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Erin Burnett Outfront
Trump Orders DOJ To Block Alaska Senate Results If His Candidate Loses; New Documents Reveal Acton's Estranged Mother Has Troubling Past; Top Election Forecaster Predicts Dems Will Flip Up To 22 House Seats. Aired 7-8p ET
Aired October 23, 2026 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[19:00:29]
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next:
Breaking news, the president says he directed the Justice Department to intervene in a key Senate race, but only if the Republican doesn't win. Is this just the beginning?
Also breaking, CNN obtaining new court documents which reveal the estranged mother in Vivek Ramaswamy's ad has a, to say the least, troubled past, including a conviction for animal cruelty involving days-old kittens.
And a top forecaster moves 19 House races towards the Democrats tonight. "The Cook Report" says Republicans path to keep the house has, quote, "all but evaporated". That report's top analyst is our guest.
Let's go OUTFRONT.
(MUSIC)
BURNETT: And good evening. I'm Erin Burnett.
And on this Friday, we begin OUTFRONT with the breaking news. President Trump now appearing to be desperate in his attempt to keep control of Congress because he's admitted that he was the one who ordered the Justice Department to block Alaska from certifying its election results if and only if Democrats win.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Any thoughts on the Alaska lawsuits?
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, I'm the one that said do it. They have two guys named Dan Sullivan running.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Okay, so there it is, right? He said, I'm the one who told them to do it. Maybe no one really expected him to come out and admit to that, but what Trump is referring to in terms of Alaska is this. You can see there are two Dan Sullivans on the ballot, the incumbent Republican Senator Dan Sullivan and Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. The DOJ argues the confusion over the two could taint the results, but they say that they could only be tainted if the Republican loses.
And Trump directed this himself, right? He admitted that he told the DOJ to insert itself into an election if and only if his side loses.
So, when you listen to Attorney General Todd Blanche's own words, though, it is clear that he has no problem with this role, that his role as A.G., as he sees it, is to do Trump's bidding.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TODD BLANCHE, ATTORNEY GENERAL: So there was this misperception that there's this separation and independence between the Department of Justice and the White House, and everybody likes to champion that, and they accuse me of not suffering from independence. I don't. I work for President Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: So, I said there's no fig leaf. There's no attempt to say, oh, we're trying to be fair and square here. Blanche is saying the truth. He's saying what he thinks the job is.
President Trump has not been shy about his plans to interfere with the upcoming election either. For weeks, he has been laying the groundwork to undermine trust.
In an interview with "Time Magazine", I don't know if you remember this, but he refused to rule out invoking the Insurrection Act or declaring a national emergency around the midterms. He said, quote, "I don't rule anything out or in. We'll see." Reporter asks, you mean -- he said, "You mean the Insurrection Act?" The reporter says, "Yeah", to which Trump responds, "No, I've never used it. I could use it."
And then, of course, there are his comments about the polls, which Trump is using to create fears of a rigged election.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: The polls are fake. A lot of the polls are rigged. The polls are fake. Fake news, fake polls are all fake. They're rigged polls. A lot of crooked polls.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: And everyone is here with me now. I want to begin with Ryan Croswell, because you handled-- you were prosecuted for the DOJ. You resigned in protest of what you believed were Trump's efforts to interfere with the DOJ. And obviously, you handled election cases for the public integrity section there.
So, do you-- when you look at this case that the DOJ is bringing the preemptively suing to block the certification of the Senate race in Alaska if the Republican loses? RYAN CROSSWELL, FORMER DOJ ATTORNEY: Hi, and it's great to be back with you. Yeah, this this is incredible and I think unprecedented. We're talking about a situation where the DOJ is essentially stating ahead of time, that any votes that are cast for this third-party candidate should be countered in favor of the senator, and we know that all the time Republicans and Democrats voters, they're frustrated with both, so they vote for independent candidates.
It is a preemptive decision that unless I guess Mary Peltola wins by more votes than this third party candidate gets, they're going to try to enjoin the result and stop certification. By the way, that is not the federal government or the DOJ's job. It's the state's job.
It's really incredible.
BURNETT: Doug, Trump had no problem.
[19:05:00]
He's the one who brought up. No one asked him if he authorized it. They asked him what he thought about it, and he came out and said, I'm the one who told them to do this. I directed them to do it.
DOUG HEYE, FORMER RNC COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: I don't think that would surprise anybody. Look, this is what we had the confirmation hearings for. I think what a lot of the people who watched learned, but not all the Republican senators that they wanted to learn.
I made a bet with a friend of mine who worked for one of the three, what we call the YOLO caucus, right? Thom Tillis, Bill Cassidy, John Cornyn. I said, I'll bet you a real fancy steak dinner that all three of them are really troubled with Todd Blanche, vote yes. He called me a name I'm not going to repeat on air, but he wouldn't take the bet.
So, when all three voted yes, I said, do I get my steak dinner? This is what Republicans have signed up for. And unfortunately, if chaos is ensued here in the next couple weeks, and Alaska's a mess anyways, and I don't believe any polling that I ever see come out of Alaska because it's the hardest state in the country to poll, Donald Trump is already laying his case out for how he's going to muddy these waters.
And unfortunately, I would say to my Democratic friends, If you're scared of what Trump is going to do with a loaded gun, don't give him any bullets. Two Dan Sullivans on the ballot is a bullet for Donald Trump. You've given him opportunity to do this.
BURNETT: What do you say, Tara?
TARA SETMAYER, FORMER GOP CONGRESSIONAL COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: Well, Doug is right. I mean, this is literally just the tip of the iceberg. I mean, Donald Trump has been laying the foundation for interfering in these midterms for years. A lot of his acolytes have been studying how to -- how to manipulate the system, how to stress test it ever since January 6th, and now you have no guardrails.
And there are so many people in positions of power now that weren't there the first time around that are looking at wargaming ways to do this. I'm concerned about a trifecta here. And the thing about it, he's so audacious now, they're telegraphing what they're going to do. I mean, they've been telling us for years, they laid it out in Project 2025, you had these different legal think tanks that under the guise of constitutional law, that a lot of MAGA supporters were cooking up these ideas.
I just don't want Democrats to suffer from a lack of imagination of what this administration is laying the foundation to do come Election Day. They're showing us they have people in power who can do it.
And Todd Blanche, I guess he fell asleep during the Watergate history books because that is why we had that separation between the Justice Department and the president of the United States.
And Doug and I, when I was a Republican along with Doug and we used to do things at the RNC, I was up in Alaska in 2004 when Senator Murkowski was running and she was down a couple points. It was about this time in the election. They the RNC had a program and they would bring staffers and campaign folks up there into different campaigns to help them win. She turned around and within 10 days and ended up winning by three points.
So, a lot can happen in Alaska and clearly the polling is making the Republicans nervous So they're going to mess with the system and we have to stay vigilant on this. This is not a surprise.
BURNETT: I guess it's a case of -- you know, Trump likes to say the polls are who knows what the polls are right or wrong. But he likes to say they're rigged when they're not in his favor.
SETMAYER: Of course.
BURNETT: But as I say, his actions speak louder than words You're not filing a preemptive lawsuit to not certify the results if you lose, if your view isn't that you're losing.
MAX ROSE (D), FORMER U.S. REPRESENTATIVE: Well, listen, kudos to him for not even trying to hide it here, this not just partisan behavior, but also just this reckless anti-democratic behavior.
But us Democrats knew this was coming. For months, we have been talking about the fact that the individual who architected, catalyzed, and cited, whatever you want to say, January 6th, violent riot to overturn an election would continue with this reckless behavior.
Positive news, though, is that our governors throughout the country, where the majority of these contested swing districts actually are, have been preparing for this, coordinating with state law enforcement, National Guard, local judicial authorities, I think, to rapidly respond to these very instances.
HEYE: And Erin, none of this is happening in a vacuum. Judges are going to see exactly what Donald Trump said in a preemptive filing that makes it really hard to prove when you said, well, this was going to be a case only if we lost. It's a real bad statement for him to make politically, but also if you
want to win this case in the court.
BURNETT: So, Ryan, when we come to the DOJ and Todd Blanche saying independence is a farce and I don't pretend to be independent and I work for the president, right? You heard him say that. He was very clear.
And I just wanted to play a short exchange in that context that he had during his confirmation hearing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE): If you're confirmed and you're asked to take an action you believe to be illegal or unethical, would you resign?
BLANCHE: That will never happen, but yes, if it were to happen, I'm not going to violate my oath to the Constitution.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: So where are we, Ryan? In your eyes, is this lawsuit -- and obviously, Blanche is completely fine with this lawsuit, right? But is this something that would -- that would cross that line, that would be taking an action that is or unethical?
[19:10:02]
CROSWELL: Yes. I mean, I don't -- I don't -- I think that Todd Blanche considers ethical to be whatever is in the interest of Donald Trump. But understand this was litigated already. The Supreme Court of Alaska decided this.
So, this is like making an end run around their decision. And it just -- it breaks my heart, Erin. I served in the DOJ for 10 years. They're supposed to protect our elections. And for the first time, They are the threats.
We've heard stories of prosecutors being told they have no discretion to decline election interference cases. My former section, the public integrity section, was essentially gutted. We protect elections in a nonpartisan way. And just this week, for the first time in history, the National Voting Rights Act provision that prevents voter intimidation was used against DHS. You're talking about a law that was passed during the civil rights era. to protect voters in the South is now being used against our own government.
And Todd Blanche is the top of this. And I just have to ask you, I mean, ask the American people if the second candidate was named Mary Peltola, do you think Todd Blanch would be doing this? Of course, he wouldn't.
I just think -- it's just very, very sad. Of course, he's not going to resign. He's going to continue.
BURNETT: You know -- and I think the sad point, I understand it's a rhetorical question, but unfortunately, we can all answer that. And that's the problem, right? That is the problem.
Let me just ask you, Tara, in the midterms, as we're looking just overall, right, going beyond Alaska here. New Harvard youth poll finds Trump has a 21 percent approval rating with young voters.
Now, that's people under the age of 30 -- 21. and that likely young voters say they would vote for a Democrat over a Republican at their district, okay, just generic Democrat, Republican, 63 to 26. That's not -- that's not close. You know, you might say, curious to find where the 21 percent are, but that's not close.
So, I understand there's a lot of consternation about the polls. Trump's not the only one who's not sure about the polls. A lot of pollsters aren't sure about the polls, but do you see a problem in numbers like this, the youth for Republicans.
SETMAYER: Well, I mean, the Republican Party has traditionally been behind the curve a little bit when it comes to the younger voters 18 to 34. Now they made inroads with that with that cohort, thanks to hundreds of millions of dollars being invested into Turning Point USA and what they -- and what they've been doing on college campuses. And we saw the numbers in 2024.
But I'm not surprised to see that folks who are under the age of 30 are looking at and particularly the ones that Republicans were able to capture now saying, wait a minute, what do we do? They have buyer's remorse.
I mean, it's part of many demographics because Donald Trump betrayed them. He's betrayed them. He's betrayed them on the economy. No new wars, just like he has with veterans and farmers and small business owners, which is why Donald Trump is underwater in so many places.
So, this is just another cohort that the Republicans have not done a good job of maintaining because it's part of the coalition that helped them win in '24 and it's also going to be part of the coalition that's going to in 2026 and potentially 2028 if Donald Trump is who they're measuring the successor up against.
BURNETT: And yet -- and yet, if Democrats do win the House, and that appears to be very likely, very possible, okay, then they have a decision as to how they're going to spend their time. Are they going to investigate and impeach, which they could do, or are they going to, while they could do that, do something else?
Connor Sen, former Bloomberg opinion columnist, did you see this?
ROSE: I did.
BURNETT: Okay, I saw it last night. He invoked Max's name. He was talking about Democrats potentially winning the House, and he said they would give a chance for some Max Rose type Dems to distinguish themselves.
So that stood out to me. I went and checked your record. You did things like bills on fentanyl with Republicans, you -- practical. Get the potholes filled, kind of governing. And I'm not, you know, are we going to see Max Rose type people?
ROSE: Well, I thought Connor was referring to very attractive, charismatic, intelligent members of Congress.
BURNETT: Oh, my goodness. I'm so sorry.
ROSE: Clearly, it was my record on potholes.
But no, look, I think that there are two sides of the coin here, both of which I proudly tried to pursue. One was really trying to bring government to people. And that's a brand of, you know, Democrats that is now becoming far more widespread. That applies to, you know, Sam Forstags, and quite frankly, AOC is doing that, too. So that's generational.
But look, there will be some Democratic members of Congress that get elected that will not be there forever. A wave of yours called just that for a reason. And I think what Ken's also referring to is, look, I voted to impeach the president. I voted for police reform at a time where it wasn't necessarily the most popular thing to do. Some say it's why I lost my seat as well.
And, you know, that is a reason for Democrats to be proud, too. That's why people are voting for Democrats, because they will not just be there to win reelection.
[19:15:02]
They'll also be there to do the right thing. You know, politics be damned.
BURNETT: Well, that's the big question, right? If they do get that win. Is it squandering it if you use it on investigations?
HEYE: Look, I think Hakeem Jeffries is going to have a very difficult job for two reasons. One, he's not Nancy Pelosi, the most effective leader that we've seen, Republican or Democrat, in generations. And he is going to have what John Boehner, Paul Ryan, Mike Johnson, Kevin McCarthy had on the Democratic side, a House Democratic Freedom Caucus. Good luck.
ROSE: You're ridiculous.
HEYE: All right, we'll see. I'll bet you steak dinner on.
BURNETT: Max just turns his chair as if he's getting up. I mean, the segment is over, but I know you're going to walk out.
ROSE: The Freedom Caucus was anti-government. The entire Democratic caucus coming in under Hakeem Jeffries leadership will focus on governing for the people, something Republicans have utterly failed to do.
HEYE: I hope you're right.
SETMAYER: So we've dug and I lived through the insurgency of the Tea Party. And believe me, we recognize the insurgency from the other side. We are. I am warning my Democratic friends. Please be prepared.
ROSE: Republicans have a monopoly on crazy and I'll stop there.
BURNETT: All right. We're -- we're --
HEYE: No one has a monopoly on crazy.
BURNETT: No, they don't.
All right, next, CNN learning troubling new details about Amy Acton's estranged mother, the one who appears in Vivek Ramaswamy's ad. That includes being convicted of animal cruelty involving kittens.
Plus, President Trump campaigning in his home state with a candidate who has all but erased Trump's image from his campaign website. Tonight, the Democratic nominee for governor of Florida is OUTFRONT.
And a KFILE exclusive this hour uncovering comments from the Republican nominee in a crucial Senate race, comments which include suggesting American political leaders deserve to be hanged from helicopter.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:21:05]
BURNETT: Breaking news, CNN obtaining new documents that detail a troubling criminal past for Amy Acton's estranged mother, Donna Arthur, including a conviction for animal cruelty. Arthur, who appears in that controversial ad put out by Vivek Ramaswamy, where she calls her daughter a liar, was also charged with fraud multiple times.
This comes as Trump is quadrupling down defending the ad and now praising Acton's mom, who again is accused of fleeing Ohio with her husband after a grand jury indicted him of sexually abusing her daughter, Amy Acton, when she was a young child.
Here's Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: The mother looks like she's totally elusive. This is a person, a mother, a smart woman. I watch smart woman. She said her daughter is a disaster.
Why wouldn't you listen to a mother that says that? Why? Why would you, Miss NBC? Why wouldn't you listen?
Wait a minute. Quiet. You have a -- I don't know anything about a stepfather. All you have -- this one just keeps talking. You just keep talking. You have a -- I don't know anything about stepfathers. many, many years ago.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: It's incredible. Brian Todd is OUTFRONT.
Brian, Trump praised Acton's mother today, and you're learning even more troubling new details, though, from these documents.
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, Erin, tonight we do have new information from court documents which shed more light on the troubled past of Amy Acton's biological mother. Court documents from a case in Pennsylvania in the spring and summer of 2021 say that Donna Arthur was found guilty at that time of neglect of animals.
News reports from that period which cited court documents say that Arthur was arrested after four five-day old kittens were found locked in her, quote, "filthy" vehicle with the windows rolled up and the temperatures inside reaching about 120 degrees.
The reports say a Humane Society police officer who responded to the call described feeling a, quote, "wave of heat released" when he opened the door and they say a staffer at a local animal rescue nonprofit testified that one of the kittens later died from heat.
Donna Arthur at the time disputed that the car was dangerously hot. She was given a fine and sentenced to probation. Arthur appealed the conviction, which we do have to say was later vacated, but that was because of a procedural error that the appellate court did not overturn the conviction on its merits.
CNN has also obtained court documents regarding the alleged rape of Amy Acton by her stepfather. One document from July 1978 says Amy Acton's biological father actually lodged a formal complaint against the stepfather, alleging that the stepfather engaged in, quote, "sexual conduct with someone who was less than 13 years old". The documents say the stepfather pleaded not guilty to rape charges on July 18th, 1978.
They indicate that he was indicted by a grand jury in September of 1978, but that the following month, in October of 1978, he vanished and he became a fugitive. The stepfather never stood trial. He died in 2004.
In addition, Erin, we also have documents from three fraud cases involving Donna Arthur. She was charged with fraud three different times in Pennsylvania, in July 1995, January 1996, and March of 1996.
She pleaded guilty in the 1995 case. She was found guilty in the January 1996 case. In that last case, March of 1996, she was declared a fugitive. CNN has attempted several times to reach Donna Arthur for comment on all of these matters. We not been able to get a response -- Erin.
BURNETT: It's all incredibly disturbing and frankly it's almost surreal that we're having this conversation.
But there's also, Brian, I know sound surfacing of Arthur saying in an interview back in 2020 that Acton's stepfather was accused of rape by another child, so that she was not the only one, but that that other child, just to be specific, who accused him of rape while a child was his biological daughter.
[19:25:12]
TODD: That is correct, Erin. In 2020, Donna Arthur gave an interview to the extremist anti-abortion group Operation Rescue. In that interview, she indicated that one of the stepfather's biological daughters had accused him of rape. Here's a clip from that interview.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONNA ARTHUR, AMY ACTON'S ESTRANGED MOTHER: Him and his wife were divorced and his oldest daughter lived with him and he was -- he always made her do her homework do this and that and she wanted to run around. She had accused him of rape and -- but that was dropped too because it never --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Never happened is presumably what she says there. That audio drops out there at the end of the Operation Rescue interview. CNN has reached out to Arthur for comment on that audio. She has not responded to that. that either, Erin.
BURNETT: No, no, but I guess consistent there in taking the side of her husband against now two children, one his stepdaughter, another's biological daughter accused him of rape while they were young children.
Thank you very much, Brian.
Amid all this uproar, a top election forecaster is now making a major projection moving the Ohio governor's race in which this horrible conversation has come up because Vivek Ramaswamy ran that ad. That race now moving from toss up to leans Democrat in favor of Amy Acton. It comes as another respected forecaster, Larry Sabato, also moved that race to lean Democrat.
OUTFRONT now, Dave Wasserman, senior editor and elections analyst at "The Cook Political Report".
Dave, I appreciate your time. You know, going through all that with Brian Todd, it's all-- it's disgusting and disturbing and horrible. And we're talking about all this because Vivek Ramaswamy ran an ad that the President of the United States continues to say is such an amazing thing. And you're making this major projection about that specific governor's race tonight.
Did the ad impact your call?
DAVID WASSERMAN, SENIOR EDITOR & ELECTION ANALYST: Let's be clear. Amy Acton was already ahead in this race. Our poll found her leading by five points. And this was a Hail Mary ad by Ramaswamy that threatens to derail his candidacy entirely. But all over the country right now, there are Republicans who are not as toxic as Vivek Ramaswamy or Ken Paxton or Donald Trump, who are trying to localize their races and make it a choice between their record and Democrats who they're trying to portray as the unacceptable alternative.
But to the extent that Vivek Ramaswamy, Donald Trump remain the face of the party and inject themselves into the national spotlight in this way in the closing two weeks of the campaign. It's harmful to Republican turnout, and this has the potential to infect other races in Ohio.
Keep in mind that there are key House races in Dayton, suburban Columbus, Toledo, the Cleveland suburbs where Max Miller has unique baggage and vulnerabilities that could cost Republicans a seat they should otherwise be able to -- not to mention the Senate race where Jon Husted is trailing Sherrod Brown.
So, there are massive problems popping up for Republicans in Ohio and elsewhere.
BURNETT: I like the word you just used. That ad has the potential to infect other races. You know, you also shifted 19 House races toward Democrats, and that covers the map, right? We're going beyond Ohio here, Dave. Texas, North Carolina, obviously states that Trump himself won easily two years ago, now leaning Dem.
I guess the bottom line is, when you look at all of this, does Trump have a chance at this point still to hold on to the House?
WASSERMAN: Not realistically. This is a question of how high this blue wave is going to go and how many Republican seats get swept up. And we're looking at shocking polling numbers for Republicans, not only in districts that Trump carried by five or 10, but 15 or 20 points.
And I think to the extent there are going to be surprises on November 3rd, I'd look to places with high numbers of secular white voters and also independents. And that points to the Midwest, Iowa, Ohio. Kansas, Nebraska, more so than the Deep South, where things are more racially polarized and it's more difficult for Democrats to win on turnout alone.
And on a really strong night for Democrats, it's easy to see how they could exceed the total number of seats they won in 2006 and 2018, given that President Trump's approval rating today is lower than where it was eight years ago and where George W. Bush's approval rating was amid the Iraq war. This could get to 235 seats or more.
BURNETT: Wow. All right, Dave Wasserman, I appreciate you and thank you. Have a good weekend.
WASSERMAN: You, too.
BURNETT: All right.
[19:30:00]
And next, Trump is in Florida, and he is taking on the Democratic nominee for governor there.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: He was thrown out of the party like a dog. We threw him the hell out. He was terrible. No, he was terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: So the person he's talking about throwing out like a dog is the former Republican turned Democrat, David Jolly. And he's our guest next.
Plus, exclusive reporting from K-File here tonight about one of the most watched Senate races. The Republican nominee from Georgia we now know has a history of praising a fellow Republican after she spoke up at a white nationalist conference.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BURNETT: Breaking news, President Trump campaigning in his home state of Florida, the state he won by 13 points in 2024, less than two weeks before the midterm elections. He's campaigning for Republican gubernatorial candidate Byron Donald, who's been one of Trump's staunchest supporters in the House but who recently removed almost any trace of Trump from his campaign website homepage, including a picture of the two together.
[19:35:07]
And as the polls have tightened in the Florida race, Trump is taking direct aim at Donald's opponent, who is a former Republican congressman turned Democrat.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: He was thrown out of the party like a dog. We threw him the hell out. He was terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: All right, well, that person is David Jolly. He is the Democratic candidate for governor of Florida.
And David, so you hear Trump saying they threw you out like a dog, his choice words for you at the rallies in Florida tonight. I mean, look, he won Florida easily, okay? But he's down there now.
I'm looking at the bug on our screen 11 days before election day, campaigning for your opponent in what would have been a safe state and yet he's down there now. Why do you think he feels the need to do this now?
DAVID JOLLY (D), CANDIDATE FOR FLORIDA GOVERNOR: Yeah, listen, I don't think people of goodwill really pay any mind to Donald Trump any longer. I think we're a nation looking past the president and frankly, many Republicans are looking past the president.
But the reason he's down in Florida is because this race is a toss-up tonight. I mean, we are defying history in many ways, not specifically because of candidates. Sure, I think we built a strong campaign around housing, healthcare, education, and no data centers, but because the people across the state of Florida are saying we have to do something differently.
I think honestly, this is a burn the ships moment for the nation politically where voters are saying, I don't care about party registration right now, we know that we are broken, our politics are broken, our leaders tell us if we just keep hating each other a little bit longer, if we just stay a little more divided, that somehow life's going to improve.
And so, they look at a rally like you saw today where the insults are being thrown and they say, hey, you're missing the point. We're worried about an economy slipping away from us. We don't care about the insults any longer. We need to know what you're going to do for housing, healthcare, and education.
And an incumbent party that has failed to deliver is now being held accountable by the American people.
BURNETT: So, you know, voting's already started. So, when I say we're 11 days, we're 11 days away from election day, but by then, you know, coast to coast, maybe not in every state, but by then the majority of people will already have voted, right? Early voting's underway across Florida and many counties now.
Democrats right now, David, have a slight edge over Republicans in ballots cast, two points, okay? Slight edge. And I know there's independent, there's things we don't know in there, but we do know that there are more than 1.5 million more registered Republicans than Democrats in the state of Florida.
And obviously, it went from being a swing state to a state that hasn't elected a Democrat as governor in 32 years. So why do you think this year will turn out differently?
JOLLY: Yeah, and throw in my opponents, raise $150 million, raise the stakes even higher.
Listen, cycles determine elections and this is a cycle I think most like a 1974 post-Watergate moment. Look, the economic crisis is real. Half of our state doesn't have enough savings the last two weeks. People are worried about affording their mortgage, their home insurance, their rent. Where do I get health care? A state that's abandoned public education.
And so, people are truly worried, but they're looking at a president who's building ballrooms and memorials to himself, and they're watching the outright grift, graft, and corruption crypto company that is feeding the economy for some, but not for everybody else.
And so, I think in this moment, yeah, it's a bit of a let them eat cake anger that you are seeing develop, but it's also just a moment where I think there's enough pent-up democracy where American voters are about to say, hey, it's time for a new direction. It's not unlike the sixth year of other presidents. We saw it in 2014
with Barack Obama. We saw it in '06 with George W. Bush. And I think what we're seeing is the sixth year of a presidency where the nation is exhausted by a president who's trading on anger and hate and insults when they're desperate for just solutions about their own personal economy.
BURNETT: So when it comes to election day, I want to ask you about the lawsuit that was filed today up in Alaska, right about as far from you as it gets geographically, but perhaps not. when it comes to the reality here. Trump says he directed the Justice Department to file a lawsuit to block certification of the Senate race in Alaska if the Republican loses because the Republican Senator Dan Sullivan is on the ballot, and among others on the ballot, there's another person named Dan Sullivan, obviously not a Republican.
Look, it's a close race between Senator Sullivan and Democrat Mary Peltola when it comes to the Senate race, okay? And it's important.
If Trump, though, can do this in Alaska, and he's got this Sullivan and Sullivan reason to do it, do you have any worries that he could do something similar in Florida?
JOLLY: I absolutely do. This is a president who orchestrated January 6th to try to stop the certification of a presidency. And so, we have also seen whether it is the deployment of ICE agents or the threats of ICE agents in communities.
[19:40:02]
I do believe that disrupting the election is something that's in Donald Trump's playbook.
And the question is, can we trust our local supervisors of elections? I believe we can. But I also think we're seeing the resiliency of the people, Erin. What I am seeing is a raw anger among voters saying, try to stop me. I dare you to try to stop me. We're going to turn out and we're going to vote.
Look, yes, the economy is the number one driver in our state, housing, healthcare, and education. But I'll also tell you we're litigating our own national identity. We're litigating something bigger than our politics.
You know, we have a family in our -- staying in our family in a world of Donald Trump be Ted Lasso. I think enough voters are saying, listen, the nation is broken right now. Our politics are broken. The economic inequality is because we have leaders who don't care, but we're failing to honor the ideals of a country that believes in economic opportunity for the most number of people.
And frankly, in a state that launched culture wars, returning to a place where everyone's dignity is respected and protected, we're litigating the fundamental goodness of who we are in the face of leaders who continue to tell us, just hate each other a little bit more, call people dogs from the state your life's going to get improved.
Voters are saying, no, we're not going to do that anymore.
BURNETT: All right, David Jolly, I appreciate your time. Thank you very much, the Democrat nominee, as we said, for governor in Florida.
JOLLY: Thank you, Erin.
BURNETT: And next, our KFILE uncovering a series of comments from the Republican nominee in the crucial Senate race of Georgia, comments not uncovered until now, and they suggest his political enemies be hanged from a helicopter.
Plus, how the fallout over the Epstein files is creating a new problem at this moment for Republican candidates.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:46:19]
BURNETT: Tonight, exclusive CNN KFILE reporting on one of the most watched Senate races in America. KFILE reporting revealing Republican Congressman Mike Collins, who is trying to unseat Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff in Georgia. He's uncovering a series of previously unreported comments in which Collins suggested hanging American military and political leaders from a helicopter and joked about pushing then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi out of an airplane.
And it goes farther than that. KFILE's investigation found Collins repeatedly promoting conspiracy theories about January 6th and continued praising a Republican lawmaker even after she called for more gallows at a white nationalist conference.
CNN's Andrew Kaczynski of KFILE broke this reporting.
All right, there's a lot there, Andrew. What did you find?
ANDREW KACZYNSKI, CNN KFILE SENIOR REPORTER: Well, Erin Collins has been dogged throughout this race by questions about his rhetoric and associations with the far right. And look, this is just the latest example of that.
What we'd uncovered is a series of previous unreported comments in which Collins suggested violence against political opponents and perceived enemies, including repeated references to throwing people out of an aircraft, for instance, this tweet that we found Collins was responding to an image of what was purportedly showing the Taliban hanging someone from a helicopter. And here's what he wrote, he said, "If someone said this is what should happen to one of our political/military leaders for everything that's happened in Afghanistan lately, they'd probably get banned so good thing no one says that."
So here's Collins suggesting that American political leaders and military leaders deserve the same treatment as what happened to that image. And, Erin, this wasn't the only time you made that comment. We found
just a few weeks earlier during a radio interview, Collins joked about pushing Nancy Pelosi out of a plane when another congressional candidate who was on joked about catching a ride with her on a private plane.
And Erin, both of those comments were made during Collins' first successful run for Congress a few years ago.
BURNETT: Right. And as you point out, that run was successful. Now, you talk about the helicopter, the airplane, but you also found that Collins continued praising a Republican lawmaker even after, okay, emphasis on after, she was censured for speaking at a white nationalist conference?
KACZYNSKI: Yes, that's right. This involves Arizona State Senator Wendy Rogers, she spoke at a white nationalist conference organized by Nick Fuentes in February 2022, where Rogers praised Fuentes and told his followers they were the future. She also declared, quote, that we need to build more gallows for perceived enemies.
And the backlash to this was so significant that the Republican-led Arizona State Senate censored her 24, 23. And even that, Collins continued to praise Rogers publicly. We found months later, he wrote in a tweet, "Very grateful to Senator Rogers and called her an early supporter who never backed down. Thank you."
And then we found that when he launched his Senate campaign in July 2025, Rogers endorsed him and Collins publicly thanked her in a tweet writing, "Thank you, Wendy."
BURNETT: So that continued, as you point out, even in the face of the censure, our Republican censure. So, you also found some new materials about Collin's son-in-law. You've done a lot of reporting on him for K-File. People on this show have seen it.
You've reported that he had a history of posting white nationalist content and antisemitic content as well. This became a heated issue, I know, based on a lot of your reporting in a debate.
KACZYNSKI: Yeah, right. In that debate this week, back in July, we reported on this show that Collins' son-in-law, who lives on a property owned by the congressman, had a history of sharing antisemitic material and Nazi imagery online. And during last week's debate, Ossoff repeatedly pressed Collins to commit to stopping what he called neo-Nazi propaganda being produced from his home.
[19:50:06]
Take a listen to that exchange right here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JON OSSOFF (D-GA): Will you commit tonight that for the remainder of this campaign -- it's just three weeks, Mike -- you won't allow any more neo-Nazi propaganda to be produced from your house. Can you make that commitment?
MODERATOR: Unfortunately, I'm --
REP. MIKE COLLINS (R-GA): No, I deserve that.
MODERATOR: Thirty seconds, 30 seconds, sir.
COLLINS: Yes, ma'am.
You know what? I'm a little tired of this, Jon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KACZYNSKI: Now, Erin Collins did condemn anti-Semitism and hate speech elsewhere in that debate, calling it important, but never directly responded to what Ossoff was asking. Instead, he accused Ossoff of fueling threats against his family. We also identified another anti- Semitic comment connected to Collins' son-in-law, this time coming from an Instagram account for a new skincare business that his son-in- law launched on Wednesday.
The comment used the term "goyslop", which Erin is an antisemitic term commonly used in white nationalist circles to describe what they say is unhealthy products that they claim Jewish people market to non- Jews. Now, Erin, we did reach out to Collins's campaign to ask all about all this stuff, and we haven't heard back.
BURNETT: Wow, wow, that goyslop, that term you say, that was on a skincare business that was launched on Wednesday?
KACZYNSKI: On Wednesday in the Instagram comments. That is correct, Erin.
BURNETT: All right, thank you very much, Andrew Kaczynski of KFILE.
It's incredible.
And next, the Epstein election, a special report tonight on how one of the world's most notorious sexual predators is looming large over some of the biggest races this election.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:55:50]
BURNETT: Tonight, 11 days to the midterms, the Democrats unleashing an Epstein ad blitz, taking aim at Republicans who voted to block the file's release. The issue is still front and center in races across the country, and M.J. Lee is OUTFRONT.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
M.J. LEE, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL ENTERPRISE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein looms over the midterm elections in Ohio. You see it here in the Epstein reading room, where visitors have
covered entire walls with Post-it notes encouraging people to get out and vote. The emotions are most visible on the faces of Epstein survivors who are taking in the installation's latest stop in Columbus.
WENDY PESANTE, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: Reality that -- it's huge. Like I know it is, but to see it. That's where -- there are so many girls that still should have been found. People should know.
LEE (voice-over): Rows and rows of bookshelves filled with volumes of the Justice Department's Epstein files. Wendy Passante was barely 15 when she was abused by Jeffrey Epstein in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Now an Ohio resident, Wendy says she never imagined that her abuser would become a hot-button political issue so many years later.
PESANTE: This one decision, the bad decision that I made when I was a kid, has been thrown in my face over and over and over again.
LEE (voice-over): Epstein has been dead since 2019, but over the past year, the child sex offender has roiled American politics.
One big reason, President Donald Trump's past friendship with Epstein. Trump has denied any wrongdoing related to Epstein.
And here in Ohio, one local billionaire has also become a political lightning rod, Les Wexner, the former Victoria's Secret CEO, was named an Epstein co-conspirator in government documents. Wexner employed Epstein as his money manager and has long denied any wrongdoing related to the pedophile.
Downtown, the Wexner name is everywhere you look.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This building right here. Yes, the Wexner Center for the Arts. Not to be confused with the Wexner Medical Center, which is over there.
Kaleb Duarte and Murray Katkin (ph) organized protests on campus, calling on the school to get rid of the controversial name.
KALEB DUARTE, OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY STUDENT: The Epstein issue allowed folks in our generation to understand the broader impact of those in power and how they protect their own power.
AD NARRATOR: Jon Husted took more money from Epstein's co-conspirator than anyone in Congress.
LEE (voice-over): Epstein has come up in the state Senate race, one of the marquee contests that will help decide who controls Washington after the midterms.
AD NARRATOR: While Senator Brown took 100 grand from Epstein associates.
LEE (voice-over): At campaign events outside of Columbus, we pushed both candidates on the Epstein issue.
LEE: Do you think that the release of the rest of the Epstein files by the DOJ that that should be a top priority for members of Congress?
SEN. JON HUSTED (R-OH): Yeah, I've always been supportive of releasing the Epstein files. What's out there is because of what that I made to make it happen.
You guys energize me so much.
LEE (voice-over): But neither Jon Husted nor Sherrod Brown is making Epstein their top issue weeks out from Election Day.
LEE: If you make it back to the Senate, how high would the Epstein issue rank in terms of your top priority?
SHERROD BROWN (D), OHIO SENATE CANDIDATE: I don't know. I mean, my first priority is how to bring prices down. And you wanted to make this interview about Epstein. My focus is way more than that.
LEE (voice-over): On the first day of early voting, every person I speak to leaving the polling station says they care about Epstein survivors. But most of these voters I speak to here say Epstein is not a major factor in their vote.
LEE: Was that issue an important one for you when you were deciding who to vote for, the Epstein issue?
BETTY COX, OHIO VOTER: Yes, it was one of them. But you know, with our gas, food, and everything going up in the war.
LEE (voice-over): Back in the reading room, Epstein survivors say they hope the midterm elections will show that voters are on their side.
SHARLENE ROCHARD, EPSTEIN SURVIVOR: Which should be at the forefront of any voter's mind, really. I think we're changing hearts and minds along the way.
M.J. Lee, CNN, Columbus, Ohio.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BURNETT: And, of course, questions now as to whether that Vivek Ramaswamy ad will bring Epstein and the Epstein issue back to the forefront for more voters in these final days.
Thanks so much for joining us. We'll see you on Monday.
"AC360" starts now.
