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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Chaos In Minneapolis; Joe Rogan Blasts ICE Street Operations; Trump Encourages Iranians To Keep Protesting And Take Over Institutions. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired January 13, 2026 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:36]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR: Tonight, as ICE raids become more public and violent in the streets, public opinion sours and so Donald Trump's fans.
JOE ROGAN, PODCAST HOST: Are we really going to be the Gestapo? Where's your papers? Is that what we've come to?
PHILLIP: Also, as the President's economic ideas become more socialist, Republicans pour cold water on them.
REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): I wouldn't get too spun up about ideas that are out of the box.
PHILLIP: And on the brink as thousands of protesters are reported killed, will a public execution force Trump to strike Iran?
DONALD TRUMP, UNITED STATES PRESIDENT: We will take very strong action if they do such a thing.
PHILLIP: Live at the table, Ana Kasparian, Joe Borelli, Jamal Simmons, Jason Rantz and Ana Navarro. Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here they do.
PHILLIP: Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York. Let's get right to what America's talking about.
Chaos in Minneapolis, tonight tensions are boiling over as federal officials clash with demonstrators in the wake of last week's deadly ICE shooting.
That was the scene earlier tonight on the streets of Minneapolis. More than a thousand agents have flooded the city, deploying tear gas and flashbangs amid these escalating protests. And tonight, there's been a major shakeup in Minnesota's US Attorney's Office. Six federal prosecutors have resigned after pressure from the White House over that investigation into the shooting of Renee Good.
A source tells CNN that the Trump administration told them to focus not on the actions of the officer who shot her, but instead on Good herself and her wife, who was also on the scene of the shooting. Now, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche also tells CNN there is no basis for opening a criminal investigation into the officer.
Now, as tensions continue to rise, an ominous warning this morning from President Trump. He posted this message telling the people of Minnesota, "fear not, the day of reckoning and retribution is coming." What does he mean by that? And is the White House, the DOJ, are any of these entities doing anything to bring the tensions down in a very explosive situation, frankly?
ANA KASPARIAN, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER AND HOST, "THE YOUNG TURKS": Minneapolis: I mean, soon after she was gunned down, shot in the face three times, DHS didn't hesitate. Immediately came out and referred to her as a domestic terrorist. And what that does is it signals to other ICE agents that they can behave with impunity, that the federal government will come to their defense regardless of what happens.
So, no, they have done nothing to calm tensions. In fact, one can suspect, and this is speculation, of course, that the federal government seems to have an interest increasing the tension. And I'm worried that Trump is angling to call for martial law.
JASON RANTZ, SEATTLE RED RADIO HOST: Who's asking folks to take to the streets right now in angry protest?
KASPARIAN: We live in America --
RANTZ: No, I know.
KASPARIAN: -- where protest are legal.
RANTZ: I'm not saying it's not legal. It clearly is.
KASPARIAN: But you have issue with it.
RANTZ: No, I have an issue with people who are taking to the streets and creating the tension. And then you saying --
KASPARIAN: Do you have an issue with ICE agents knocking people to the ground simply because they're recording the operations that they're conducting?
RANTZ: In cases if that happens, I think that should be called out. But let's also stop pretending that the folks who aren't turning up aren't the ones who are engaging in not just legal protests, but they're turning violent. Their intent is to create an action from ICE agents so that they could film it, so they can post it online and have folks like you don't.
KASPARIAN: You don't think flooding Minneapolis with a thousand ICE agents who are just acting like absolute thugs (inaudible) intentions.
RANTZ: I think ICE agent are under attack and they deserve protection.
KASPARIAN: Look like that from the videos.
ANA NAVARRO, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: The reason people came out to protest is because I think there's a lot of outrage, anger, indignation at the extreme, cruel, performative tactics that some ICE agents have taken at the racial profiling, at the dragging of pregnant women, at the dragging out of teenagers in the snow, and frankly, at the death of this woman.
[22:05:10]
I think that if there -- if people felt that there was a legitimate investigation going on that you could have some credit that had some credibility, people would feel differently. But right now, what you are seeing is a federal government that is not investigating what happened. They're trying to investigate the dead woman and her spouse. They're not cooperating with this -- yes.
JOE BORELLI, FORMER REPUBLICAN LEADER, NEW YORK COUNCIL: But the FBI protocols don't start with the criminal justice.
NAVARRO: Why are they not cooperating with the state?
BORELLI: I'm just saying FBI's own guy --
NAVARRO: OK, but do you think it would be a much more credible investigation if they were invested -- if they were cooperating with state and (inaudible) law enforcement.
BORELLI: If the investigation unit, the inspection unit, if they feel that there is a criminal referral to the civil rights division, then they do it. That's what happens in every case. I don't know what will happen, right? I can't predict that. But to say there's no investigation --
(CROSSTALK)
NAVARRO: You have six US attorneys resigned or what?
BORELLI: You have the local attorney general saying he's going to conduct an investigation. You have the local and --
BORELLI: And you have six US attorneys resigned --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: They don't have access, the locals are not being given access to the evidence. But the other --
BORELLI: If they have a grand jury, they could.
PHILLIP: Why are these prosecutors being pressured to investigate the widow of the person who was just killed?
BORELLI: In every police involved shooting, the actions of the victim. In this case, she's the victim.
PHILLIP: A criminal investigation --
BORELLI: Every police involved shooting --
PHILLIP: -- of the person --
BORELLI: In every police involved shooting, the victim's actions and the contributing factors to that shooting, whether they --
PHILLIP: No, no. I'm not talking about the victim. I'm talking about the wife of the victim.
KASPARIAN: The wife of the victim.
NAVARRO: They didn't actually cause the shot.
PHILLIP: The victim's wife.
KASPARIAN: Exactly.
PHILLIP: The victim's wife. And if there is a need to launch a criminal investigation into the victim's wife, at the very least you would think that the person who pulled the trigger would also prompt a similar investigation.
BORELLI: Let me say this. I think we need a public service announcement for anyone who's involved with some of these groups that are pressuring individuals to go and provoke law enforcement officers. If someone's pressuring you to go out there and provoke law enforcement officers --
KASPARIAN: We live in a third world country --
BORELLI: They're doing that to invoke a reaction of violence from the officers so that they can, as you pointed out before, Jason, they can rant, rally and rave about what just happened. But you might be the victim of violence, whether it's intentional, accidental or not.
PHILLIP: Wait a second.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Let me break this down. Let me break this down. So --
BORELLI: Break it down.
PHILLIP: So you are saying that if Americans decide to go into the streets and disobey law enforcement, they deserve to be brutalized by police --
BORELLI: That's your word.
PHILLIP: -- shot by them?
KASPARIAN: That's what you're implying. That's what you're implying?
BORELLI: Why don't you let me finish?
PHILLIP: Hold on. There's a real question on the table. You guys keep saying, you're putting yourself in that situation. What kind of protest is OK with you? BORELLI: Parts that don't involve the impediment of law enforcement doing their constitutionally protected duty of enforcing the law.
PHILLIP: So what about filming an ICE officer?
BORELLI: Filming an ICE officer is fine.
PHILLIP: What about --
NAVARRO: Heeding the officers --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: I want to be very specific. I want to be very specific.
BORELLI: OK. Give me a chance to respond.
PHILLIP: A lot of videos. I'm going to ask you one by one, filming an ICE officer, you think that's OK?
BORELLI: If the camera is in front of the officer on duty, then --
PHILLIP: OK. Yelling at an ICE officer, that's OK?
BORELLI: If it's just yelling, then that's fine.
PHILLIP: What about --
KASPARIAN: Working at Target?
PHILLIP: What about -- what about.
BORELLI: Let's be honest --
PHILLIP: No, no. Hold on a second. What about driving in a car behind an ICE officer and filming them? Is that OK?
BORELLI: Why are we talking about this when the accident had to happen? The incident that happened --
PHILLIP: I'm just asking you --
BORELLI: Was a person, an officer --
PHILLIP: Because you're making a blanket statement.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: I just laid out a bunch of things that don't violate the law. These are all things that -- these are all things that people on the ground in a Minneapolis and all around the country are doing. I'm just being concrete.
I don't want to talk in vague terms. Let's be concrete. Those are some of the things that are happening on the ground that are provoking some violent encounters with ICE. Whether or not the people in some of these videos are not being violent at all.
So are you fine with that? Just on the principle that if you antagonize law enforcement, you are deserving of brutality from --
RANTZ: No.
PHILLIP: -- the government?
RANTZ: No. And I don't know anyone who's taking that position. I think where it becomes unlawful is what -- like that's what we're talking about here is that, when your goal is to get in the way of an immigration enforcement, that is illegal. That is not a protest. Now, if you want to do it from the sidewalk, if you don't want to get involved, that's different.
The reason why in this particular case, though, that they're talking about the wife is, I guess people keep ignoring the fact that she was encouraging her wife to flee from a stop.
PHILLIP: OK. Hold on a second.
RANTZ: I believe he should be prosecuted because I think it's a bad.
PHILLIP: Is fleeing from a stop something that results in somebody being shot?
RANTZ: It can accidentally.
[22:10:05]
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Guys, hold on a second. Hold on a second. What you're saying is not correct. That is not correct.
BORELLI: Never result in a shooting.
PHILLIP: Joe, what you're saying --
BORELLI: If you drive a car into someone, it could result --
PHILLIP: Joe, I'll ask you again, is fleeing a stop a reason for ICE to use force? Any federal law enforcement.
BORELLI: No.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: So even if the wife had said you should flee, that is not a reason. It is not lawful. It is not in their conduct books to use for simply because a person is fleeing.
RANTZ: Correct.
(CROSSTALK) BORELLI: That did not have it. The officer was in front of the car. Fleeing with a guy in front of the car is (inaudible) say I'm fleeing down the street.
PHILLIP: We're talking about why they're investigating the wife. That's what we're talking about.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because she encouraged someone to talk about.
PHILLIP: We're talking about why investigating the wife. We have six US attorneys, some of whom involved in, deeply involved in prosecuting the Medicare fraud in Minnesota. They're involved investigating the murder of a Minnesota state legislator. They're involved in some really high profile, important investigations.
They decided to hang up their entire careers over this. I don't understand why that is not a red flag for our friends.
BORELLI: If you're in charge of investigating fraud in Minnesota, you should probably resign. If you were the one in charge of investigating that --
PHILLIP: Well, what about --
NAVARRO: They've prosecuted.
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: They have prosecuted in Miami. We talked about -- I'm saying that it was rampant in Minnesota as we're seeing the evidence uncovered. If you're going tout that, I don't think it's a great thing for (inaudible).
PHILLIP: They prosecuted dozens of people to the point --
BORELLI: (Inaudible) on the jets and saying you're a football player.
PHILLIP: Hold on, to the point that the Trump administration is touting the prosecutions that these guys did before Trump was even in office.
BORELLI: God bless them.
JAMAL SIMMONS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Let me -- all right. Let me just level set here. There's not really a situation where police welcome civilian oversight of their behavior. Civilian oversight boards across the country are always pushed back on by police unions.
Any time the police feel like they're going to have civilian oversight, they say no because it's going to interfere with the conduct of law enforcement because they know they don't want people watching what it is that they do. But we know that it makes for better policing when that happens. We know that cameras make for better policing. Police resist that all the time.
(CROSSTALK) RANTZ: One last point, police across the country have said --
SIMMONS: OK. So now that change --
RANTZ: -- you want this.
SIMMONS: because now they've been operating their own -- in their own -- in their own --
RANTZ: No, I think --
SIMMONS: -- benefit but at the beginning they don't really -- they don't like that.
RANTZ: I think the reason why they want the body cam footage because it's impossible to twist it around.
SIMMONS: I saw a video today of an ICE officer walking up to a Somali, a young man who was of Somali descent who's standing at a gas station and asking him for his driver's license, wants to see his papers. He said, are you an American citizen or are you naturalized? Those two things are the same thing.
RANTZ: What happened before that? What happened before that?
SIMMONS: If you are naturalized, you are an American citizen. So he began to ask him --
RANTZ: Cheering picking videos without knowing the context.
SIMMONS: He began asking, where were you born? Where were you born is none of your damn business. I'm an American citizen just like you are.
RANTZ: What led to it?
PHILLIP: Jason, I've seen dozens of these videos. I've seen --
RANTZ: I have seen plenty of videos too --
PHILLIP: You have seen them too, right?
RANTZ: -- which some I completely --
PHILLIP: No, no.
RANTZ: -- think are wrong but they are not all wrong.
PHILLIP: Hold on a second. But you've seen the videos that we're talking about --
RANTZ: I've seen some.
PHILLIP: -- where they go up to someone sitting in a car and they say, where were you born?
RANTZ: Yes, I've seen some of videos buts lots of them do not -- PHILLIP: That's a citizenship check.
RANTZ: -- context.
PHILLIP: That's a citizenship check is -- do you think that's -- I mean, put aside legal or not?
RANTZ: Sure.
PHILLIP: Are you good with that?
RANTZ: No. Unless there was context in which we don't know that could actually provide some more information. For example, we're targeting someone who may be -- we know is in this country illegally and that was the pretext for that conversation.
PHILLIP: That's not -- that's --
RANTZ: If that is happening -- but hold on. If that is --
PHILLIP: But do you acknowledge --
RANTZ: -- is that OK?
PHILLIP: That's not what's happening.
RANTZ: Sometimes it's not, and I think that is wrong. Other times it is.
PHILLIP: They walking around the city --
(CROSSTALK)
SIMMONS: The only reason we know these things are happening is because civilians are walking around with their phones and they're filming this. If it wasn't, we would have the same kind of BS reporting that the police do, and they say that someone is attacking them or coming at them with when we're watching video of someone saying, I'm not mad at you, dude.
RANTZ: We just watched video of woman driving into a ICE agent, and you're telling us that didn't really happen. That's an important distinction here too.
PHILLIP: Let me just pause us here, because we have more on that and some new information about how Americans actually see that very video that you're just talking about next. More of these videos, as we've been talking about, are surfacing of the chaos on American streets as these confrontations between ICE and the public, and these agents take a dangerous turn.
Plus, not only are more Americans souring on ICE and on the raids, but many of them are Donald Trump's fans.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROGAN: Are we really going to be the Gestapo? Where's your papers? Is that what we've come to?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[22:15:05]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: We're seeing new scenes of the turmoil that's unfolding on the streets of Minneapolis six days after an ICE officer shot and killed Rene Good. Now tonight, just a couple of blocks from that shooting scene, federal agents confronted a different woman in her car. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(SHOUTING)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[22:20:00]
PHILLIP: You can hear the woman there pleading with officers that she's disabled and she's trying to get to a doctor's appointment. Now as ICE agents surrounded her car and dragged her out, in another confrontation today, CNN's Ryan Young captured the moment that authorities deployed flashbangs toward a crowd.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: But they are loud and they are angry. I'm sure when they get in this car -- there we go. They're firing the flashbangs again. I knew that was going to happen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Now as federal agents ramp up their tactics in Minneapolis, there is new polling out today showing the public opinion is souring on ice, with the majority of registered voters disapproving of the way that agents are enforcing immigration laws. And here is how podcaster Joe Rogan described it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROGAN: You don't want militarized people in the streets just roaming around snatching people up, many of which turn out to actually be US citizens. They just don't have their papers on them. Are we really going to be Gestapo, where's your papers? Is that what we've come to?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: As were just discussing in the last segment, I mean, that has also become a big part of this so-called enforcement. I mean, Minneapolis is not a huge place, OK? And they are absorbing thousands of federal officers, more than any other deployment that they've done so far. And we are seeing these encounters where you're seeing federal officers, maybe ICE agents, maybe border patrol, walking down the street stopping people, sometimes because they look Somali or they look brown or whatever it is. This is according to those people who were stopped and asking them, where are your papers? Show me your papers. Where were you born?
That's the stuff that we're seeing. And Americans like Joe Rogan are concerned about it.
NAVARRO: And I think part of it is, look, Joe Rogan's identity does not depend on defending Donald Trump and his administration doing things that are indefensible. And I see people all the time bending themselves on TV, bending themselves into all sorts of pretzel shape because they subsist from being a Trump supporter. And that's all they've got.
Joe Rogan, I think, is speaking out of conviction, is speaking out of what he is seeing. And I think it's reflective of what a lot of Americans feel right now. People are showing up at the streets because they are pissed off at what is happening in our country. It is heartbreaking to see these images in America.
We are the country that's supposed to be an example for the rest of the world. And the things that are happening in our streets are the type of things that happen in these third world countries. And they do bring all sorts of bad memories when you see these masked men targeting people.
And it's not just Minnesota. I mean, we remember the woman who got pulled out of the street in Boston by masked men. We have seen pregnant women dragged. In Minnesota, we saw two young teenagers who were working at Target --
KASPARIAN: Yes.
NAVARRO: -- like so many of our children do --
KASPARIAN: American citizens.
NAVARRO: -- have a job while going to school, being pulled out while screaming I'm a US citizen, I'm a US Citizen, because they look Latino and they were Latino. That is un-American and unacceptable. And good for Joe Rogan for standing up and denouncing it.
More of Trump supporters, if they want him to be a good president, should be doing the same.
PHILLIP: Let me play what he said about the Renee Good video that we've been discussing. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROGAN: It's complicated, obviously, but it's also very ugly to watch someone shoot a US citizen, especially a woman, in the face when people say it's justifiable because the car hit him. It seemed like she was kind of turning the car away.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Now, Joe, what was really striking to me about this Quinnipiac poll, 53 percent said it was unjustified for the ICE agent to shoot Renee Good. But I was also really surprised by how this had penetrated. Eighty two percent of registered voters say they saw that video.
So you're talking almost universal impressions of what happened there. Is it -- I don't know, are Republicans misreading the situation or risking misreading the situation?
BORELLI: Look, if anyone saw last segment, right? I had no problem defending the officer, and I think Joe Rogan's factually wrong about his assessment. But I am a big Joe Rogan fan and I listen all the time. And he is really emblematic of one of the most successful things Trump did in the campaign, it was to engage podcasters and win a lot of people who listen to that type of forum.
I have a conversation in my head with Joe Rogan for hours every week. I'm a big fan, right? I talk to him. So when I hear him challenging something that I believe, you know, or my gut reaction to something, I actually listen to him. So I do think this is a problem for Trump because I think he is a very good barometer of where people stand.
Again, this instance, he might be factually wrong on. I think he is, but he is a good barometer of where a lot of Trump supporters are. And I would have, you know, they have the Waffle House indicator for a hurricane. Like if the Waffle House is to closed, there might be -- there should be a Joe Rogan indicator.
[22:25:12]
PHILLIP: And can I just say, I actually think what you just said, Joe Borelli, is important because there are probably -- this is a little bit of a Rorschach test. Like you can have 10 people watch this video and everybody's going to see something a little bit different. But what might end up really mattering is how people feel about what happened. And I think that there is this gut feeling in a lot of Americans that is not something that they ever want to see happen in this country. And they don't blame Renee Good for her own death.
RANTZ: But I do think the Rorschach test in this, when you go and you look at this particular poll, I mean, it's also really different depending on your political ideology. Republicans overwhelmingly supported what happened in Democrats the other way. The worry part --
PHILLIP: Independents.
RANTZ: Well, that's the worry part.
PHILLIP: -- also say that they thought was unjustified. And that's also a problem.
RANTZ: Yes. That's my point is like the worrying part from Joe's point of, you know, Joe Rogan is speaking to a very specific crowd. And this is about a narrative, you know, people see a video, they see one thing, other people see the other thing. So it really is going to come down to one's gut reaction to it.
And I think most people -- I thought actually tonight the president handled a question on this rather effectively. I mean, he's arguing that it is, in fact, ugly that we didn't want this to happen. There's no one out there celebrating what happened except for maybe the fringes of fringe on X. People generally accept that this was a tough call, I think a lot of people are on the side --
KASPARIAN: I don't think so. DHS came out immediately and called her a domestic terrorist.
RANTZ: No -- I'm sorry, no. That was a response. That was a response.
KASPARIAN: We'll have a polite conversation about normalizing militarized federal agents roaming the streets under the false pretense of mass deportations. I'm sorry, but the deporter in chief, Barack Obama, didn't have militarized ICE agents roaming the streets in order to do the proper operations.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Why is it --
KASPARIAN: And by the way, small government Republicans suddenly love having feds roaming the streets like that. Come on.
PHILLIP: Why is it that that is not ever answered. Why is it that, I mean, why can't conservatives answer for that? Why was Obama able to deport so many people without creating anything like --
RANTZ: Because there wasn't resistance. And that's an important piece that we cannot ignore.
PHILLIP: No, no. That's not the reason that.
RANTZ: I think that is the reason.
PHILLIP: Hold on. That's not the reason. It's not because there wasn't opposition to deportations, there absolutely was. It's because these types of raids were not happening.
KASPARIAN: Correct.
RANTZ: Abby?
PHILLIP: ICE agents were not walking around masked. That did not happen. None of that happened.
RANTZ: I mean, do we concede that the level of resistance that's institutionalized from government agencies actually does not.
PHILLIP: Hold on. Why is there resistance?
RANTZ: Here's why.
PHILLIP: Why is there resistance from the population about what ICE --
RANTZ: No, it's the resistance. I -- I think a lot of it is being fueled by how they are perceiving this based on media coverage. I don't think has been particularly fair.
PHILLIP: But what about --
RANTZ: Hold on. Let me answer your question.
PHILLIP: -- could it be because of what they're seeing in their own communities?
RANTZ: Let me answer your first question, because I think it is an important one, right? I mean, the resistance under Obama was not the same as what we're seeing now. We don't have -- we didn't have sanctuary cities and states and counties at the time. That matters, here's why.
Because when you're trying to make a deportation effort, when you're trying to engage in this, and you're being told that a prison is not going to hang on to someone who's already a criminal and released them out into the street, you are forcing ICE agents to go into communities.
PHILLIP: Jason, hold on. If all ICE was doing was simply getting those people that you're describing, again, I don't think there would even be sitting at the table having this conversation. The vast majority of the arrests that ICE is making are not of people who were just arrested for a violent crime.
They are people who overstayed their visas. They are people who are going into courthouses.
BORELLI: Seventy percent of criminal records --
PHILLIP: To have their --
NAVARRO: Seventy percent of criminal records --
PHILLIP: -- day in court.
BORELLI: I'm saying 70% of criminal records. But answer your won question, Abby.
PHILLIP: Listen --
BORELLI: Why aren't those judges, why aren't those police departments, why aren't those cities, towns and counties complying --
PHILLIP: None of --
BORELLI: -- valid ICE agents?
KASPARIAN: Why are they snatching up people when they show up -- PHILLIP: None of that is justifiable.
NAVARRO: Seventy percent do not have crime criminal records.
SIMMONS: Seventy percent of criminal records who have been charged with a crime.
BORELLI: Seventy percent of the 65,000.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Let me just say about those numbers --
BORELLI: -- have criminal records or been charged with a crime.
PHILLIP: Let me just say about those numbers that there is a lot of dispute about the validity of those numbers. And a lot of independent looks at these populations have found smaller percentages. So there's that.
BORELLI: Do you dispute that those people, though, were at some point released by sanctuary city jurisdiction who could have in the past turned them over to ICE with a valid ICE detainees?
PHILLIP: Joe, hold on. During the Obama years, local jurisdictions did not call up ICE and say, hey, we have an immigrant here, come and get them.
RANTZ: They honor detainers.
BORELLI: They honor ICE detainers.
PHILLIP: Yes, but if ICE has a detainer.
BORELLI: They don't -- they don't --
PHILLIP: ICE doesn't have a detainer for all of these people that they're arresting.
BORELLI: For Rikers Island, they have detainers on hundreds of people that just.
PHILLIP: But, Joe, it is not the case that of the thousands of people that ICE has arrested and detained that all of them are criminals. That's not the case.
BORELLI: That's 70 percent -- I didn't say all of them. I said 70 percent --
PHILLIP: So the point is --
BORELLI: -- of the 165,000 people that (inaudible) day --
PHILLIP: Hold on. The point is --
BORELLI: -- have criminal records or charges. [22:30:08]
PHILLIP: Obama, Biden, Bush were able to deport huge numbers of immigrants, right? And we never had this kind of unrest. We never saw ICE agents coming in guns blazing, 10 or 15 of them with long guns. We never saw them masked up in American streets. We never saw federal agents roaming the streets asking people about their citizenship status.
BORELLI: And you're saying that the sanctuary city policy isn't a contributing factor to that?
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Joe, did we see those things in Trump one, in Biden or in Obama?
BORELLI: Abby, what changed? The only thing that changed is that cities, towns and counties had --
PHILLIP: Look, Joe. There were sanctuary cities when Trump was president the first time.
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: -- and states had implemented sanctuary cities -- correct. And he didn't deport people like this level. I'm saying at this level.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: So, he did -- he deported a lot of people.
BORELLI: He didn't deport people the same level as Obama. Obama, as you pointed out, deporter in chief.
PHILLIP: But hold on. So, hold on. So --
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: What changed other than the fact that the Democratic Party --
(CROSSTALK)
KASPARIAN: What changed was the administration's rhetoric, demonizing immigrants and --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: This is not making any sense. It is not making any sensed. Why would ICE agents during Trump one not need to wear masks?
BORELLI: I'm asking you. What changed other than sanctuary city policies, the new pasturing of the Democratic Party to defend every single person illegally?
(CROSSTALK) PHILLIP: Why did ICE agents not need to wear masks in Trump one?
BORELLI: Because people weren't assaulting and hitting ICE agents. Is it not true that vehicular attacks on ICE agents are up 3600 percent this year? Is that not true?
PHILLIP: Well, is it not true that there are way more ICE agents in American cities than there have ever been? So, I mean, you would imagine that if that's the case, you would also see a cause on interactions between ICE and --
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: If there's no compliance -- if there's no compliance with law enforcement -- if they used to have compliance with law enforcement -- local law enforcement, and now they don't, it obviously takes more people to execute the law.
PHILLIP: Joe, I think that's totally disingenuous.
BORELLI: It's not.
PHILLIP: It is not the case that the only reason that we're seeing ICE interacting with the public is because of sanctuary cities. It is also because ICE is actually just interacting with the public way more now than they ever have. And they're doing so, masked. They're doing so by conducting sometimes random checks. We know that because they tell us that that is what they are doing. I'm not making this up.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: They are saying that their strategy is to go out and to stop people --
(CROSSTALK)
NAVARRO: Listen. A few things have happened because frankly, there's a lot more undocumented in places like Texas, in Florida, but they happen to be red states than there are in Minneapolis. Look, they now -- ICE now has a quota that they have to fill every day. So, they're out trolling the streets in order to fill the quota that Stephen Miller has imposed on them.
We have a surge of ICE agents that are being offered $50,000 bonuses, and so there's been a very quick, dramatic increase of a force. And so, not as many -- so, people don't have the same level of experience and training that they did in the past. But also, let me just tell you what the CATO Institute says about criminal convictions. I don't know where you're getting your numbers. This is the CATO Institute.
Five percent had violent criminal convictions. That means murder, rape, assault, et cetera. Eight percent had violent or property convictions. In a much larger share, 73 percent of people in ICE custody had no criminal conviction at all.
BORELLI: CATO Institute is out against any kind of actual -- (CROSSTALK)
NAVARRO: Well, tell you what, I believe the CATO Institute a hell of a lot more than I believe -- I don't believe --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: The bottom line is -- the bottom line is that there is -- there is a dispute about the numbers.
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: You said that in red states, we don't have big deployments of ERO which is the ICE enforcement --
(CROSSTALK)
UNKNOWN: Which is not true.
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: They operate in those states. They have compliance with local law enforcement.
PHILLIP: Wait, why aren't they surging in Texas where there are just more undocumented immigrants than anywhere else in the country?
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: I just said that -- because there's compliance with local law enforcement. You don't have to have massive, you know,
PHILLIP: So, you --
BORELLI: -- packs of ICE agents doing the job of local law enforcement.--
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: --non-sanctuary jurisdictions --
PHILLIP: -- So, you really think that Minneapolis, which I think has a population of maybe 100,000 undocumented immigrants, requires the largest deployment of ICE anywhere in the country?
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: Just like -- a temporary one.
PHILLIP: And where in the country, Joe, really?
BORELLI: Just like Ana said -- just like Ana said, in red states where they're complying with ICE detainees, complying with local law enforcement --
(CROSSTALK) PHILLIP: That -- listen. We have common sense here.
(CROSSTALK)
NAVARRO: He has absolutely targeted blue states, particularly of people here.
BORELLI: Sanctuary cities, yes. Agree. Agreed.
NAVARRO: No, people like J.B. Pritzker -- I hate J.B. Pritzker.
BORELLI: Sanctuary cities. Agreed.
NAVARRO: I hate Gavin Newsom. That's not true. You know exactly that this is retribution. He himself is saying that this is about that being vindictive and retribution
(CROSSTALK)
KASPARIAN: It's what Trump is. Yes.
NAVARRO: Any normal human being that was president will be finding a way to tamp down what is happening in American streets right now instead of escalating it. What happened in the sanctuary city should be condemned by all of us.
BORELLI: So, you think the fact that the sanctuary cities have nothing to do with it.
NAVARRO: No, I don't.
NAVARRO: I think most of it --
BORELLI: I think they are the minority here.
NAVARRO: -- has to do with Donald Trump being very selective on who he goes against.
BORELLI: Sanctuary cities.
PHILLIP: All right.
NAVARRO: No. Blue states and blue --
(CROSSTALK)
SIMMONS: And Americans are afraid for themselves and they're afraid for their families.
PHILLIP: Next for us, Donald Trump's affordability ideas -- they're getting a thumbs down from his own party. We'll debate that next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:39:32] PHILLIP: Tonight, Donald Trump put it out in the open saying that he wants Fed Chair Jerome Powell gone because he won't bend to -- bend to his will.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We have a bad Fed chairman. He's bad in a lot of different ways, but he's bad because his interest rates were too high. I don't know, with this guy, you don't know. He's got some problems.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[22:40:00]
PHILLIP: Now, in addition to blaming Powell for the affordability crisis, Trump once again pointed the finger at a familiar foe.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Only been here for 11 months, okay? And you know, the first few months were really rough, if you look at them, because I inherited a mess. I inherited a mess of crime. I inherited a mess of inflation. I inherited a mess of places closing up and going to other countries. And now we have the hottest country in the world.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Still blaming Biden a year in. But also notably, pulling from Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren to try to address some of the supportability stuff, the credit card, interest rate cap, the banning of private equity from owning homes. That's just a couple of the things that he's put on the table, called Elizabeth Warren up this week on it. I mean, seems like good idea, except will he put his money where his mouth is?
KASPARIAN: No, he won't. He won't. He knows that his base is angry with him for a number of different reasons. The refusal to release the Epstein files -- he's not even complying with what Congress unanimously voted in favor of, which was the release. His base has upset at him for being far more focused on foreign wars as opposed to affordability here at home.
This is what Trump does. He will just spurt out all sorts of populist economic policy proposals and then do nothing. He wants the kudos without actually doing the work. And then they'll play the good cop, bad cop. Trump wants to do it, but oh no, I can't do it because of the Republicans who are funded by the financial services industry won't let me do it, right? That's the game. That's the game.
(CROSSTALK)
RANTZ: We were told that about no taxes on tips. And this administration did, in fact --
(CROSSTALK) PHILLIP: Johnson and Thune have poured all kinds of cold water on it today.
SIMMONS: President Trump's facts are wrong here. In the last year of the Biden administration in 2024, they created two million jobs. That means jobs were created in 2025 -- yes, in 2025, 500 and something thousand, right? So, a lot less jobs. We saw four percent unemployment in 2024.
PHILLIP: We actually have -- let me just pull it up because to your point, not to cut you off, but we have some of these stats that you're just mentioning here. September 2024, and I'll tell you why I'm showing September 2024 in a second. Inflation was at 2.4 percent. Today, it's at 2.7 percent. Unemployment was at 4.1 percent. Today it's at 4.4 percent. There were 254,000 jobs added in -- a year ago.
Fifty thousand added in December. And the Fed cut rates then at 50 basis points. And in October, this is what Trump said about what the Federal Reserve was doing in terms of interest rates and compare it to what he's saying right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: The fact is that the Federal Reserve brought the interest rates down a little too quickly. It was too big a cut and everyone knows that was a political maneuver that they tried to do before the election, but they did the wrong thing. It was totally a political decision and inflation has started to rise.
We're talking about the head of a Fed -- of the Fed. And I want somebody that when the market is doing great, interest rates can go down. You have a good quarter and they want to kill it because they're so petrified of inflation.
(END VIDO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So technically, Biden had better numbers. The Fed lowered interest rates. Trump thought it was a scheme, some kind of political scheme at the time.
SIMMONS: He did. And here's also part of the problem of what he's just talking about with the markets. What we've seen is that GDP actually has been going up in 2025 over 2024. Problem is, median income has been going down. You know why? Because all the gains are going to the wealthiest people in the economy and not going to everyday people. So median income, individual income, and medium household income have all gone down under the Trump administration.
This is a problem for the American people. And that's why you see him coming out and saying things like, oh, we got to do something about credit card rates or we got to figure out housing --
RANTZ: Do we? Do we?
SIMMONS: -- because people are getting screwed in its economy.
RANTZ: Do we need to do something about both of those issues?
SIMMONS: And the President has to figure out how to solve that or else his party is going to take it on the chin next year.
KASPARIAN: We do and he won't.
RANTZ: Yes, but let's start from a basic pint here.
KASPARIAN: We do and he won't.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Are you in favor of capping credit card interest rates?
RANTZ: Actually, no, I'm not --
KASPARIAN: That's what I thought.
RANTZ: Hold on. I don't agree in absolutely everything.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Do you even believe that it's possible for the President to ban -- unilaterally ban private equity from purchasing homes in America?
RANTZ: The President? No, I do think that Congress can get more involved. But let's also hold him to the same standard that we hold the Democrats who have been making all these promises. I'm going to completely wipe out all student loan debt and I'm going to do it with the signing of some executive order and did not get the same level
PHILLIP: Sure. Yes. Well, listen.
RANTZ: -- of pushback from -- it didn't.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Well, I mean --
KASPARIAN: -- that Biden was even able to do it fully, so --
PHILLIP: Let's just level set. I don't think the pushback here is coming from the left, by the way.
RANTZ: Oh, no, no. I agree with you. Yes.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: -- wants those things that Trump is wanting.
[22:45:00]
RANTZ: A hundred percent --
PHILLIP: It's the right that's pushing back. All right, let me just -- let me just pause here and we'll continue on the other side of the break. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:49:48]
PHILLIP: As we were just discussing, President Trump is now proposing that he would do by executive action, Jason, a bunch of things that liberals have wanted to do for a long time. What he won't do, seemingly, is use political capital to actually get Congress to do it, which would be more legal. Why?
[22:50:07]
RANTZ: I don't know if he's not doing that. I mean, for all we know, he is, in fact, doing that behind the scenes. I think right now, getting bipartisan support is important. I think just politically, it's probably just an astute move to try to reach across the aisle. It puts Democrats in a kind of difficult position because at the same time that we're criticizing him for doing this --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: I don't think he does.
KASPARIAN: I don't think he does.
RANTZ: But I think he does.
PHILLIP: Bernie Sanders is thrilled. Elizabeth Warren called him and said, hey, call up to your friends on -- in Congress and let's get this done.
(CROSSTALK)
NAVARRO: He's not making calls behind the scene. Listen. Mike Johnson is practically a ventriloquist act when it comes to Donald Trump. Whatever Donald Trump tells him to say, he says. If he is pouring -- I would say less so John Thune, but if Mike Johnson is pouring cold water on the things that Donald Trump was talking about today, it's because he's not making behind the scenes calls.
PHILLIP: Yes, let me just go ahead and play what Mike -- this is what Mike Johnson said. It's very quick. Let's just play it so you can hear it for yourself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R) HOUSE SPEAKER: I wouldn't get too spun up about, you know, ideas that are out of the box that are proposed or suggested. The thing about this President is he's totally transparent and he says often what he's thinking out loud.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
And just to be clear, Trump said in these announcements, I don't know, you know, if there's any force behind them, that these things would go into effect on a date certain. So he seems to think he has the executive authority to do this. It does not seem like he is even interested in calling Mike Johnson about it.
RANTZ: Well, I mean, if that's the case, then doesn't that mean he is, in fact, sincere about his positions, that he is going to try to move it in that way, regardless of whether or not he can get Republicans on board. I do think that that actually makes that point less so than he's not really serious about doing this.
If he were to put in place an executive order -- and by the way, I don't think that that is constitutional in this case. But let's just say for the sake of argument he did. Will the Democrats give him credit at this table? Will you then say, okay, he actually wasn't sincere about that?
KASPARIAN: I would love, by the way, I don't even identify as a Democrat these days, but I would love to give him credit for that. But here's the thing, it's not going to happen. It's a fake proposal and it's just not going to happen. He wants cookies from the people who have turned on him because he did not fulfill his campaign promises and has led to absolute chaos on our streets instead.
RANTZ: Yes, but he's not interested in placating Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
KASPARIAN: No, no, he's interested in placating his own base which has turned on their party.
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: He does need 60 votes from the Senate for a lot of the financial bills that are coming down the pike. So, I think the really out of the box thing is to go and align himself with the Republicans.
(CROSSTALK)
BORELLI: Well, yes, but I'm saying, to go outside of the base and take the populist wing of the Democratic Party, which is also the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, and maybe make some concessions there. That could be what he's doing because of just the --
(CROSSTALK)
KASPARIAN: He's not doing that. Come on.
BORELLI: He's definitely aware of the whip count in the Senate, so he has to do something.
NAVARRO: The people around him are telling him what is accurate, which is that Americans have an affordability crisis and want to hear the President talk about that. He went to the Detroit Economic Club practically under duress, got off script, pulled out his greatest hits, started imitating Joe Biden, started imitating Barack Obama, started talking about the Panama Canal, started hitting, you know, Jerome Powell, and then finally ended the day by flipping the bird at an employee from the Ford factory. RANTZ: But you're trying to it both ways. And the one hand, he does
something, you say it's wrong. He doesn't do anything, you say it's wrong. You're creating an environment in which he can't do anything that's not going to upset you.
BORELLI: I think that's the plan.
RANTZ: Exactly.
(CROSSTALK)
KASPARIAN: I'm sick of politicians who do nothing for us expecting credit from the American people for simply proposing something without real intention in getting it done. No cookies for you unless you get it done.
(CROSSTALK)
KASPARIAN: And if he does get it done, hold on, if he does get it done, I will come back on the show and I will applaud him. I will celebrate him but he's not going to do it.
(CROSSTALK)
RANTZ: You're preemptively attacking him for doing something.
(CROSSTALK)
KASPARIAN: He's not going to do it.
PHILLIP: I think she's the wrong one to pick this fight with because --
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: -- she will actually give him credit for it, because she --
NAVARRO: She will give him credit for what? For lowering the interest rates on credit cards. Is that the specific thing?
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Thank you very much for being here. It is now morning in Iran and the threat of an execution of a detained protester is looming large. And Donald Trump has a warning for them if they do.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:59:06]
PHILLIP: The sun is now rising in Iran and the U.S. fears that the regime is set to publicly execute a detained protester. Now, this would further inflame an already explosive crisis as a U.S.-based rights group reports more than 2400 Iranians have been killed in protests against the government there. Tonight, Trump is encouraging Iranians to keep protesting and take over institutions. He promises that help is on the way.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TONY DOKOUPIL, CBS EVENING NEWS HOST: Americans woke up this morning and they saw that you said help is on the way. What do mean by that?
TRUMP: Well, there's a lot of help on the way and in different forms, including economic help from our standpoint and we're not going to help Iran very much.
DOKOUPIL: Now, we're hearing that they're going to start hanging protesters tomorrow. So, it comes back to the question, have they crossed your red line or has the line moved?
[23:00:00]
TRUMP: I haven't heard about the hanging. If they hang them, you're going to see some things that -- I don't know what your-- where you come from and what your thought process is, but you'll perhaps be very happy.
DOKOUPIL: What do you mean by that?
TRUMP: We will take very strong action. If they do such a thing, we will take very strong action.
DOKOUPIL: And this strong action you're talking about, what's the end game?
TRUMP: The end game is to win. I like winning.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: We're keeping an eye on that situation and we're on throughout the night updates as we get them. And thank you very much for watching "NewsNight". "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
