Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Supreme Court Hands Down Ruling on Social Media; Biden and Trump Set For CNN Presidential Debate. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired June 26, 2024 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:01]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: And the first time in decades that a network will host the debate with no live audience, a departure from these Presidential Debate Commission debates.

CNN is covering this historic moment from all angles. Jeff Zeleny is live at our studios in Atlanta. Arlette Saenz is following President Biden at the White House. And Kristen Holmes is in West Palm Beach with the Trump campaign.

And, Jeff, let me go to you first. Let's talk about this debate. What are we going to see?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Jim, of course, this is incredibly significant, and it's the first -- earliest debate in modern presidential campaign history.

And the reason is, both candidates agreed to this debate. They want to try and define their opponents, define themselves and, frankly, shake up this race. For all of the changes, all of challenges in the country and the world, this race has largely been much of how it's been for the last several months, if not year.

Donald Trump has had a narrow lead nationally and in some battleground states. President Biden has been defending his record. Well, on stage tomorrow evening, President Biden will, of course, try and draw that contrast with former President Donald Trump.

Jim, history is probably not our best guide for this, because we have never seen two sitting presidents side by side like this, making the case about one another. But think of all the differences over the last four years.

One thing I'm struck by is, we follow these candidates and listen to them and talk to voters. So much has changed that's different, but foreign policy is chief among them. There will be a vast difference in that. Of course, the invasion of Ukraine has happened, the war in the Middle East.

But one thing that former President Donald Trump has been saying again and again is that he does not want another World War III. He said that President Biden has led to instability in the world. Of course, President Biden will take the converse view of that. He is heralding his administration as one of building alliances, increasing stability in the world.

So, foreign policy often does not decide elections, but look for that to be a central, defining difference between these two candidates, certainly one difference of so many, many between them, Jim.

ACOSTA: Yes, and, Jeff, the rules are going to be important this time around.

ZELENY: They are.

I mean, we are not going to see an audience at this debate. It is going to be a throwback, two candidates on stage standing for 90 minutes with two commercial breaks, two moderators.

And, interestingly, presidents are never without their advisers. They're rarely without their aides or their note cards. This time, these two sitting presidents, one sitting president, one former president, will be walking into this stage and studio alone. They will not have advisers around them, so they will be taking questions.

The answers will be defined by a topic, and they will be talking for two minutes, with their rival getting one minute to respond, and then the original candidate getting one more minute to speak. And the microphone certainly is an issue as well.

We saw so much interrupting in the debates four years ago. This time, the microphone will only be on for the candidate who is talking. Of course, the question is, will some of the other sound bleed over? Will that be used to distract President Biden perhaps or vice versa?

So, but the big difference, Jim, no audience, of course, but voters certainly will be watching. And, again, we should point out this is in battleground Georgia. Joe Biden was the Democratic winner here four years ago --

ACOSTA: Yes.

ZELENY: -- the first time a Democrat won Georgia in nearly three decades, so the close audience here, as well as, of course, the national audience, also so important to the rest of this campaign, Jim.

ACOSTA: Yes, we will be watching, Jeff. Thank you very much.

We have new reporting in the meantime on how the candidates are preparing for the showdown.

Arlette Saenz, Kristen Holmes, they have the details for us.

Arlette, what are you learning?

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, President Biden is continuing to run through his mock debates in preparation for the showdown against Donald Trump. They have set up podiums for the president to practice at. And he's actually also, we're told, watched a video that staffers

recorded during a walk-through of the debate. So he knows exactly what that debate stage will look like, what he is looking out at as he's preparing to deliver these messages against Trump.

The Biden campaign and his advisers really are hoping to drive home some contrasts on domestic issues like democracy, like the economy and abortion rights. But advisers are also aware that foreign policy could easily arise in this debate. Advisers believe that foreign policy is one of those areas where they can further drive those contrasts with Trump, trying to paint him as too dangerous to serve in the office of the presidency.

Of course, it also comes at a time when Biden is also balancing his own foreign policy concerns, as there are some within the Democratic Party who are frustrated with his handling of the conflict in Gaza. Now, while the president is preparing over at Camp David, at the campaign headquarters in Wilmington, they are very eager to push this democracy contrast today.

They have rolled out a key endorsement from former Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger, a vocal critic of Trump's actions relating to the January 6 insurrection. And, this morning, they have also rolled out a new television ad highlighting a Michigan sheriff who says that Trump neglected his duties as president on January 6 and did not side with law enforcement on that day.

[11:05:10]

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS SWANSON, GENESEE COUNTY, MICHIGAN, SHERIFF: It should have been stopped. That's neglect of duty. As a sheriff, it's awful to watch police officers getting attacked. That's not supporting this badge and this uniform.

I have no desire to work with somebody who divides. That's not what America is, but I will work with anybody who unites. That's why I'm with President Joe Biden.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Now, Biden has made protecting democracy a cornerstone of his campaign, but advisers also believe that this is something that can really appeal to those anti-Trump Republicans who were turned off by Trump's four years in office and specifically his actions relating to the January 6 insurrection.

So, all of this offering a bit of a preview of how Biden could relay his contrast messaging against Trump heading into this debate set to take place on CNN tomorrow.

ACOSTA: All right, Arlette, thank you.

And, Kristen, how's the Trump debate prep going?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, nothing traditional about Donald Trump's debate prep, which I guess is not that surprising.

He hasn't had any mock debates. He hasn't had someone sitting in for Joe Biden or the moderators, Jake Tapper or Dana Bash. Instead, it has been a series of conversations of what they call -- quote, unquote -- policy sessions focusing on things like abortion, like democracy, how to answer those questions about what happened on January 6 and Donald Trump's role.

But what most of his advisers are trying to get Donald Trump to do is to focus on three key issues. As Jeff said, this is really unprecedented to have two sitting -- or one sitting president and one former president up on that stage together.

And Donald Trump, they want him to contrast his record to Joe Biden's on three issues, the economy, particularly inflation, crime and immigration. They have seen recent polling that shows that people, voters favor Donald Trump when it comes to these three issues over Joe Biden.

And that's what they want Trump to hammer home. Now, one thing we have heard from senior advisers really in the last several days is a tempering of expectations. Remember, they spent months saying that Biden was incompetent, that he couldn't string two words together to make a sentence.

Now we are hearing that he is a formidable opponent, a lot of that coming from this idea that he was holed up in Camp David really having this intense debate prep, something, of course, Donald Trump was not doing. Now, we did hear from Trump last night in an interview talking about some of his preparation. Take a listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (R) AND CURRENT U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think I have been preparing for it for my whole life, if you want to know the truth. And I'm not sure you can lock yourself into a room for two weeks or one week or two days and really learn what you have to know.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

HOLMES: Obviously, a reference to President Joe Biden, who, again, has been at Camp David.

The big question, of course, will be which version of Donald Trump shows up. There has been some reflection by the former president in recent days. He did a rather candid interview, in which he talked about the 2020 debate against Biden, saying that he believed that he interrupted him too much.

Now, whether or not that's going to impact his behavior on Thursday, his advisers certainly hope so, but, obviously, no one will know which version of Donald Trump shows up until Thursday.

ACOSTA: That's right.

All right, Kristen Holmes, thank you very much.

Let's discuss all this with CNN political commentator and former Trump campaign adviser David Urban. And also with us, Meghan Hays. She was the director of message planning for the Biden White House.

And, David, I mean, what do you make of this no-debate-prep debate prep?

DAVID URBAN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Look, you know Donald Trump is not a traditional candidate. So, he's not going to prepare in a traditional way. He's out there every day. He's doing the rallies. He's taking questions.

He'd go to the helicopter. He'd love the give-and-take. So his preparation, he sees it as just live life every day, right, engaging in the give-and-take that he does with individuals and out on the stump. He stops, talks to police officers, takes photos. So that's how he's preparing for it, right? And that's probably the best way he can prepare.

And, Meghan, how does that affect the debate preparations for President Biden? Because it almost seems as though, if that's the case, then you have to prepare for just about anything.

MEGHAN HAYS, FORMER SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO PRESIDENT BIDEN: Right.

I think that the president is doing that anyways, right?

ACOSTA: Yes.

HAYS: And he's used to that.

I think that you just never know what you're going to get with Donald Trump. And I think that's part of what they want to drive home is, four more years of Donald Trump would be chaotic and return to that would be chaos. So I think that that's probably what they're preparing for. And I think that Joe Biden just needs to keep his steady hand and be his authentic self and be true to who he is.

ACOSTA: Yes.

And, David, I mean, what about what Kristen was saying a few moments ago about initially they were saying Biden has lost his step and he can't put two words together and so on, and now -- I mean, let's play a clip. This is what one Republican congressman was saying over the weekend on these performance-enhancing substance allegations that Trump world is making.

Let's listen to this one.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. ERIC BURLISON (R-MO): Trump's team should not underestimate Joe

Biden and his team's ability to -- whether they're going to jack him up on Mountain Dew or whatever it is, that, look, at the State of the Union this year, he had a lot of energy for about an hour or an hour- and-a-half.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[11:10:09]

ACOSTA: Now, that jacked up on Mountain Dew references --

(LAUGHTER)

URBAN: I know. That's maybe -- does he drink Mountain Dew? I'm not sure.

(CROSSTALK)

HAYS: It's Coke Zero.

ACOSTA: We're right out of "Talladega Nights." I think that was of -- Ricky Bobby's two kids. That was Texas Ranger who said he was all jacked up on Mountain Dew.

Is he going to come after Joe Biden -- or is Joe Biden going to come after Donald Trump like a spider monkey? What's going on here?

(LAUGHTER)

URBAN: Listen, I think that -- they would love it if he came after him like a spider monkey, right?

ACOSTA: Yes.

URBAN: The Biden camp needs to see an energetic Joe Biden. They want to see a youthful, aggressive Joe Biden.

And you heard Kristen Holmes talk about this. The Trump campaign wants to see a more subdued Donald Trump. Donald Trump in the second debate in 2020, if he shows up on Thursday night, it's going to cause very big problems for Joe Biden, because he was constrained, he stuck to the topics, he was policy-focused, and he quickly -- he won the debate.

Nobody remembers it because they didn't watch because he did so poorly in the first debate.

ACOSTA: Yes.

URBAN: The second debate, he did very well. If that guy shows up, W. for the Trump camp.

ACOSTA: Yes, but, David, I mean, how silly is this getting when we're talking about jacked up on Mountain Dew? I mean, come on. This just doesn't even past the laugh test. (LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: He's quoting Ricky Bobby.

(LAUGHTER)

URBAN: Listen, so, I think --

ACOSTA: If you're not first, you're last, I guess, is -- is that where we're at right now?

(CROSSTALK)

URBAN: Maybe Biden's driving around with a cougar in his car. We don't know.

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: Yes.

URBAN: You know, what the Trump campaign is trying to do is -- right, is paint a picture.

Like, the president, when people see him, when people see President Biden out, right, kind of shuffles along a little bit, doesn't look like the most robust guy. At the State of the Union, he was a pretty robust fellow. People saw a different a different Joe Biden.

Now, maybe -- listen, maybe he slept all day. Maybe that's what happened, and they woke him up late.

ACOSTA: We've seen multiple versions of Donald Trump too.

URBAN: No, listen, but you have been around. And I have been around, Jim.

ACOSTA: Jacked up and otherwise.

(CROSSTALK)

URBAN: Listen, you have been around and I have been around.

Donald Trump is a robust fellow, no matter what time of day it is, OK?

ACOSTA: Well -- OK.

Meghan, let's put a quote up on screen. I guess Trump has acknowledged that he isn't always at the top of his game and has acknowledged that he interrupted the president too much at that first debate four years ago.

I suppose there is the possibility, despite what David was saying about Trump being charged up all the time, that Trump could come in more subdued. And then what does Biden do at that point?

HAYS: I think that the president continues to drive home his message and show what he did for the people for the last four years and lay out what he wants to do for the next four years.

I think -- I'm not sure that Donald Trump is going to show up subdued.

HAYS: I mean, I think --

ACOSTA: Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

HAYS: -- hope for that. But I think the president is a game day person. He shows up prepared for things. He shows up all the time, consistently, just like he did on the State of the Union.

So I just -- I would be surprised if he reacted poorly.

(CROSSTALK)

ACOSTA: David, I mean, here's the screen -- here's the full screen right here.

"The second one, I was different. I got great marks on the second one. I'm probably going to look at the scene at the time. It's like a fight. It depends on what the situation is."

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: Yes.

URBAN: Well, listen, you saw him with the stare-down with Jake Paul the other day, right? So --

ACOSTA: Right. But he went overboard that first time.

URBAN: He did.

ACOSTA: He gave Biden a huge opening.

URBAN: Absolutely.

ACOSTA: That was when Biden said, "Shut up, man," and everything else.

URBAN: Yes. Absolutely.

And I think that he recognizes he didn't comport himself well there. He will do much better. And, listen, it really cuts into the narrative of -- the Biden campaign's narrative that it's chaos and it's going to be the end of the world. If Donald Trump talks substance and is measured, I mean, game over.

HAYS: That's why the optics matter here almost more than a substance for both of these guys.

ACOSTA: And, Meghan, what about what happened last night, Jamaal Bowman losing that primary battle. What do you think? What's going on? HAYS: I mean, he -- his views didn't represent his district. That's why you have primary. So his views were out of step with his district, and he paid the price for it and lost his primary.

I mean, I think, also, when you do things that he has done, like pull the fire alarm and some other more incendiary things, that's what happens. People don't like that. He has a -- his representation and his people don't like that. That's -- I mean, that's why elections matter.

ACOSTA: And it hasn't been a clean sweep for all Trump-endorsed candidates this cycle. What does that mean, David?

URBAN: Listen, in the primary, I think -- the Republican primary, Donald Trump still has a pretty firm grip on the Republican base.

When it comes to general elections, a little bit -- a little bit mixed bag, but, generally, the candidates this cycle been really, really good candidates. We have got good folks on the team this time. So we will see.

We're very hopeful for the fall of '24. It's not going to look like '22.

ACOSTA: All right, guys, thank you very much. I'm going to be all jacked up on Mountain Dew tomorrow. That's for sure.

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: If there's one thing that's certain, that's it.

All right guys, thanks very much.

We're about 33 hours from CNN's historic presidential debate in Atlanta. Don't miss President Biden and former President Trump on CNN and Max tomorrow night at 9:00 Eastern.

When we come back, why Supreme Court Justice Sam Alito says the country may come to regret today's ruling on social media, a very important ruling today. More on all of that in just a moment.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:19:13]

ACOSTA: Some breaking news this morning. The Supreme Court handed down today's rulings, not about Donald Trump's claims of immunity. That did not happen today, but instead there was a very important decision involving social media.

The justices ruled that the White House and federal agencies may continue to urge social media platforms to take down content the government views as misinformation. I want to bring in our panel, CNN chief legal affairs correspondent

Paula Reid, CNN senior Supreme Court analyst Joan Biskupic, and CNN media correspondent Hadas Gold.

Paula, let me start with you. Walk us through what we heard this morning.

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, here, the Supreme Court really handed a victory to the Biden administration, because now, in this critical election year, the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, even the White House can continue to press social media companies, flagging them to disinformation and misinformation.

[11:20:00]

That's especially important when it comes to foreign disinformation, right? We have seen the impact that can have on an election. Now, this case raised some really important First Amendment questions about the extent to which the federal government can press, right, a private company.

The Supreme Court didn't get into that though. Instead, they decided this based on standing, right? And -- quote -- "To establish standing, the plaintiffs must demonstrate a substantial risk that, in the near future they will suffer an injury that is traceable to a government defendant and redressable by the injunction they seek."

So they didn't get into the bigger First Amendment questions here, but there was a similar, but slightly different case raising questions about states and their ability to restrict social media companies' power to censor or restrict conservative views.

We thought maybe these two cases would come out together, but that is one of the 10 outstanding cases we're still waiting for.

ACOSTA: A lot left.

Yes, Joan, and Justice Alito wrote a 34-page dissent, am I reading that correct, and said the country may come to regret today's decision. Justice Alito has been in the news a little bit lately, yes.

JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN SUPREME COURT ANALYST: Yes.

ACOSTA: What is he saying?

BISKUPIC: Yes, Justice Alito wrote for himself and fellow dissenters Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, and his dissent was actually longer than the majority opinion by Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

ACOSTA: Wow.

BISKUPIC: And I do have to say, Justice Alito, who hadn't been on the bench the last two times they issued opinions, was there today. And they were all lined up there. And Justice Barrett, if you're in the audience looking ahead, she's to

your far left. And she started out by actually highlighting some of the potential First Amendment concerns here, saying that there were enough statements that came from the administration that were super provocative.

And she referred to one example where an official who was frustrated with Facebook that it had removed a particular post involving potential misinformation about COVID-19 said, last time we did this dance, it ended in an insurrection. So she was pointing up some of the, as I said, provocative posts, but then quickly pivoted to the reality is that you need to show an injury to be able to bring a case in federal court.

And neither the two states, Missouri and Louisiana, or the five social media users could demonstrate standing. Now, Justice Alito did not read his dissent from the bench. That often happens, Jim, in these final cases.

ACOSTA: Yes.

BISKUPIC: But, instead, he saved all his rhetoric for these 34 pages that outpace the 29-page majority opinion, as you say, warning that this could happen and really pointing up the actions by the Biden administration that he found egregious.

ACOSTA: And, Hadas Gold, what does this mean in practical terms for social media companies? Because this was a decision that could have had a major impact on those companies.

HADAS GOLD, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, we are kind of in the World Cup of waiting for Supreme Court cases that could really determine how Internet speech is regulated, the laws around Internet speech.

We have been waiting for this moment really for 30 years. And it is a long time coming, because when you look at the regulations that are currently in place, they're really focusing on the telephone companies, on the broadcast networks, what are considered public utilities.

And there is a major question of if and when these social media companies will be determined to be public utilities, because let's be honest, more people are online than they are on the phone or watching broadcast networks.

So there's a question of whether this will be determined. It has not been determined yet. We didn't get sort of a major standard issued by the Supreme Court. There was a question about whether they would issue some sort of standard on when a government reaching out to a social media platform will be considered coercion, would be considered some sort of censorship.

We did not get that yet, but we might be getting them in one of these other cases. There are several cases out there. As Paula noted, we're still waiting to hear from the Supreme Court on this. In the meantime, though, this means that things will continue on as they have been. The administration can still reach out to the platforms, flag things for them that they believe violate these platforms' own policies.

But the platforms are still free to do what they wish with their own moderation policies.

ACOSTA: All right.

And, as Hadas was saying, Joan, I mean, what's taking these guys so long? I mean, a lot of rulings left to come. And it sounds as though we may be heading into next week with some of these very important decisions.

BISKUPIC: Yes, I love Hadas' reference to the World Cup.

ACOSTA: Yes.

BISKUPIC: And I will throw in a couple of other sports ones, the final stretch, the ninth inning. That's where we are right now.

ACOSTA: Yes, extra innings.

BISKUPIC: Yes, extra. Yes.

ACOSTA: Yes. Yes.

BISKUPIC: They will -- next week, we're going to have extra innings.

They do have 10 rulings to hand down, and they're in most important cases that everyone's waiting for, including the issue over whether Donald Trump has immunity from criminal prosecution for subverting the 2020 election.

ACOSTA: Right.

BISKUPIC: And we're going to -- they will be in session on Thursday and Friday mornings. And, right now it looks almost certain that they will go to next Monday. And there might -- they might even need to go to next Tuesday.

They do not like going to July. They do not like going into July. They're like everyone else. They have got plans. They want to go on vacations.

ACOSTA: Yes.

BISKUPIC: And -- but I think, at this rate, when only two opinions were issued today -- and let me tell you what's actually happening.

ACOSTA: Yes.

BISKUPIC: The chief sets goals and deadline goals --

ACOSTA: Right.

BISKUPIC: -- and expects his colleagues to be able to finish writing [11:25:00]

ACOSTA: Yes.

BISKUPIC: But, see, they're passing opinions back and forth for amendments by other people who are in the majority.

And then, like you see in today's opinion, Justice Barrett might have written something that then got Justice Alito more worked up and said, I want to amend my dissent. So you have a lot of that going on.

ACOSTA: There's a give-and-take.

Well, that's why I was wondering, does anybody play sort of like the air traffic controller over there at the Supreme Court? Because they have got a lot of planes to land right now.

BISKUPIC: They do.

ACOSTA: How do they decide this? I mean, are they thinking about this the night before and saying, OK, we were going to do immunity tomorrow, now we're going to do it Tuesday?

(CROSSTALK)

BISKUPIC: Well, yes, the chief justice keeps a list, and he designates cases either the A list or the B list.

ACOSTA: Yes.

BISKUPIC: And that's all timed out.

Right now, they should all be on the A list in terms of get these things done. They're supposed to get done. But he is -- as I always say, he's not the boss of them. He can be the -- he can try to be the air traffic controller, but they are all individually appointed for life.

They have their -- all have their own say. And I will never forget one year when Chief Justice William Rehnquist, his predecessor, said, I have got tickets to fly to Rome and we have to finish it on a certain day. They didn't. He was on an airplane as they announced the final decisions.

ACOSTA: Wow.

(CROSSTALK)

BISKUPIC: He was like, I'm not waiting around for you guys.

ACOSTA: Being the chief comes with some perks, I guess.

BISKUPIC: Yes, right.

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: All right, well, we were wondering. We were all wondering that this morning, like, what's taking them so long?

REID: Yes.

ACOSTA: And then how does that work? So that is excellent insight.

BISKUPIC: It's like anything. It's like any kind of deadline, you know? But -- and now -- now that I think it's inevitable that they're going to go to Monday, they're probably thinking, ah, well, let's have lunch, everyone, yes.

ACOSTA: All right, thanks, guys, very much. Really appreciate it.

We're all waiting. We're still waiting.

Coming up: Biden's border policy, is it having an immediate impact? We will break down some new numbers. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)