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GOP Rep. Salazar Breaks With Trump In Ad, Says Hispanics Feel Betrayed; U.N. Report Says Two U.S. Strikes Early In Iran War May Have Been War Crimes; Former American Idol Contestant On Trial For Wife's Murder; State Claims Flynn Texted His Mistress About Wanting To Kill His Wife; COVID Vaccines Delayed For About Half Of U.S. Children. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired September 18, 2026 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": And you wouldn't support the DIGNITY Act because it creates the latest version of it, which creates this sort of unspecific status for undocumented immigrants, it doesn't provide a pathway to citizenship. In the 2025 version, you would support a pathway to citizenship. Is that correct?

ELIOTT RODRIGUEZ, (D) FLORIDA CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: Well, that's what I had in my family, Boris. My parents came to this country from Cuba as immigrants. My father owned a grocery store in the Bronx. My mother worked as a seamstress in the garment district, and then we moved here when I was 12-years-old. I've grown up in this community.

You're from South Florida. You know that Miami is a city of immigrants, made up of immigrants from all over the world, and what we want is fairness. People that are here and are cooperating and contributing to this economy, have jobs and have children born in this country, they should have a pathway to legalization, a pathway to citizenship.

That's what we have done in the past, and that's what we're going to do once Democrats take over Congress after the midterm elections.

SANCHEZ: Eliot Rodriguez, we appreciate you coming on and sharing your point of view. Just for the record, I want to let you and our viewers know we have invited Congresswoman Maria Elvira Salazar to join us on the program. We're still working out the details of that. So far, it has not yet been confirmed.

Thank you again, Eliot.

RODRIGUEZ: Thanks, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Of course.

Up next, a U.N. report alleging the U.S. may have committed war crimes in Iran. We have that story after a quick break.

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[13:35:35]

SANCHEZ: U.N. investigators say they have grounds to believe the United States may have committed war crimes in Iran. We want to warn our viewers, the video you're about to see may be disturbing.

The new report centers on two deadly U.S. strikes on Iran during the opening day of the war, including one that hit an elementary school and killed 120 children and 26 teachers in the southern city of Minab, at least according to Iranian authorities. The U.N. says a second strike on a sports complex killed 22. Here's part of a CNN report from earlier this year on those attacks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENNIFER HANSLER, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER (voice-over): A new satellite image shows an Iranian Revolutionary Guards base and an elementary school in southern Iran. Here you see craters in several of the buildings, including the school. They were hit in their exact centers, suggesting precision strikes, experts say. A wall separates the school and the base. Satellite images from December show dozens of people in what appears to be a handball court at the school.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: CNN's Jennifer Hansler joins us now. So, Jennifer, the U.N. report also says that the regime in Tehran may have committed crimes against humanity with its own crackdown on protesters. What are you hearing about these U.N. investigations and, of course, what is the Trump administration's response?

HANSLER (on camera): Well, Boris, the findings of this report, which was conducted by independent investigators is significant, not only in the findings and allegations that the U.S. may have committed war crimes and Iran may have committed crimes against humanity, but also in what could -- it could be used for. Now, this was compiled for the U.N. Human Rights Council and it will be presented to them next week.

It does not necessarily compel any action, but it could be used by global courts like the International Criminal Court to launch their own investigations or potentially bring charges against those believed to be involved in these alleged crimes. Now, the U.S. administration is pushing back on the findings of this report. We have heard from the State Department saying they do not believe it is credible and we heard from the White House, from Anna Kelly, also pushing back on this.

I want to read you a little bit of what she said. She said, quote, "The only party in this conflict that has committed war crimes is the Iranian regime, which has murdered thousands of its own people, killed Americans overseas, executed acts of terrorism in the Strait of Hormuz, and launched indiscriminate attacks against its neighbors in the region." Now, Boris, of course, this comes as the U.S. has yet to release its own findings into its ongoing investigation into that deadly strike on Minab.

This could be potentially one of the most deadly strikes on civilians in recent U.S. military history. The Defense Department declined to comment on this report. They said that investigation is ongoing.

You may recall, however, that in the early stages of that investigation, sources who were familiar with the preliminary findings said that this was likely the result of the U.S. Central Command using outdated target information from the Defense Intelligence Agency. Boris?

SANCHEZ: Jennifer Hansler, live for us at the State Department. Thank you so much.

Still to come, a former American Idol contestant is on trial for murdering his wife. The details when we come back.

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[13:43:08]

SANCHEZ: Day one of testimony is now underway in the murder trial of former American Idol contestant, Caleb Flynn. Flynn is accused of shooting his wife to death last February inside their Ohio home, and then staging the crime scene to make it look like she was killed by an intruder.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": The former music pastor has pleaded not guilty and faces life in prison without parole if convicted. CNN's Jean Casarez is here with more on today's opening statements. Jean, tell us what's happening.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, this community is still in shock of what happened in February because this was a high-profile couple and they loved Ashley Finn, who was a teacher and a volleyball court. Well, this morning, more shocking information from the prosecution, a mistress and texts descriptively to that mistress.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL WATKINS, MIAMI COUNTY, OHIO PROSECUTOR: "I was up until 4 a.m. last night trying, literally trying to think of ways to kill her and not go to jail."

"If I could literally kill her and not go to hell, I would do it in a heartbeat. That is how dark and how hateful I feel."

Those two messages are Caleb Flynn's own words. The words about his wife, Ashley, words communicated to his mistress.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: The defense is saying this investigation was faulty from the start. It is mere speculation and what was in his mind was not the reality, does not comport with the evidence, and you can't prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. Ashley is gone and she deserves more than this.

Well, Ashley deserved a 9-1-1 call that prosecutors say was filled with inconsistencies. It was played in court today as the first piece of evidence. Listen closely.

[13:45:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CALEB FLYNN, ACCUSED OF KILLING HIS WIFE: Oh my God, Oh my God.

911 DISPATCH: Miami County, 9-1-1.

FLYNN: Oh my -- Oh my, somebody -- somebody broke into my home, somebody broke into my home and shot my wife.

911 DISPATCH: OK. Are they still in there?

FLYNN: I don't know -- I don't know.

911 DISPATCH: OK, what's the address?

FLYNN: (Inaudible) Ohio. Please, please hurry. Please, please hurry.

911 DISPATCH: OK, what are -- what are you seeing?

FLYNN: My wife is -- she's got two shots to her head. There's blood everywhere. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Sir, please, please, please.

911 DISPATCH: Ma'am, I need you to take a deep breath, OK?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: And he goes on to say that his wife was shot two times in the head, and she was shot two times in the head. And the officer that testified today said that she was sleeping. She was in her bed.

She was on her side. Her arm was up, as if she was relaxed. And she was shot two times, right in the back of the head.

And the prosecution is saying that the evidence is going to be forensics and DNA and fingerprints and ballistics. They never found the gun, but it doesn't mean that the shell casings were not on the floor. They were.

And the FBI is going to come in with their tool mark expert, and they are going to say that they can prove this case beyond a reasonable doubt, a circumstantial case, to defeat every single thing that Caleb Flynn was saying.

SANCHEZ: Jean Casarez, thank you so much for the update. Up next, it is the season for respiratory viruses, yet half of U.S. kids currently don't have access to a free updated COVID vaccine. What is the holdup? When are they going to get it? We'll dig into the details, next.

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[13:50:55] KEILAR: With fall just four days away, about half of American children still cannot get updated COVID shots. Those shots are provided for free through the federally funded Vaccines For Children program. But the CDC hasn't started the process for states and other jurisdictions to order the shots. We're joined now by Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, former Director at the CDC Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. He resigned over concerns about Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert Kennedy.

Thank you so much for being with us. Talk to us a little bit about this. The FDA has approved the updated COVID vaccines, but the CDC, it's kind of like in a limbo. It hasn't decided whether to make them available and we need to be very clear about this federal program because it provides vaccines to about half the country's kids. We're talking about un- and underinsured low-income and Native American children.

DR. DEMETRE DASKALAKIS, CDC OFFICIAL WHO RESIGNED OVER CONCERNS ABOUT RFK JR.: Brianna, yeah, thank you so much for having me on and that's correct. These vaccines have been approved by the FDA. They've been authorized. And right now, many states and jurisdictions are just waiting for the Vaccines For Children program to start shipping these vaccines.

I just want to add that it's more than 50 percent because some states also use their vaccines for children contracts for their other non- Medicaid and Native American patients or uninsured patients. So this means that a lot of kids aren't getting the vaccines because CDC is doing something without transparency that is delaying their shipment

KEILAR: So doctor, an HHS spokesperson said an arbitrary September date should not be treated as a public health deadline for COVID-19 vaccine procurement. What do you say to that?

DASKALAKIS: I say that they probably have never been in a clinic seeing patients. It is very likely that the spokesperson is not a clinician, nor is the secretary. And at the end of the day, you only have a few bites at the apple, especially with children, especially this time of year with school starting. So really, the faster that the vaccine gets out so that pediatrics practices can make their plans, can schedule their patients and have some certainty, the more likely it is that kids are going to get vaccinated

So, this should be interpreted as HHS withholding vaccines from underinsured kids.

KEILAR: I mean out of pocket costs of a COVID vaccine, you're looking at about $150 without insurance, right? So this is pretty expensive. Right now, if you have insurance, you can get it. If you pay out of pocket, you can get it.

I also want to ask you about this, the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, ACIP, has to formally vote to recommend a vaccine before it can be covered and distributed through the Vaccines For Children program, of course, that panel has been in disarray since March. We've been talking a lot about that over the months. What does it mean if ACIP does not vote to recommend the vaccine?

DASKALAKIS: Right, so the resolution that allows the shipment of the vaccine out to pediatricians actually is not specific for season or for formulation. So this is something that the CDC director or the secretary of HHS can say, please ship vaccine and let it be. With that said, the chaos that's been created in vaccine policy in the United States is definitely impacting what's going on.

This is uncharted territory. We've never had a situation where CDC has not been able to formulate recommendations through the advice of experts to be able to launch a seasonal vaccine. And so I'm sure that there's a lot of stuff going on with their general counsel and attorneys to figure out how to make this work, but you know, from the perspective of a medical provider and someone who had led this, this vaccine effort at CDC, that planning should have started long ago.

And so if we are just in the middle of trying to figure out how to make this happen, the clock is ticking and it's making it really hard for parents and pediatricians to make plans for their fall.

KEILAR: We just had some graphics up of the COVID trends right now.

[13:55:00]

If we can put those back up so that we can take a look, they're important because COVID-19 levels have been climbing for weeks. We were showing there, this is the graph of the trends, you can see the activity has gone up. We also have a map where you can see what's happening because COVID-related E.R. visits, the first week of September, they were actually higher than they've been since February. You're seeing more hospitalizations than we've seen since March.

What could be the impact of further delay?

DASKALAKIS: Yeah. I think that it's pretty clear that though the HHS spokesperson said that the September date is arbitrary, it's seemingly not very arbitrary based on the disease trends. And so the longer we wait, the more likely that we're going to have kids who are not going to be protected from COVID-19.

To be clear, if you follow the recommendations, that means our most vulnerable kids, so especially for kids that are over two, this is really about kids that have underlying conditions that could make COVID worse. For kids under two, six months to two, it's a no-brainer because it's independent of their conditions that COVID can cause a bad outcome.

So, look at this and say the lack of shipment of vaccine in the middle of what is the beginning of a COVID surge means more opportunity for kids to get sick, more opportunity for kids to miss school, and more opportunity for parents to not be able to work because their kids are at home. That's just the beginning. Right? I mean, we know that this vaccine protects from hospitalization and really severe outcomes.

So they need to get their stuff together to get this vaccine out. KEILAR: Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, thank you so much for being with us. We appreciate it.

DASKALAKIS: Thank you so much for having me, Brianna. Have a good day.

KEILAR: Great. You too.

Next, some exclusive CNN reporting. Sources say the U.S. military was preparing a major operation, very close to pulling it off, based off an Intel report that it turned out was written with the help of AI. And the problem, they say, was that the report was, quote, "entirely false." That's what one source is saying. We have more ahead.

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