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New Strikes Launched from Iran; Reports of Plan to Send Kurdish Forces into Iran; First Chartered Flight Evacuates Americans; Gonzales Admits to Affair; Tommy Pigott is Interviewed about the Evacuation of Americans. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired March 05, 2026 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Now, March 2nd, two days before Eric Richins died. "Life is going to be different I promise. Your one hell of a patient person. I hate your hard days. I wish I could be there to turn them around for you. Can I try Friday? Give me a few days? Hang in there until then please?"

Defense turned this around by saying there were texts that said I can't break up my family.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Right.

CASAREZ: Us being together is a fantasy. But about two weeks after he died, she met with the man she was having the affair with, and he had served in the Afghan War. She says, have you ever killed anybody? What did it feel like?

BERMAN: So many explosive statements there. Although in the text it does say divorce, right? Notably there.

CASAREZ: Yes.

BERMAN: Jean Casarez, thank you for doing this. And we'll see you on CNN All-access covering this all day long. Thank you.

CASAREZ: Thank you.

BERMAN: A brand new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: CNN is now inside Iran, reporting from the ground. The first American network there since the war started. And that war this morning is widening. New Iranian strikes hitting new nations today.

Republican Congressman Tony Gonzales now admits he had an affair with a staffer, who ultimately took her own life. The House Ethics Committee is now opening an investigation into the congressman over it.

And a retaining wall comes crashing down, trapping a man inside his car. We've got an update on what happened here.

I'm Kate Bolduan, with Sara Sidner and John Berman. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: We begin with breaking news this morning. New video from U.S. Central Command appearing to show strikes on an Iranian military site and planes as the war widens across the Middle East and beyond.

There's also this new video appearing to show Iranian drone strike at an airport in Azerbaijan. Authorities say two people were injured and a terminal building was also damaged. This is the first known strike in Azerbaijan since the war began, marking new front in this war.

And new images from central Israel. Emergency workers responding after a projectile fired from Iran landed east of Tel Aviv today.

In Qatar, our CNN team on the ground capturing another video of explosions in the sky after suspected Iranian missiles were intercepted over Doha.

And a look at this in northern Syria. An Iranian missile stuck in the ground. You see how large it is. We are told it landed near a Kurdish controlled city without causing any casualties.

CNN is now in Iran this morning, reporting from the ground, the first American network inside of Iran as this war widens. And we are covering this story from across the region.

Let's begin with Nic Robertson, he is in Riyadh for us in Saudi Arabia.

What can you tell us is happening there?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: The tempo of Iranian strikes is being very, very carefully measured and gauged here. But what happened in the early hours of this morning, three cruise missiles were shot down close to a large Saudi air base just outside the capital, Riyadh, here, Prince Sultan Air Base. Historically, it's an air base that U.S. forces have used in the past. It's not clear if they have a presence there at the moment. That appeared to be the target in the early hours of this morning.

Then a couple of hours later, ministry of defense here reported that there was another attempt or apparent attempt on that base. They said three drones were shot down in the same area. And then a little later, another drone intercepted and shot down in the north of Saudi Arabia, fairly close to the sort of border with Jordan and Iraq.

At the moment, the calculation here is, is Iran -- are Iran's strikes on the wane? Are they operating in a way that's going to -- that's going to worsen the threat to Saudi Arabia? And we learned yesterday that ballistic missiles have been fired at one of the oil energy facilities here in Saudi Arabia. They were intercepted. But this is the tightrope Saudi Arabia walks at the moment.

SIDNER: All right, thank you to you Nic Robertson with a great reporting there from Saudi Arabia.

Let's go now to our Clarissa Ward. She is near Iran on the Iraq border there in Erbil.

What are you learning there? Because you've had some incredibly interesting and potentially game changing reporting from there as to what is happening with the Kurdish population.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. Well, as we first reported, just a couple of nights ago, Irani Kurdish opposition forces here, supported by the CIA, say that they will be going into western Iran as part of some kind of a ground offensive, assisted by the U.S. and Israel, though there's no specificity given as to what that kind of assistance would look like.

[09:05:10]

And Iran appears to have taken note because in the last 24 hours, Sara, there have been multiple missile and drone strikes on at least three different groups, three different Iranian Kurdish groups who are part of this coalition that is talking about participating in this ground offensive. And Iran's intelligence ministry earlier on releasing a statement saying that they were hitting these groups precisely because of all these reports that they may be going inside.

Now, it's interesting because we've been reaching out consistently to these groups. They're trying, clearly, to perhaps dial down the rhetoric a little bit. Before they were saying in coming days. Now they say we are ready at any time. And part of the reason perhaps for that calibration, let's say, Sara, is because the leadership here in Iraqi Kurdistan is deeply uncomfortable with all of this. They desperately want to remain neutral in this war. They have a very good and warm relationship with the U.S. But Iran is a neighbor, and they cannot take the risk of being seen to facilitate the use of their territory as a launch pad for U.S. Israeli assisted ground offensive inside Iran.

Sara.

SIDNER: Yes, all very good points. Clarissa Ward, thank you so much for your great reporting to you as well.

Nic Robertson there in Saudi Arabia.

John.

BERMAN: All right, also new this morning, word that the first charter flight evacuating Americans has now left the Middle East. The State Department says more flights will be surged throughout the region. The Trump administration has faced criticism that it did not have an evacuation plan ready when it began this war.

CNN's Kevin Liptak is at the White House with the latest.

Kevin, what are you learning this morning. KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes, and you are starting to see this logjam of Americans and other nationalities as well who are trying to leave the Middle East. You're starting to see it ease somewhat. The State Department saying that that first charter flight left yesterday. They're not actually saying where it left from. And they're not saying where future charter flights will be leaving from. They say that's for security reasons, which I think just underscores the very grave security situation that many Americans now find themselves in after essentially being trapped in the Middle East when this war began. You know, the administration says it's now trying to get these charter flights out. They're trying to find military flights. They're looking to help Americans book the very limited commercial options that are available. But it has led to enormous frustration among these American citizens who are trying to get out, questioning why, even amid this massive military buildup for the last several weeks, there wasn't more done to plan for these evacuations ahead of time.

You know, President Trump has said that this all happened very quickly, that these plans weren't able to be laid ahead of time. And it has led to this scramble at the State Department to put together, you know, this 24-hour call center where Americans can call and try and get information about how to leave.

Now, as of yesterday, the State Department said that it had assisted 6,500 Americans with leaving the Middle East. They say, in total, 17,500 American citizens had returned to the United States since the start of this conflict. But it is just one area where the administration is trying to mitigate some of the fallout effects of this war.

The other area I would note is oil prices and the cost of gas in the United States. You've seen President Trump say that he will potentially escort -- use the Navy to escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz. We just heard in the last few minutes from the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt. She wrote on social media, quote, "rest assured" President Trump's entire energy team had, quote, "been planning on this." And she says they are all over it.

John.

BERMAN: All right, yes, gas prices have gone up really over a quarter in just a few days. We haven't seen a rise like that in years and years.

Kevin Liptak, at the White House, thank you very much for that.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Joining me right now to talk about what all this adds up to is CNN's senior political and global affairs commentator, Rahm Emanuel, former ambassador to Japan, former Chicago mayor, former White House chief of staff to President Obama.

You add up everything we're hearing from our reporters, situation, you know, Clarissa's on the Iraq-Iran border, you've got Kevin Liptak talking about attempts now to get evacuation plans moving for Americans stuck in the region. You have the price -- oil markets that have just clearly been surging since this happened. And my question is, when you have, broadly speaking, an American public that does not approve of the U.S. operation, though Republicans do, of the -- of the operation, what does the president need to do to better communicate, or do you think he is doing a good job of communicating what the goal is and what mission accomplished looks like?

[09:10:06]

RAHM EMANUEL, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL AND GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: Look, I think the president is not doing a good job. As you know, they went -- literally said nothing over the weekend when we started too. You had basically a salad bar of choices.

I think what -- if I was in the White House in the days, in the Situation Room, a very concise message. This is what we were negotiating. End of the nuclears, end of the missiles, end of the proxies. Very precise. They refused to negotiate in good faith. This is why we're taking action. That had a shot of not only giving the military a precise objectives, but also rallying the country around. And I keep wanting to hike this point or focus on this. In Desert Storm America was united. Our service men and women in our military functions better when the whole country is focused on the mission, not just the one percent that has joined and served as volunteers for the armed forces. So, I think he has made a huge mistake by not rallying the country behind a concise message of what was negotiating and failed to get an agreement. I'm not sure that would have won the argument, but the idea that you have Secretary Rubio talking about Israel leading us into efforts, Secretary Hegseth talking about, this is military and president -- and the president giving you four different options on four different days. They have lost the opportunity to rally, not only public opinion here at home, but people around the world.

BOLDUAN: And kind of the embodiment of this scattered view on it. You can see on Capitol Hill as well, they had -- the Senate voted on war powers.

EMANUEL: Yes.

BOLDUAN: The House is going to vote on it. Democratic Senator John Fetterman, he was the one Democrat to vote with Republicans to basically greenlight this continued operation. I asked him yesterday, he was on, about the Israeli defense minister saying that -- he put out on Twitter that essentially every future leader of Iran is open to being a target for elimination. And let me play what Fetterman told me about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN FETTERMAN (D-PA): Yes, just keep killing. Killing them until they're -- until they're gone. I mean, absolutely. I saw that, I've read that they're going to target who they ever elect to be their next leader and kill them. Absolutely. I fully support it. So, that's what's entirely appropriate. (END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: That's gotten a lot of people's attention just hearing the senator say just basically continue killing them all.

EMANUEL: Well, the American people not only are not for this, they're not for the endless war that that would take. Second of all, if you -- if you narrowed this to strategic objectives of the threat that Iran posed to the region and to the United States, that's one thing. Once you go to regime change from the air, which cannot be achieved, you're setting up the military not only to fail, but we, as a country, will have failed. And the country is not -- not only not for this effort, the country is not going to support, nor should they, an endless effort in the military to regime change.

And lastly, as I -- we were just talking earlier, 15 months in this administration, eight nations have been targeted for military action by this president, one every six weeks. That is not what the United States signed up for when we are struggling here at home to give more Americans the opportunity. We're not focused on the home front in the way that this president is focused on the world stage in some search for the -- for the Nobel Peace Prize, which after this is definitely not happening.

BOLDUAN: Let me ask you about -- I've been reading a lot about the Rahm Emanuel and his travels. Just this morning, "The Journal" has a new piece out. The headline was, "Rahm Emanuel Floods Democrats with Criticisms and Ideas. Will His Party Listen?" And last month, "Politico" had a headline that -- a piece that said, "another month, another Rahm Emanuel policy proposal, what's he up to?"

You and I have talked about the policy prescriptions that you've been rolling out, on social media, on education. A lot of what you're saying here, the things that Americans are focused on here at home. What are you up to now, Rahm, have you decided?

EMANUEL: Trying to get more time here on CNN.

BOLDUAN: Perfect. Perfect. Done and done.

EMANUEL: Well, so, look, I'm off meeting with people in America. I was in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I'll be soon in Wisconsin. What ails America? The fact is, we have three -- or 50 percent of our kids cannot read at grade level. And nobody's focused on it. Nobody wants to solve it. And yet we have an answer coming out of Mississippi that could actually address this problem. They went from 49th to ninth on success on reading across the country.

The fact is, the American dream has become unaffordable to Americans. You and I were talking about our kids. They're going to be fine. But it's the rest of America's kids who won't be fine. We should be focusing on making sure they have a chance. When they say get ahead, that means getting ahead of their parents. And that's slipping through their fingers.

And so, to me, I'm off and meeting people, talking, hearing stories. I met a woman in Grand Rapids, used to work in a flower shop. She's a carpenter now. She's a foreman making $50 an hour. Has health care and retirement. We should have more following in her footsteps. A young man in Howell, Michigan, who used to work at a warehouse making him a little more than a minimum wage. Couldn't afford rent. Today --

BOLDUAN: Are Democrats listening to those people.

[09:15:00]

EMANUEL: Well, I think the American people need to focus on them. They are the future of this country. We live in a period of time where you earn what you learn. We haven't done a single thing to ensure not only reading levels, high school graduations. And as we did in Chicago, you get -- you're going to get your high school degree. If you show us a letter of acceptance from college, community college, a branch of the armed forces, or a vocational school. Every child will know where they're walking to. Not just our children. Every child in America. Don't ever throw your towel in on their future.

BOLDUAN: It's good to see you, Rahm. Thanks for coming in.

EMANUEL: Thanks very much.

BOLDUAN: I really appreciate it.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, ahead, after repeatedly lying about it, Republican Congressman Tony Gonzales now admitting to an affair with a staffer who later killed herself. He's now facing an investigation. But will he resign?

And nervous Republicans are waiting to see which candidate President Trump will endorse in the Texas Senate Republican runoff.

Also, we're just minutes from the opening bell on Wall Street. How markets are going to react today as the widening war in the Middle East threatens the global oil supply. Those stories and much more ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:20:27]

SIDNER: New this morning, after months of denying it, Republican Congressman Tony Gonzales admits to an affair with one of his staffers who ended up killing herself. He admitted it on a podcast, calling it a lapse in judgment. That admission also came hours after he was forced into a primary runoff to keep his House seat, and after a House Ethics Committee investigation was launched against him.

CNN's Annie Grayer is following all of this.

What are you learning? Is he planning on resigning or no?

ANNIE GRAYER, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Well, Sara, no, he's planning on staying in this race. He has -- his runoff is in May -- end of May, but he plans on fighting these allegations to the end.

And this is a big, major development in the story that he came out and said -- and admitted to this affair, given the fact that it is against House rules for a lawmaker to have a relationship with a -- with a staffer. And we're going to see, how does this impact the House Ethics investigation that was just opened into him, and how does it impact the growing call from Republican lawmakers, who -- his own colleagues who are set -- who are calling on him to resign the more information about these allegations come out.

Now, Speaker Johnson has said he wants these -- this investigation to play out, but he has called the allegations pretty serious. So, we'll be asking him today what Congressman Gonzales' revelation, if that impacts his calculus here on any of this. But Gonzales maintains he's not going to drop out of this race.

Take a listen to how he admitted, though, to the affair with his former staffer in the podcast last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. TONY GONZALES (R-TX): I made a mistake. Ad I had a lapse in judgment. And there was a lack of faith. And I take full responsibility for those actions. Since then, I've reconciled with my wife, Angel. I've asked God to forgive me, which he has, and my faith is as strong as ever.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRAYER: Now, Sara, Gonzales also said in that interview that he looks forward to the ethics investigation playing out, and all of the facts coming to light. But he has until March 18th to decide if he's going to drop out. Again, he has said he's staying in this fight, Sara.

SIDNER: Yes, the margins are really slim. We will have to wait and see what happens in this case. But a lot of people watching it.

Annie Grayer, thank you so much. Do appreciate it.

John.

BERMAN: All right, thousands of Americans remain stranded across the Middle East as the war in and around Iran expands. Flights are starting to trickle out. But why were evacuations not planned sooner?

And gas prices in the U.S. now at their highest level in 11 months, with oil and shipping all caught in the crossfire of war.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:27:08]

BERMAN: This morning, the State Department says more flights will be surged throughout the Middle East to get Americans back home. The first charter flight out of the region, we are told, took off yesterday, though we're not told exactly where. More than 17,000 U.S. citizens have now returned since the war with Iran began on Saturday. The Trump administration's faced backlash for not having an evacuation plan ready before the first strikes were launched.

With us now is Tommy Pigott, principal deputy spokesperson for the Department of State.

Tommy, great to see you.

I mean, obviously, part of the issue has been that airports in major transit hubs, like the UAE, were hit, and, obviously, there were closures around Qatar. Doha is also a major transit hub. And there were restrictions in Israel for some time.

Give us the status at this point of the evacuations.

TOMMY PIGOTT, PRINCIPAL DEPUTY SPOKESPERSON, STATE DEPARTMENT: Well, that's why it's so important that people call that number that we've been saying, that plus 1-202-501-4444 because each country is different. So, for example, where airspace is closed, we're looking at options and have options and have been helping Americans move from areas where airspace is close to where its open. The current numbers as of now are that over 20,000 Americans have been able to return to the United States since this began.

BERMAN: OK.

PIGOTT: Including the provision of direct assistance to nearly 10,000 Americans by our 24/7 task force. Charter flights, as you mentioned, are also underway. So, we encourage Americans, please call that number. Please register so that we know where you are. We can offer that personalized advice. And that we can get you home, bring you home. We're working 24/7 to make sure we do just that.

BERMAN: All right, 20,000 is an update. The last number we had heard was 17,000. So, it's up to 20,000 now.

Any update on the number of flights that are out? Because all we've been told is a single, a single chartered evacuation flight has taken off. Any more than that at this point?

PIGOTT: Well, I can say charter flights are underway, but for operational reasons, we're limited by what we can say in terms of specifics. We'll be continually updating people on those numbers throughout the day, going forward in the days ahead. Our main priority is getting that information out about step, that's state.gov, the number I just mentioned, to make sure that people are getting the information they need that are in the region. So, we'll be updating those continually.

But I can say, like you mentioned, the 20,000 Americans that have been able to return to the United States and the provision of direct assistance to nearly 10,000 Americans since this began because of that 24/7 task force.

BERMAN: But it's flights plural. It's flights with an "s" at this point, not just one? The reason I'm asking, Tommy, is because, one of the questions has been, other countries were having multiple charter flights. They had a string of charter flights out. In some cases, a day or two days before the United States, which is the one that launched this conflict. So, why were other countries able to get this started more quickly?

PIGOTT: I don't accept that characterization of what we've been able to do here. We saw the implementation of this task force immediately. And we also saw the assistance of Americans from the very beginning. That's why that 10,000 number is so important. Each one of these countries, of course, with a different situation that people are working with, people are actively overcoming in order to provide those security options where able.

[09:30:04]

But we have seen Americans be able to return to the United States since the beginning. We've been providing that direct security, that direct travel guidance