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Virginia Votes on New Congressional Maps; Fed Chair Nominee Faces Confirmation Hearing; Iran Negotiations in Holding Pattern. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired April 21, 2026 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:01]

DANA BASH, CNN HOST: Yes, it really is interesting, Betsy, particularly since the president -- and you've just laid out the relationship that the president has had, at least publicly -- we don't know about privately -- with religion, but especially as we continue to see Pete Hegseth, for example, talk in very religious terms as he discusses the war in Iran.

Thank you so much. Great reporting.

Thank you for joining INSIDE POLITICS today.

"CNN NEWS CENTRAL" starts right now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Holding pattern. The vice president is supposed to be heading to Pakistan for peace talks with Iran, so why is he still in Washington?

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: And in short supply. As the war goes on, the U.S. is facing a critical shortage of missiles the Pentagon could need in a major conflict. We have the details.

Also, a map makeover -- the latest in an escalating war over redistricting, as Virginia voters decide whether to approve a new congressional map that could reshape the balance of power in Washington.

We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

KEILAR: Our breaking news this hour, sources telling CNN it is now unclear when Vice President Vance will leave for Pakistan for a second round of peace talks with Iran.

Vance was expected to depart Washington today, but Pakistani officials say Iran still has not confirmed that it will even be attending these talks. President Trump is warning Iran time is running out to get back to the negotiating table. That two week cease-fire that has been happening between the U.S. and Iran is set to expire tomorrow evening.

And in an interview with CNBC today, the president said he's not interested in extending it.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

JOE KERNEN, CNBC ANCHOR: So, to be clear, you're saying that you need a -- at least the prospects for a signed deal today and tomorrow, or else you would resume bombing Iran?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, I expect to be bombing, because I think that's a better attitude to go in with. But we're ready to go. I mean, the military is raring to go.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

KEILAR: Let's go now to the White House, where we have CNN's Alayna Treene.

Alayna, what are you learning about this timing right now, Vance remaining in Washington, as they're looking at the prospects of Iran potentially not showing up for these talks?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I think that's certainly a factor here.

And just to give you a clearer sense of what was expected to happen as he headed into today, the vice president was expected to depart for Islamabad this morning. And the talks were tentatively scheduled in Islamabad for tomorrow, we were told, according to our conversations with sources familiar with that in-person meeting.

But, as you mentioned, the Iranians have still yet to agree to send their high-level officials to that meeting. And so, when I spoke with sources, they said it's very much unclear at this moment when the vice president is going to depart.

Now, they did say that the vice president was going to be arriving at the White House. We actually did just see his motorcade come here. The -- a White House official told me, essentially, that the vice president is going to be participating in policy meeting today -- policy meetings today.

Other officials I spoke with said that they're really trying to figure out what the next moves are for this, particularly given that the cease-fire expires tomorrow evening.

Now, a few things I do want to point out. You played that clip of the president speaking with CNBC this morning, saying that he does not want to extend the cease-fire, that the military is ready to go and move forward with potential kinetic strikes once it expires.

But, still, the posture from the conversations I have been having as recently as this morning is that they still want diplomacy to prevail. That is still the priority here. And they do not want more military attacks to take place. Of course, we really have to see where things stand. There are a lot of negotiations going on behind the scenes and a lot of uncertainty about the path forward.

But, still, there is hope that there could ultimately be a deal here. KEILAR: The president has obviously had a lot of heightened rhetoric

around the situation with Iran. I know you have some reporting about how officials are viewing that in the lead-up to these potential very important talks.

TREENE: Yes, look, I think a lot of this actually was really on display on Friday, although, of course, we have seen President Trump posting kind of nonstop on TRUTH Social. He's done a series of phone interviews with different media reporters.

But some of that, from the conversations I have been having with Trump allies and Trump officials, they privately acknowledge that some of what the president has been saying has been detrimental to these talks, especially given just the deep mistrust on both sides, from the U.S. toward the Iranians and, of course, the Iranians toward the United States.

[13:05:12]

But the reason I bring up Friday was, I'd remind you that, Friday morning, we saw the Pakistani mediators, who have been such crucial intermediaries in these negotiations. They were in Tehran on Friday for a third day of talks. There was a lot of optimism on Friday about the potential of finalizing a compromise or even a broader agreement to end this war.

And then, as that meeting was happening, you saw the president posting, and what I was told, posting a lot of things, some of the most crucial demands that the U.S. were making of the Iranians and saying that the Iranians had essentially capitulated to them.

And what I was told was that they hadn't yet done that and some of those discussions weren't even finalized. And so some people noting that that has been a little bit damaging to these talks, and, of course, where we are today, very different spot than the optimistic posturing we saw last week as we were closing in on the weekend, Brianna.

KEILAR: Very interesting.

Alayna, thank you for the reporting from the White House -- Boris.

SANCHEZ: New video from the Pentagon appears to show U.S. forces in the Indian Ocean boarding what's being described as a stateless sanctioned vessel. According to the Treasury Department, the ship had already been sanctioned for transporting Iranian oil.

This operation comes after U.S. forces fired on and then seized an Iranian-flagged vessel in the Gulf of Oman on Sunday and as the U.S. imposes a blockade on all Iranian ports. Iranian state media released this footage claiming to show ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz with permission from Tehran as they head toward the Persian Gulf.

Let's go now live to Tel Aviv with CNN's Jeremy Diamond.

Jeremy, what's the latest you're learning?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, these incidents involving ships, including the latest boarding by the U.S. military personnel, are just an indication of the kind of broader dynamics at play here as it relates to the U.S.' naval blockade of any ships transiting to and from Iranian ports, the continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz, and all of the disputes that have emerged from that in the days -- in recent days.

And it really does remind us how central those two issues have been to the potential progress in negotiations and, frankly, it seems, to the halting of some considerable momentum that there seemed to be in terms of the United States and Iran being able to bridge their differences.

When we were here late last week, it seemed like Iran was willing to open the Strait of Hormuz once again. President Trump was celebrating that notion, saying that Iran would never do so again, claiming that all major points had been agreed to between the United States and Iran.

And then we saw, as President Trump refused to lift that naval blockade, the Iranians once again said that the Strait of Hormuz would be closed and would only be reopened once the United States lifted that naval blockade.

We have even seen some reporting indicating that the Iranians were not going to travel to these negotiations in Islamabad unless the United States first lifted that blockade. And, today, once again, President Trump has reiterated that he will only lift that blockade once a deal with Iran is actually concluded.

And so it does seem like this naval blockade and Iran's blockade of the Strait of Hormuz are once again some of the central issues not only in these negotiations, but perhaps holding up progress in these negotiations that very much seemed to be developing.

But I'm joining you right now, Boris, from a region that is very much waiting to see which direction things are going to take, the very real prospect once again of major regional escalation, of the United States and Israel returning to carry out major bombardments inside of Iran, Iran preparing for the possibility of renewing its missile attacks on Israel and Gulf countries as well, or, on the other hand, a de- escalation, with the real possibility of a deal between these two sides.

Both possibilities seem just as realistic, one as the other. And so we're going to wait and see whether indeed these negotiators travel to Islamabad and negotiations can indeed get under way or whether we're looking at a very different scenario -- Boris.

SANCHEZ: A staggering range of possibilities.

Jeremy Diamond, live for us in Tel Aviv, thank you so much.

Still to come: The president and his pick for Fed chair is up on Capitol Hill today, Kevin Warsh telling lawmakers that he will not do President Trump's bidding, as we follow this tense hearing on the Hill.

Plus, a federal investigation now under way after 10 people connected to sensitive nuclear and aerospace research have died or disappeared. What we know about these cases.

And just minutes from now, dozens of parents who say their kids were harmed or died because of tech platforms are going to be testifying before lawmakers as they pressure Congress to pass online safety legislation -- that and much more coming your way next.

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[13:14:23]

KEILAR: President Trump's pick to lead the nation's Central Bank just made his case for a confirmation before the Senate Banking Committee.

Kevin Warsh was pressed today about the potential influence the president might have with Fed decisions when it comes to interest rates. The president, of course, has repeatedly blasted the current Fed chair, Jerome Powell, for not reducing its key rate fast enough.

But Warsh insists he won't be swayed by any pressure from the White House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEVIN WARSH, FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIR NOMINEE: The president never asked me to predetermine, commit, fix, decide on any interest rate decision in any of our discussions, nor would I ever agree to do so.

[13:15:04]

I was honored he nominated me. Like everyone else in the committee and the world, I've heard his view on interest rates. It sounded very similar to me to every other president in economic history that I've studied.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: We're joined now by business columnist and founder of The Pinpoint Press Rick Newman.

Rick, it's interesting, because he says he wasn't -- good to see you, as always. He says he wasn't asked to essentially cut interest rates or have some kind of agreement on interest rates, nor would he ever agree to that.

But, publicly, Trump has been very different than any other president on this messaging, right? He wants interest rates cut. He's really ticked off that Powell has not done that. And even hours before the interview, he had this -- even hours before the confirmation, Trump had this interview where he says he'd be disappointed if Warsh doesn't immediately cut interest rates.

How has Warsh approached this issue of what he would do with interest rate cuts as his nomination was looming?

RICK NEWMAN, BUSINESS COLUMNIST AND PUBLISHER, THE PINPOINT PRESS: I mean, he has had no choice but to say he will be independent of anything Trump wants him to do.

If he were to say anything otherwise or indicate that, sure, he would go in there and do Trump's bidding, I don't think he would get confirmed at this point. And we have seen the Republican senators kind of draw a line on this one.

I mean, they have basically rubber-stamped a lot of Trump's -- practically all of his Cabinet appointees, but they're not really doing that on this one. And I think they indicated ahead of time that they were not even going to consider a Trump lackey, somebody who would just do whatever Trump wanted.

So Trump nominated Warsh. Wall Street likes Kevin Warsh. They actually think he will be pretty independent. I mean, he has a reputation for being his own man. So I think that what that means is, we're going to see disputes between the new Fed chair and President Trump almost as soon as the new Fed chair takes office.

But a couple of other things I think we should talk about here just real briefly, I'm not sure Warsh is going to get confirmed by the time Powell's term expires on May 15. So, we may have this unusual interregnum period where the current chair, Jay Powell, is still there and the Senate has not yet confirmed Powell.

KEILAR: Yes.

NEWMAN: Excuse me -- concern -- confirmed Warsh.

KEILAR: Yes, because Thom Tillis has made it clear, even as he is saying that Kevin Warsh is -- he's praising him, right, his qualifications. He's made it clear he is not going to get out of the way of blocking his nomination if DOJ doesn't get rid of what he called this frivolous criminal investigation of Fed Chair Powell.

How do you see that playing out? Because, so far, the president has really stayed firm on that.

NEWMAN: Right.

So, Thom Tillis, Republican senator from North Carolina, he's the one who's standing up and taking the stance here. But he's not a lone wolf. Other Republican senators basically support Tillis, which means that the Senate is not going to get around to confirming Warsh until Trump has somehow called off this Department of Justice investigation.

This has to do with Trump says there are these cost overruns at a Federal -- a Fed -- Federal Reserve renovation project. There are some cost overruns, but there are in almost every federal project. And there's no reason to think that Jerome Powell has any criminal culpability at all there.

So, the Senate really wants -- on this one, the Senate is saying, we're going to call the shots on this and, to protect the independence of the Fed, we want this investigation completely finished, or we're just not going to confirm Warsh until then.

So, Trump is not going to back down and say, OK, sure, I will call off the investigation. There's going to be some kind of machination here to make this work and where this is sort of coming into view. There's possibly going to be some congressional oversight or look -- they're going to look into these cost overruns, and then maybe Trump will say, see, there was a problem. I'm getting what I want.

But, at the same time, he calls off the investigation. The Senate says, OK, that's what we wanted. But that's going to take probably more time than just a few weeks before Powell's term ends. So I think we are -- I mean, the forecasting I'm seeing says Powell could be in the job for a couple of months or more after the time his term ends.

So, the irony here, of course, is that Trump is the one standing in the way of his new nominee replacing Powell, just one of the many ironies in the Trump presidency.

KEILAR: Yes, he is not going to be happy for those extra days of Jerome Powell if that is the case.

Rick, always great to have you. Thank you so much for being with us.

NEWMAN: Thanks, guys.

KEILAR: Thank you.

And, right now, polls are open in a special election that could shift the balance of power in the House of Representatives -- ahead, the battle in Virginia that could favor Democrats in a big way.

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[13:24:28]

SANCHEZ: Right now, voters in Virginia are deciding the nation's latest redistricting battle, one that could eventually give Democrats the edge on Capitol Hill.

The party could scoop up four House seats if voters pass an effort to redraw a new congressional map. The vote is expected to be close, with more than a million early ballots already in. Democrats have poured roughly $55 million into this fight, more than doubling what Republicans have spent on ads.

CNN's Arlette Saenz is live for us outside a polling station in Manassas.

Arlette, how are voters there feeling today?

[13:25:01]

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, I can tell you this man just pulled up in his truck right next to us to tell us that he voted no against this referendum here in Virginia.

But we have really seen a steady stream of voters throughout the day, with voters really expressing mixed reviews on whether they are supporting this redistricting effort that has widespread ramifications not just in Virginia, but also across the country.

Virginia voters will be voting on whether to approve a constitutional amendment that would allow the Democratic-led State Assembly to temporarily redraw these congressional lines in the midst of a heated redistricting race across the country.

President Trump yesterday rallied his supporters to try to urge them to vote against the measure, trying to argue that it was a Democratic power grab, even though Republicans had kicked off this redistricting fight when they pushed forward with those efforts down in Texas over the summer.

Democrats here in the state have said that they are simply trying to level the playing field with a redistricting fight that they believe the GOP has started.

But take a listen to a sampling of the voters we spoke to on both sides about these new proposed maps.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOUGLASS TATE, VIRGINIA VOTER: I just feel that it's a constitutional right, that we should not be gerrymandering our districts in order to adjust temporarily for fairness, in the sense that -- in the way that they're trying to articulate fairness. So I just don't like the way that they're trying to go about it.

CATHERINE MONROE, VIRGINIA VOTER: What the Republicans have done in some other states is to make them not reflect the makeup of the country accurately.

SAENZ: But what do you think of the arguments that -- that Democrats are essentially doing, what Republicans have done in other states?

MONROE: That's true. That's true. But it's temporary. And it's because the Republicans did the wrong in the first place. So we're doing two wrongs to make a right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Now, we are here in Manassas, Virginia, which is actually in one of the most talked-about proposed districts in this redistricting debate.

That is the proposed 7th Congressional District of Virginia that some have dubbed as the Lobster District. If you take a look at the makeup there, it starts up in the Northern Virginia suburbs outside of Washington, D.C., and then kind of comes down towards Manassas, where we are, and then goes out into these two claw shapes, which is basically encircling another district which includes the college town in Charlottesville. Opponents of this measure have said that some of those -- the way that

these districts are drawn, that you're going to have the same lawmaker representing the -- a heavily Democratic area in Northern Virginia and then conservative in rural areas.

And that's something that some voters have expressed opposition to. But, certainly, there are very high stakes for both parties in this redistricting fight. A bit earlier today, the Republican chair of the House Campaign Committee said it would be very tough for Republicans to hold the majority in the House in November if these maps move forward, so a big decision for Virginia voters today as they are voting on this statewide ballot measure.

SANCHEZ: And, to be clear, Arlette, no matter what voters do today, the state Supreme Court may have the final say in all of this.

SAENZ: They could. The state Supreme Court did allow this referendum to move forward, but there are still some legal challenges to the amendment itself and the process that has played out. So they could end up weighing in on this matter.

But, again, this is something that Democrats have said will only be a temporary measure. After this amendment, if it does pass, after this redistricting takes shape, then they will return back to that bipartisan commission, bipartisan effort in 2020 -- in 2030, I should say.

SANCHEZ: Yes. Arlette Saenz live for us in Manassas, thank you so much.

Ahead: missile math. Why officials at the Pentagon are worried about the supply of critical weapons, what it could mean for a future conflict.

Stay with us.

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