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GOP Rejects Dems' Effort to Kill Trump's $1.8 Billion Anti- Weaponization Fund; Senate Kicks Off Marathon Vote to Fund Immigration Enforcement; Trump Says He Will Nominate Todd Blanche as Attorney General; Mixed Messages on U.S.-Iran Talks as Ceasefire Under Strain; House Votes to Limit Trump's Iran War Powers; Hezbollah Leader Flatly Rejects Lebanon-Israel Ceasefire Plan; Trump Set to Announce $700 Million Investment in Coal Facilities. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired June 04, 2026 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:00:28]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": A battle on Capitol Hill over the president's anti-weaponization fund, Republicans rejecting an effort by Democrats to kill that controversial fund, but the fate of a $70 billion immigration bill still hangs in the balance.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Plus, lurking on LinkedIn, a new warning about how Beijing is using the site to recruit spies in the West. And they're coming for the cattle, a flesh eating screwworm making its way back to the United States. We're going to explain how this gross sounding, maybe gross looking, pest could lead to higher prices at the supermarket.

We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to "CNN News Central."

KEILAR: We begin not with the screwworm, but with the voterama drama -- I know you're so sad about that, but this is also very important to pay attention to. It's entering its third hour on Capitol Hill and just moments ago, Senate Republicans fought off a Democratic effort to kill the passage of a $70 billion Immigration Enforcement Bill.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, holding everything up was President Trump's $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund because there are still Republicans who want a commitment in writing that would end that controversial effort for good. CNN's Lauren Fox is closely watching this for us. Lauren, the fate of the $70 billion bill kind of still at stake, what's the latest?

LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. I mean, they are now, as you said, in their third hour of voting on these amendments and they were stuck on the first amendment for a considerable amount of time because there were a number of Republicans who wanted to vote with Democrats in order to send this bill back to committee to strip out any additional language for the president's weaponization fund.

And you had Senator Bill Cassidy eventually voting with his Republican colleagues, but he was working furiously with leadership in order to try to get some kind of commitment or guardrails around that fund. Now, as we've noted, the Acting Attorney General, Todd Blanche has made clear that they are not continuing to fight for this fund but the president has just left the door open enough that some Republicans on Capitol Hill are extremely uneasy about what the future of that weaponization fund might be.

Now the key question is now that we don't expect any language or guardrails to be included in this underlying immigration funding bill, what does that mean for people who are concerned about the weaponization fund? What does that mean for someone like Senator Thom Tillis who has made clear that without any guardrails included in this bill, perhaps he would not vote for it? And does that mean that Bill Cassidy potentially could vote against this underlying immigration funding bill?

I think those are still questions that we're going to have to get answers to over the course of the next several hours. I do want to point out that this is a broad opportunity for Democrats to offer amendments and make Republicans take tough votes on a myriad of issues. You know, they spent several hours on this question of the weaponization fund, you can expect that they may introduce other amendments that put Republicans in a really difficult spot whether that is on the conflict in Iran, whether that is on the president's ballroom.

So stay tuned for what other political amendments, typically, these kind of voteramas happen overnight and you aren't necessarily covering them moment by moment. But obviously, today, this is a really good opportunity because it's happening in the daylight hours for Democrats to put Republicans on record time and time again. So we're going to be watching to see how this all unfolds. But ultimately, keeping very close tabs on a couple of Republicans as to whether or not they are comfortable with this bill, ultimately, not including language, to limit or put guardrails around that weaponization fund. Brianna? Boris?

SANCHEZ: Lauren Fox, live for us on the Hill, thank you. So President Trump says he's going to nominate his former personal attorney Todd Blanche to become Attorney General. It's interesting to look back and see how Blanche got to this point. You might recall, he was President Trump's lawyer during the New York hush money trial and two federal cases brought by Special Counsel, Jack Smith, one over Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election, the other over his retention of classified material after leaving office.

Trump named Blanche as his nominee for Deputy Attorney General back in November of 2024 and he would be confirmed months later and notably one of his most significant actions during his time as deputy A.G. was the two-day interview that he had with longtime Jeffrey Epstein associate, Ghislaine Maxwell.

According to transcripts, the Justice Department gave the convicted sex trafficker limited immunity so that she could discuss her criminal case, but he did not promise any other benefits in exchange for her testimony. [14:05:00]

Maxwell though soon after this interview was transferred to a minimum security prison camp once the interview was completed.

KEILAR: Blanche would stay on in there -- he would stay in the role of Deputy A.G. until April of this year when Pam Bondi was fired. And then, President Trump tapped him to be the Acting Attorney General. The president has suggested the job was Blanche's to lose and has praised him as a loyal ally. And since then, Blanche has taken great pains to show the president that he will aggressively pursue his agenda.

Over the last few weeks, Blanche secured indictments against some of the president's personal foes, like former FBI Director, James Comey. He also rolled back gun control measures and he issued subpoenas to journalists for their sources. The acting A.G. also announced sweeping fraud initiatives and Blanche's expected nomination coming in the thick of continued pushback over that controversial anti-weaponization fund.

It's a fund that was initially announced as part of a settlement between the IRS and the president, his adult sons, and the Trump Organization. So, taking all of these moves into account, will Senators be confirming Blanche to replace Bondi permanently? Well, time will tell, but it seems it is far from a slam dunk with Senate Majority Leader, John Thune saying it was hard to say if Blanche has the votes.

We're joined now by CNN Legal Analyst and former Federal Prosecutor, Elliot Williams. The president putting the Senate in a tough spot during an election year, I will say, that doesn't seem to stop him. Nonetheless, if you consider what this kind of confirmation process would look like, it's going to include all of that that we just talked about, including the Epstein stuff.

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST AND FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Right, including all the Epstein stuff. And just do the math, Brianna. This is a challenge for, under any circumstances, to get someone through, but particularly here. I was just writing out some notes and looking at the United States Senate. There's a 53-47 vote breakdown.

You have three Senators who are out, not coming back, and just sort of in their YOLO era. That's Senator Cassidy, McConnell, Tillis. Tough votes, Senators McConnell, Murkowski, Paul, who are up for re-election in tough races, Husted and Sullivan. That's eight Senators right there that Republicans cannot afford to lose. And so, what will it take to convince them of all the things that you're talking about here, whether it's Epstein or whatever else, that Todd Blanche warrants their vote? It's going to be a tough fight for the next couple of months.

SANCHEZ: Looking back, has there ever been a president that has had as a nominee for attorney general someone who has such a personal legal relationship with the president as a client? WILLIAMS: Well, not as a client. I mean, you know, the obvious one is John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert F. Kennedy which, you know, many people in hindsight would look back and say, how could that ever have possibly happened in the United States? And it should not have. I mean, that's a conflict of interest as good as any. No, I can't think of one.

But ironically, and perhaps sadly, Boris, that's not the thing that I think American people are most up in arms about. I think it's this Epstein files saga and all of the fact that Todd Blanche's name is all over it and this weaponization fund that Todd Blanche really has stuck his neck out on. So those are the things that I think are going to cause Senators the most pause, not the prior representation of the president, which I think is a problem.

KEILAR: So not to say that Pam Bondi was not a loyalist to Trump, she was. But let's remember, his initial pick was Matt Gaetz, who he could not get through the confirmation process. This is quite the loyalist.

WILLIAMS: Right.

KEILAR: His personal lawyer, right? And then when you take that in totality with the other loyalists that he has installed, for instance, he's got Bill Pulte moving from the Housing Administration, where he used his place there to refer a lot of things to DOJ. Now he's going to this key intelligence role. Just looking at all of that, how are you seeing what this would mean to have this loyalist at DOJ?

WILLIAMS: Yeah. You know, it's really interesting because I think we've gotten so desensitized to this horrible problem of a president installing loyalists in these top government roles that the mere fact that someone's not Matt Gaetz somehow qualifies him to be Attorney General of the United States. It's almost heartbreaking to see what's happened to Todd Blanche, given how respectable his career was prior to this both in private practice and as a senior prosecutor in the Southern District of New York, the most prestigious prosecutor's office in the country.

He's a top lawyer, but he has thrown that all away with these attachments to the president, both by representing him as an attorney and then coming in and serving him and putting his name on these things. And so, we've been broken as a country by how we've been willing to accept what a president is willing to do to put his personal people in these very sensitive roles.

SANCHEZ: I wonder whether you think that this potential amendment to shoot down the anti-weaponization fund might affect his nomination process because in a way, if there's an amendment and this fund gets scrapped, it might make his confirmation easier.

WILLIAMS: To some extent. I mean, I think Democrats are going to continue to try to make, put Republicans on the record about this. And let's be clear, that's what this vote was about today. I don't think it was as much about shooting it down as making every Republican cast a vote in favor of or against this weaponization fund.

[14:10:00]

And so that will continue to go on. I think you're going to see it, you know, should Todd Blanche have a hearing, where you are on this fund is going to be the big issue, but whether they get to those 50 noses to count them to vote for Todd Blanche, I just don't know where it is today.

KEILAR: He signed the IRS piece of this, right?

WILLIAMS: Yeah.

KEILAR: That inoculates the president and his sort of associates and family and entities --

WILLIAMS: Right.

KEILAR: -- from past investigations by the IRS, even into issues that are unknown at this point to the IRS.

WILLIAMS: Yeah. And I will note that the federal judge overseeing that has reopened the case, thinking that the Justice Department was not honest with her in their negotiation of that whole settlement agreement. It's a problem. This is --

KEILAR: Because that was added later?

WILLIAMS: It was added later. And this is a problem for the Justice Department. It's a problem for Todd Blanche. But it's also just, you know, anytime you have a judge questioning your integrity or whether you've been honest with the court, you're talking about people's law licenses potentially on the line here. So it's all a big deal. It's all things that ought to come up in any sort of confirmation hearing, whether he gets voted up or down.

KEILAR: Elliott, thanks for taking us through that.

WILLIAMS: Of course.

KEILAR: Appreciate it.

Still to come. President Trump suggesting that the ceasefire with Iran remains in place and that talks have gone very well. That's not what Iran is saying. The foreign minister says there's been no significant progress and there's also been a lot of fighting. There's been a lot of volleys back and forth. So we've got some information on that mixed message situation that we're hearing there.

Plus, some new reaction from the president on this House vote to limit his war powers in Iran, ahead why he's calling out several members of his own party.

SANCHEZ: And back to that screwworm, a dangerous flesh-eating worm attacking livestock. It's been detected in Texas after having been eradicated from the U.S. for decades. Why this could pose a major threat to food production in the U.S. and some ugly, ugly increases in the prices you're paying at the grocery store. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:16:30]

KEILAR: Israel and Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy that operates inside Lebanon, launching new strikes this morning and Hezbollah's leader rejecting the ceasefire agreement that was reached by Israeli and Lebanese diplomats. Iran has made a full ceasefire one of its central demands in negotiations with the U.S.

SANCHEZ: Today, the U.S. and Iran have conflicting accounts of how those talks are going. President Trump says the deal could come as soon as this weekend. Iran's foreign minister says there is no significant progress and, quote, "no formal negotiation process underway."

CNN's Jeremy Diamond is live for us in Jerusalem. Jeremy, how critical is this Israeli and Lebanese ceasefire to talks between the U.S. and Iran?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, it certainly is critical, and frankly, it has been since the very moment that we had the initial ceasefire agreement between the United States and Iran some two months ago. We saw at the beginning of that ceasefire, as continued Israeli strikes in Lebanon seemed to potentially put the whole ceasefire in jeopardy.

And we're seeing a very similar situation that has played out over the last week, a situation that has included President Trump getting on the phone with the Israeli prime minister, getting him to shelve a plan for Israeli attacks on the Lebanese capital, and ultimately culminating in this new ceasefire agreement between Israel and Lebanon.

It doesn't directly involve Hezbollah, which would be responsible for ceasing fire on the Lebanese side of things. But what we are seeing today are the potential cracks in this ceasefire agreement, in part because Hezbollah is not directly involved and because Hezbollah is now rejecting this ceasefire agreement quite publicly.

Hezbollah's leader, Naim Qassem, saying that the ceasefire would amount to surrender, defeat, and achieving the enemy's goals. He is vowing that as long as Israel remains in southern Lebanon, quote, "the resistance will continue." And he even called on the Lebanese government to halt these direct negotiations with Israel, calling them an insult.

And this is critical because this ceasefire agreement depends not only on Hezbollah ceasing its fire against Israel, but also on Hezbollah actually removing its forces from southern Lebanon to allow for a situation where, basically, Israeli troops would begin to withdraw from certain areas and the Lebanese government, the Lebanese military, would instead move into those areas that would be free of any Hezbollah forces or Israeli forces, and begin to kind of reassert its sovereignty over southern Lebanon. And so, that is the roadmap that was laid out yesterday by the United States, Lebanon, and Israel. But achieving it is obviously something else altogether, particularly when you don't have the overt support or acceptance of this plan by Hezbollah, which is the main, you know, non-state armed group in southern Lebanon.

We are seeing, however, that Hezbollah for now doesn't seem to have carried out, in recent days, any significant attacks against northern Israel. They're still carrying out strikes, however, against Israeli troops in southern Lebanon. Israel also carrying out strikes in southern Lebanon, but for its part has not hit the Lebanese capital of Beirut.

So all of that is holding for now, and it seems like we're back to the kind of mild detente between these two sides that we were at, you know, over a week ago. The question is whether that's going to be enough for Iran, which has basically threatened that if Israel carries out strikes against Beirut, keeps up its attacks, then that will mean Iran will once again begin striking Israel.

[14:20:00]

All of this, of course, critical to the broader diplomacy that President Trump is trying to achieve vis-a-vis Iran, where we still don't have a clear timeline on when or if the two sides will actually reach a broader agreement. Boris? Brianna?

KEILAR: All right, Jeremy Diamond, thank you so much for that from Jerusalem.

And still ahead, investigators say a man brought an explosive device and weapons inside of his carry-on at a California airport. We'll have new details on that coming up.

SANCHEZ: Plus, the Trump administration moving to dismantle a deep- sea monitoring system that collects data for weather forecasting, earthquakes, even tsunami alerts. We'll break down the potential fallout.

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[14:25:17]

SANCHEZ: In about a half an hour, President Trump is expected to announce a $700 million government investment in coal production. Lawmakers and leaders from coal-producing states like Wyoming and West Virginia are set to appear at an event at the White House. Part of this initiative uses money from the Defense Production Act to support more than a dozen coal-fired power plants and also for a proposed coal export terminal on the West Coast.

CNN Chief Climate Correspondent, Bill Weir is here with the latest. Bill, tell us more about what this involves and the potential environmental impact.

BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is a law, Boris, first used by Harry Truman to increase steel production during the Korean War, but President Trump has been using it on his favorite energy companies, including restarting oil drilling off the California coast, and now a huge handout to big coal companies is going to be announced here.

$425 million, we can put the price tag up there, to keep 13 coal-fired power plants, dirty aging plants, alive. This is in West Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, Indiana, Tennessee, Arizona, Arkansas, Oklahoma, North Dakota, Wisconsin. Also, $75 million to build a new coal export terminal in Oakland, California, so to send this fossil fuel overseas as well, and then a couple hundred million more to build two brand new coal-fired power plants in Alaska and West Virginia.

In the words of a spokesperson for the National Resources Defense Council, what's next? A taxpayer bailout to prop up phone booths? There's, of course, the health argument of this. We've seen a spike in black lung cases among younger minors who have silica poisoning, and those regulations have been sort of suspended by this White House. And then the EPA is lifting protections on communities that live under coal ash clouds and so forth.

And then there's the planet-cooking qualities of this fuel. But at the end of the day, it's the economics that coal can't compete with wind, solar, and batteries. But this White House is hell-bent on making sure they stay alive despite the economics.

SANCHEZ: Bill, I want to ask you about this move by the Trump administration to dismantle a critical deep-sea monitoring system. What are the details there?

WEIR: Yeah, so at the same time, and they're saying this is a cost- cutting move, they're stripping away something, a program that was 10 years into a 30-year lifespan. This is a little under $400 million for monitoring stations both in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans to keep an eye on rapidly changing ocean systems.

We have record-breaking sea temperatures that are happening. This new Super El Nino that's just beginning. There's a system of ocean currents in the Atlantic that seem to be breaking down as Greenland melts. But in the middle of all this, Trump is now pulling the funding for about 900 instruments. Some of these have been paid for by taxpayers already and are building big data sets that will be used in the future, but now, just shutting it down over the next year, both in the Pacific and the Atlantic here.

A lot of the critics of the White House, Democrats, saying this is cover for oil and gas companies who don't want us to see what their product is doing to the oceans, and also cover for deep-sea mining companies. There's new interest in going deep under the ocean floor to try to get precious minerals for weapon systems, electric cars, and so on.

Very controversial there, but again, a latest attack on the climate science and Earth science that monitors exactly what's happening to our little blue marble in real time. This is just in keeping with this White House. SANCHEZ: Bill Weir, thank you so much for that reporting.

Still ahead, rebuking the rebuke. President Trump dismissing the passage of a resolution limiting his war powers in Iran, labeling the vote meaningless. He's also calling out several Republicans who joined Democrats to defy him.

We'll discuss after a quick break.

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