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Israel and Iran Halt Strikes Against Each Other After New Attacks; Growing Protests Over U.S. Ebola Ward in Kenya; Raman Surges Past Pratt into Second Place in L.A. Mayoral Race; Trump Makes Baseless Claim of California Election Fraud; Pentagon Updates Recognized Religious Affiliations After Backlash from Mormon Lawmakers. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired June 08, 2026 - 14:30   ET

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

[14:30:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Israel and Iran have de-escalated attacks against each other today after exchanging some of their worst strikes in months. CNN's Fred Pleitgen was in Tehran as the missile attacks were happening. And we do want to note that CNN operates in Iran only with the permission of the government but maintains full editorial control of its reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We were woken, I would say, around 5 a.m. and it was 4.45 a.m. local time that apparently the first strikes happened here in the Iranian capital in Tehran, but then also in other Iranian cities as well. The first reports that we were getting was that Tehran, specifically the western part of Tehran, apparently had been hit, possibly also the Mehrabad Airport, which is sort of an airport here within the city limits of the Iranian capital, but then also Isfahan, which of course is a major industrial center, and then Tabriz in the north as well.

And the Iranians certainly didn't waste any time with their retaliation. One of the things that we had been hearing from Tehran over the past couple of days was that if Israel were to retaliate after the Iranians, of course, targeted Israel last night with ballistic missiles, that then the Iranians would be ready for what they call a crushing response against Israel. And they started launching ballistic missiles very quickly. The Iranians saying that there were several waves of those ballistic missiles, some of them targeting Israeli military bases, specifically the radar installations affiliated with those military bases.

And then there was also one situation where the Israelis hit -- and this was confirmed by both Israel and the Iranians -- a petrochemical facility in the south of Iran, and the Iranians said they responded with ballistic missiles of their own. So it was really only until the afternoon hours that the Iranians then announced that their military operations were being halted. However, they do warn, and this is certainly something you still feel here in Tehran, that they could resume at any point in time, specifically if the Israelis continue their military operations in Lebanon. Certainly one of the things that we've heard here is also sort of a change, if you will, in what the Iranians have been saying. If you look at about 24 hours ago, the Iranians were saying that the threshold for them was Israeli strikes in the Lebanese capital in Beirut. They said that for them that was the red line.

And if you look at about 24 hours ago, almost exactly, the Israelis obviously hit a suburb of Beirut, and the Iranians immediately said that for them a red line had been crossed, and they answered that with those ballistic missile attacks against that airbase in Israel last night. The Iranians now saying that if these military operations against Lebanon continue, and specifically also if they escalate, that then the Iranians certainly reserve the right to strike once again.

[14:35:00]

And the Israelis apparently since then have continued their military operations in the south of Lebanon. And right now it really is a tense situation, a difficult situation, sort of a gray area where it's unclear at what point the Iranians are going to say that for them this is too much. At the same time, the Iranians also saying that they remain committed to that diplomatic process that is still going on with the United States.

But they specifically also say that for them, Lebanon is also part of that process. They say there's only going to be an end to the war and end to the hostilities within the United States. But there is also a ceasefire and an end to the hostilities in Lebanon, specifically between Hezbollah and the Israelis.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Our thanks to Fred Pleitgen from that report Inside Iran.

Ebola cases have surged past 500, and new CDC modeling suggests the outbreak centered right now in the Democratic Republic of Congo could become the largest on record if stronger public health responses are not done. At the same time, protests are erupting some 1,500 miles from the DRC in Kenya.

A court there has halted construction on a U.S. isolation ward for Americans exposed to Ebola abroad. Kenya has no known cases of Ebola, and protesters argue the U.S.-funded facility would expose Kenyans to risks the U.S. would not accept on its own soil. Kenya's president is defending that decision, which is part of a $1.6 billion health deal with the U.S., saying it would be, quote, very inhuman for Kenya to reject the U.S. ward after years of receiving American aid.

Let's discuss the Ebola crisis further with Dr. Fiona Havers. She's an infectious disease physician and a former official with the CDC. Doctor, thanks for being with us. Why do you think, then, that Kenya's president is allowing this plan to go forward?

DR. FIONA HAVERS, INFECTIOUS DISEASE PHYSICIAN: I mean, I think it likely comes down to money and access to U.S. aid dollars to fund things like HIV care programs. I don't know why, but I do know that this is not the best plan for Americans who have responded to an outbreak and have potentially a high risk of exposure. They should be allowed to be brought back to the United States and not sent to Kenya.

SANCHEZ: When it comes to the broader outbreak, is this on track to surpass the size of the 2014-2016 outbreak and is enough being done to prevent that?

HAVERS: I mean, I think it was already a very large outbreak when it was first detected and had been going on for a while, meaning I don't think we even right now have a good handle on how large the outbreak actually is. And I think because of this and because of where it's located and because of the resources that are lacking to respond to the outbreak, I do think that it is it is potentially on track to be an extremely large outbreak, potentially rivaling the one that we saw in West Africa in 2014 and 2015.

SANCHEZ: The World Health Organization has said that it's trying to reach more than 90 percent of contacts to get ahead of the outbreak. People that may have been exposed. So far, it's been able to only reach fewer than half. What is getting in the way?

HAVERS: Well, that is very concerning because that's really going to be the only way they're going to be able to stop this outbreak is to reach people who have been exposed and then quarantine them and then isolate them if they develop symptoms. But I think this is an unstable area of the Democratic Republic of Congo. There is so there's safety issues with accessing that part of the country.

But there's also a lack of resources. I think that with the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development, the withdrawal of the U.S. from the World Health Organization and along with its hundreds of millions of dollars of funding and the fact that doing those actions undercut the sort of health care infrastructure on the ground and the ability to respond on the ground in the Democratic Republic of Congo has made this a very, very challenging scenario to work in.

SANCHEZ: There are also concerns about local residents having a deep distrust of hospitals and aid workers. Why?

HAVERS: Well, I think I mean, these are very, very complicated settings to work in. I think that also there is a lot of cultural mistrust, I think, in a setting where you've had an unstable government and you haven't and you've had, for example, for funerals, bodies of people who've died of Ebola are very infectious and those need to be buried in a very specific, safe way in order to not have funerals or contact with dead bodies be a further spread -- a way that the infection spreads further.

But that is also very culturally sensitive. If people aren't being allowed to bury their loved ones or be with their loved ones when they die, I think that if it's not done culturally in a culturally sensitive way, I think that that can undermine trust in aid workers. I think there's just a lot of challenges in working in this scenario but having local people that are trusted by the community to be able to go in and educate the population about what is happening with Ebola and how best to stop it for their community is critical.

[14:40:00]

SANCHEZ: There are currently three vaccines in development to target this strain of Ebola, doctor, how long do you think it'll take to develop and then trial and clear a vaccine?

HAVERS: I mean, that is I mean, months to years away. I mean, these are not vaccines that are going to be able to be rolled out into people within the next couple of weeks. And so I think that for this outbreak, it's really going to be critical to have resources dedicated to contact tracing, to making sure that health care workers have the equipment that they need to be protected to care for people. And that there are the resources on the ground to do all of the infection control measures that are needed. And I think that that's really what is lacking right now. I think that the scale of the international response is going to need to be much larger if this outbreak is going to be brought under control.

SANCHEZ: Dr. Fiona Havers, thank you so much for joining us.

HAVERS: Thank you for having me.

SANCHEZ: Of course. Still to come, questions over delayed vote counting in L.A.'s mayoral primary. We're going to look at the biggest challenges that have slowed down the process.

[14:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: We're getting a clearer picture of who may face incumbent Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass in November. With just over 80 percent of ballots counted, progressive L.A. City Council member Nithya Raman has pulled ahead of former reality TV star and registered Republican Spencer Pratt.

Raman is now leading Pratt by about 3,000 votes, but given how slim that margin is, CNN is not projecting a second place finisher just yet. President Trump, however, is already claiming voter fraud. He says it's not possible for Pratt to have lost the L.A. runoffs after the big lead he had, but when pressed for evidence in an interview over the weekend, this happened.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: How it's looking. Look at what's happening in California.

KRISTEN WELKER, NBC NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Where's the evidence to that?

TRUMP: It's four days.

WELKER: The Republican was doing well in California.

TRUMP: In California, it's, no, they're not there. They're dropping fast because it's a rigged election.

Let me tell you. It's four days, and they aren't even close to coming up with it.

WELKER: That's why they can't (CROSSTALK)?

TRUMP: You know why they're doing that? Because they're cheating on the election.

WELKER: What, do you have evidence to support that?

TRUMP: All I have to do is look. All I have to do is look --

WELKER: That's not evidence.

TRUMP: -- and I listen, and I listen to people, and let's see what happens.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KEILAR: Dean Logan is the registrar, recorder, and county clerk for Los Angeles County. Dean, thank you so much for joining us. Can you just address what the president is claiming is happening there in that interview with NBC's Kristen Welker, where he doesn't have evidence, but he's saying that the elections are rigged, which is something that he also doubled down again on this afternoon.

DEAN LOGAN, LOS ANGELES COUNTY REGISTRAR-RECORDER/COUNTY CLERK: Yes, unfortunately, I can't really explain it because I don't understand it myself, other than to say that I think the kind of political narrative that we've seen really dating back to 2020 and going forward is that if you are dissatisfied with the outcome of the election, you start making attacks towards the process. What I can tell you is that the process that is happening in California and here in Los Angeles County is the way elections are structured in California. And I get that it's frustrating, but that structure is designed to make sure that voters have multiple options, multiple opportunities for how and when and where to cast their ballots.

And in this election, a lot of those voters did that, leading right up until the final hours of voting on election day. And we need to make sure that all of those ballot votes are counted and counted properly.

KEILAR: Have you had any communication with Spencer Pratt's campaign? He has raised his own questions about vote swings and homeless people voting.

LOGAN: So I haven't had any direct contact with Mr. Pratt. He has had representatives here at our ballot processing center observing the process. I've talked to them regularly.

As far as those specific allegations, I don't have the details of that. What I can tell you is that every ballot that comes back here goes through a verification process. Under California law, we have to verify that the signature on that ballot envelope matches to the signature of the individual who was registered to vote. That voter registration has gone through a verification through our statewide voter registration database for validity. And it's only after that verification has taken place that that ballot would be cleared for counting.

KEILAR: So an L.A. DOJ official, first assistant U.S. attorney, Bill Essayli, debunked a baseless claim that's circulating on social media that's alleging a vote count update showed Spencer Pratt getting zero new votes. It wasn't true.

And the Trump-appointed U.S. attorney said so on X. But you also have ex-owner Elon Musk on X propagating this very claim. Is there any effective way to really debunk these kinds of claims?

LOGAN: Well, I think that's the challenge of the environment that we're operating in as election officials in the country right now is that those assertions and that kind of proliferation of misinformation is so fast and spread so quickly. And while we appreciate that the U.S. attorney's office did put out that clarification, it would have been helpful to have had that out right after the allegation was made. It's just unfortunate.

These are the kind of things that potentially will discourage voters from participating in future elections. And that's counterintuitive to the purpose of an election. So we can't chase every allegation or assertion that's been made.

[14:50:00]

What we can do, though, is make sure that we have a clear record of what's taken place and that we're responsive to the voters who are participating in the election.

KEILAR: The extended period of time counting ballots over which fortunes can change over that period of time coupled with some of these concerns, maybe some of them in bad faith about the election results and how they do kind of change, it does affect voter trust. We see that. You can only, though, in California, as election officials, address one part of that, which might be the amount of time that it takes to count ballots.

What could you do to make it go faster? Is there anything you could uniformly do to make it go faster over different counties?

LOGAN: Well, I think that's a dialogue that we can have here in California. I think it's -- and we ought to do that, not in the middle of an election, but during the post-election period. I think you have to balance those changes.

One, how quickly will voters adjust to those changes? Voters are used to the options that they have. In this case, I think it's important to note that we had half a million voters who dropped off their vote-by- mail ballot in a drop box late in the day on election day.

I think the fact that voters are choosing that option to vote when they have other options is an indication that they do trust the process. That's why they're choosing to use that method of voting. And I think any change to that, certainly we could look at that, but we would want to counterbalance that against anything that would reduce voter participation.

KEILAR: Yes, very good to speak with you. Thank you so much, Dean.

LOGAN: Thank you very much.

KEILAR: And still to come, the new guidance about when to introduce eggs to your child's diet and its relationship to food allergies.

[14:55:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Backing down after backlash, the Pentagon has just updated its list of recognized religious affiliations for service members after it removed the Christian designation from several faiths, including the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Several Mormon lawmakers had blasted the move, including staunch Trump ally, Senator Mike Lee.

CNN's Haley Britzky is following this story. All right, Haley, tell us what is happening here. With this, with the Pentagon saying, what is the remedy?

HALEY BRITZKY, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes, so the Pentagon released last week a renewed list of religious codes, which is essentially what service members can put on their personnel files, showing what religion they belong to. And Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said a few months ago they were going to cut it down. He said it had ballooned to over 200 codes for 200 different religions, and they were going to cut that down to around 31 religions.

And so last week they released the new list, which identified the majority of them as variations of Christianity and labeled them as Christian faiths, but they did not put Christian next to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, upsetting many Mormons who feel that they are Christians and should have been included in that list, including Senator Mike Lee, as you mentioned. And so just today, the Pentagon released a new list saying that it had included redundant and unnecessary labeling on the previous list and that they were seeking to fix it. So they removed that Christian label from many of them, kind of streamlining some of those faiths.

KEILAR: This has been in the works for a long time though, right?

BRITZKY: It has, yes, the Secretary announced that they were doing this specifically with the 31 religions in March, but he also alluded to it in December. So this is something they've been working on for quite a while.

We just hadn't seen the official list until last week. Clearly, they did not expect that kind of response from the Mormon community on what this list was saying.

KEILAR: All right, really interesting. Haley, thank you so much for that report -- Boris.

SANCHEZ: Now to some of the other headlines we're watching this hour. Pope Leo addressed members of the Spanish Parliament today, the first pontiff to do so in his speech in Madrid focused on peace. He described war as a painful defeat of negotiations and said that violence and polarization has plunged the world into a profound crisis.

The pontiff also addressed what he called the scourge of clergy abuse, urging Spain's bishops to listen to survivors and offer reparations.

Also, at least three utility workers were seriously injured from an apparent electrical shock at a Metro station near D.C. this morning. Officials say the workers were inside an electrical shaft when the incident happened.

They were evacuated and taken to the hospital. The station remains open to the public as crews are working to ensure the area is safe.

And the Nashville Zoo is now pushing back against a proposed data center planned next to its property. Zoo leaders say that noise and light pollution from the nearly 70,000 square foot facility in South Nashville could negatively affect thousands of animals in their care. The zoo is pointing to its clouded leopard population saying that they are some of the most delicate and rarest animals in captivity in the world. An online petition opposing the project has already gathered more than 180,000 signatures.

This is also gaining attention from celebrities like country singer Brad Paisley.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRAD PAISLEY, COUNTRY SINGER: First of all, they don't have the power to build this. They don't have the water. It doesn't belong there.

It would be an enormous monstrosity, an absolute eyesore and detract in every way from not only the zoo, but that area.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: The company behind the data center proposal says it'll work with the zoo and community leaders to address concerns.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

END