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Erin Burnett Outfront

Standing By For Judge's Ruling On Trump's CNN Ban; Fighter Jet Parts Missing; GOP Senate Nominee Boasted About Leaving State She Now Wants To Represent. Aired 7-8p ET

Aired September 23, 2026 - 19:00   ET

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

[19:00:24]

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next:

The breaking news, we're standing by for a ruling on Trump's press ban as Trump rolls out the red carpet tonight for China's Xi Jinping. Now, we can't show you what's happening at this extraordinary event because of the ban.

Plus, sensitive U.S. fighter jet parts are missing, and Bloomberg is now reporting that they are in the hands of perhaps America's greatest adversary. The very latest on this massive and disturbing development.

And our KFILE uncovering a deleted post from a Republican candidate trashing her own state. She denies saying it, but of course, KFILE found it.

Let's go OUTFRONT.

(MUSIC)

BURNETT: And good evening, I'm Erin Burnett. And OUTFRONT tonight, we begin with the breaking news.

We are standing by for a judge to issue a ruling in Trump's White House media ban, a ruling that could come at any moment. Now, the judge in the case, who appeared skeptical of Trump's ban, says he will respond as soon as he can.

The attorney for CNN, Ted Boutrous, calling Trump the, quote, lead witness. That is because Trump has repeatedly said he banned CNN, MS NOW, and "Politico" because he didn't like their coverage.

I mean, here is what the president said on the day the ban was announced.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: With all of the victories I've had, everything's been a victory. It's all been a victory. And I won the election like nobody's ever seen anything like it. I get no -- they never write a good story. I will get a good story out of these people. (END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Now, when announcing the ban in a post that day, Trump also said, quote, "Media outlets shouldn't be able to constantly write or report fiction and lies when they're covering the president of the United States." Now, of course, the reality is that for Trump, fiction and lies refers to any story that he doesn't like. And this is a ban that is more likely to be seen in Beijing than Washington.

China's Xi Jinping does have absolute control over the media. He has the power to silence dissenting voices. And that's exactly what Trump is doing on the same day that he meets with Xi, where he is rolling out the red carpet for the Chinese president, something that hasn't been done on U.S. soil. We haven't been here in nearly a decade.

But you won't find pictures and video today of today's pomp and circumstance. It's hard to find it because the biggest news organizations in this country are still refusing to cover the president because of the ban. Sort of like if a tree falls in the forest, did anybody hear it?

The Justice Department claims repeatedly that the ban was put into place though to protect national security. So, I want to go through this because in their court filing they do point to a number of reports by CNN, reports that they claim threaten national security or spread lies.

So, let's just go through them and take the first CNN story that's mentioned in the Justice Department filing called "Inside Plans to Rebuild the Top Secret Bunker Beneath the White House East Wing". Okay, so they cite this as a story threatening national security. That story was published on January 19th.

The administration took no issue with it at the time. In fact, Trump went on to brag about the complex and its underground military operations, saying this to reporters on Air Force One. "The military is building a massive complex under the ballroom, and that's under construction, and we're doing very well."

So, you heard what he said. The military is building a massive complex under the ballroom. But somehow CNN's story inside plans to rebuild the top secret bunker beneath the White House East Wing is a national security threat. Well, then there's this. The Justice Department mentions this reporting.

They say nearly 80 percent of interceptors for a key missile defense system depleted, sources say. At the time, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth responded with a post showing that graphic with that news, writing, "The chyron is false, CNN. You should be ashamed. We don't hate the fake news media enough."

Well, of course, what he said was false. I mean, the inspector general for Hegseth's own Defense Department revealed Operation Epic Fury has resulted in strategic inventory shortfalls. There's been incredible reporting detailing this in many outlets. And to state the obvious on this one, if the story was false, then it

didn't hurt national security. And it wouldn't be cited in the court filing legend that it did hurt national security. So, this is a very circular reasoning that does not add up.

The administration then also took issue with CNN's reporting on the U.S. strike that hit an Iranian school, killing more than 120 school children, according to Iranian officials. Now, sources told CNN that the U.S. accidentally struck the school, likely because of outdated information about a nearby naval base.

Now, that reporting is not a national security threat. That reporting is essential. And in the 208 days since that attack, the Pentagon's internal investigation has been stymied.

[19:05:03]

It has gone nowhere. And Trump has spent the past eight months passing the buck on this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: In my opinion, based on what I've seen, that was done by Iran.

Somebody said it was our missile. Well, maybe it wasn't our missile. I don't think it was us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Certainly, the United States that we all live in would want to get to the bottom of this and own up to it if it was America's fault.

Kristen Holmes is OUTFRONT in Washington.

And, Kristen, Trump wanted big coverage of his meeting with Xi, right, the red carpet, meeting him at the actual plane, which is virtually unprecedented, right, to go to that extra step. But instead, you are sitting in our bureau in Washington, D.C., and we have no pictures of Trump and Xi. He's getting none of it tonight.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. We would have been there. I mean, these are the moments that President Trump wants on camera. He wants the pomp and circumstance. He wants to show off what he is doing for President Xi.

And I will be clear, President Xi also wants those images scrolled across all of American news outlets, every TV station. And now they're not getting it. And he's facing the consequences of his own actions.

And Republicans I have talked to have really expressed somewhat of an annoyance over the fact that it's not just this issue in which he seems to be making his own political headwinds, creating his own problems for himself and the party, the economy, the war in Iran. And again, they believe that he is the one who created a lot of these problems that Republicans are now facing. it is a critical time for President Trump to be able to be on TV, to talking to reporters, to get out there on that pool feed because we away, weeks away, really, from those midterm elections at a time in which he should be selling his agenda to the American people.

Recent CNN polling says that 33 percent of people, only 33 percent, approve of the job he is doing as president. And now he still has taken away a vehicle that he had to get that messaging and his agenda out.

BURNETT: All right. Kristen, thank you very much, and everyone's here with me now.

Ryan, let me just start with you. I was going through the cases that the Justice Department cited today, the instances, right, from CNN. So, I was breaking those down, of course, and there was also the "Politico" and MS NOW cases.

So, did the team make any kind of a compelling case in those charges?

RYAN GOODMAN, FORMER SPECIAL COUNSEL AT DEPARMENT OF DEFENSE; No. It's very inevitable that this judge will rule against the government. It went terribly for the Justice Department. The judge basically said, look, I'm working with standing precedent. the Court of Appeals has said that if you ever want to deny journalists a press badge for the White House in particular, you have to give the standard before the alleged misconduct. You have to announce it. You have to publicize it.

And that did not happen here. Even the letter that they're trying to do to cover for the president, the letter that goes out to CNN, MS NOW, and "Politico", lists a bunch of news reports occurred weeks and months ago. That's not how it's done.

So when the government is up there before the judge They can't say anything in their defense because that's the standing precedent and they violate the precedent because the announcement is of things in the past They have to have had standard established the standard that this would be a punishment for publishing those news articles before the news articles were ever published.

It's just game over. There's nothing there.

BURNETT: There's nothing there.

I mean, Stephanie, the judge started the hearing today by referencing the Brian Karem decision, which is in 2019. Brian was on the show last night talking about it. You were the one charged as press secretary at the time with suspending Brian's press pass. A judge overruled it, right?

Now, I know you learned a lesson there, but here Trump is, take two, if even that.

STEPHANIE GRISHAM, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Well, I mean, when I was press secretary the entire time, I was tasked actually with getting the entire press corps, everyone, out of the white, off the White House grounds. And in fact, they told me we were going to use the excuse that we were needing more office space. So, he's been wanting to do this for quite a while and I don't think that by the time he's done, I think he will get that end goal, whether he cares about the courts or not.

With Brian, he and a staffer almost got into a physical altercation. So I sent him an e-mail saying his press pass was suspended for 30 days and yeah, they took us to court and we lost and we appealed it and we lost.

So, he just doesn't like these stories and it made me laugh. I was listening to the hearings today and the fact that so hard on national security doesn't surprise me at all. He did it with the ballroom. He's now doing it with this this arch. I mean, he knows that that's one place that people can't argue.

But I will say this as press secretary, I never dealt with a reporter that wasn't absolutely a pro when it came to the actual national security issues. They don't want anything to happen to our country either. They do great at listening to us, keeping things quiet. So even the national security thing is very light.

[19:10:02]

BURNETT: Yeah, I mean, S.E., what do you make, though, of one thing Stephanie said, which is, courts aside, this is what he wants. We know the press off and that he's going to get it.

S.E. CUPP, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Oh, I don't know that he'll get it, but this is about Trump's feelings. And it is not our job in the press to make Trump feel better about the consequences of his own decisions. And the consequences are polling. The consequences are political. They're also practical.

BURNETT: Gas prices, diesel prices.

CUPP: Gas prices, the effects of the war, the effects of a trade war, the effects of tariffs, the effects of all the things. We get to report that he has to lie in the bed that he made.

But this is not about the law, because all the things we laid him out, all the things he's accusing us of, to use his own words, we're reporting lies and fiction, we're doing it purposely, and we're coordinating to do it, there's a word for that. It's defamation. It's actual malice.

He could sue us if he truly believed we were doing all those things. But he's not, because it's not about the law. It's not about facts. It's about his feelings.

And we're not his kindergarten teachers. We're not his mom or his little league coach. Someone else needs to console him, it is our job to hold powerful people accountable, period.

BURNETT: Right. And that is why presidents don't like the coverage they get, because when you hold them accountable, right, that's the whole point, to hold them account, not to be a sycophant and tell them how great they are.

ASTEAD HERNDON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: It is essential to the role, and Donald Trump knows that. I mean, but to Stephanie's point, he's been building to this point over a series of time, and I don't think it's an accident that it comes at his lowest approval rating yet. This is someone who is lashing out, and so not only is it a blatant infringement of First Amendment.

BURNETT: Even some below 30.

HERNDON: Yeah, yeah. Not only is it a blatant infringement of the First Amendment, it's frankly just blatantly petty too. But I would say on the political front, he's also picking on an institution which unfortunately is one of the few with lower approval ratings than him. I mean, when we think about mass media, public trust is at the 28 percent. That's lower than his 33 percent.

I remember being at the Trump rallies in which we were booed and spat on by some of those supporters. That's the game that he's sort of trying to play here. And I think we should actually acknowledge as folks who are interested and care about the press's role in democracy, this kind of a muted response to something that I think would have had a much bigger response in Trump's first term, too.

And so, I also think that I'm not trying to victim blame here because this is a president who is lashing out for his own accord, but I also think it's incumbent on the press to say, how do we prove to the public that we are an essential part of this democratic experience? Because I do think we are, right?

And I think that we should take that 28 percent number as something that we want to improve, too.

BURNETT: Right, right, right. No, I think that's If that's about tied with Trump, right, look at how Trump is seen.

HERNDON: That's what I'm saying.

BURNETT: It's an important point.

The White House, Ryan, is downplaying-- we're talking about Xi Jinping being here tonight, right, and the fact that that's an important story. And as Kristen said, we want to cover it. We absolutely do. But we're banned. So, we're not -- it's not being covered.

The comparison, though, between the power that Xi Jinping wields over his own press, the ability to silence dissent, imprison people he doesn't like, you know, all of that that he has and Trump does not have. The deputy press secretary today for Trump said the comparisons of the two just don't add up. Here it is. Let me play.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TAYLOR ROGERS, WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY PRESS SECRETARY: There's no comparison. This is the most transparent president that our country has ever seen. Reporters go in and out of the Oval Office almost daily. They cover him all the time. And these outlets still have the opportunity to cover the United-- to cover the president of the United States. It just might not be from the Oval Office.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: Jonathan Swan, by the way, says we know five percent of what goes on in this White House, five percent. So just the most transparent president doesn't -- flies in the face of any kind of reality.

But what about the argument that there's no comparison between what Xi Jinping is doing and what Trump is attempting?

GOODMAN: So, there's certainly no comparison between what Trump's attempting and what other modern presidents have ever attempted. There's one scuffle that happens with Obama, but it doesn't end up in court. So that's why we have CNN and Acosta v. Trump, Brian Karem v. Trump, Associated Press v. Trump.

He's not only doing it, but he's forcing the issue into the courts in order to say this is the maximalist power that I want. And it's from day one, when people looked at their first executive orders, The claim of executive authority is so maximalist. One set of lawyers called it dictatorial authority because not even after 9/11 did George W. Bush claim this level of maximal executive power.

That's what he's trying to do through the courts. He's actually trying to obtain that power through the courts. They are pushing back on it, but that is totally unprecedented, and it is on a spectrum towards something that does not look like American democracy at all.

BURNETT: And that spectrum, S.E., where you have on the other extremes places like Russia or China --

[19:15:04]

CUPP: Yeah.

BURNETT: -- or even more extreme, North Korea, those are all individuals and systems, you know, about which Trump has expressed great admiration specifically about their control.

CUPP: I think Trump wishes he were president of a country that looked more like Russia or Hungary or China. The irony is, as he's screaming at home about our Democrats running who are socialists and communists, he seems to look up to regimes that behave in these oppressive ways, and he's accusing our own people of engaging in that kind of actions and activities.

That's what he would really want. He really admires that. It's a liberal, it's authoritarian, and it's not who we are. And the American people like the part of the Constitution. They like the part that deals with the First Amendment. They support it.

BURNETT: I mean, Trump is saying that the outlets are, you know, he's accused them of being treasonous. HERNDON: Yeah, I mean, he's done this so many times.

BURNETT: Crime punishable by death.

HERNDON: And I mean, this is intentional, I think, to the lawyer's point, the strategy that they're executing. They want to force the issue into courts. They want to be able to seize an expanded view of executive authority, and that's been an explicit part of his second term project. I also think it's important that he wants to insulate himself from consequences too. Like this is a president who his strategy for the midterms was basically to win them before they started by drawing new districts.

I mean, he has basically tried to respond to his growing unpopularity by insulating himself from the ways our democratic system would expose them. He's trying to shut those out.

BURNETT: So, Stephanie, can I circle back here where you started, which is you said Trump, his goal is to get the media out and regardless of the courts, that he could be successful. How and in what way do you think that he could do that?

GRISHAM: Well, I'm no lawyer, so let me start there. But I just think that if he takes it to the Supreme Court and they rightfully side with the media, I think he could get to a point where he's like, no, let's kick him out. And anybody who kicks him out, I'll just give you a pardon.

And I do want to just follow up really quickly with something that, well, SE said too. But speaking of Russia and North Korea and China, I heard him on two different occasions in a bilat with China and in a bilat with North Korea. The North Korea, I actually physically fought those guards to get the press into that room, and he told them on both occasions, the dictators, that is, that the press aren't they animals, they're animals, they're crazy, you have the right idea.

So, he absolutely wants to have a presidency more on the side of dictators.

BURNETT: That's incredible. They're animals, and you have the right idea. Wow.

All right. Sobering finale there, Stephanie, but thank you very much, and thanks to all of you for being with us.

And next, we've obtained new information tonight that reveals the number of attempted suicides during the USS Abraham Lincoln's record deployment. An official calling the number incredibly high, and we have it.

Plus, Iran's president tonight responding to Trump's threat to annihilate his country in New York.

And new videos out of Austin, Texas, show ICE agents involved in a high-speed chase moments before the DoorDash driver was shot.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:22:52]

BURNETT: Breaking news, President Trump just greeting Chinese leader Xi Jinping at Joint Base Andrews. We don't have video of it because Trump decided to ban CNN and other outlets from the White House. But this is a real honor for Xi. It's extremely rare for the president of the United States to greet any leader on the tarmac instead of waiting for them to drive up to the White House where they do the greeting.

And when Trump went to China earlier this year, Xi was not at the airport to meet him. The Chinese vice president was there instead. So, this is an incredible honor, a real elevation. It is the first time that the two men have met face-to-face on U.S. soil in nearly a decade since Trump last had Xi here.

And Trump is rolling out the red carpet tonight, even as the Wall Street Journal is out with incredible reporting, okay? A Chinese satellite imagery was linked to an Iranian strike that killed three American troops in July. And as detail in just a few moments. China is in possession of some of the most top secret military information in America right now.

So, I want to go to Democratic Congressman Adam Smith, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, to talk about all this.

And, Congressman, I appreciate your taking the time tonight.

Can we start with where we are? I don't have the images, right? But this rolling out of the red carpet for President Xi, this greeting at the airport, not at the White House, the handshake, a bouquet of flowers. Do you think that Xi deserves a welcome like this from the U.S. president, given just two of several stories, but the two that I just mentioned about satellite Chinese data being used to target a strike that killed American soldiers and the F-35s.

REP. ADAM SMITH (D-WA), ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: No, I don't. I mean, I think it's very important for President Trump and President Xi to meet, to be in communication, to deal with our differences. We have many.

But I don't think Trump needs to elevate him. And I think your previous guests hit the nail on the head. Trump aspires to be Kim Jong Un or President Xi or Putin, to lead a country where he's the absolute dictator and can control things. I mean, he rolled out the red carpet for Putin when he showed up for that meeting.

BURNETT: Literally, yeah.

SMITH: So, it's really troubling. Yeah, literally. Yeah, sorry. I left out that word.

I mean, it's really troubling that we have a president of the United States of America who doesn't admire Zelensky, doesn't admire the leaders of the democratic nations like Canada or Germany or whatever. He admires Kim Jong-un, Vladimir Putin, and President Xi of China. BURNETT: So, I want to ask you about the Bloomberg reporting, okay? This is, you know, I was talking about this with Senator Mark Kelly when we first heard a little bit about this. He was deeply concerned, okay, that the Chinese government, there was a shipment of F-35 stealth aircraft parts.

It was going from Australia. It was coming to the U.S. It got intercepted. And now Bloomberg's reporting that was indeed by China, okay? The parts were diverted to Hong Kong and now they've got them.

Now, Bloomberg is reporting that this includes a cockpit canopy, which, of course, you can't overstate the importance of that particular piece of the F-35 in terms of reverse engineering or understanding it, and a weapons bay door from an F-35 that were coated in radar-absorbing material.

So, again, yeah, I mean, go ahead and I want to give you a chance to respond to this because it's obviously hugely significant.

SMITH: Yeah, well, I mean, look, China is trying to compete with us. They're trying to beat us. They're trying to steal our stuff. That's not surprising.

What's troubling is that we somehow allowed this to happen. And I want to take a step back from all of this and just say, we have to figure out, like I said, how do we get along with China? And that doesn't mean acquiescing and ruling over for everything that they're doing.

But as we start down the road of this is unacceptable and that's unacceptable and everything's unacceptable, this is how we've stumbled into conflict after conflict after conflict, all right? I don't know the precise path to resolve these differences. I recognize the threat that China poses to us militarily, economically, in a bunch of different ways. But we can't go down the inevitable road to conflict that I hear so many commentators on this issue, elected leaders and others laying out for us.

BURNETT: So there's also a development tonight that I wanted to run by you because we've just found out this. We obtained a letter from the acting secretary of the Navy revealing that eight U.S. Navy personnel assigned to the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group attempted suicide, so the number is eight.

You have more context on this, of course, than I do, but a U.S. official does tell us the number is incredibly high. The other recent deployments have one or two per year, so it was eight on this deployment. And, you know, we've obviously been there's been reporting on some of this, but in their position is the top Democrat on armed services. What are you hearing about the toll that this war is taking on service members?

SMITH: It's been brutal. And look, this is Gosh, one of many reasons why starting this war was so stupid in the first place. We are stretching ourselves over capacity. We are pushing our service members to the brink and not giving them the support that they need. I think the war was just incredibly disastrous starting in the first place. It was going to go to this place where we don't have the resources to

meet the demands that Trump is placing on them, but also, why are we finding out about this? Because we had to dig it up. We had to go and, you know, somehow find out this information because the Department of Defense is not being transparent with the American people.

They're not being transparent on the number of casualties. They're not being transparent on the toll of the troops. They're not being transparent on the cost, how much munitions we needed or used. And they certainly haven't been transparent on the impact this is having on our troops.

BURNETT: Congressman, I appreciate your time and thank you very much.

And Iran's president has a message for Trump. Iran's president here in New York after Trump threatened to annihilate the country of Iran. We still, though, have not heard from the supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. We have new reporting tonight, though, about his status.

And a candidate's words coming back to haunt. Exclusive reporting from KFILE revealing a Republican candidate once trashed the state she's now running to represent. She denies saying it, but he's found the tracks.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:34:14]

BURNETT: Tonight, Iran Defiant speaking in New York, the president accusing the United States of terrorism.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MASOUD PEZESHKIAN, IRANIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): The United States president described us as terrorists. We have been the victims of terrorism. We will never bow our head or bend at the knee.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: The lone U.S. delegate in the room walked out in protest as the president went on with that description. It comes just a day after President Trump threatened Iran yet again with annihilation and being driven to hell. Then hours later, praised the quote, very good meeting his advisors had with the Iranians, the typical whiplash that we have become accustomed to.

OUTFRONT now, Karim Sadjadpour and Robert Kagan.

Karim, so Iran's message, obviously there was a strident speech, the president, he wanted to, you know, he said what he said, he knew that the U.S. delegate would walk out, right, all of that was part of the strategy. What's the strategy?

KARIM SADJADPOUR, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: So I think President Pezeshkian has one of the worst jobs in the world because he's essentially sandwiched between a hostile international environment and a very radical internal environment. You know, internationally, the Israelis at one point tried to bomb him. He survived a bombing attack. And he's also being threatened with impeachment.

So, when he comes and speaks before the global stage, He's essentially representing a radical revolutionary regime, which he has no ability to moderate.

BURNETT: Yeah, so Robert, how much do you think any of this changed or was impacted by Trump's threat yesterday to annihilate Iran and drive them to hell?

ROBERT KAGAN, CONTRIBUTING WRITER, THE ATLANTIC: No, the threat is totally hollow. I don't think that The United States right now has the capacity to launch a major military action against Iran without so depleting already depleted interceptor stocks as to leave the United States naked in the event of a conflict with Russia or China, both of which are possible. I'm sure the military has repeatedly advised Trump not to do that.

So, the threat is hollow, and, you know, it's just really at this point a question of when will Trump finally give in to Iran, I think that's where this is heading. I know there were divisions in Iran, but the divisions in the United States are getting deeper and deeper as Republicans turn against the war.

BURNETT: Which they have done. I mean, we've seen with several people running for office, Mike Rogers, right, who had stood by it, now coming out and turning against it in the Michigan Senate race.

Karim, Pezeskian, as you say, an unenviable sandwich. Okay, he is the symbolic head of the country. He's the president, right? He's here at the U.N., right? So, he has that role.

You're talking about IRGC power players who are back in Tehran. And there's also, of course, the Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei. And seven months, we haven't heard from him. You're hearing some perhaps new details, though, about his status?

SADJADPOUR: Well, when I speak to both senior folks in the U.S. government and folks inside Tehran who've known Mojtaba, they will give differing answers about his --

BURNETT: His passing (ph).

SADJADPOUR: -- his situation.

Some will say that he is still alive, he's running the country, he's motivated by revenge. Others will say, Listen, there's no proof of life. Not only have we not seen him, we haven't heard his voice.

U.S. officials have said, listen, we're told by the intelligence community that every decision Iran has to make takes a long time because you have to go and get it approved by Mojtaba. But we haven't seen any signs of life.

BURNETT: It's like the Wizard of Oz. I'm not trying to say that to be light, but, I mean, the truth is no one knows who is giving those approvals if it isn't him.

So, Robert, I want to follow up on something you said, though, when you talk about the inevitable outcome here as you see it of the U.S. giving in. We've heard a lot about the arguments that Iran does have a lot of internal divisions and the economic pain there is so severe there's only so much they can take. Those arguments are used to make the case that it is Iran which will eventually the clock will run out, right? We've all heard that argument.

You don't agree with it. You say the U.S. is in a worse position. How do you see it?

KAGAN: Yeah, I don't want to minimize the difficulties that the Iranians are facing. They're very severe. I don't -- you know, they're starving them to some extent, although the Iranians have demonstrated for decades their willingness, or at least the leadership's willingness to put the people through this. And I don't see signs of cracking in Iran.

If you wanted to see signs of cracking, you would see it here in the United States. The economic situation gets worse and worse, and it's clearly being driven by the Iran war and energy prices. And now, treasuries are -- the yields and treasuries have gone through the roof.

I can imagine that's usually when Trump starts to back down. And I think there really is no outcome in this war other than Trump granting Iran ultimate control of the Strait of Hormuz. He will declare victory. The oil prices will drop, and even though it'll be one of the greatest strategic defeats that the United States has ever suffered with all kinds of global ramifications, I think that is how Trump is going to try to solve this problem.

BURNETT: Karim, we also would hear about this ground-swelling of people in Iran who would stand up. Obviously, that was part of the premise that the war was based upon, that the Israelis sold, whether that was the Kurds coming in, all of that, none of it's happened.

Is there any indication that it would happen at this point?

SADJADPOUR: No, Erin. This is a population in Iran which is totally demoralized. And what I find striking in both Washington and Tehran, it's two adversaries fighting a war which is it's using very modern tools.

But it's not fueled by national interests of either country. It's really fueled by these ancient impulses of hubris and avenging humiliation and revenge.

BURNETT: Yeah.

All right. Thank you both very much. I appreciate you.

And next, quote, "I'm embarrassed to say I live in Minnesota," end quote. Well, that is the deleted post from the woman you see on the screen, the Republican Senate candidate in Minnesota. So, what is she saying now?

And ICE facing new questions tonight. A driver dead after an attempted stop by agents just today, and an American citizen detained.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:45:15]

BURNETT: Tonight, a KFILE investigation into Minnesota Republican Senate nominee Michele Tafoya, revealing previous comments slamming the very state she's running to represent. Even more notable, in one interview, she flat-out denies ever disparaging Minnesota.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHELE TAFOYA, REPUBLICAN NOMINEE FOR U.S. SENATE IN MINNESOTA: I've never said I was embarrassed to be from Minnesota or to be a Minnesotan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: But our KFILE team found that she said exactly that, and KFILE's Andrew Kaczynski is OUTFRONT now.

So, Andrew, tell me what you've found here.

ANDREW KACZYNSKI, CNN KFILE SENIOR EDITOR: Well, Michele Tafoya is the former sports broadcaster turned conservative pundit turned Minnesota Senate candidate. And we found that she has a history of disparaging the state she wants to represent, saying she's embarrassed to live in Minnesota.

I want people to look at this tweet that we found she deleted in 2023, where she said, literally, quote, "I'm embarrassed to live in Minnesota. The state has gone so far left. It's amazing. Any of the snow still sticks."

She did, however, Erin, as we played right there, issue a rather categorical denial of having never said such a thing. Let's listen to a little bit more of what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TAFOYA: Okay. If I were embarrassed to be from Minnesota, would I be running for the United States Senate to represent Minnesota? Would I be putting my family and myself in this position to say I want to be the senator representing the great state of Minnesota if I were embarrassed of Minnesota?

I have never said that. I've never said I was embarrassed to be from Minnesota or to be a Minnesotan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KACZYNSKI: But, Erin, she did say that. And it didn't actually stop at that tweet that we just pulled up. After she sent that embarrassed tweet, people on X, as they tend to do, Minnesotans got a little angry about her tweet and started tweeting things at her. And that's when things got a little bit snarky.

One user said to her, you want to look at this tweet, they said, quote, "You can leave." And she responded, "That's the plan. Have a great day." She then added that she was considering moving to Tennessee.

And then a day after that, another user responded to her and said, promise, quote, or promise the question mark. And she said, yes, I want to make you and your 35 followers happy. So she was punching down a little bit about the person's follower account.

We actually found that over the past three years, she said on four separate occasions that she wanted to leave the state she now wants to represent in the United States Senate. She said in one, she said, quote, that she would be fleeing soon. In another, she said, "I will be leaving." And then she described herself in another as a, quote, "future former Minnesotan".

We also found that she said this on a number of podcasts and radio interviews just in the last few years, including this one from 2025, which is just a few months before she launches her Senate campaign. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TAFOYA: There are a lot of people leaving, and I think I'll be one of them in the near future.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BURNETT: So, okay, you lay all this out. She obviously, just by what you're showing, the fact that this was said again and again and again and again, right? This was a thing. It wasn't as if she forgot saying this. So how does she explain these comments now? And what is she saying now?

KACZYNSKI: Well, in that interview, she gets into it a little bit. She claimed, you know, she said, "I'm saying people are telling me that they're embarrassed to live in Minnesota. I'm just sort of relaying what they're saying." She says, I'm not criticizing the state itself I'm criticizing the state politicians and its policy which she is doing.

And they did give us a statement from her campaign manager. They sent a statement from her saying, quote, "I hear from Minnesotans every day that they are fed up and won't be staying forever if we can't turn the state around. I love Minnesota and I got into this race to fight for it."

So, she said she doesn't want to leave anymore and she's running for Senate because she is fighting to save the state is how she spends this.

BURNETT: Yeah, well, we'll see how all this plays out. As you said on X, you know, when you post something like she posted, it was Minnesotans who were.

KACZYNSKI: People were angry. People were mad.

BURNETT: People love where they're from.

All right. KFILE Andrew Kaczynski, thank you very much.

And next, new surveillance video showing ICE agents in a high-speed chase moments before the DoorDash driver was shot in Austin, Texas.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:54:45]

BURNETT: Breaking new, disturbing headlines involving ICE tonight in Grand Rapids, Michigan, A driver dead after fleeing immigration agents, according to state police. Our affiliate WZZM identifying the man as Mario David Coronado Juarez, father of three, originally from Guatemala.

[19:55:02]

He'd been working in Michigan as a construction worker, according to his family. He was pronounced dead at the scene after his car crashed into a tree and caught fire. It's unclear why ICE pursued him.

In Illinois, just outside Chicago, ICE agents mistakenly detained an American citizen, the man found on the ground by police after ICE agents left him with injuries, according to local authorities. A DHS spokesperson tells CNN that ICE agents were conducting an enforcement operation when they encountered a person who resembled their target.

Also tonight, CNN's obtaining new video out of Austin, Texas, giving a clearer picture of the moments before ICE agents shot a 28-year-old DoorDash driver.

And Ed Lavandera is once again OUTFRONT with the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my God.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is the moment when an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and wounded Wilber Garces Perez Sunday afternoon in Austin. But less than six minutes earlier, the 28-year-old Venezuelan immigrant had been stopped and pulled over by ICE officers.

A source familiar with the incident tells CNN that Garces-Perez fled the scene in his car. New videos released by Austin police, along with surveillance videos obtained by CNN, help reveal some of the moments that led up to the shooting.

It's 12:44 p.m. The dash cam of an off-duty Austin police officer shows two ICE officers standing by the driver's side window of a blue Toyota sedan driven by Garces-Perez. There are also two dark SUV's surrounding it. Right after this video is recorded, Garces Perez apparently fled the scene, sparking a chase in the surrounding neighborhood.

At 12:45 p.m., he's seen driving past a bingo hall about a half mile away with two black SUV's following behind him with their lights and sirens on. Seconds later, the chase passes a gas station, which again captures the two unmarked ICE vehicles still in pursuit.

At 12:46 p.m., less than a minute later, the blue Toyota is seen again in the gas station surveillance video, but this time moving in a different direction. Two dark SUV's are still following closely as the pursuit crosses the intersection.

At 12:47 p.m., the blue Toyota passes the gas station a third time, headed back toward its original direction. One dark SUV follows the car through the intersection. We don't see the second dark SUV this time.

About 30 seconds later at 12:48 video shows the blue Toyota driving in the direction of a highway overpass. One dark SUV in pursuit. Seconds later, a woman live streaming on her phone captures the sounds of squealing tires and gunshots under the highway overpass.

On Monday, Garces Perez took questions from journalists by speakerphone while he was in detention in an ICE facility. This is what he said about what happened, according to a translator.

TRANSLATOR: An SUV rode next to him and tried to hit him. He thought it was like an aggressive driver. Turns out it was not. He asked the ICE officer if he could please at least pull over so that they could detain him. They said no and they sideswiped him, basically. He did a U-turn to try and find a spot to park so that he could go with them and they basically ran into him and then shot him.

LAVANDERA (voice-over): Questions remain over what happened in the gaps between the videos and what led the ICE officer to fire his weapon.

The Travis County District Attorney Jose Garza says local investigators are requesting key pieces of video evidence from the Department of Homeland Security and interviews with the ICE officers at the scene. So far, Garza says DHS has not responded to those requests.

JOSE GARZA, DISTRICT ATTORNEY, TRAVIS COUNTY, TEXAS: There is a range of evidence that is in the possession of the federal government that would help local law enforcement officials assess whether or not there are any violations of state law, and to help this community understand what may have transpired on Sunday.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BURNETT: Ed, obviously live on the ground.

So, what has Garces Perez's attorney told you about the new videos? LAVANDERA: Well, we have reached out to the lawyer and have not heard back about why Garces-Perez fled the scene and about that pursuit as well. We should also point out that these new videos still leave the question about what happened in those final seconds and moments that compelled the ICE officer to fire his weapon. We've reached out to the Department of Homeland Security about that and have not heard back.

And here in San Antonio, Erin, just a little while ago, we spoke with Congressman Greg Casar, who met with Wilber Garces-Perez at that detention facility just a few hours ago. He says that during the meeting, the 28-year-old DoorDash driver was in a wheelchair, had just recently received an injection for pain medication. So, he was starting to feel a little bit better because of that. But he also told us that a doctor is recommending that he have surgery as soon as possible to remove the bullet that is still in his body -- Erin.

BURNETT: And you said in a wheelchair.

All right. Ed Lavandera, thank you very much. Ed's been reporting on this story.

And thanks so much to all of you for joining us. I just want to make sure you know, as you know, we've got streaming here now. You can stream our show live. You can watch on demand with a CNN All Access subscription. And if you don't know how, you can just scan the QR code or go to CNN.com/All Access. And all of the information is there. We hope you'll check it out.

Thanks so much for watching.

"AC360" starts now.