, the New York mayor, Zohran Mamdani. And he wasn't just elected. I think he was elected with barely 50 percent of the vote.

But his favorability rating in New York according to a Siena poll is 58 percent. I mean, people like what he's doing.

EMANUEL: Let's also look. Well, Jake, let's go through this one. There was a primary in the Omaha race. Denise won.

TAPPER: Yes.

EMANUEL: It was against a very progressive candidate. Two go to Arizona last night and in fact you had an incumbent member beat back a very progressive. So it's not universal across the board. But take it as an example. In Nebraska, a candidate running for the Senate is not running on the Democratic label because it's too unpopular. Same thing in Montana. We don't have a lot of bandwidth here and a lot of cushion.

So my point is you don't want the distractions. We won 31 seats in the house in '06 and we won the Senate. That's also true. We added in '08. So we had two back to back very successful years. The whole strategy is to put an end to the Trump presidency, the end to this corruption and a checkmate to a Congress that's acted like a rubber stamp.

Anything that is distracting from that, that it's a burden on that is exactly that, a distraction and a burden from what we as Democrats believe. And I think take the policies, you got a set of defunding, decriminalizing, open borders. We have run that play and gotten our butts kicked. We don't need to do it a second time to see if it turns out, if the movie turns out any different.

And so I don't agree with you. That's happening universally. Yes, it happened in the New York districts, et cetera, but that hasn't happened as in this case. Take the Omaha race as one example. There's other Democrats that want. And the classic example that I also say in the piece, you have a governor from New Jersey and a governor from Virginia. They both were military but national security backgrounds, both ousted incumbent Republicans --

TAPPER: Yes.

EMANUEL: -- and then both went on to become governor. The whole strategy, Jake, is to flip red to blue so you can raise the minimum wage, not deeper blue districts. I'm not into cobalt blue versus midnight blue. I like navy blue. That's the color I prefer.

TAPPER: Former Congressman Rahm Emanuel, thank you so much for joining us. Appreciate it. The op-ed is in the Wall Street Journal right now if you want to check it out. We're going to get some reaction to Rahm Emanuel's spoiler alert.

Plus the breaking news. The Justice Department dropping its subpoenas targeting reporters at the New York Times and family members of them after they reported on the security concerns related to Trump's Qatari gifted Air Force One. A lot going on tonight. We're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:47:26]

TAPPER: In our Politics Lead, today the White House withdrew the subpoenas they had issued for three New York Times reporters after they admitted legal errors. These subpoenas would have required the reporters to testify about their sources after they reported on Trump's Qatari gifted Air Force One and security concerns about it. The Justice Department issued a statement saying in part this judge threatened our attorneys with sanctions unless subpoenas were withdrawn and blocked us from presenting the meticulous process of this investigation.

Make no mistake, this investigation remains ongoing and we will pursue justice against those threatening national security by leaking classified information, a serious federal crime.

The Trump administration recently withdrew similar subpoenas for journalists at the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal. My panel joins us now. Karen Finney, the White House, which is about to be feted the president by the White House Correspondents Association on Friday for the makeup dinner. They've been vigorously going after news organizations that they deem unfair, whose coverage they don't like for national security issues, et cetera, et cetera.

What does today's developments tell you about how they've been waging this battle?

KAREN FINNEY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think one of the most disturbing things is they're going after the wrong people. I mean, you know, the First Amendment is a, you know, it is -- the framers put freedom of the press in the Constitution for a reason. And when we are trying to flout those norms that, you know, as this president has done on many fronts, it's -- that is a threat to our democracy.

It, you know, certainly if they have concerns about the leaking of classified information, the way to pursue that is to do an internal investigation and find out who the leaker was.

TAPPER: Yes.

FINNEY: Not to go after the journalist who made the choice to then report on the information they were given.

TAPPER: Marc.

MARC SHORT, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO VIP MIK PENCE: I agree, Karen. I mean, the reality is that leaking national security is a serious crime. But at the time, same, same time, I think we protect freedom of press and our First Amendment protects a lot of our other freedoms.

And so, agreed, the way to go after it is try to find those who leak rather than going after the reporters.

TAPPER: Today, at an event about data centers and AI, President Trump addressed the war in Iran. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: We're doing very well against the Islamic Republic of Iran. We're doing extremely well. They would like to do something, but I say they're not ready yet. They need more of the same. They're not ready yet. They got some evil intentions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: I can't tell what's happening here or when there is any, any hint that anything is going to end at this point. They're trying to get the Strait of Hormuz open. That's the big goal, and that was open before the war was launched.

[17:50:04]

SHORT: Jake, I think that there's probably a reluctance to actually use the military necessary to ensure the straits are open. And I think that creates a situation. We're going to continue to be in the situation where the president is looking to negotiate publicly. There'll be, I think, more kinetic action and then opening doors to negotiation.

But I don't see in that path how it ends unless actually you're allowed to finish the job that was started here.

TAPPER: What do you think, Karen?

FINNEY: Well, look, the problem is that Americans don't like this war. They don't want this war and is becoming increasingly unpopular. Gas prices are back up, but also just the strain of war. And I think sometimes we forget that we now -- we have a generation of young men and women who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that is still a very real pain and wound in our culture.

And so the idea of getting dragged into yet another conflict in the Middle East where there seems to be no clear plan for to, you know, unless you believe that, I guess it's over, but maybe it's back on again. I'm not sure.

TAPPER: It's on the first day that we won the war.

FINNEY: Yes. Or it's like two more weeks, I guess it's going to be for, you know, and without congressional approval, that people are wary of it and wary of it also at a time when they're being told we can't do these. I mean, just look at the budget proposal. We can't do all these other things that people need to meet the basic needs of our own people. But we need more money to go fight this war and to continue to prosecute this war that nobody can say what the plan is.

TAPPER: The president's other big priority in addition to the war is the Save America Act. His bill that would make it a little tougher or a lot tougher in some cases to vote, to register to vote. One of the issues in the Senate is there aren't the votes for it. There are not 60 votes to bring it up for a vote, and there aren't even 50 votes to pass it. Even though Republicans control the Senate, the President is mad. He wants the Senate Republicans to get rid of the filibuster.

So it's only 50 votes, by the way, that still wouldn't allow it to pass because there still aren't 50 votes. But here's White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt with a warning for the Republican leader of the Senate, the Majority Leader, John Thune.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The president spoke about this directly yesterday, his patience is running out. He wants to see as much of the Save America passed as possible by the August recess. The House did its job. The Senate needs to do its job, too.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: On the Hill today, Senator Thune, the majority leader, said this to reporters about Leavitt's comments, quote, well, maybe she or somebody else ought to get on the phone and get the votes. Right. It's 50 around here. So instead of, you know, pointing the finger at Republicans that might think about going after the people who are stopping on the floor, which is the Democrats. It's not just the Democrats, I should note, I mean, Lisa Murkowski, there are a number of enough Republicans to stop it.

What is the likelihood you think that this will pass before recess?

SHORT: Zero.

TAPPER: 0. Yes, that's correct.

SHORT: I think --

TAPPER: There's a right answer. And your prizes are.

SHORT: I think there's a small chance that post-election and a lame duck there's it could happen. But I still wouldn't put a lot of confidence in that, Jake, for the reasons you said. I'm sitting here as a supporter of the State Act. I believe you should have voter id, believe you should be able to prove citizenship.

But the very senators that you mentioned are holdouts are the very ones the president himself has personally attacked, from Murkowski to Collins to McConnell to Cornyn to Tillis. And so when he blames John Thune for not getting them on board, they're the very ones that he has gone after. And so he's created a big obstacle to actually get the most prized legislation piece he wants right now through the Senate.

FINNEY: Can I just mention though, you know, I feel for the Republicans because Democrats were in the same place in 2021. We may, you guys are old enough to remember --

TAPPER: The John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

FINNEY: Correct. And it was, you know, Kyrsten Sinema and you had Joe Manchin. And look, we got to a point when it comes to voter id, you had, you know, Stacey Abrams and you had, you know, Clyburn and Barack Obama on the same page about when it came to voter ID, we couldn't get a deal.

The concern constantly, though, from Democrats is it's got to be broadly available and it has to be free because we're consistently --

TAPPER: A voter ID.

FINNEY: Voter ID.

TAPPER: Right.

FINNEY: Meaning that, you know, because this will impose costs on people to either go and get the ID or to get the -- have to go wait in line to get the documents that they need to get the ID. But I do think there's another piece. I know Republicans want to talk about the same act like it's just voter ID but it's more than that because remember there's also a provision in there that would force the states to provide the federal government, the Trump federal government with sensitive voter data that they want and they're trying to sue to get it right now from the States.

16 -- they've lost 16 times in court. These are Republican and Democratic governors and secretaries of state. So when we hear that the SAVE Act is about voter ID, it's about a lot more than that.

TAPPER: Yes.

FINNEY: That's a big part of --

SHORT: All that's not in the reconciliation bill that's being argued or it's in the reconciliation bill. It's be funding to the states to ask them to try to comply with some of these conversations.

TAPPER: Marc, just quickly on the on the filibuster because the Trump want -- Trump wants soon to get rid of the filibuster.

[17:55:03]

Former Republican Senator Ben Sasse, who I'm going to talk about in a second, he penned an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal entitled Americans need the Filibuster. He writes in part, when partisans talk about killing or reforming the filibuster, they're saying they want to turn the sand into another House of Representatives. That would be a tragic mistake. The filibuster prevents the dramatic pendulum swings that are the natural result of simple majority lawmaking. Do you agree?

SHORT: I look forward to your interview with Ben on Sunday night. He's a dear friend of mine and he's a courageous fighter. I'm not probably somebody is sacrosanct on the filibuster. It was not in the Constitution. It's a rule in the Senate. And I think a lot of senators who are typically moderates, have hidden behind the filibuster because they can say to their leader, hey, look, you don't need me on this vote because the threshold 60, it's not 50.

And so if you actually change that rule, I think you might find members actually voting their conscience more.

TAPPER: All right. Thanks to both you. Really appreciate it. A red alert in Trump's war with Iran today, the price of oil topped $100 a barrel. The new escalation driving the surge, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)