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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
GOP Rebukes Trump on War, $1.8 Billion Fund, Ballroom, Intel Pick; Rubio Declares Iran War Over, U.S. Victory, It's a Fact; GOP Weighs Ban on Trump's $1.8 Billion Fund as He Declines to Kill It. NYU Professor Advises Democrats to Stop Purity Tests; DOJ Investigates George Santos Over Insider Trading in Prediction Markets. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired June 03, 2026 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Tonight, an extraordinary rebuke. The House votes to rein in Donald Trump's powers against Iran as the war drags on.
Plus, Donald Trump's party officially bucks him on the ballroom and the slush fund, which he suggests isn't dead.
SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R-LA): Mr. President Trump, get engaged.
PHILLIP: Also, in the Trump era, are Democrats moving away from purity tests for their candidates?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Folks, if your house is on fire, you don't ask whether the firefighter has problematic D.M.s.
And add George Santos to the long list of people facing legal scrutiny after getting a free pass from Trump.
Live at the table, Bakari Sellers, Batya Ungar-Sargon, Sarah Matthews, Jason Rantz, and Ana Navarro.
Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening, I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Tonight, he's losing control. Donald Trump's party is starting to rebuke him left and right as he becomes more unpopular, along with his war, his economy, and his distractions. Over the last few days, Republicans have blasted his choice to lead the nation's intelligence agencies, choosing a man with no experience and revenge on his mind, Senate Republicans formally rejected any ballroom funding from their immigration bill, and even Trump's DOJ is backing off the $1.8 billion fund to compensate allies, which Trump says isn't over. And perhaps the most extraordinary rebuke, the House just voted to limit his war powers in Iran, with four Republicans joining Democrats in that vote.
Now, it seemed that the things were getting rougher, and the more unglued the president seemed to be today. That meltdown was pretty evident in the Oval Office, from sexist attacks to obsessing over his many renovation projects. The president losing this war powers vote in the House, I think, is a story of a couple of things. One, he's getting more unpopular with the public. This war is unpopular. But also when you look at some of the people who voted against it, he's making enemies left and right in his own base in Congress, and that's showing up in some of these votes.
JASON RANTZ, SEATTLE RED RADIO HOST: I mean, not in this vote. You have four Republicans who decided to vote for this resolution, two of them are in swing districts, and I think that was a motivating factor. I mean, losing Thomas Massie, I don't think, tells you anything really about the popularity of the president --
PHILLIP: But, hey, when you have a slim majority, war is all you need, that's the point. It's not about what an ideal scenario it is. It's what do you need in order to get the vote and you've lost the vote.
RANTZ: It's not a huge shift from where the Republicans generally stand.
PHILLIP: It doesn't need to be is my point.
RANTZ: Yes. No, I agree with you on that. I'm simply saying it doesn't tell us much about the direction of the Republican Party and whether or not he's, quote/unquote, lost control here. You lost four votes. Two of them you expected to lose, two of them you lost for political purposes. It doesn't necessarily change the direction right now of where things stand. It can in the long-term, but we'll see what ends up happening in the next steps.
I think Marco Rubio, you know, obviously made the comments yesterday and again today about the war being over. I think they're setting up for this off-ramp in a more meaningful way. The bigger problem I think we face now here is we want this all to be over. The president wants this to be over as well. You've just made it a lot easier for Iran now to not take the negotiating seriously, because now they're looking at what's happening in the House, and saying, we can wait this out just a little bit longer. He's lost the political backing that he had from his own party. We're going to continue to just dig in here, and that's a larger problem.
ANA NAVARRO, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think it's less about Trump and it's more about -- well, Trump is unpopular, this war is unpopular, but we are now just five months away from a general election. Some of the primaries are now over, so they have switched over to general election campaigning, and this war nobody likes.
And, look, Marco Rubio can say as many times as he want and as many languages as he knows that this war is over. I don't know any American who feels that the war is over, and I don't think Americans are going to feel that the war is over when we're still seeing headlines about bombs in Kuwait and bombs in Lebanon and conversations with Netanyahu and the gas prices are through the roof and the fertilizer prices are through the roof and people can't make ends meet.
[22:05:00]
So, people don't feel that the war is over, do not believe that the war is over, and elections are in five months.
PHILLIP: Let me play that exchange that Marco Rubio had with Sara Jacobs on Capitol Hill today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. SARA JACOBS (D-CA): If the war is over, I have a simple question: who won?
MARCO RUBIO, SECRETARY OF STATE: First of all, Epic Fury is over, which is what you would consider the war. That operation is concluded --
JACOBS: So, you agree it's a war then?
RUBIO: No, I think those are hostilities. They called it a war.
JACOBS: Okay, fine. We're taking you at your word. The war is over. Who won?
RUBIO: Well, first of all, you're not taking me at my word. It's a fact. We're no longer conducting sustained strikes inside of Iran to degrade their military because Epic Fury is over. The second point is, on the question of who won, I can tell you this, we define victory as destroying their defense industrial base, significantly reducing the number of missile launchers that they possess, significantly reducing their stockpile of drones, and we achieved all of those, in addition to destroying what they had left of an air force and wiping out their entire conventional navy. Those are all gone. So, I consider that victory.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: That's not victory. In fact, that's a lie. Because the --
NAVARRO: And that's not how they were defining it four months ago.
SELLERS: The number one objective, the number one objective of going to Iran was making sure to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon. Everybody around this table agrees that Iran does not deserve or need to have a nuclear weapon. The entire world actually probably agrees with that sentiment, or the overarching majority of them.
He didn't articulate that one time in anything that he said. You know why? Because Iran was further away from a nuclear weapon under the JCPOA than they are today. And that's what this White House doesn't want you to understand. This is a failure when your number one objective, your number one objective is something that your secretary of state did not even mention.
We talked about the unpopularity of the president. I disagree with everybody else. The president is extremely popular with his base, period. But that's why you have all of these MAGA Republicans who are running in these general elections who are caught between a rock and a hard place, because you cannot be popular with the American people and be popular within MAGA. Those two things right now in this country cannot coexist because people are hurting.
SARAH MATTHEWS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY PRESS SECRETARY, TRUMP FIRST TERM: I just want to point out, too, that something that you touched on was the biggest thing that Trump has been out there saying is that Iran cannot get a nuclear weapon, which is something I agree with wholeheartedly. But just today, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that the risk of Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon is much higher today than it was before the war. So, if the war is somehow over, then why is the risk higher for them to acquire a nuclear weapon?
So, it doesn't seem like the war is, in fact, over. And then you couple that with the fact that I believe we're in a much worse position than we were before we entered this war, whether you look at gas prices skyrocketing, the U.S. being more isolated than ever before. We upset a lot of our allies by not really tipping them off to our plan to go after Iran, and I think that we're in a much weaker position.
So, actually, in fact, I can't see a place in which the war is over, no matter how many times Marco Rubio wants to speak it into existence.
SELLERS: If it's over and we did not meet our number one objective, the thing that Donald Trump hates to hear the most is that we lost. If this war is over and we did not accomplish our number one objective, we lost.
The fact is, just as you stated, everybody understands the reason we went to Iran supposedly was to keep them from getting a nuclear weapon, and the secretary of state today testified and he didn't even mention that as one of the accomplishments.
PHILLIP: So, Batya, if none of that happens, if they say the war is over, but the war is really not over because we're not back to where we were before, the Strait of Hormuz is still closed, and Iran is still not prevented from having a nuclear weapon, how long will MAGA stand by this conflict?
BATYA UNGAR-SARGON, NEWSNATION HOST, BATYA!: Well, we're currently in a ceasefire in which the president is engaged in active negotiations to achieve what I totally agree with Bakari was the main objective of Operation Epic Fury. So, the hostilities are over, we're in a ceasefire, and we are trying to achieve a deal that would prevent it from that.
PHILLIP: We can acknowledge that we are still shooting at each other, right? Because we bombed Iran two days ago, they are striking their allies now, so there are still hostilities. UNGAR-SARGON: Yes, Trump was asked in the Oval Office how he defines a ceasefire, and he said, I think very funnily and very accurately, well, in that area of the world, it means you're shooting at each other a little bit less vigorously, or something along those lines. I think that's accurate.
So, we don't know how this is going to end. The problem is that the American people who voted for Donald Trump are hurting. They are bearing the cost of this war disproportionately because they are the ones struggling to pay for gas and struggling to pay for food. And this is a big problem for the president, and I don't know how aware he is of that.
So, he has two competing imperatives. He cannot get out without some sort of deal that is better than the JCPOA, and he has to somehow alleviate the pain and the suffering of working class Americans.
[22:10:02]
In my view, the best way to do that is a stimulus check, and I don't know why this isn't on the table at all. I think he needs to give people --
SELLERS: Whoa. Does anybody hear this?
UNGAR-SARGON: -- some sort of a tariff rebate in order to get them through the summer months.
SELLERS: A tariff rebate?
UNGAR-SARGON: Yes, a tariff rebate.
PHILLIP: How about just get rid of the tariffs?
UNGAR-SARGON: Well, we brought in --
PHILLIP: Wait, weren't you an advocate for the tariffs?
UNGAR-SARGON: Yes, exactly.
PHILLIP: So, then why are you asking for a rebate exactly?
UNGAR-SARGON: That's exactly what a rebate is.
SELLERS: But you can't give a stimulus check while inflate while you haven't done anything to tamp down inflation.
UNGAR-SARGON: We brought in $200 billion in tariffs, and we should now take some of that money and give it to Americans who are struggling to pay for gas and groceries.
PHILLIP: (INAUDIBLE) actually have to already be refunded because most of them were illegal.
UNGAR-SARGON: That's actually -- it's not clear that they have to be refunded. PHILLIP: No, they are already being -- we know that they are already being refunded. The refunds are happening right now.
UNGAR-SARGON: Well, no. People -- companies are suing for refunds. But it's not clear that they're going to get them.
PHILLIP: But, again --
UNGAR-SARGON: But we brought in a bunch of money --
PHILLIP: If you think tariffs are a good idea, why would you have to rebate the money in stimulus checks? That just makes no sense.
UNGAR-SARGON: We're giving rebate the money. I'm saying we should -- we brought in a whole bunch of money, and we should now give that to working class Americans who are struggling to pay for gas --
MATTHEWS: But Trump thinks about the affordability crisis as a hoax --
UNGAR-SARGON: -- at a time when the reason that gas is high is for a very noble cause, which is ensuring that the Iranians never get a nuclear weapon.
NAVARRO: Yes, we made things high through the tariffs, and then we're going to turn those tariffs --
UNGAR-SARGON: No, we made things high through Iran.
(CROSSTALKS)
NAVARRO: No. I'm talking about -- I'm talking about a bunch of things. I'm talking about your refrigerator. The producer price index --
PHILLIP: Guys, let's -- hold on.
(CROSSTALKS)
UNGAR-SARGON: The producer price index before Iran was down.
NAVARRO: I mean, I don't know what bubble you live in where you think that the tariffs literally freeze prices.
UNGAR-SARGON: I'm just telling you what the data shows.
NAVARRO: So, I don't know what bubble you live in.
PHILLIP: Hold on, Ana. Let me let her finish, and then I'll let you respond, so we can all hear what's going on.
UNGAR-SARGON: The producer price index was down before Iran. Groceries and gas are now up because of Iran. Iran, as we all agree, ensuring that they not achieve a nuclear weapon is a noble goal. So, Trump needs the leeway to get a good deal.
SELLERS: Inflation was up before Iran.
NAVARRO: Let's give them another Trump check.
RANTZ: No, they were not.
UNGAR-SARGON: It was not. It was down.
RANTZ: No, prices were clearly coming down on the whole.
UNGAR-SARGON: They were down. And gas was under $3 a gallon.
RANTZ: There were some elements that were up. There's no doubt about that. But we're saying, on average, on the whole, things were down. That is a fact.
SELLERS: But can we talk about just the strategy of Iran? Because what I haven't understood is how you go to war, Pete Hegseth, Secretary Rubio, and others, and you don't anticipate that they're going to close the Strait of Hormuz, which is a great deal, it bears a great deal of responsibility for the prices that --
UNGAR-SARGON: Why do you think they didn't anticipate it? Of course, they knew they were going to close the strait.
SELLERS: Because you just said we needed refunds. I mean, I don't understand how you can articulate one thing that says that the pain of the American people is unbearable, that Republicans are now touting for refund checks.
RANTZ: You're conflating two things, I think, in that case. I mean, the president is --
UNGAR-SARGON: I'm the only one touting that, unfortunately.
RANTZ: The president has clearly said multiple times that he understood, and they understood that there was risk. Marco Rubio made that point, I think, earlier today. They knew that there were going to be some risks economically and politically. But they chose to make this decision because they think it's best for this world to not have a nuclear Iran.
PHILLIP: Trump has also said that they didn't think that they would shut down the Strait of Hormuz. He did say that explicitly.
RANTZ: Yes, he did. But that does not mean that they did not think that was a possibility.
PHILLIP: Well, no, I mean, he said they were surprised.
RANTZ: Well, they were given that information.
NAVARRO: And he has also said -- he also said there would be regime change. He said Iranians would take their country back. He said that after they killed the ayatollah. He said that there had been regime change. And I don't know anybody who thinks that there have been regime change. They may have other names, they may have other titles, but it is still the same Iranian regime.
PHILLIP: And, of course, you know, the president makes this decision to go into this war thinking that Iran is just going to cave instantly, and they don't, and that's why we're still here several months later.
But one other thing about today, you know, the president in the Oval Office really lost it on several occasions, including to our colleague, Kaitlan Collins, accusing her again of not smiling for whatever reason.
Sarah, you worked for him. What's behind it?
MATTHEWS: I will say that during my time working as deputy press secretary in the first Trump administration, Kaitlan Collins was the one reporter that scared Kayleigh McEnany and President Trump the most. There would be times where Kayleigh McEnany wouldn't even call on Kaitlan Collins at press conferences, at press briefings, because she didn't want to answer the questions, because Kaitlan Collins is a very, very good reporter. She's the best at what she does. And I think that's why you see Trump go after her more ferociously than any other reporter in that room.
And it is disgusting to watch him tell a woman that she needs to smile while doing her job. I've seen Kaitlan smile plenty of times, but when she's asking someone a hard-hitting question, I don't think that that means that she has to smile while doing it.
And he brings it up time and time again, and it's these misogynistic attacks, not just against Kaitlan.
[22:15:01]
You know, he told her today to be quiet while she tried to ask a follow-up question. We've seen him say, quiet, piggy, to a female reporter, another great female reporter, I will add, someone I worked with during my time in the first Trump administration.
And so I wish that this wasn't normalized and that we weren't desensitized to this type of behavior from the president, but it really is appalling. And I just want to give, you know, kudos to Kaitlan Collins.
NAVARRO: And, you know, I mean, he called another reporter, said to her, Are you stupid or something? I mean, just it's time after time after time. And I'll tell you one of the things that really bothers me is that there is not more solidarity and outrage from the press in that room. Because I would like to think that if I was in that room and my colleague was being treated that way, I would say, screw you. I'm leaving. You go ahead and you cover yourself. Leave yourself here with OAN and with Fox News and let that be what your national coverage is.
And that's why I feel that it is so ridiculous and hypocritical for people to go sit at a White House Correspondents' Dinner where Donald Trump is speaking, and we're supposed to be celebrating the free press, when practically on a weekly basis we have to hear his rants against women who are doing their jobs as journalists.
And that is why, even though it's just been rescheduled, I refuse to go. I refused to go then, and I refuse to go now because it makes no damn sense.
PHILLIP: All right, we'll leave it there.
Next for us, Republicans are also rebuking Trump on his ballroom, the slush fund, which the president won't definitively say is dead.
Plus, George Santos is back again, and he's under investigation again, joining a long list of people facing legal issues after getting free passes from Donald Trump.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
PHILLIP: The Republican rebellion keeps growing over some of the president's biggest priorities. Tonight, not only did GOP leaders scrapped funding for his prized White House ballroom out of their immigration package, they're also threatening to kill his nearly $1.8 billion slush fund for his allies, and for good.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): I think even DOJ knows that this was a bad idea, and what we need to do is provide finality.
We got to either eliminate it, streamline it, guardrail it. It can't go in its current form. And if that's the only choice we should have, we should eradicate it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Tillis says that he plans to introduce an amendment that would permanently shut down the fund by tying it to that massive immigration bill. But the president continues to fight for the fund, and he refuses to let the issue go.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Is the $1.8 billion DOJ fund dead, or is it on hold?
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: It's -- I'd have to ask the lawyers. I don't know. The weaponization fund as far as I'm concerned, was a beautiful thing. It was something I was -- I didn't make it, but I was -- I heard that, I thought that was the greatest thing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: So, not only is he vigorously defending this weaponization fund, but I just also want to remind people that even though DOJ has said they are not moving forward with it, they refuse to actually put that in writing, which is why Republicans are pushing back and saying, we might have to do something about that.
UNGAR-SARGON: I'm so glad to see this. I'm so glad to see them tank the weaponization fund, which was so gross. I mean, the idea that a person who beat up a cop could get compensation for that just disgusts me, and I'm so glad to see them not funding the ballroom. Like, as we said before, Americans are hurting. It's not the time to be doing these kinds of projects and asking the American taxpayer to pay for it. So, good on the Republicans for saying, look, this stuff is not consistent with our values right now.
PHILLIP: Can we play -- actually, on the ballroom, let me just play what Scott Bessent said about the ballroom when he was questioned today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCOTT BESSENT, TREASURY SECRETARY: There is no cost to the American people. If there is a new bill for the ballroom, the decorative part of the ballroom is privately funded, and everything that you are talking about --
SEN. MAGGIE HASSAN (D-NH): The president requested a billion dollars for the White House ballroom in our budget. He has spent $45 million on a military birthday parade. So --
BESSENT: That all -- look, it goes on outside my office every day. I've watched it progress, and it is national security matters that the billion dollars is for.
HASSAN: That's ridiculous, and I think you know it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: National security matters. Meanwhile, just to point out, they're building an outdoor stadium outside the White House that is open air, that the president is supposed to attend a UFC game at in a couple of months.
SELLERS: Fight.
PHILLIP: Fight, excuse me.
SELLERS: You were about to just get roasted on the air. I just -- I mean, I think that in your read, I think that it highlighted the fundamental problem and disconnect with Donald Trump and the rest of the American public at whole, and MAGA and the rest of the American public.
You outlined his priorities, and right now his priorities are the water, that little water thing in front of the Washington Monument.
UNGAR-SARGON: Reflecting pool.
SELLERS: It's the reflecting pool or whatever, and then his other priority is a ballroom, and then his other priority is a slush fund.
NAVARRO: Arch, don't forget the arch.
SELLERS: Oh, and the arch, and then you have the UFC stadium he's building, like none of that drives down prices. None of that keeps Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. None of that is actually the eye on the ball of what you want the president of the United States to be doing.
And for people who say, you didn't vote for this, yes, you did. You knew this man had no leadership capability whatsoever when you elected him again. And this is what you get. You get -- his top five priorities as he sits here today, he had a whole diagram up with the little swimming pool in the front yard.
[22:25:05]
And nothing that he does can actually improve the quality of life for most average Americans. Those are his top five priorities.
NAVARRO: So, but it's been an astounding level of tone deafness week after week, event after event, boondoggle after boondoggle, as the American people are having such a hard time making ends meet. It's just -- you know, it's the convergence of the two things, the frivolity that's going on --
SELLERS: The what?
NAVARRO: -- and just the frivolity, F-R-I-V-O-L --
PHILLIP: What is those big words?
NAVARRO: Hey, come on. The let them eat cake attitude going on, on frivolous projects on this side, on the White House side, on the Trump side, the grift, the family enrichment. It's one thing after another after another, the $40 million documentary by Melania --
PHILLIP: Jason, you're shaking your head. Why are you shaking your head?
NAVARRO: -- while people can't pay for gas.
PHILLIP: Why are you shaking your head?
RANTZ: It's just because it's an exaggerated reaction to this. This idea that this is his like the biggest priority is obviously not true. Iran is his biggest priority.
NAVARRO: He walks around --
(CROSSTALKS)
RANTZ: Hold on.
PHILLIP: Okay. Wait. Hold on.
RANTZ: The fact that he is responding to -- PHILLIP: Let me ask you a question, though, because he called that Oval Office impromptu press conference today and can you tell me why he did?
RANTZ: Well, he talked to a bunch of reporters, which is something that is kind of important.
PHILLIP: What was the top issue on his mind that caused him to make this --
SELLERS: The swimming pool.
RANTZ: The idea it was --
PHILLIP: It was because he wanted to show the reporters a chart that, by the way, he had shown them before of the size of the reflecting pool compared to skyscrapers.
RANTZ: Yes, I'm --
PHILLIP: Why?
RANTZ: I'm not moved by the fact that the guy who's interested and obsessed with real estate and projects is actually talking about this. This idea, however --
PHILLIP: So, you acknowledge that he's obsessed with real estate and projects?
RANTZ: I think that is clearly something that he's interested in. I'm not arguing that he's not interested in this. I am, however, arguing that it's not his top priority. That is the kind of exaggerated reaction that I do think ends up dismissing legitimate concerns that you raise specifically on Iran. So, you can talk about something without it being your number one priority.
PHILLIP: Fair.
RANTZ: We have to acknowledge that.
MATTHEWS: I will say, going back to legitimate concerns then, I do want to touch on something that Batya mentioned, which was the January 6th $1.8 billion slush fund, and how we know that if that does end up happening, that money could potentially go to January 6th rioters. And that is something that I have been encouraged to see Republicans actually finding their backbone and pushing back on and saying, no, we don't want to see this slush fund happen. And that --
RANTZ: It's dead.
MATTHEWS: But he says it's not.
RANTZ: No, he didn't -- no, he did not say it's not dead. He just literally didn't use the words, it is dead.
MATTHEWS: He said, I love it. RANTZ: He said that it was killed by the courts.
MATTHEWS: He talked all about January 6th and how his crowd sizes, and how it was a day of love and celebrate --
RANTZ: He said it was killed by the courts.
MATTHEWS: -- and friendship. And he said people were crying.
RANTZ: But that was his acknowledgement now that it's dead.
MATTHEWS: No, but he's going to do everything in his power to make it happen because he does want to see his --
(CROSSTALKS)
PHILLIP: I'm not trying to -- I don't need like a Ouija board to try to figure out what Trump means or what he doesn't mean. The courts didn't kill it. So, the issue now for Republicans is going to be what are they going to do about it, and some of them are actually considering passing legislation that would make it permanent, that slush fund never exists.
I also want to just point out one other thing. The Bill Pulte thing at DNI, choosing the director of national intelligence who has zero qualifications, that seems to be like the next frontier for where Republicans are going to really start to lose it on this administration in terms of the pushback that he's asking.
MATTHEWS: He has one qualification, which is blind loyalty. So I know that you're -- so that's exactly what Trump wants, though, in that role. He doesn't care about national security credentials, doesn't care that the guy doesn't have any experience in intelligence, has never had a security clearance, no geopolitical connections as far as I know. But that is the one thing that he wants.
And he wants someone in that role to go after his perceived political enemies. We saw him do it with Tulsi Gabbard as well, and obviously now she is left. And so he wants to fill that vacancy with someone who will be willing to carry those things out.
SELLERS: The very practical political problem goes back to something that Abby said earlier, which is that you now have Thune -- not Thune, excuse me, Cornyn. You now have Cornyn, you now have Cassidy, you now have Tillis. You have these individuals who kind of have this unbridled sense of --
PHILLIP: Well, you do have Thune, too, because he's not a fan of Bill Pulte either.
SELLERS: Well, I mean, he actually -- that's what I was thinking about.
PHILLIP: He's not leaving Congress, but he's also not a fan.
SELLERS: So, I have a feeling that Bill Pulte's going to have a rough ride to getting that DNI spot.
NAVARRO: And it's not just the loyalty, it's the second part that you mentioned, is the vindictiveness. He has proven himself to be this -- you know, an operative, a Trump toady, who will not only be loyal but will use government against Trump's enemies, right? We saw what he did with the housing agencies and Letitia James, and that's why he wants him there.
But also remember, this DNI position, it was created after 9/11.
[22:30:00]
Some of these senators that are still there are old and were there when these laws were created, which was -- you know, I remember the first DNI officer. It was John Negroponte, an intelligence officer, somebody with impeccable credentials.
So I think even for Republicans, it is galling that we would give this DNI position to somebody who is an unqualified, vindictive, you know, Trump bootlicker.
SARAH MATTHEWS, CONTRIBUTOR, "THE BULWARK" AND FORMER WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY PRESS SECRETARY DURING FIRST TRUMP ADMINISTRATION: And we've seen Trump abuse the system with making them an acting person as well.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR: Next for us, are Democrats putting too much weight in purity tests when it comes to picking candidates? We'll debate that next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:35:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIP: Tonight, in the Trump era, do Democrats need to abandon purity tests? Scott Galloway says in the case of Graham Platner, Democrats ought to.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCOTT GALLOWAY, PROFESSOR OF MARKETING, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY: Every election is a choice, not a marriage proposal. We're not hiring a priest, we're hiring a senator.
Do you want to make sure that women's rights aren't continuing to be rolled back? Do you want a more responsible economic policy? Do you want different approaches to labor that raise the wages of nurses and students? Do you want something regarding fiscal sanity? Do you want to stop, have a check against the unfettered, unprecedented corruption?
But we're going to talk about (expletive) tattoos and sexting. I mean, the obsession with personal purity has become a luxury belief. And folks, if your house is on fire, you don't ask whether the firefighter has problematic D.M.s. (END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Platner, the Democrat running for Senate in Maine, has faced significant controversy over a series of offensive online posts that he's since apologized for, and a tattoo that is widely recognized as a Nazi symbol that he's since covered up. Over the weekend, it was revealed that Platner shared sexually explicit messages with multiple women in the early days of his marriage.
Now, before we begin, I want to mention that Batya's new book is out this week, "The Jews and the Left." You can pick it up wherever books are sold. But I want to go back to what Scott Galloway was saying, because I
feel like, fine, if you want to have that perspective, then you need to stop complaining about people voting for Donald Trump, because that's exactly the rationale that people on the right have when they vote for Trump.
JASON RANTZ, SEATTLE RED RADIO HOST: But they're not going to stop. That's the problem.
NAVARRO: That's actually your choice, right? The choice that voters in Maine have, and voters in Maine will make, is whether they vote for a very flawed candidate, and Platner, very flawed.
I think so many different things that he has done, I find morally reprehensible. But do they vote for the guy who's flawed, or do they vote for the woman, the senator, who has voted 90 percent for the President, with the President, who is even more flawed, who has 24- plus accusations of sexual misconduct, who we have heard boast about sexual assault.
PHILLIP: But isn't that, I mean, I guess you can't, if you're saying that there's no moral test anymore, you can do whatever you want.
NAVARRO: You don't think Trump has changed the moral test?
PHILLIP: All I'm saying is that what that does, does that not just create a permission structure for people on the right to say, hey, put aside the several marriages, the grab-them-by-their-you-know-what. He's going to outlaw abortion, he's going to do all these things that we care about, lower taxes. That's why we voted for him.
BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I hear Galloway, and I'm somebody who believes in giving people grace, right? I don't ever want to look at anybody on their worst day, but people deserve grace, and we should give ourselves more grace.
I think he was conflating, though, that when we talk about purity tests in the Democratic Party, most times we're talking about policy and ideological purity. We're talking about progressives saying, oh my god, he's not progressive enough, so our tent continues to constrict.
We're not necessarily talking about the fact that Donald Trump has put the moral and ethical ground of elected officials in hell. Like, that's the bar. Somewhere in hell. And so it's very low for anybody to, like, eclipse that. I don't want
Nazis, regardless of if they're going to vote with me, like, on wearing my jersey. I don't.
And I don't know Graham Platner, I think that's his name. I don't know everything about him. But I do know that Ken Paxton is extremely flawed.
Like, beyond flawed. Like, he has character issues. I do know that we see Andy Ogles just yesterday talking about not gay marriage, but just being gay in this country is an abomination.
Like -- so I think that we have to get back to a point where, and I say this to people all the time, I say being a pastor and being an elected official are the only professions in this world where people expect more from you than they expect from themselves.
And we used to have individuals who were in elected office who had some modicum of respect and dignity. I would like to get back there, but I'm not, to agree with Galloway a little bit, I'm not about unilateral disarmament either.
RANTZ: There's a few issues here. Number one, this is a guy who the Democratic base chose before the primary season even took place -- really took place, and there was actually a vote. So there was plenty of time to go with someone who doesn't have a Nazi tattoo, to your point.
[22:40:00]
Like, they're making a choice. I think if this was someone with a KKK tattoo, the Democratic Party would not be embracing it the same way. This is a different Democratic Party in its relationship to Jews and Israel.
It just is. And I think that they're willing to give up certain kinds of morals that they used to hold, all because they've been deeply broken by the threat of Donald Trump in their eyes.
This is not someone who's just deeply flawed. He has a Nazi tattoo, and I think that that goes far beyond someone who is simply flawed. None of this started during Donald Trump either. I think that when it comes to the sexting and whatnot, I don't think people care anymore. I think they should, but that's not a Trump thing. I seem to recall a certain President who was in the Oval Office who had sex with an intern.
NAVARRO: Democrats just got rid of Swalwell because of precisely another thing.
SELLERS: And I was wrong about Al Franken. By the way, Senator Franken, I was completely wrong about you. I jumped on this bandwagon that was a purity test.
RANTZ: But Eric Swalwell is a good example of this. The story that came out was everyone knew. This was the quiet secret everyone knew. So they allowed it to continue for a very long time, regardless of his potential victims. I think that's the real issue here. It is just beyond bizarre that the Democrats are still defending him.
SELLERS: Can you do me one favor and stop saying the Democrats?
RANTZ: It is the Democrats in this case.
SELLERS: You literally had an individual in the United States Congress sleep with an intern, destroy her life to the point where she committed suicide and set herself on fire.
NAVARRO: It wasn't an intern. It was a staffer.
SELLERS: Excuse me.
So let me just back up real quick. What I'm saying to you is that we have an issue in the American body politic. And it does not do its service to have this conversation if you're going to make it about partisanship. Because I can tell you that there are warts on both sides. For example, you want to talk about anti-Semitism? Did you hear Thomas Massie?
RANTZ: Thomas Massie is an anti-Semite.
SELLERS: Did you hear that?
RANTZ: I said that from the beginning. I said the same thing with Marjorie Taylor Greene. I'm not viewing it as political.
SELLERS: Marjorie Taylor Greene believes that Jews control the weather from lasers.
RANTZ: Which is why from the beginning I was someone who called her out. She has been suddenly embraced by some in left-wing media because she's suddenly Donald Trump.
SELLERS: My point to you is that this is a cancer that does not strictly affect the left arm or the right arm.
RANTZ: 100 percent.
SELLERS: This is a cancer that has completely corroded our body.
PHILLIP: Batya, you have a moment.
BATYA UNGAR-SARGON, NEWSNATION HOST, "BATYA", AND AUTHOR, "THE JEWS AND THE LEFT": I'll just say my grandfather's whole family was murdered in the Sobibor concentration camp. Graham Platner doesn't just have a Nazi tattoo. For 18 years he had a tattoo of the concentration camp guards on his chest and he knew what it was.
He knew what it was. And to hear people compare that to anything else in the public sphere in America is insane and it is insanely offensive. These people who are defending him called me and every other MAGA person a Nazi for 10 years because we voted for someone who we thought would improve the lives of working-class Americans and now they are lining up and defending a guy who had a Nazi tattoo which he knew about for 18 years.
It is so insane to act like anything Donald Trump did was anywhere close to having a Tottenkopf on his chest for 18 years. This guy is a Nazi and Democrats are lining up behind him because they think he can win.
SELLERS: When we talk about the depths of hell this is what I mean. People become desensitized to it because I take your point about Graham Platner and his Nazi tattoo and how offensive that is.
I can also tell you that when somebody says that with a woman all you have to do is grab her by the you know what. Talking about sexual assault as a husband, as a father, as those type of things, then that actually takes you to this point where I just say that the body politic as a whole, I'm not talking about Oppression Olympics, I'm not saying that this one is worse than this one or this person is worse than that person.
What I am saying though is the body politic has become corrosive. And so yes, I can call Graham Platner a Nazi who does not deserve to be in office. I can also say that if you admit or talk about grabbing women by the vagina, you should not be President of the United States.
MATTHEWS: I will say I think we're all in agreeance here. I think that when it comes to, we shouldn't be comparing like apples and oranges of this is worse than that, but at the end of the day what the problem is and why Americans are so fed up with our politics is the hypocrisy.
Because both sides are guilty of it, of making excuses for bad behavior from candidates on both sides--
Let me finish my point. Batya, let me finish my point.
[22:44:58]
We could go all day and I could rattle off every bad thing that Trump has ever said or done and we could compare all these things but what I'm trying to get at my main overall point is that we would all be a lot better off, instead of making excuses for candidates and excusing this type of behavior, whatever it is from either side, that we stopped constantly lowering the bar and we held them to a higher standard.
Because I agree with Bakari's point that there is a level that we do I think need to see from our politicians. We want our children to look up to our President, to look up to our senators, our congressmen, our congresswomen and want them to be someone that they can look up to and inspire them and be a role model for them.
And I don't think that we're seeing that, not just from Trump, I think that could apply to many politicians nowadays.
PHILLIP: We'll leave it there. Next for us, Trump commuted his sentence and now he is under legal scrutiny yet again, this time for insider trading and George Santos is not the only person in trouble again after the President intervened. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:50:00]
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PHILLIP: Tonight former New York Congressman George Santos is once again making headlines, this time under federal scrutiny for suspicious activity on prediction markets. Santos, who went to prison last year on federal fraud charges, had a sentence commuted by Donald Trump after serving less than three months of a more than seven-year sentence. He joins a growing list of Trump allies who have found themselves back in legal trouble after receiving free passes from the President.
Santos released a statement on X just now saying, "To the hundreds of reporters calling me through the night," which I'm sure is his favorite thing, he says, "stop. My legal team and I were made aware by a report from NPR yesterday that DOJ might be looking into me, so now my legal team is in contact with the DOJ to see what's going on."
He says, "the basis of this accusation is preposterous and I look forward to supplying any information asked of me to any agencies or inquiries. Until then, media, please do not inquire."
NAVARRO: I swear to God, this guy is like herpes. He goes dormant for a while and then he keeps coming back. You just cannot get rid of him. The things that he will do for money, right?
PHILLIP: Allegedly.
NAVARRO: Well, no, some of them were not allegedly. He was convicted of campaign fund misuse. Was that not what the conviction was for? And then there's the cameo stuff and now is a, what's it called?
RANTZ: Let's acknowledge this one's funny. It is. It's funny, it's amusing, it's wrong. It highlights some of the problems with Kalshi in any of these online betting markets.
NAVARRO: Jason, there's professional athletes that have been indicted.
RANTZ: I know pretty much doing it all over the law. It is funny because it's George Santos.
NAVARRO: But it's illegal.
PHILLIP: It's also a pattern.
RANTZ: I'm not saying it's not legal.
PHILLIP: It's also a pattern because, not just for George Santos, it's not just a pattern of fraud for George Santos if it's true, it's also a pattern of Trump commuting sentences or pardoning people and then those people going on to reoffend. He said literally he pardoned someone two times and then they reoffended. A drug dealer whose sentence was commuted was found guilty of
violating the terms of his release. Jared Kushner's friend who pleads guilty to stalking in a case involving his ex-wife after getting a Trump pardon, so on and so forth. So this is kind of happening a lot.
NAVARRO: They just arrested the guy, the soldier who was in the armed services who was part of the Maduro operation and used inside knowledge to gain these bettings.
SELLERS: I think that a lot of Americans are kind of, because George Santos is just something that we can't laugh about because he is a unique character in American politics. But also, you know, you have people who've made, you see it every day, you see a new story about people who bet on the strikes in Iran, right?
And how do they get that information? And all of a sudden, they make $600,000, $700,000 or just betting on strikes because they have some proximity or some closeness to somebody over there. So it's something that they needed to crack down on, sir.
MATTHEWS: I will say, too, I mean, yes, George Santos is a joke, and this is kind of funny to laugh at, thinking that he bet on Kalshi, on something related to himself, while being a Polymarket spokesperson. But I do think that, which is ridiculous, but what I will say is, I mean, this is the least surprising thing.
Like, it's in other news, fork found in the kitchen. I mean, he is a cook, and so Trump should have never pardoned the guy in the first place. This was bound to happen again.
He's just a fraudster, and I will say that Trump shouldn't have pardoned plenty of other people that he has given pardons to, related to fraud, and there have been dozens in the second term.
PHILLIP: All right, next for us, the panel's going to give us their nightcaps, "Disclosure Edition." We'll be right back.
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[22:55:00]
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PHILLIP: Given that we are in the middle of primary season, and given that scandals and 11th Hour Revelations are rocking the news cycle, what's something that you'd be reluctant to disclose if you were running for office? Jason, you're up.
RANT: Okay, this is difficult for me. I was a fan of New Kids on the Block when I was younger. I like their music, I'm sorry. I hope you will forgive me and vote for me.
PHILLIP: Yes, they were like the third best boy band.
MATTHEWS: It was just so much more innocent than mine. Mine, I occasionally do enjoy a drunk cig, sue me. And if my parents are watching, that was a joke, and I just lied, don't worry. And if kids are watching, don't smoke.
NAVARRO: Okay, I'm horrified. I don't even know what a drunk cig is, is that what it is?
MATTHEWS: Like when you're a little drunk and you want one cig.
PHILLIP: We're running out of time, go ahead, Anna.
NAVARRO: Nothing, I'm going to confess that every camera operator wants us to be over so that they can go watch The Knicks right now.
PHILLIP: No, we didn't hear that before, Bakari.
[23:00:00]
SELLERS: Confessions? No, deny. You don't have any confessions, that's it, deny.
NAVARRO: We don't do confessions.
PHILLIP: Batya.
UNGAR-SARGON: Yes, I have a new book out, it's called "The Jews and the Left," and it's about why Jews became Democrats in America and why the left turned on them. And Abby, I wrote a quick inscription to you for Abby Phillip. Yes, thank you so much for all your kindness in providing a space where healthy civil debate can flourish, God bless and protect.
PHILLIP: Oh my gosh, oh wait, no kidding. Well, thank you, Batya, it's so nice to see you.
NAVARRO: You want to confess something, or you want to confess?
PHILLIP: We got to go, I'm confessing that it's time for the next show. Everyone, thank you very much. Thanks for watching "NewsNight." "Laura
Coates Live" starts right now.
