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Iran Supreme Leader: Foreign Foes Belong in Depths of Persian Gulf; Interview with Sen. Jeff Merkley: Pete Hegseth Back on Capitol Hill for Another Grilling By Lawmakers; How Voting Rights Ruling Could Affect Midterms and Beyond; Press Gala Shooting Suspect Due Back in Court for Detention Hearing; U.S. Accuses Mexican State Governor of Helping Drug Cartel. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired April 30, 2026 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And clearly the fun continues with that hilarious man. A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts now.

All right, let's start this hour off with the breaking news, a new message from Iran's supreme leader as President Trump is apparently considering starting back up with strikes on Iran. His defense secretary facing down lawmakers on Capitol Hill again today.

The man accused of trying to assassinate President Trump this past weekend heads back to court today and the new images that have been revealed in court filings about him in the moments before the attack.

And a wild chase as police try to stop a man in a stolen military truck.

Sara is out today. I'm Kate Bolduan with John Berman. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, brand new this morning, gas prices jumped 7 cents overnight to a new nearly four year high. They're now $4.30 a gallon nationwide. This is the biggest one night jump in six weeks.

The market's clearly feeling the pressure of the war. And this morning, sources tell CNN the president will receive a briefing today from the head of U.S. Central Command. The goal, we are told, either breaking through the stalled talks or hitting Iran, maybe with a new strike to force their hand.

Also breaking this morning, a new message attributed to Iran's new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, saying that foreign aggressors have no place in the Persian Gulf except, he says, in the depths of its waters. The message also says that Iran will safeguard its nuclear and missile capabilities.

Also happening today, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth testifies before the Senate. This after lashing out at House members yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. MAGGIE GOODLANDER (D-NH) ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Mr. Hegseth, can I ask you, do you know what the average cost of a gallon of gas was in this country on February 28th?

PETE HEGSETH, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Well, it depends on where you live. If you live in California, it's $8.

GOODLANDER: $2.83. Do you know what the average cost of a gallon of gas is today?

HEGSETH: Much higher in California.

GOODLANDER: $4.23. I got to say, Mr. Hegseth, you said you've got a crack economic team that's looking at the impacts of this war on the American taxpayer. And you can't answer this basic question. That should shock the conscience of every American.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, with us now is Senator Jeff Merkley, a Democrat from Oregon. He is on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, not the Armed Services Committee.

So you will not be face to face with Secretary Hegseth today. But you got a sense of the tone of that hearing. I want to play a little more so you can get a sense of how he is handling questions and how he is going after the people asking them.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETE HEGSETH, DEFENSE SECRETARY: The biggest challenge, the biggest adversary we face at this point are the reckless, feckless and defeatist words of congressional Democrats and some Republicans.

Your hatred for President Trump blinds you to the truth of the success of this mission.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So he is saying, Senator, that Democrats are a threat to national security. What's your response there?

SEN. JEFF MERKLEY (D-OR), SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE: Well, when the Secretary of Defense doesn't have an analytical argument or a valid point to make, he just attacks people. It's what back home we'd call a blowhard.

BERMAN: Moments ago, we heard from Iran's new supreme leader. Or we think we did. He put out a statement on paper.

It's a statement attributed to him. We still haven't seen him. But it reads, "We and our neighbors across the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman share a common destiny. And foreign actors who come from thousands of kilometers away with greedy intentions have no place here except in the depths of its waters. This chain of victories achieved by the grace of God and through the policies of resistance and the strategy of a strong Iran marks the beginning of a new regional and global order." And this was a statement really all about the Strait of Hormuz, the history of it, and Iran's now control of it.

Where does it tell you, if this is really him, about where Iran thinks this conflict stands?

MERKLEY: Yes, what really has happened through this conflict is Iran has really understood how much power it has given the geography of the Strait and its ability to control that traffic. So we see these various impacts of the war.

One is that the hardliners have been strengthened. The reformers have been seriously undermined. Russia has been enriched. But maybe the most consequential factor here is Iran realizes how much leverage it can exercise over this crucial geographic point as a point of leverage and power in the world.

[08:05:00]

BERMAN: Do you really think they can do it indefinitely, though, with their ports now blockaded and none of their oil getting out?

MERKLEY: Well, we are at this stalemate. And it's not the stalemate. It's not what Trump and his team anticipated.

They thought they could go over, drop a tremendous amount of munitions, blow up a tremendous amount of things, and that, well, Iran would sue for mercy. It would sue for an end of the war and on America's terms, and that's certainly not the case at all. In fact, now we have each nation basically thinking, well, we can pretty much outlast the other.

And that is a situation that means, if this persists, a really significant cost to the world's economy, certainly to the American economy, certainly to the American treasury as well. I keep thinking about those gas prices that were being mentioned, how what that means right now is an additional 50 bucks a week for the average American family in the cost of gas. And that is a tremendous impact and tax on America.

So Trump has this motivation to put an end to this but suddenly doesn't have the leverage to do so.

BERMAN: Senator, I want to ask you about what you think that Democrats should do now in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling yesterday, which reshapes the Voting Rights Act some. Now, this more or less does away with the ability to challenge majority minority districts like majority districts that may be majority black, majority Latino, to challenge them being drawn out there. Effectively, it could give Republicans a couple more seats in the South. But do you think Democrats in the North, in blue controlled states, should aggressively redistrict and maybe spread out some of their Democratic votes there? In other words, do you think they should get in this game even more than they are already?

MERKLEY: Well, it's a tough question, John, because I really believe in bipartisan redistricting that is free of this sort of manipulation. Certainly, what we have seen is that the court said it is OK to do what's referred to as cracking. You take a minority community, you divide them up into different congressional districts so that they wipe out -- it wipes out any political influence they have.

And that is why Elena Kagan's opinion referred to, hey, we had the opportunity for political power with communities, racial communities, minority communities, because of the blood of our soldiers in the Civil War and because of the Civil Rights Movement. And now the Supreme Court has just utterly destroyed that. They have given a complete permission slip to states to divide up minority communities and take away their political power.

And it's a very, very sad day for the vision of equal opportunity for all Americans. I hope the Republican states resist the temptation to redistrict and therefore not have the blue states say we have to counter this in order to have fairness in the House of Representatives. That's what I hope for.

I'm not sure that that's going to happen. We did see some resistance in states like Indiana before that didn't want to go down this path. But we'll see what it's a kind of a lose-lose situation the court has put us in.

BERMAN: Senator Jeff Merkley from Oregon. We do appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very much.

MERKLEY: Thank you, John.

BERMAN: Kate.

BOLDUAN: So this morning, the man accused of trying to attack the White House Correspondents' Dinner is due back in court. There are new details coming out about the timeline of the shooting and the weapons that he had with him.

Several former and current Mexican officials have now been indicted, accused of working with the cartels to bring drugs into the United States. Much more on that.

And a child rescued after his curiosity landed him inside the claw machine at the arcade.

[08:10:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: This morning, the man charged with trying to assassinate the president at the White House Correspondents' Dinner is returning to court.

Prosecutors say that they believe that Cole Thomas Allen was planning this attack for weeks. And the new court filing that's come out also includes a selfie of Allen that he allegedly took in the hotel room shortly before the attack. You see it right there in the picture. You can also see at least four weapons with him.

Prosecutors want him to remain in custody now as he awaits trial, saying that there is no way to ensure the public safety if he is released. What could happen today?

CNN's Katelyn Polantz is outside court and joins us right now. Katelyn, what are you expecting?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Kate, this could be a lengthy and contentious hearing. This is one of those times where the Justice Department has a lot that they have to do in court in order to make sure that Cole Allen remains behind bars as they want him to be. Now, you might be looking at the footage or reading about this shooting and thinking, shouldn't this be easy to keep him detained?

But actually, it's a pretty high bar. What's happening right now is there are legal arguments being made on both sides. The Justice Department is saying Cole Allen, obviously, he is an extreme danger.

[08:15:00]

It is extreme political violence he was planning. The crimes he's charged with, including attempting to assassinate the president of the United States at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, that's a crime of violence. It's a crime of terrorism.

Those are really significant charges that this man faces. And thus, he needs to be detained as he awaits trial, because that's how the community can remain safe.

But the defense team, the public defenders that are representing Cole Allen, they are already picking apart the information that the Justice Department has given, saying this letter, this manifesto that he sent to family and a former employer, is that really enough? They say that that's the sort of thing that is something that they can look at, but he's not specific about his targets. He doesn't write Donald Trump's name in it, especially.

And they also write that he has no criminal history. He has prestigious degrees in both computer science and mechanical engineering. He had a job, and he has the support of friends and family.

If he were released, they would all be able to work together to make sure that he wouldn't commit any violence. He's also a Christian and active in his church. So all of that will come out in court.

But the thing that we're really going to be watching for in court is more about exactly what happened that night as Cole Allen ran past the security perimeter. The Justice Department has told his lawyers they believe he fired one shot out of that rifle that he had, and then a Secret Service agent fired back at him five times. There is some question exactly of who was hit and when still.

But the Justice Department also says this guy not only was prepared for that moment to fire a shot, he had a lot more rounds on him. He had up to two dozen cartridges for this shotgun. He had many rounds of ammunition for a pistol on him.

And when he was downed outside of the ballroom at the dinner, he had two knives, daggers, sheaths, holsters, pliers, wire cutters, and there was even more in his hotel room at the Capitol Hilton. Back to you.

BOLDUAN: All right, Katelyn, thank you so much. Back in court shortly this morning.

Also this morning, the battle of the billionaires continues inside a California courtroom. Elon Musk set to take the stand again in a trial involving Sam Altman's OpenAI. Got the latest on that for you.

And the new and real impacts to come of the Supreme Court's decision further hollowing out the Voting Rights Act. What it means for the midterms and also how much more it means for 2028?

[08:20:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: This morning, new federal charges here in New York against 10 current and former high-ranking Mexican officials. Mexican officials, for allegedly helping drug cartels. CNN's Kara Scannell is here following this case. And this involves some pretty senior Mexican politicians.

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, I mean, we're used to seeing U.S. prosecutors bring charges against members of the cartels. This time they are charging high-ranking politicians and law enforcement officials in the Mexican state of Sinaloa. That is where El Chapo had operated for a long time and a faction of that cartel run by his sons, the Chapitos, is part of this allegation here.

What the authorities allege is that the governor of Sinaloa, his name is Ruben Rocha Moya, is indicted along with nine others. And what authorities allege is that Rocha Moya had met with the cartel members, the Chapitos, when he was running for election in 2021. And that they made a deal that he would put in place if elected cartel-friendly law enforcement politicians and the Chapitos would steal ballot boxes, kidnap opponents to help them get elected.

Now, according to authorities, among those people put in place, a senior official in the police commander for one of the largest cities in Sinaloa. And what he allegedly did was took $41,000 a month in bribes from the cartel. In exchange, let them ride in their patrol cars, listen to the police radios and even allegedly help them kidnap an informant for the U.S. DEA. Now, Rocha Moya has denied these allegations. He says, "I categorically and absolutely reject the accusations made against me by the Southern District of New York Federal Prosecutor's Office as they lack any truth or foundation whatsoever. And this will be demonstrated with full force at the appropriate time."

Now, we have also heard from the Mexican foreign ministers. They said that they received an extradition request from the U.S., but based on that request, they say there's insufficient evidence. So they're still going to make a determination about whether they will turn over any of these 10 current and former government officials to face charges here.

BERMAN: I mean, that's the real question here. We're talking about some current government officials there from Mexico. What are the chances they end up here in court?

SCANNELL: I mean, this is going to be this geopolitical kind of battle here, I think, you know, we have not seen cooperation all the time. Sometimes there is, depending what kind of deals are arranged because of bigger issues.

So that is going to be the big question. Will any of these people come here? I mean, it is interesting to note, though, that El Chapo is in a federal prison here.

El Mayo pled guilty. Two of Chapo's sons also pled guilty. So there are ramifications here sometimes, but it really remains to be seen what's going to happen with these politicians.

BERMAN: Kara Scannell, great reporting as always. Keep us posted on this.

We are just minutes away from the release of two big economic reports that can tell us a lot about economic growth and inflation. You can see stock futures up in advance of the opening bell on Wall Street.

And then a new edition of our obsession with robots that do stuff. Now handling baggage at the airport. How this impacts whether your carry on will fit in the overhead bin.

[08:25:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: The breaking news this morning with gas prices soaring to a nearly four year high now. Sources tell CNN that President Trump will be receiving a briefing today from the head of U.S. Central Command on new military options to attack Iran that could either be in order to pressure Tehran back to the negotiating table or to deliver one final blow before ending the war.

Also this morning, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is set to return to Capitol Hill to testify this time before the Senate. And this, of course, comes on the heels of that combative appearance that he made.

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