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Erin Burnett Outfront

Search Intensifies For 160+ Missing In Texas As Deaths Rise To 119; Kyiv Hit By Intense Drone Attack As Trump Says He's "Not Happy" With Putin; Bondi Rejects Conspiracy Theories She Pushed, Faces MAGA Backlash. Aired 7-8p ET

Aired July 09, 2025 - 19:00   ET

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

[19:00:31]

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next:

The breaking news, the desperate search for victims of the deadliest flooding in the United States in at least half a century. We are learning that a firefighter called for a code red alert at least 90 minutes before that alert reached the public. Ninety minutes could have saved so many lives. What happened?

Plus, Putin unleashing an unprecedented drone strike on Ukraine just hours after Trump calls out his, quote, BS. The former minister who served under Putin is OUTFRONT.

And Pam Bondi under fire. Questions about how long she'll have Trump's support as some of the biggest names on the right are calling for her to go.

Let's go OUTFRONT.

And good evening. I'm Erin Burnett.

And OUTFRONT tonight, the breaking news, frantic search and rescue efforts underway at this hour. Still, they are hoping against hope for survivors desperately trying to locate the 160 people known to still be missing tonight.

It is now five days after the catastrophic flash floods devastated Central Texas. So far, we know 119 people have been killed, 36 of them at least children.

But tonight, as I'm talking to you, officials are still holding out hope that there will be a miracle that they will find someone alive. The reality, of course, is no one has been rescued since Friday. But that is not stopping the hope.

And as crews scour the area, cutting through downed trees and tens of feet of debris, we are now learning crucial new information this hour. And that is this. We're learning that a Texas firefighter urgently called for a code red alert and urgently called for that code red alert before the Guadalupe River surged 26 feet in under an hour. And we actually have the audio of this call. And according to the transcript of that, the firefighter said, and I

quote him, the Guadalupe Schumacher sign is underway on State Highway 39. Is there any way we can send a code red out to our Hunt residents, asking them to find higher ground or stay home?

So, it was very clear asking for that code red. And why does this matter so much? Well, it matters because of the time. That was at 4:22 a.m. and a dispatcher responded, quote, "Stand by. We have to get that approved with our supervisor."

Of course, many hours -- time passed, right? The code red didn't actually go out until 6:00 a.m., so you're looking at 4:22 a.m. when that request happened? Six a.m. when it went out. Think about what happened between that time. How many people may have died?

Well, the Mayor of Kerrville telling the Texas tribune formally that they did not get that code red until 6:00 a.m. and that is more than 90 minutes after the firefighter called for the alert. So, it is going to be crucial why there was such a delay.

And the local law enforcement on the ground who risked their lives to save so many that night, want answers, too.

Here's one of the local sheriffs saying he wants to know what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHERIFF LARRY LEITHA, KERRY COUNTY, TEXAS: I believe those questions need to be answered to the family of the missed loved ones, to the public, you know, to the people that put me in this office. Those need doing, and I want that answer. And we're going to get that answer.

And I know that's going to be asked over and over. Please understand that, you know, we don't have -- we're not running. We're not going to hide for anything.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Isabel Rosales begins our coverage. She is OUTFRONT in Center Point, Texas, where that search for victims continues. And the desperate search, it is still a search and rescue.

Isabel, what are you seeing tonight?

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Erin, all but ten of the missing are out of Kerr County. And you have hundreds of people dedicating sunrise to sunset to try to find them. Meantime, folks are relying on the kindness of strangers to try to get back to any sense of normalcy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEITHA: Sometimes evacuations is not the safest. Sometimes it's better to shelter in place. The Hill Country is not a one-size-fits- all place. ROSALES (voice-over): Local officials defending their team's actions

today in flood-ravaged Texas before facing heated questions from reporters and promising that answers are coming.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're in the process of trying to put a timeline. You know that's going to take a little bit of time.

ROSALES: CNN affiliate KSAT now reporting a firefighter in nearby Ingram, Texas, requested the Kerr County sheriff's office issue a code red nearly six hours before that emergency alert was issued and sent to residents' phones.

The sheriff asked today about that lapse in time.

LEITHA: I believe those questions need to be answered to the family of the missed loved ones, to the public, you know, to the people that put me in this office.

[19:05:04]

Please understand that, you know, we don't have -- we're not running. We're not going to hide from anything.

ROSALES: Search and rescue teams are in day six of this exhaustive search, focusing now on combing through nearly 60 miles of riverside and piles of debris looking for victims.

KOURTNEY RAND, VOLUNTEER: We're getting down in places that normally people can't get to by foot. More harder terrain.

ROSALES: Dozens of volunteers have joined state and local agencies coming out on foot, boat, ATVs, horses and mules who can help carry heavy equipment. These volunteers talked to CNN about what they witnessed when arriving to help.

DUSTIN BERTERO, MISSION MULES: The water damage, how high the water got on trees, the debris piles around like bridges and, you know, parts of homes and stuff like fridges or water heaters.

MICHAEL TOBERER, PRESIDENT OF MISSION MULES: That amount of people getting taken like that just tells me that there's nobody was ready for it.

ROSALES: Drew Yancy owns this RV resort park.

The July 4th weekend is his busiest of the year, but he managed to safely evacuate all of his guests.

DREW YANCEY, OWNER, GUADALUPE KEYS RV RESORT: We lost ten trailers.

REPORTER: You lost ten trailers?

YANCEY: Ten trailers.

REPORTER: Out of how many?

YANCE: Twelve. We pulled two out. Thats all we could get. Thats all we had time for.

ROSALES: At least 160 people remain missing, and authorities say they have a long way to go. Maybe even weeks.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROSALES: And Drew, with his frantic 6:00 a.m. door knocking, may have very well saved the lives of those families. This is the state of his home down there on the Guadalupe River. It's gone.

Meanwhile, volunteers all over this river are finding mementos of families that they hope are okay. Pictures, baby pictures, wedding pictures, dance recitals, turning them over to the fire department, hoping the rightful owners will be able to come and claim those mementos -- Erin.

BURNETT: Thank you so much, Isabel.

And Pamela Brown is also OUTFRONT on the ground. She's in Kerrville, Texas, and she has been reporting there since hours after the disaster. Obviously knows the area, Pam attended Camp Mystic herself.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN CHIEF INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

BURNETT: So this has been an incredibly difficult story for you to cover and tell, Pamela, as a reporter and of course, given your own experiences and you spent the day with a family, one of the many families whose lives have now been completely upended by this crisis. What did you learn from them?

BROWN: Yes, I met this incredible family, the Dupree family, and I spent a good part of the day with them and their story of survival is incredible. The matriarch of the family, 83-year-old Penny Deupree, told me that she had her family in for the Fourth of July. There were eight others, including two little kids.

She got up in the middle of the night and she said it seemed like an ocean was coming through the house. She woke up her son to get into action and she said had she not renovated her house a couple of years ago, that she likely wouldn't be alive, her family wouldn't be alive, and she is thanking her contractor tonight for surviving.

Here's what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PENNY DEUPREE, SURVIVOR OF TEXAS FLOODS: This is the new -- the old part of the house, and it disappeared first, and we didn't know it had disappeared. So that went all first. And you could hear the creaking and the -- you know, and you knew they were boards or and most of the windows stayed, didn't they?

BROWN : All of these windows over here stayed, the new -- the new addition.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BROWN: And so, you see the pan, the other part of the house that was renovated, it was still standing a largely. And so, she described going up the ladder as you see that I'm doing right here. I went up there to this loft, which is what the family did in those overnight hours as the water was rushing in, you could see the water mark right there, Erin. Look how high the water got, right?

And so, as it was getting higher, the family didn't have a way out. So, they grabbed a lobster buoy on the top shelf there and created a makeshift hatch door in the back and squeezed through it to safety. Here's what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEUPREE: So this is a lobster buoy that's used in the East Coast, and they use this end to barrel through the wall that was at the back of the house, and there were three boys, and they each had one of these.

BROWN: And they were just banging.

DEUPREE: And actually, the neighbor straight behind me yesterday or the day before said, I heard you guys yelling and I heard you banging on the walls, trying to get out of your house.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Imagine how agonizing that was for the neighbor hearing that at the time, not being able to do anything. Fortunately, they all made it out alive.

And when they made it out that that makeshift door in the back of the loft that they created tiny little space, a tiny hole, they went into the rushing water, Erin, imagine that. It was pitch black, no light. And they made it onto the top of a gutter, and they were there for hours until the sun came up and the water receded.

I asked her if she ever thought she would die in all of this, and she said no. It never crossed her mind -- Erin.

[19:10:02]

BROWN: Wow. Pamela, just -- I mean, that is just so incredible. And you're going up the loft actually, tangibly show. I mean, just the small space there. And to imagine the fear when you have a roof over you and nowhere to go and the water that high, I mean, just incredible.

And thank you so much for sharing that with us.

I mean, just incredible reporting by Pam.

And OUTFRONT now, Democratic Congressman Lloyd Doggett from Texas, of course.

So, Congressman, can I just start with the fact that I know were five days in? I know they haven't found someone since Friday, but they are still search and rescue. They are still desperately hoping for miracles that they may find people alive among the 160 people known to be missing.

What is the latest that you understand from briefings on the state of the search and those 160 missing people?

REP. LLOYD DOGGETT (D-TX): Well, there are truly heroic efforts being made. It is a long time since this happened. And so, we become more troubled by the hour, as we've not found additional people there.

You know, this, Erin, this is, as your reports indicate, this is such a painful set of losses, and it's afflicting families all over Texas and far beyond, so many little kids who've been lost. And I just believe that with the technology we have these days, the loss is inexcusable to have a loss of this size.

I think there were failures at the local, the state and the federal level that contributed. And until we get accountability and we get reporters' questions answered, we face the possibility of another disaster like this, maybe from a hurricane or a tornado or snow storm or wildfire or whatever, but we're not prepared for it in the way we should be, and there's not an adequate federal support for our local officials.

BURNETT: You know, Congressman, when you think about those people who are still missing, and I know that everyone is hoping, praying if they pray for a miracle here.

But if those people are found and not alive, you're going to have a crisis here. A death toll of nearly 300 people. I mean, it is -- it is hard to comprehend. And so it is fair to ask questions as to whether those people had to die. The affiliate KSAT, our affiliate, is reporting, when you talk about those potential failures, about that Texas firefighter.

And they are reporting that this firefighter called for a code red alert, called for that alert 90 minutes before it was actually issued, and called for it before the Guadalupe River surge. So, before that hour in which it surged 26 feet.

The firefighter said the Guadalupe Schumacher sign is underwater on State Highway 39. Is there any way we can send a code red out to our residents, asking them to find higher ground or stay home? Four twenty-two a.m., the alert did not go out until 6:00 a.m.

We don't know how many people may have died in that window. We know that he was told to stand by for a supervisor's approval.

But what -- what do you know about this?

DOGGETT: Well, I'm alarmed by that report, but I'm also alarmed by the fact that by 422, I think cabins were floating down the river from Camp Mystic. And some of these other folks that were so harmed by this. And I'm troubled that there weren't sirens along the river, that emergency plans didn't seem to be implemented anywhere along that river. And I'm also concerned that the first report for actual warning was

not delivered from the National Weather Service until 1:14 in the morning, when much of the county was asleep, and the emergency not until about the time of that code red you referred to after 4:00 in the morning.

I think the short staffing at every federal agency involved is a real problem. In this case, the warning coordinator meteorologist was not on duty that night. That was one of the vacancies. They had almost one out of four officials vacant there. And we have similar problems that CNN has disclosed concerning FEMA that are really bothersome here.

So, whether it's federal or it's a volunteer firefighter and the failure to respond at the local level, or the fact that the state didn't fund sirens for the area, all of these contributed. And we need to get to the bottom of it, or we will have another catastrophe of this magnitude.

BURNETT: Well, I'd hope it'd be something everyone could agree on, regardless of what role they played, what their party may be, that those answers are needed. Because if lives could have been saved, something needs to be done to make sure that that would never, ever happen again.

Congressman, thank you so much.

DOGGETT: Thank you.

BURNETT: And breaking news right now as we're talking, several states are under flash flood warnings as we speak.

And an incredible video to share with you tonight, which shows the sheer power of these increasingly common types of floods, this flash flooding.

[19:15:07]

A home being swept away, and a woman who captured the video of one of these moments is next.

Plus, more questions tonight about Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, as Trump is pressed about Hegseth's pausing weapons shipments to Ukraine.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: What does it say that such a big decision could be made inside your government without you knowing?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I would know if a decision was made.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Did he know or not? And beating Trump to the punch, North Korea. Kim Jong Un is unveiling

a brand new massive beachside resort. A resort that Trump had once pitched as a way to get Kim Jong Un to work with the U.S. and give up nuclear weapons.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:20:21]

BURNETT: Breaking news as Texas reels from what is now formally the deadliest flood in half a century, even as 160 people are still missing, seven states and Washington, D.C., so across the country right now, as we're talking there are flood flash flood warnings right now. And so, in the past five days alone, if you look across the United States, there have actually been more than 225 reports of flash flooding.

In Chicago, a so-called one in 1,000-year rainfall event unleashed overnight. And in New Mexico, a surveillance footage shows water surging into a trading post, mail and packages that are floating through the room in a matter of seconds. Now, three were dead from the floods in that state. A tragedy, of course, though the context of Texas shows how horrible this can be.

And this video that's captured by our next guest shows an entire house floating away. She was stunned to realize that this was her best friend's family home. Now, thankfully, there was no one inside. That is the miracle of this story.

But Kaitlyn Carpenter joins me now.

And, Kaitlyn, look, I'm obviously sorry that we're talking, but it is a miracle your friend is okay. She wasn't in the house. So as we try to understand what these floods are like, you were

sheltering in place when all this began. Suddenly you see debris, and then you see that turquoise door. Is that when you realized, wait, this is my best friend's home? And. And what did you think when you knew that it was her house?

KAITLYN CARPENTER, FILMED NEW MEXICO HOME SWEPT AWAY IN FLOOD WATERS: I mean, I was in absolute shock. You know, we had saved her house last year from the flood. So, to see it just be taken up in the flood was just -- it was horrific. I have no words. It was so surreal.

And, you know, there's no words when you see something like that happen.

BURNETT: So -- no, I mean, you struggle to find words because they don't capture the magnitude of your feelings or your fear or any of the emotions.

I mean, Kaitlyn, can you try to tell us what it's like when you're -- you were in a situation where the river rose from two feet to more than 20 feet in 30 minutes, so in a half an hour, it rises more than 18 feet, right? That's the height of, you know, four average people. I mean, what is it like to watch that? CARPENTER: It's heartbreaking because, you know, so many people's

homes are going to be in the way. RV parks are right along the river all along our town. And it comes so quickly. It was the size of like a four-lane highway. It was -- it was unlike any flood I've ever witnessed here before.

BURNETT: So when you -- and you're watching this happen, I mean, this is in the context of what had just happened in Texas. I cannot even imagine how afraid you must have been.

CARPENTER: I was -- I mean, I was definitely terrified when I saw the water, but before it happened, we get alerts. We were warned to, you know, stay out of flood zones. Everybody, there's so many safe places here in our town. And even if it's not a safe place, if on the list, if somebody knows that you need to be safe and they're in a safe place, everybody welcomes you here. And that's what I love about our community.

It just comes so fast sometimes that some people like the tragedy that occurred. Sorry. You know, some people don't have a chance to get away.

BURNETT: I mean, thank god your friend wasn't in that house. I mean, I know the loss. It upends her life. But thank God she's okay.

You know, when you -- you see what happened in Texas, of course. And then you had the alerts that you're talking about. You obviously responded to them, Kaitlyn, but does all of this change you? I mean, does it change how -- when you get a warning on your phone, how you see it and what you do?

CARPENTER: Oh, definitely. As soon as I hear a warning, I immediately find a safe place and, you know, check on my friends, anybody I can, you know, just make sure everybody's okay. And, I mean, that's all you can do.

You can -- it's Mother Nature. It's going to do what it does. And all we can do is listen to our alerts and take care of each other.

BURNETT: Kaitlyn, thank you very much for sharing the video with us and talking to me. I appreciate it.

CARPENTER: Of course.

BURNETT: And next, breaking news Russia right now, as we're talking, unleashing a new wave of attacks on Ukraine's capital.

[19:25:03]

Those strikes are coming after Trump said that he's not happy with Putin. A former minister who served under Putin is my next guest.

Plus, we have new details on the very public breakup between Trump and Musk. Trump's chief of staff rarely speaks out publicly at all and is now coming out talking, breaking the silence about Trump and Musk.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BURNETT: Breaking news. Russian attack on Kyiv as I speak. Our CNN producer on the ground in Kyiv is telling us right now that as they're sitting there, there is an intensive drone attack underway in Kyiv. So again, our producer there, experiencing this, witnessing it as I speak.

The situation, our producer says, is very dynamic at the moment. They're hearing a lot of drone activity overhead. And this attack, which is going on now, comes after President Trump doubled down today on Vladimir Putin, speaking out against his latest offensive in Ukraine.

[19:30:06]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I've been sort of letting people know I'm not happy about what's going on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: All right. Trump has been making that clear recently. So far, though, as evidenced by what's happening on the ground right now with that latest attack, Putin does not seem to be responding, at least maybe only insofar as with increasing attacks, the ongoing attack on Ukraine, happening as I speak, comes after Putin launched a record 741 drones and missiles across Ukraine last night, not even 24 hours ago, which was pretty much right after Trump said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We get a lot of bullshit thrown at us by Putin, if you want to know the truth. He's very nice all the time, but it turns out to be meaningless.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: All right. That is one of the harshest attacks that Trump has had when it comes to Putin directly, right? Because he's often sided with Putin when it comes to Putin's rationalization and legitimization of the war. And yet, inside Russia, there are many who seem to be rolling their eyes when it comes to Trump's tough new tone.

One Russian tabloid writing, and I quote, the U.S. president blows hot and cold. He changes his mind on key issues as easily as he changes shoes.

And journalist Julia Davis, who closely monitors Russian propaganda, uncovered this on Russian state TV.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VLADIMIR SOLOVIEV, RUSSIAN STATE TV HOST (through translator): Trump is totally getting carried away. He's having a hard time. He thought he would show up and everyone would clap. Yo, Donald, we've been waiting for you. But everyone says, so?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: All right, OUTFRONT now, Democratic Congressman Seth Moulton sits on the House Armed Services Committee, also an Iraq war veteran.

And, Congressman, I appreciate your time.

So, look, you've been critical of Trump in the past who has, you know, repeated Putin's rationalization for the invasion of Ukraine, you know, saying, oh, well, if Ukraine didn't want to join NATO, this never would have happened, right? Trump's done all those things. And you have called him a coward, who is Vladimir Putin's puppet.

But when you hear him saying that what Putin is doing now is a lot of BS and he's sick of it, and when he's saying all these things over the past 24 hours, do you think that he has changed course?

REP. SETH MOULTON (D-MA): I mean, God knows, like no one knows. It's just total chaos from this administration. There's chaos at the top. There's chaos in the Pentagon. And right now, he's not echoing Kremlin talking points.

I mean, you actually had to play the Russian propaganda directly from Russian TV. Usually, we just hear that directly from Donald Trump's mouth, but he might change his position tomorrow. We can't predict it. And that's not leadership.

BURNETT: So, when you mentioned the Defense Department, I want to ask what's -- what you understand is going on there. You're on Armed Services. So I know you're trying to get to the bottom of this.

The latest that we've learned here at CNN is that Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, did not inform the White House, so didn't inform the president before authorizing that pause in weapons shipments to Ukraine. So, do you -- do you think, okay, just taking a step back here, if you can put party affiliation aside, should a defense secretary be making a decision like that and be able to make a decision like that without telling the White House?

MOULTON: No, absolutely not. The president's most important title is commander in chief. And that means he's commander in chief of the entire U.S. military. And yet, this commander in chief has lost control of his own direct deputy, his own cabinet secretary, who's in charge of the Defense Department.

When I was a marine platoon commander, my job description was you were responsible for everything your platoon does or fails to do. So, so merely at the lowest level, the platoon level, if a private in my platoon screwed something up, that was my responsibility. The idea that that Trump can't even take responsibility for his own direct deputy, his appointed cabinet secretary at the Pentagon, who's just a total loose cannon -- I mean, that's just -- it's very dangerous. It's dangerous enough having a Putin apologist -- basically a Putin puppet as president of the United States, commanding our military, but now he's lost control of the military. BURNETT: So, do you think that, you know, when you talk about is his

-- is his change of tone on Putin going to stick? Right.

One thing that had large bipartisan support in Congress, right, in the Senate, too, was that increased sanctions, right? And it had the support of people from Lindsey Graham to John Thune everybody. Okay? I mean, there was a lot that was bipartisan push for that.

Trump was not for it. Okay? And now, all of a sudden, that push has started again, right? It's come again. Lindsey Graham, who's one of the lead sponsors of the bill, he actually says now Congressman that Trump backs the bill.

Now, yesterday, Trump called it optional.

[19:35:01]

So, it's unclear.

But that would be significant if Trump were to get behind it and push that forward. Have you heard anything about that?

MOULTON: Well, yes. I mean, actually, veterans in the House -- we have a bipartisan veterans group, and one of the Republicans, right after Trump made these comments, decided he's going to introduce a sanctions bill. I mean, clearly, he's doing this not on principle, but based on what the president's whim of the day is.

You know, I would advise my Republican colleagues who do genuinely believe in supporting Ukraine and often criticize Trump's support for Russia behind the scenes. I'd say, let's get on this quickly. You know, while the president happens to be on the right side of history, but there's a lot of work to do here to get back to the point where we're not just not supporting Putin, right? Which is what Trump has been doing, but actually giving Ukraine the tools that it needs to win.

One of the questions that Democrats and Republicans on the Armed Services Committee repeatedly asked the White House under Biden was, we get the fact that you're supporting Ukraine, but what is the plan to win? Where is the plan to win? It's very clear that this administration has no plan for Ukraine to actually win this war.

BURNETT: All right. Congressman Moulton, thank you very much. I appreciate your time.

MOULTON: Good to see you.

BURNETT: And OUTFRONT now, Vladimir Milov. He is a former deputy minister of energy in Russia. He served under Vladimir Putin before resigning.

And, Vladimir, I'm glad to see you again. I appreciate -- I know it's obviously, you're in Lithuania, so thank you so much for staying up so late to have this conversation. When Trump has come out and called it BS and he didn't say BS, he

actually said the word, and he says he's not happy with Putin. He's frustrated. Right? He says -- the quote was Putin throws a lot of bullshit at him. So what's Putin -- what do you think Putin's response is to that? To Trump now talking in that way.

VLADIMIR MILOV, FORMER RUSSIAN DEPUTY MINISTER OF ENERGY: Good evening, Erin. Great to be with you again. I think this did not come as a surprise to Moscow because Putin has been playing maximalist hardball all these past six months.

So, what do you expect? At some point, Trump's rhetoric would probably begin to evolve.

But I think Moscow will also be looking into not just words, because I'm sure that, you know, Trump's words and Trump's deeds are sometimes two different kinds of sports. So, they will be looking in the change of a long-term behavior, like, would Trump be asking Congress to allocate tens of billions of military aid to Ukraine, which is -- doesn't look likely at this moment?

We're not talking about resuming some auxiliary ammo supplies like anti-aircraft missiles or artillery shells, but like big new packages of military aid. Will he coordinate with allies? Will he improve his relations with NATO allies on helping Ukraine? Would he resume discussing Ukraine, NATO membership and so on and so forth?

BURNETT: Yeah.

MILOV: I think Moscow will be looking into that. So far, you know, just publicly complaining that he doesn't like what Putin is saying, I think Moscow is clearly not looking to impress.

BURNETT: So, I want to ask you about something else, though, related to this, but a bit different may surprise some people. I'm asking about it. I want to talk about Trump's bombing of Iran, because the bombing of Trump's Iran -- Trump's bombing of the nuclear facilities there, you believe was important, and you believe it actually made -- appeared weakness in the eyes of the Russians. In what way?

MILOV: The first thing is Trump's appeal to Iranians saying, listen, guys, it was just one time. We did it once, but I'm not looking for a major escalation with you. If you want to use force to shut down Iranian nuclear weapons program, this is not the message you would send out. The message you would send, I'm going to go all in and bomb you till the very end, until you stop, because actually, what Trump was doing, he only did it once after Israelis basically cleared the field and incapacitated Iranian air defenses.

I think Moscow took a clear note. And also, there was this big mega crowd outcry. Tucker Carlson, whoever who said, no, we don't need to go into another war. And so, Moscow takes note of that. They evaluate Trump's willingness and readiness to really engage in like a major, probably painful military standoff.

The answer from the Iran story is Trump is clearly not ready. I think this should be encouraging for Putin.

BURNETT: All right. Thank you so much, Vladimir Milov, former deputy energy minister. Thank you so much.

MILOV: Thank you.

BURNETT: And next Pam Bondi is under fire tonight because some of Trump's biggest supporters are turning on the attorney general. Why? And is this -- is this real?

[19:40:01]

I mean, is her job seriously in jeopardy?

Plus, Kim Jong un pulling a big surprise, unveiling a splashy resort just like the one Trump had -- has had once pitched to him to lure him into a deal. But Kim did this all on his own without giving a single concession to Trump or the U.S.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BURNETT: New tonight, a top Fox News host still pushing Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theories days after a Justice Department memo ruled out that Epstein was murdered behind bars and also ruled out that he even had a client list.

These are things, of course, that have long consumed many, including some in the MAGA base. Jesse Watters tonight, still adding fuel to the fire.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JESSE WATTERS, FOX NEWS HOST: You saw what happened with Epstein. Where did this guy go? Where did that whole case go? Where did all the files go? They just went nowhere?

[19:45:00]

No one even believes that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: He's not alone in the skepticism. There are others.

Laura Loomer is keeping up her attacks on Attorney General Pam Bondi, who had helped push conspiracy theories that the DOJ now says are not true. Right? Bondi had said that the stuff was on her desk, the client list was on her desk, and now there is no list.

Loomer says that Bondi, who she calls "Blondi", quote, botched the Epstein file release, lied to the MAGA base and added that Trump should fire her to preserve the midterms.

Tom Foreman is OUTFRONT.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Some conspiracy theorists have long believed that the accused sex trafficker, Jeffrey Epstein, kept a list of powerful friends allegedly tied to his alleged sordid activities.

And just months ago, Attorney General Pam Bondi was building up anticipation that list would soon be public.

JOHN ROBERTS, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: The DOJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients. Will that really happen?

PAM BONDI, ATTORNEY GENERAL: It's sitting on my desk right now to review. That's been a directive by President Trump.

FOREMAN: But with the Justice Department memo now saying there is no list, Bondi is backing up fast, saying there will be no release.

BONDI: I was asked a question about the client list and my response was, it's sitting on my desk to be reviewed, meaning the file.

FOREMAN: The apparent about face has enraged some in the MAGA movement who have long accused the Justice Department of throwing a shroud of secrecy around the case.

This is Kash Patel in 2023.

KASH PATEL, FBI DIRECTOR: Put on your big boy pants and let us know who the pedophiles are. We have an election coming up and we need to adjudicate this matter at the polls.

FOREMAN: Patel is now the FBI director.

Dan Bongino, now his deputy, said this in 2019.

DAN BONGINO, FBI DEPUTY DIRECTOR: What the hell are they hiding with Jeffrey Epstein?

FOREMAN: Bondi released a stack of folders months ago, which was largely panned as old material. But she has repeatedly suggested all the dirty details should come out.

BONDI: There are tens of thousands of videos of Epstein with children or child porn, and there are hundreds of victims.

FOREMAN: And back when Donald Trump was fighting to retake the White House and railing against the Justice Department for the cases it brought against him, he also called for more light on the troublesome case.

INTERVIEWER: Would you declassify the Epstein files?

TRUMP: Yeah, yeah, I would. All right, I guess I would.

FOREMAN: But it was President Joe Biden's Justice Department then. Now it is President Trump's, and he wants the pressure off his attorney general. TRUMP: Are people still talking about this guy? This creep? That is

unbelievable.

STEVE BANNON, FORMER TRUMP AIDE: This is supposed to be about the most transparent administration ever.

FOREMAN: Still, a slew of White House watchers are deeply unhappy.

TOM FITTON, PRESIDENT OF JUDICIAL WATCH: The Justice Department and the FBI are irredeemably compromised and corrupted.

FOREMAN: And reliable backers like comedian Roseanne Barr are bristling. Mr. President, yes, we still care about Epstein. Is there a time to not care about child sex trafficking? Read the damn room.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOREMAN (on camera): It's easy to see why Trump was attracted to this movement during the campaign. He was against the government. This was against the government. But now, he is finding it's like picking up an electrical wire. It's easy to grab thinking you're getting the energy, but it can be hard to put down and you can get badly burned along the way.

Right now, he still has a problem over the Epstein files, even if he wants to say he doesn't -- Erin.

BURNETT: All right. Tom, thank you very much.

So I want to go now to longtime conservative writer Bill Kristol, now editor at large for "The Bulwark".

So, Bill, you know, when you see this, Tucker Carlson, Laura Loomer, Megyn Kelly, just three of the very loud and in those three cases, very influential voices on the right slamming Attorney General Pam Bondi over her handling of this when, you know, Laura Loomer says, you know, she's got to go.

Do you think Bondi really could lose her job over this?

BILL KRISTOL, EDITOR AT LARGE, THE BULWARK: I mean, I'm doubtful. I think it could be doing damage to Trump because, you know, prying out parts of the MAGA base is very interested in conspiracies. Trump has catered to conspiracies way back to when he was a -- he tried to launch his possible presidential campaign in 2011, 2012 on the birther conspiracy.

So, undercutting conspiracy or not coming through when he promised to expose the conspiracy, I could do some damage to him. I think among some of his voters will Trump -- Trump dump Pam Bondi? I'm pretty doubtful.

I mean, Pam Bondi has been a very loyal attorney general, and that's one of the key jobs he wanted a true loyalist in, right, Defense, Justice, DHS.

BURNETT: Yeah.

KRISTOL: Trump was smart about that. He wanted people who would do what he wanted in the power agencies. Bondi has, you know, gotten rid of a bunch of cases against Republicans, against Trump supporters.

[19:50:00]

Obviously, the cases against Trump himself totally dropped. They're going after all the people who worked on those cases and the FBI and the Justice Department, totally politicized Justice Department. And if he dumps Bondi and she's not happy about it, she knows a lot about what's been going on there, right?

BURNETT: Yeah. I mean, so okay, then, you know, as part of this, you've got Elon Musk, right? You know, they were as close as close could be. And now, you know, it's as horrible of a breakup as it could be.

But Elon Musk has fueled conspiracy theories after the DOJ memo contradicted, right, those theories about Epstein's death, he posted, how can people be expected to have faith in Trump if he won't release the Epstein files? He posted a clown meme trolling the Trump administration. Where it goes from, we will release the Epstein list. There is no Epstein list.

And of course, in his initial breakup with Trump, he talked about Trump being on the list, which he, you know, since tried to disavow.

So what -- I maybe I'm using two too strong of a word. Is there a Musk strategy?

KRISTOL: Yeah, I think Musk actually does. He wants to do more damage to Trump than I might have expected for personal reasons. Maybe he's got political agenda, too.

He doesn't seem to have been intimated. I think the interesting thing that people have commented on enough is for a while there, it looked like Trump had intimidated Musk. He retreated. You say he disavowed that original Trump about this big bombshell.

He just asserted this, Trump is on the list. He was a senior White House counselor. He probably heard people talked about whether there was a list, who's on the list. He just asserted it, fine, maybe Musk make things up, makes things up.

Anyway, he retreated on that. He seemed to go quiet for a while. Now he's reemerged. He's going after Trump.

The excuse was the big bill, the reconciliation bill in Congress. He went after that because of debt and deficit. But and that would have been nothing much, honestly, that would have faded away. The bill got past the debt. Whatever happens to the deficit happens.

But for him to escalate to Epstein, which really is, you know, hitting a nerve in a way that debt and deficit don't, it tells me that Musk is pretty serious about doing damage to Trump. BURNETT: Yeah. I mean, there's a conventional warfare and then there's going nuclear and deficit is in the -- is in the former. And Musk and Epstein in the latter.

Thank you so much, Bill. Great to talk to you.

KRISTOL: Good talking to you, Erin.

BURNETT: All right. And next, North Korea tonight unveiling a massive resort. I mean, massive -- 20,000 people that resemble something that Trump once pitched. But how its gone down is really different

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:56:35]

BURNETT: Finally, tonight, new images into OUTFRONT of a brand new beachfront resort in North Korea that President Trump actually first pitched to Kim Jong-un years ago as a way to lure Kim into signing a nuclear deal and working with the United States. That, of course, didn't happen.

And Kim beat Trump to the punch. The resort is now complete without any involvement from Trump or a single U.S. dollar.

Will Ripley is OUTFRONT.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Kim Jong-un's yacht glides ashore on North Korea's eastern coast. The Wonsan Kalma Coastal tourist zone, miles of white sand beaches, water sports and luxury villas, 1,500 hotel rooms.

Wonsan was known as the ruling Kim family's favorite summer retreat, and one of North Korea's most active military testing grounds.

TRUMP: But they have great beaches. You see that whenever they're exploding their cannons into the ocean. And I explain, I said, you know, instead of doing that, you could have the best hotels in the world right there.

RIPLEY: President Donald Trump once pitched U.S. investment in Wonsan.

NARRATOR: Were the doors of opportunity are ready to be opened, investment from around the world? One moment, one choice.

RIPLEY: Today, seven years later, Kim beat Trump to the punch, building it on his own.

The resort features grand hotels with luxurious amenities, even international grade summit halls, a soft power backdrop perhaps setting the stage for diplomacy.

Kim did bring the Russian ambassador for the grand opening. These days, Pyongyang reportedly won't even accept Trump's letters at the United Nations.

Kim's wife, Ri Sol-ju, made her first state media appearance in more than a year, often walking several steps behind her husband and their teenage daughter, believed to be Kim Ju-ae. She often appears alongside her father at official events, fueling speculation she's being groomed as a possible successor.

Kim personally inspected the Wonsan project at least six times, including once when I was there reporting for CNN.

On the ground here in North Korea, now they're building a beachfront resort that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un came here to Wonsan to inspect just yesterday.

How have things improved under Kim Jong-un?

"Every day we see changes," he told me, "like new construction."

The new resort includes a massive water park and a surf machine generating artificial waves. And this very real wipeout. Even grannies firing pistols on horseback.

This retiree says she was moved to tears thinking about how their leader has given them such amazing benefits, even as much of the country still struggles with food shortages, medical care and electricity.

Now, North Korea celebrates a resort. Kim built it without Trump, without aid, without compromise, and with every single one of his nuclear weapons still intact.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RIPLEY (on camera): They built it. But who will come?

Aside from locals, only Russian tour groups can visit the beach resort. No Westerner, certainly not even Chinese tourists, at least for now. It may be quite some time before North Korea even comes close to filling those dozens of brand new hotels designed to accommodate up to 20,000 people -- Erin.

BURNETT: Wow, that is incredible.

Will, thank you so much.

And thanks so much to all of you.

"AC360" begins now.