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Dolly Parton Dies at 80 After Brief Battle With Cancer; Sen. Darline Graham Wins South Carolina GOP Runoff for Late Brother's Seat; Soon, Final Witness Due Back on the Stand in Clancy Murder Trial. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired August 26, 2026 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Tributes pouring in for Dolly Parton, the queen of country music, and we are learning new details this morning about her final days.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And breaking overnight, Darline Graham squeaks through a Senate primary, the sister of the late Lindsey Graham. The president's endorsement made all the difference.

And then a manhunt is over. The suspect wanted for wearing a creepy mask and terrorizing people in Philadelphia is found all the way on the other side of the country.

I'm John Berman with Kate Bolduan in New York. Sara Sidner is in Nashville. This is CNN News Central.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: I am here in Nashville live outside the Ryman, the most famous home of the Grand Ole Opry, also known as the Mother Church of Country Music, and you can see why. It does look like a church. When you go inside, there are pews inside and stained glass on the outside.

Dolly Parton made her first appearance here at just 13 years old. She would later move to Nashville when she was 18, where she brought her incredible writing skills, her talent, and her hard work, and became the world's biggest country music star. Nashville is also where she died. She died at the age of 80 after a brief battle with cancer.

Tributes are pouring in from all over the world and from some of the biggest names in music as well, from Taylor Swift, from Beyonce, from Barbra Streisand, from President Trump, President Obama. And we also saw some of the reaction around the country. For example, the Empire State Building was lit up all in pink at 9:25, a nod to her first and very famous movie, 9 to 5, and also the song that went along with it that we can all sing.

She also is getting tributes in many different places where Dolly is known to have been, especially where she grew up as one of 12 children in Sevier County, which declared a day of mourning. And we should mention that there was tributes that happened inside the Grand Ole Opry as well last night. She will be missed. She is one of the people that has given so much to so many, not just her fans, but also the people that played with her, that learned from her. She was really a genius in her own right.

Let's go now to Jason Carroll. He is in Dolly's hometown of Sevierville. And talk to me, Jason, about what you're seeing from folks, what you're hearing. We are seeing, for example, here there are many different places people can go to honor her, one of which is her star, where they're starting to see some of the flowers pile up and some of the tributes to her.

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Sara, you can see right behind me here in Sevierville County in front of the courthouse where Dolly Parton's statue is. You can see all of the cards and the letters, the outpouring of support here for Dolly Parton, one of the messages that, particularly poignant, that reads, thank you for giving me my first job.

And that really speaks to what so many people here thought of Dolly Parton. I mean, it wasn't just about her music. It wasn't just about her songwriting. It's about how she was able to give back to the people of the community here. I mean, so many of the things that people talk about, they talk about the Buddy Program, where she literally gave $500 to seventh and eighth graders starting back in 1991 to encourage them to buddy up with someone and complete high school.

In 1986, opening Dollywood, she did that not for her own ego. She did it so that people here in the county would have jobs. And you think about the literacy program that she had where she created a program to provide books to children up to age five, every month a free book to encourage them to read, because her own father could not read.

I mean, these are some of the stories that people talk about here in this county when they talk about Dolly Parton. I mean, I spoke to a lot of people.

[07:05:01]

Many of them came out here last night. There were hundreds. More of those people expected here throughout the day. And what it was very apparent is that she touched people here in this county, where she grew up, from all walks of life.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AYDEN FOREMAN, RESIDENT OF SEVIERVILLE, TENNESSEE: Speaking for me personally, I'm gay, so I mean, she has been an ally to the gay people since before it was popular. And that's really the main reason that I came out here today is just because she has done everything for my community. And she's just put -- she puts everybody on a pedestal. She'll talk to you no matter where you're from, no matter what walk of life you've came from. And I just think that everybody needs to see that's what she really was.

CARROLL: How do you think she'll be remembered? NIKKI SMITH, RESIDENT OF SEVIERVILLE, TENNESSEE: Dolly will always be remembered. She'll be remembered. She will be remembered as her kindness. She was so kind to everybody. And her music, her music was wonderful.

JORDAN SMITH, RESIDENT OF SEVIERVILLE, TENNESSEE: She was a star. She was a saint. I mean, she had the children's hospital named after her because of everything she's done. She was a saint of a woman. You never hear anything bad about her, no controversies at all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARROLL: And, Sara, you know, you think about what happened in this area in the Smoky Mountains back in 2016, the wildfires that devastated the area here. Dolly Parton stepped up at that point as well. She started something called the My People Fund, where she gave families $1,000 a month, you know, for six months to help so many of these families here who were devastated, you know, by the wildfires.

So, it's very apparent while this is a woman who throughout her career who touched millions of people all over the world, all over the country, but she never forgot her roots, never forgot where she grew up, never forgot the people here. Sara?

SIDNER: And we will never forget her partly because of just her persona and how vibrant and wonderful and kind and giving she was, but also, of course, because of her music. She was an incredible musician, but also an incredible songwriter and wrote some of the biggest hits that this country and the world has ever seen, like I Will Always Love You, which was, of course, recorded again by many different people, including Whitney Houston, where a lot of people thought that was her song. That was Dolly's writing and her perhaps one of her biggest, biggest hits. You of course had 9 to 5 and Jolene, which is a personal favorite of mine.

But we're also seeing the grief outpouring here. I will tell you, as soon as I arrived in Nashville and I went to check in at the hotel, the lady that was at the desk said to me, she's like, I'm sorry, I'm having a hard time concentrating. I said, are you all right? And she said, I'm just so heartbroken that she's gone. And I said, you're talking about Dolly, right? She says, yes. She goes, I can't get over it. I just can't get over it.

So, it's touched so many people. It doesn't matter if you're black or white, it doesn't matter if you're -- you know, what, where you came from whether or not you were a big country music fan or not because, her music went everywhere and touched everyone.

And I do want to talk a little bit about her role here in Nashville, because Nashville was also where she met her husband who she was with for more than 50 years and who died last year, and she was certainly heartbroken from all of that. And I do also want to talk about the fact that, you know, a lot of people know some of her songs that were written for children where she spent time. There's always video of her singing to kids as well, but she never had children of her own. And so you look back at her legacy and some of the reasons why, and women suffer from this all the time, she had severe endometriosis and she just believed that, look, God just didn't want her to have children, and so every child was her child. That's the way she thought.

And I do want you -- because you mentioned her program to make sure that children have books, the Imagination Library, she talked about that and how much she loved it. Here's what she said about that project of hers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOLLY PARTON, SINGER-SONGWRITER: My own father didn't get a chance to go to school. He couldn't read and write, and that was very -- that hindered him a great deal, because he was so smart, you know? And it really bothered him a lot. But I started it because of my dad, and I got my dad involved in it. He helped me a great deal when we were putting it together, and he felt like he was doing something important. And so he took a lot of pride in that.

The kids started calling me the book lady, and my dad was so proud of that. He felt that was the cutest thing. He just was prouder of that than probably my great success in show business.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: They knew her as the book lady, and we know her as the biggest, brightest star who left us yesterday.

Thank you to Jason Carroll there in her hometown, and that's it for me for right now.

[07:10:02]

Until we speak to some of the folks who played with her in just a bit right here at the Grand Ole Opry, I'll send it back to you, Kate.

BOLDUAN: That's not it at all. There's much more to come, Sara. Thank you so much. We're so glad, ah, to have a moment to remember her. There's much more to come from Sara in Nashville.

Also ahead for us, breaking overnight, Darline Graham, the sister of the late Senator Lindsey Graham, is the winner of the GOP nomination for South Carolina's -- in South Carolina's Senate runoff. Why President Trump made all the difference in that race.

And a new threat to the Kennedy Center, the Trump administration now says that it could actually demolish the building if the president's $250 million renovation plan is blocked.

And the jury in the Lindsay Clancy trial set to begin deliberations as soon as tomorrow. So, what's expected of them today?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:15:00]

BERMAN: All right. Breaking overnight, Darline Graham in South Carolina has won the Republican nomination for Senate in that state. The sister of the late Senator Lindsey Graham, who's serving as senator now temporarily, is trying to fill the seat for a full six years. She defeated Congressman Ralph Norman in this runoff.

How did she do it? Well, look at this. She won by about 18,000 votes. I want you to remember that number, right? I want to focus on Horry County in Myrtle Beach. This is where Donald Trump went to campaign for Darline Graham just the other night.

Remember, she won the state by 18,000 votes. She won Horry County, where Myrtle Beach is, by about seventeen thousand, right? So, a huge chunk of her overall victory came from this county.

What difference did the presidential visit make? I want to show you. Two weeks ago, there was the open primary here. There were more candidates in the race. If you look at how people finished here, Darline Graham didn't even win there. There were other candidates in, but she led Ralph Norman by 9,000, right? She led Ralph Norman by 9,000 two weeks ago. She expanded that to 17,000, which essentially was her overall margin in the state. The Trump visit to Myrtle Beach clearly made a huge difference. She knew Donald Trump got her over the finish line. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. DARLINE GRAHAM (R-SC): I want to thank President Trump for all of his support and his endorsement. Mr. President, Lindsey truly loved you and viewed you as one of his closest friends. I appreciate that bond and appreciate all that you've done for our country. Our victory would not have been possible without you, and we are truly grateful.

South Carolina is truly Trump country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right. With us now, Congressional reporter for Axios, Kate Santaliz. And in this case, South Carolina really was Trump country. That visit, all the money that the president's PAC poured in seemed to make the big difference for Darline Graham.

KATE SANTALIZ, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, AXIOS: Yes, definitely. And this was a huge win for Donald Trump here. You know, he endorsed her, he encouraged her to run for this seat. As you mentioned, he spent time campaigning in South Carolina, even held tele-rallies for her as well. And we saw MAGA Inc, President Trump's super PAC, pour more than $800,000 into this race at the last minute, which is a really notable development given the group's absence from other key battleground races.

So, this is a win for the president here, but at the same time, he put in a lot of effort to get her across the finish line, and that's likely because his political clout when it comes to his endorsements was coming into question. In the recent weeks, we've seen a string of primary losses for the president, particularly last week in Florida and Wyoming, so he needed to put in this effort here and prove that his endorsement still has the power that it used to.

BERMAN: Yes. I mean, I think heading into November, he very much wanted to show he still had the juice here. He is already crowing out this victory, saying it's because of his endorsement.

You know, going forward, how much of the midterms do you think he wants to be about him, and how much about the Republican brand?

SANTALIZ: Yes. Well, we have just seen new reporting that he wants to use some of this money from MAGA Inc. to launch an ad campaign touting his own records and his own accomplishments. And Republicans definitely still want to talk about Trump. You know, he's still a powerful force, especially among the Republican base, and it's important to use that to get the Republican base out.

But when we're looking at some of these more vulnerable members in battleground races, we're starting to see some of them distance them self a little bit from Trump and some of the more unpopular policies, like the tariffs and the Iran war. So, Trump does want to play a part in this midterms, but it's not clear exactly what that role will be yet.

BERMAN: Kate Santaliz, great to see you. Thank you so much for your help this morning. Kate?

BOLDUAN: So, did Lindsey Clancy hear voices the day that she killed her three young children? That question has now turned into a critical flashpoint in the final days of her murder trial. We've got much more on that.

And also there's a new warning today from Bill Gates on A.I. Laying out in a 5,000-word essay, why he is so scared of what is to come.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:20:00]

BOLDUAN: Soon, the prosecution's final witness is expected back on the stand in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial, and closing arguments are likely then to come tomorrow. Clancy's defense team has all along argued and tried to make the case that she was suffering from postpartum psychosis when she killed her three children, so she should not be and cannot be criminally liable for their deaths. But on Tuesday, jurors heard from an FBI psychiatrist who said that he believes Clancy knew what she was doing.

CNN's Jean Casarez was inside the courtroom.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I was in the courtroom to watch the jury during most of the day on Tuesday, and what I saw from beginning to end was before the jury even comes into the courtroom, the defendant comes into the courtroom. And before the defendant comes into the courtroom, her nurses come into the courtroom. Lindsay Clancy has two nurses that are seated in the first row of court, and I saw them. They walked in, and you can tell they are nurses by what they are wearing. They sit on the front row, and then Lindsay Clancy was wheeled in.

Now, the camera does not catch this, but she is wheeled in by a court officer. She is wheeled to the defense table. Her wheelchair is a larger wheelchair than what we normally see. She then took it on her own to wheel herself back a little bit and go into the defense area as she wanted to, the defense table.

Then the jury entered, and they are middle-aged to older, conceivably parents, grandparents. They sat down. The expert witness then began to testify, and I saw notebooks come out. So many notes being written by these jurors, and, predominantly, the women are taking the notes, but I saw one man that was taking notes, but every juror completely focused on that expert.

[07:25:11]

And there have been a lot of experts in this trial, and many times it gets so monotonous with the battle of the experts, but this jury focused the whole time.

BERMAN: Great to have Jean there.

All right, SpaceX plans to build what they call the biggest launch site on Earth. The price tag, a mere $100 billion.

And then a whole generation of parents and kids knows the impact of Dolly Parton, not for her music, but her incredible generosity. The Imagination Library just part of her legacy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PARTON: I count my blessings more than I count my money. I just feel like if I'm doing what I am happy doing and doing things to share and to help everybody else, I, of course, will make tons of money. And as I've always joked, it costs a lot to look this cheap, and I need the money. But it ain't just about the money.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: So, the saga continues over the Kennedy Center in Washington, the Trump administration now threatening to demolish the building if renovations are not allowed.

In a new court filing, the Justice Department argues that without the renovations, the center will deteriorate further into an unsafe, decrepit structure, and that will need to be taken down and replaced. But this all comes amid the ongoing fight over Trump's name, really, Trump wanting to add his own name to the building. He added it. It was then removed by court order in June.