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Senate Passes $70 Billion ICE and Border Patrol Bill; NYT Details New Allegations against Graham Platner; Kevin O'Leary Cuts Back Data Center Project after Public Protests; CBS News Races to Steady '60 Minutes' after Pelley's Firing. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired June 05, 2026 - 06:00   ET

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

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's just a quick, easy money grab for these guys.

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[06:00:05]

BRAD SMITH, CNN ANCHOR: Police say that there has been a rise in the value of collectible cards, so they are seeing more thefts in the area.

And game two of the NBA finals set to tip off in San Antonio tonight. Knicks going to put their 12-game playoff winning streak on the line against the Spurs.

That does it for CNN HEADLINE EXPRESS. I'm Brad Smith. CNN THIS MORNING with Audie Cornish starts right now.

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR: Today in the group chat, that story about Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner explaining himself again after new revelations from his past. Will Democrats stand behind him this time, too?

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you considered dropping out of the race?

GRAHAM PLATNER (D), MAINE SENATE CANDIDATE: No, not once.

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CORNISH: Senators staying up past their bedtime. There was a big Republican victory just moments ago, quickly followed by a stinging setback.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All I have is a gas pedal. I don't have a brake pedal.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CORNISH: Anthropic warning that A.I. could soon build its own successors. Is that as scary as it sounds?

A new video showing what one sailor called a fight-or-die situation. The charred interior of a U.S. aircraft carrier after a fast-moving fire on board.

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GOV. SPENCER COX (R-UT): People are concerned about -- about data centers. They're concerned about the lake. They're concerned about resources.

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CORNISH: So, now Kevin O'Leary, pulling back on some of his A.I. data center project. Is that going to be enough to ease concerns in Utah?

And the World Cup opener less than a week away. But could the beautiful game be clouded by a climate of fear?

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Hispanic community loves football, you know, and they want to go and enjoy and spend time with family.

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CORNISH: We're starting with this breaking news. While you were asleep, your senator was still working.

Happy Friday. I'm Audie Cornish. And the U.S. Senate took almost 20 hours voting down amendment after amendment. But just a short time ago, they voted to approve the $70 billion Republican immigration bill.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This bill, as amended, is passed.

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CORNISH: So, here's what this bill will do: fund ICE and Border Patrol through the rest of Trump's term.

But Senate Republicans rejected proposals to formally kill the president's anti-weaponization fund in the process.

The Bill now goes to the House.

Now, just minutes later, seven Senate Republicans voted to block consideration of a contentious bill that would reauthorize the nation's spy powers. This is known as FISA, and it's a blow to Republican leaders.

So, we're going to be keeping an eye on that throughout the hours and days ahead.

The current FISA law expires one week from today.

We're also following this developing story. More unsettling allegations in the Graham Platner saga. This is just days after the Maine Senate candidate met with Senate Democrats to assure them no other shoes were going to drop.

Now there's this: a report published in "The New York Times," describing volatile and toxic relationships. At least one case of physically threatening behavior, which Platner outright denies.

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PLATNER: There are some allegations in this piece that I just want to be kind of unequivocal about are simply not true. Anything alleging physicality; anything alleging that I knew what my tattoo was. These are the statements of someone who's politically motivated.

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CORNISH: In the report, six women spoke out. One of them accuses him of twisting her arm. Some accounts go back more than a decade to a time when Platner, a combat veteran, says he was struggling with PTSD.

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PLATNER: In this piece, there's a lot about my struggling; not being a good boyfriend. Certainly, self-medicating with alcohol.

And I've been very up front since the beginning of this campaign that that was a pretty dark period of my life after I came back from my combat service. And that's what that combat -- that's what that kind of life looks like.

And -- and so, there are things in this that I absolutely will take responsibility for and have been speaking about openly for months now. But those serious allegations are just not true.

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CORNISH: So, the question this morning for Democrats: is it too late to cut bait?

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm very optimistic we're going to win Maine.

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Do you talk about any other shoes to drop that could come out in this race, or did he try to get ahead of any of that?

SEN. TINA SMITH (D-MN): No, we didn't talk about that.

[06:05:00]

The main thing we talked about was really what his -- why it is that he's been connecting so much with -- with Maine voters.

SEN. PETER WELCH (D-VT): He's accepting the burden that he's got to give his explanation of that to Maine voters. And they decide.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Are you worried about anything else coming out about him?

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): I don't know. All I can say is, look, I'm sure he's not a saint. And by the way, let's not forget he has acknowledged -- this guy served four tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. He went through some very bloody and horrible situations. He has acknowledged that he came back with PTSD.

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CORNISH: Joining me now in the group chat, Elliot Williams, CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor; Carine Hajjar, "Washington Post" editorial board member; and Noel King, co-host and editorial director of the "Today, Explained" podcast. Thank you guys for being here.

So, one of the things I'm looking at is response. Response on the left, response from Democrats.

The other thing I'm looking at is what next? Because this election is going to happen in a few days. And earlier this week, Governor Janet Mills told "The Portland Press" earlier that, quote, "People have the impression that I withdrew or dropped out, but I simply suspended active campaigning. I'm still on the ballot."

So, there is another option.

CARINE HAJJAR, EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBER, "THE WASHINGTON POST": There is. There is another option. And, you know, I think any sense of surprise -- oh, another Platner story. Well, we had a warning that he was a flawed candidate, a problematic candidate.

CORNISH: And we should say you have been covering this race since the beginning.

HAJJAR: Since the beginning in October, there was news of his tattoo. There are -- there's a lot of reporting that suggests he was aware of what that looked like. He denies that he was aware of it; covers it up under political scrutiny.

I think those are flashing red lights that you have a problematic candidate and that we're -- that Democrats are scrambling right before the Tuesday primary.

CORNISH: Yes. But does it matter if the problematic part is the story? Meaning his whole entire spiel has been, I was a bad guy. I saw the light. And you want more guys like me seeing the light. Democrats.

And you know what I mean? The sort of, like, I could have been in the manosphere. But look, I'm here running as a Democrat. And what do Democrats do with that story that they've been telling? NOEL KING, CO-HOST/EDITORIAL DIRECTOR, "TODAY, EXPLAINED": Keep it

going, I think, is the only option at this point.

CORNISH: It's not the only option. The other option is Janet Mills.

KING: Come on.

HAJJAR: Yes.

CORNISH: No, it could be.

KING: I guess, I guess. Look, the thing that I think everybody wildly wants to know is do voters abandon this guy because of the problematic behavior?

I mean, look at the last decade of American politics and American life. We now excuse a lot.

CORNISH: Yes.

KING: We now excuse a lot. And a guy who says, Well, in my 20s, I was often drunk and had PTSD, and that is my excuse.

CORNISH: Yes.

KING: Does America buy it?

CORNISH: And there are sitting members of Congress right now --

KING: Yes.

CORNISH: -- dealing with allegations of a similar manner.

Can you talk to me in terms of the response from progressive voices who are, like, "The New York Times" is printing stuff that's uncorroborated, that's biased, and doing what I think I see almost every time in a legal story that involves this kind of --

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes.

CORNISH: -- claim, which is the credibility of the people making the allegations.

WILLIAMS: Of the people making the allegations. Yes.

Well, there are some -- you know, picking up on Noel's point. There are some awful things here with an individual who is clearly struggling with PTSD, depression, alcoholism, and a host of other things. Right?

But there are some pretty awful allegations in there.

CORNISH: But he denies the most serious one, and it's the court of public opinion versus the court of law.

WILLIAMS: Yes. Right. And I would also add in some of the allegations are that one of them is that -- I think he ghosted somebody. And then they -- they put it on a -- like a Facebook page for men that had ghosted them or whatever else.

That's not the kind of allegation, I think, that ought to be brought in when we're assessing whether someone is fit for office. Now --

CORNISH: Well, isn't that the question? Like the -- the Democratic litmus test has been --

WILLIAMS: But one thing -- No, no, no, but I'm saying it's all getting blurred together. These allegations of violence and allegations of not calling somebody back after a date. I think people should be clear as to what exactly they're regarding as the original sin here.

But I think, you know, the two folk -- the two categories of people who really need to weigh in are, No. 1, Maine voters. And No. 2, Democratic women. Like what they are comfortable with defending. What is the -- what is the "uncle" point?

CORNISH: OK, we're going to -- we're going to let women talk, then.

So, to your point, how do you see this? I saw, buried in our clips, Ms. Gillibrand, right, who at one point was at the forefront of weighing in on this kind of drawing a line.

HAJJAR: Yes, yes.

CORNISH: Is it touching? Is it bad dates? Is it -- what is assault? What does the #MeToo movement represent? And are Democrats still maintaining or being the guardians of those boundaries?

KING: No, no, I don't think so.

HAJJAR: And I will say, though, it is interesting. Like, this -- this campaign has been so scandal-plagued that I think almost the effect has been watered down.

But from a poll, I think -- I believe it was a week ago. It was a UNH poll. He still led among women head-to-head with Susan Collins.

[06:10:03]

Now again, Senator Collins has come back from behind in general elections before. She has won elections where she's pulled from behind the entire time.

CORNISH: Yes.

HAJJAR: But I do think, when you start with a Nazi tattoo, and then scandal after scandal after scandal comes out, you should really -- we should really be focusing on that first big red flag.

WILLIAMS: I would go even further than that. If -- politics isn't about intellectual consistency. But if there were a Republican candidate with a Nazi tattoo, with allegations of -- forget the ghosting -- literally grabbing women or being abusive or hostile in relationships, Democrats would lose their minds over that.

CORNISH: Yes, yes.

WILLIAMS: And immediately call not just for their --

CORNISH: We're going to talk more about this later, because you've got people like Senator Coons who are saying, Well, you know, look at Ken Paxton in Texas. He's scandal plagued.

So, there's going to be a lot of whataboutism. There's going to be a lot of challenging these narratives leading up to this final vote.

I want to turn to something else. Coming up on CNN THIS MORNING, former Attorney General Pam Bondi takes aim at Trump's pick to replace her. What she's saying about the Epstein files.

Plus, the fallout over Scott Pelley's exit from "60 Minutes." What staffers were told about his firing.

And "Shark Tank's" Mr. Wonderful. Now Mr. Compromise. His decision to perhaps scale back his data center project.

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KEVIN O'LEARY, ENTREPRENEUR: I want the people that actually benefit from it to get the answers they want. I want to be totally transparent, and I plan on doing that.

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CORNISH: It's now 15 minutes past the hour. This is your morning roundup.

The search continues for a missing U.S. student in Japan. The Auburn University student James "Weston" Higginbotham was last seen a week ago at a train station.

At this point, police say there's no indication to suggest anything like a crime was committed, resulting in his disappearance.

And this video shows the severe damage aboard an aircraft carrier after a fire spread through parts of the ship back in March.

Now, you can see here sailors' bunks charred by the flames, and two sailors did receive minor injuries.

USS Gerald Ford's fire control systems failed to work, leaving the sailors scrambling to put out the flames. The U.S. Navy released a statement, saying that the fire was contained, but senior officials say the statement downplays damages to the carrier. And an investigation is ongoing. Water flowing again into the iconic reflecting pool on the National Mall in Washington. President Trump proclaiming the final coat of protection is being applied. He's touting the beautiful flat blue color and promising it quote, "won't leak."

According to federal records, the cost of the renovation has reached at least $14.8 million.

And business mogul Kevin O'Leary backtracking from plans to build a massive A.I. data center in Utah. He wrote a letter to the Utah Senate president, vowing to cut the project in half, from 40,000 acres to 20,000 acres.

The letter comes after weeks of protests at public meetings and just days after Utah's government pressured O'Leary to shrink the size of the development.

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COX: Look, we've had feedback. I think everybody's aware of that. The feedback has been incredibly helpful. People are concerned about -- about data centers. They're concerned about the lake. They're concerned about resources. And they should be concerned. I share those concerns. They're right.

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CORNISH: And it's a little more than feedback.

KING: Yes. This one feels inevitable. I mean, business moguls love a data center, because it has the potential to be very, very, very good for local economies. That simply is the truth.

However, Americans hate data centers.

CORNISH: Yes. Also, interesting coming on the news of Anthropic basically making that announcement of like, hey, maybe we should slow A.I. down.

KING: We need some guardrails.

CORNISH: Because it can self-replicate. We'll talk more.

I want to talk to you guys next, after this break, about "60 Minutes." How CBS leadership can move on from Scott Pelley's firing.

And a live look this morning at the sunrise in Baltimore.

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SCOTT PELLEY, FORMER CORRESPONDENT, CBS'S "60 MINUTES": Journalism is under attack. Universities are under attack. Freedom of speech is under attack.

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CORNISH: So, that was former "60 Minutes" correspondent Scott Pelley, delivering the commencement address at Wake Forest University just last year.

A year later, Pelley is out at CBS, claiming he was a victim of political bias.

Now, Pelley was fired on Tuesday after a heated staff meeting, where he accused editor-in-chief Bari Weiss of, quote, "murdering '60 Minutes'" after she axed several show staffers and correspondents.

"The New York Times" reports Weiss told staffers, quote, "Despite our attempts to engage with Scott Pelley and to find a way back, unfortunately, we weren't able to do so. And so, we had to part ways. We did not want that to happen," she goes on. "But that's the path that he chose."

Now, in response to that reporting, Pelley immediately released a statement saying, quote, "Bari Weiss knows what she said is not true. There was no effort of any kind to, quote, 'find a way back'."

Now, the owner of CBS, Paramount Skydance, is now seeking government approval to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, which of course, includes CNN.

We've got CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter is here with the latest.

Brian, there have been a lot of twists and turns in this, and I wanted to get from you a sense of how "60 Minutes," how CBS is trying to spin or talk about this, now that Pelley has responded and responded so specifically. Right? Saying that it was a lie, how they've described it.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: Right. These have been the most -- gosh, how many days now? Eight days. The most tumultuous eight days in "60 Minutes" history, starting off with the layoffs last week of those top producers and correspondents.

Then with Scott Pelley speaking out, then with his firing.

Now, the remaining staffers are trying to rebuild. The management team is trying to restore trust. But it's anyone's guess if that will succeed.

When it comes to Pelley's claims, CBS News management has pushed back and said there was no political interference. And we are waiting to see if Pelley will get specific and get into detail about his claims.

[06:25:10]

But repeatedly, for the past few months, there have been these claims about political interference at the show. What's happening, very clearly, is that Bari Weiss is trying to make

her mark on "60 Minutes." She wants to get her hands dirty, so to speak. She wants to be involved at "60 Minutes."

She says she's doing that not to influence the politics, but because she wants to help shape and improve the show. And she's clearly trying to drag the show into the digital age. That is for sure.

She believes the CBS News organization is old-fashioned. She believes "60 Minutes" is out of date and archaic, even though it's really valuable and popular, and she wants to reform it.

But what that looks like, what form that takes, it's anyone's guess. And now, they have to rebuild the show with a very small number of people. Well, correspondents. They had seven last month. They only have three left.

And the big question now, Audie, is, are those three remaining correspondents going to stay or go? My sense is they're probably going to stay, but no one knows yet.

CORNISH: Now you have reporting on a memo to staff that was written by Nick Bilton. He's the newly appointed executive producer. I just want to throw up some detail about him, for people who are just learning all these names.

He was at "Vanity Fair." He was a "New York Times" lead technology columnist. I interviewed him about his book about Twitter, and he is, of course, a best-selling author.

Can you talk about sort of what he brings to this role? And if people have a sense of his politics the way they do about Bari Weiss, who, you know, very publicly --

STELTER: Right, right.

CORNISH: -- sort of with the "Free Press," established a lane for herself.

STELTER: I've known Bilton for years. He's a tech reporter, and more recently made his mark in Hollywood, trying to become a screenwriter, things like that.

This is a very unusual position for him to take, but it's the kind of job no one would turn down.

So, now he's been meeting with staff this week, trying to reassure them, trying to promise that he is up for the job, that he does care about "60 Minutes."

He put out a statement last night, actually, a memo to staff, but it was really written for the public, as well. And he's clearly trying to reassure everyone that he is going to maintain the program's independence.

He said in the memo, "The foundation of '60 Minutes' is its independence. We will always pursue stories without fear or favor."

I basically view this memo as him making the commitment publicly so that he can keep these remaining correspondents on board and not lose any more staff members. Because that's a very real concern right now.

When it comes to Bilton's politics, there's nothing MAGA about him. He's not MAGA coded, so to speak. He has written critically about Trump in the past.

But Trump, you know, hangs over this entire conversation, because he sued "60 Minutes"; because he's been critical of "60 Minutes"; and because Paramount has tried to cozy up to Trump while trying to buy CNN and the rest of WBD.

Ultimately, those corporate politics are inescapably part of this story, even though CBS says it's trying to reform "60 Minutes" because of the culture, not about the politics.

And you know what, Audie? Viewers get to decide at the end of the day, what they believe here.

You know, when I watch CBS, I don't think the coverage has changed markedly. I don't view it going toward the right. I think they're still aggressively covering Trump and the administration.

But viewers are the ones that get to determine if they believe that's the case or not. They're going to tune in to "60 Minutes" in September. They're going to sense whether the show is changed or not. So, viewers ultimately are the ones who get to decide.

CORNISH: That's Brian Stelter. Thank you so much for your time. Thanks for waking up for us.

STELTER: Thanks.

CORNISH: Straight ahead on CNN THIS MORNING, should A.I. pump the brakes? Turns out they may not even have a brake to hit.

Plus, new questions surface around Trump's DOJ pick. What former A.G. Pam Bondi said about his role in the Epstein files.

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