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Trump Mocks, Insults World Leaders In Annual U.N. Speech; Trump Tells World Leaders Climate Change Is "A Con Job"; Trump Cancels Spending Talks With Democratic Leaders; Sinclair; Nexstar Says They'll Keep Kimmel Off Their Stations. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired September 23, 2025 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MANU RAJU, CNN ANCHOR, INSIDE POLITICS: Today on Inside Politics, letters and empty words. President Trump uses a speech the United Nations to mock fellow world leaders and accuse the United Nations of being useless and toothless.

Plus, what will he say? Tonight, Jimmy Kimmel returns to late night. Did ABC bring him back because it values free speech or because it values profit? And turning back time, Kamala Harris says, if she could do it over again, she would have spent her 2024 campaign, telling the country she was not Joe Biden.

I'm Manu Raju in for Dana Bash. Let's go behind the headlines at Inside Politics.

We begin in New York, where President Trump used his annual address the United Nations to rebuke the world body and berate his fellow world leaders to their faces. The dressing down went on for nearly an hour and touched on nearly every major international challenge, war, migration, climate change, disease and technology.

After months of global leaders flocking to the White House and lavishing praise and endorsements for the Nobel Peace Prize, well, it seems that flattery got them absolutely nowhere.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: These are the two things I got from the United Nations, a bad escalator and a bad teleprompter. I can tell you, I'm really good at this stuff. Your countries are going to hell. Look at London, where you have a terrible mayor, terrible, terrible mayor. And it's been so changed, so changed.

Now they want to go to Sharia law. Both the immigration and their suicidal energy ideas will be the death of Western Europe. In Asia, they dump much of their garbage right into the ocean, and over about a one week and two-week journey, it flows right past Los Angeles. Thank you very much. It's been an honor. God bless the nations of the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP) RAJU: Fair to say, you can expect some awkward meetings with world leaders this afternoon. Senior national security correspondent Kylie Atwood, is at the U.N. So, Kylie, what was the reaction like there?

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: I'm not hearing anything now. I shouldn't be, I guess.

RAJU: OK. All right, look like we lost Kylie. We'll try to bring her back when we can. But a few minutes ago, the president met with -- met one-on-one with the U.N. secretary general, and he struck a different tone. He told him, the United States is with the United Nations, 100 percent.

Hans, what do you think about the way the president reacted to this, to how he addressed the world in this situation here? I mean, he could have -- this could have been a -- this could have been a moment where the president reached across the, you know, when offered an olive branch. Could have been conciliatory. Instead, he went after the world the way he did. What was your takeaway?

HANS NICHOLS, POLITICAL REPORTER, AXIOS: I don't think any surprised by what the president said. This is what he says. He said that throughout the campaign. You know, there are a few other wrinkles in there, the escalators, the teleprompter, but this was basically Trump's unilateralism. Trump can solve the world problems. We've heard his comments inside the Oval Office close to a dozen times now, talking about the importance and how he solved these seven world conflicts.

So yes, it was shocking to actually hear him sort of lay it out, and the looks on many of the world leaders' faces was priceless, but it really wasn't that surprising, right? This is kind of part of Trump 2.0 where he's -- I mean, he's kind of always said the quiet part out loud, but now he's really broadcasting it, and there's nothing really new, right?

I mean, if you're a wire reporter, which I guess some of us here have been, I don't know what your -- what your lead is on that, right? Is it just that Trump's defiance? So, it wasn't like he articulated a new policy.

RAJU: I mean, it's very -- he wants the world to come to him. But he wants him to come to them. On immigration, on climate change, what he thinks are important. There's no effort to move to what they think is important.

SEUNG MIN KIM, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yeah. And there's kind of an underlying theme of the -- of his speech, where it was really telling the world learn from what the United States has done when it comes to the border and other issues. I was really struck by, you know, as far as the speech goes on a sort of a 30,000-foot scale. It sounded like a campaign speech. It said, there was so much of domestic politics and domestic policy in these remarks, because you're right. Hans is right.

[12:05:00] Like it did, kind of touch on things that he says in the Oval Office, says to us reporters all the time, but this is a foreign policy that, you're obviously not going to get the reaction from these diplomats and from these other world leaders that you would do to these domestic points that Trump is trumpeting. So, it was just kind of -- it led to kind of a -- kind of an interesting dynamic, if you will. But, you know, this is classic Trump.

And the difference between, you know, Trump one and Trump two, you know, the world was kind of, you know, didn't know what to make of Trump, and at times, were mocking him. But broadly, when it comes to foreign policy, the world leaders are now coming to him and trying to cater to how he views the world and trying to work with him and trying to work with his, you know, unorthodox ways when it comes to foreign policy.

RAJU: I mean, here is -- he's bragging about his accomplishments, oftentimes over very much, overstating his accomplishments. And then, you know, you have the two wars that are still raging, Russia and in Gaza. And Russia, he's been threatening sanctions for some -- for weeks and months, and reiterates this, saying that he will move forward on sanctions, but Europe, you have to act first.

AARON BLAKE, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: Yeah. I don't think this speech really moved the ball forward in a way that I think some of the more hawkish Republicans have been wanting him to move forward on this. In recent weeks, we've seen a number of kind of those Russia hawks in the party step forward and suggest kind of gently that Putin might be kind of playing you President Trump, like, you know, you gave him this deadline, you had the meeting.

He hasn't done the things that we thought he would do after the meeting. So maybe it's time to recognize the situation as it is. And there's has been no real acknowledgment of that, at least to the extent that those Republican senators would like to see it.

And I think what we saw in this speech today was very much similar to what we've seen in recent weeks, which is kind of like, yeah, I might be running out of patience here. I still hold out hope. That's not where a lot of the party is right now. I think we're increasingly starting to see them lose patience with this.

EVA MCKEND, CNN NATIONAL POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: I would say to your point that I was also watching the faces of the international leaders in the room. And I would say the tone has really shifted in that people seem to be afraid. They recognize that--

RAJU: There's no booing or hissing or heckling, that we can tell.

MCKEND: Exactly, exactly. And that's what I noticed, and it's because the sort of universal set of beliefs or the certain traditional international humanitarian policy priorities that were once championed all over the globe is not something that they can rely on in this administration. So, that was my one takeaway from this. All over the world, people are on edge. RAJU: You know, I found his comments about climate change rather striking. I mean, Trump has for years been saying that climate change is not real. It's a hoax. Of course, there is a overwhelming scientific consensus that climate change is real and has been exacerbated by human activity and burning fossil fuels, but -- and that's embraced by countries in Europe and from large parts of the world. But this is what Trump said this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: No more global warming, no more global cooling. All of these predictions made by the United Nations and many others, often for bad reasons, were wrong. They were made by stupid people that have cost their country's fortunes and given those same countries no chance for success. If you don't get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail. And I'm really good at predicting things, you know, they actually said during the campaign.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: At one point, he said, this is the biggest con job ever. I remember going back when Jim Inhofe, the former, the late Senator--

BLAKE: Snowball.

RAJU: --the snowball, he said global warming was the biggest hoax ever perpetrated on mankind. And that was seen as a really startling statement that someone would say, and now the president, he's embracing that and going even further.

BLAKE: I mean, this has been something that he's kind of flirted with over the years, and, you know, criticizing the green new deal. But this kind of takes things to a whole nother level. The idea that the president would be going out there and telling other countries how to handle their own, you know, views on climate change. That's a pretty striking thing.

I think it goes back to what Hans was talking about here, and we saw this in his first term, when he had these meetings with foreign leaders where he kind of wanted to be the big man on stage. He was kind of nudging people aside during the photo ops. But then we did have that speech at the U.N. where he was laughed at by some of these world leaders. He kind of seemed surprised by that at the time, that that's really the thing that stuck out most to me was he was like, oh, I can't believe you guys, you know, just laughed at me for this.

So, a lot of this for him is about personal pride. A lot of this is about throwing his weight around. He's clearly more comfortable in doing that right now. And I think telling other countries what they should do with climate changes is certainly high on that list.

RAJU: Yeah. All plays to his base and berating the U.N. and Europe certainly received very well on the right. All right, breaking news. The president canceled a meeting with Democrats using a series of insults. How the Democrats are firing back as a shutdown is now just days away. [12:10:00]

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RAJU: Breaking news from Capitol Hill, with just days left to avoid a government shutdown. President Trump is canceling plans to meet with top Democrats to hammer out a deal. In a rambling, Truth Social posts just before he stood up to address the U.N., President Trump wrote, quote.

After reviewing the details of the unserious and ridiculous demands made by the minority radical left Democrats in return for their votes to keep our thriving country open, I've decided that no meeting with their congressional leaders could possibly be productive.

[12:15:00]

Now, he went on to list multiple items. He claims Democrats are demanding, free healthcare, for undocumented immigrants, open borders, and quote, transgender operation for everybody. But those are actually not on their list.

These are the Democrats actual demands; an extension of expiring Obamacare subsidies, rolling back Republican cuts to Medicaid, and a promise that the White House would not eliminate spending after it is approved by Congress.

My excellent reporters are back. Look, we're a week away. Democrats, of course, have leverage. Everyone says, well, the Republicans have controlled Congress. Democrats need to give the votes for it to pass the Senate, which is why their view is critical here. But we are entering a moment where this is feeling pretty serious right now.

KIM: It's feeling pretty serious because all the sides are very much locked in. You have Speaker Johnson, saying he's not going to bring the House back to pass any sort of funding legislation that may be different than what the House has already passed. You have Schumer and Jeffries, the Democratic leaders not backing down from their demands.

And if we had seen any sort of, you know, kernels of progress with this proposed Thursday meeting between the president and Democratic leaders. It's obviously gone now with the meeting being canceled -- meeting being canceled by the president on his Truth Social account today.

You know, everything -- weird things can happen at the last minute, obviously, as we know, when it comes to shutdowns. But right now, I think the forecast of, you know, the government shuttering seems pretty high--

RAJU: Because the Democrats think that they have a winning message here. The question is, will the American people agree if there is a shutdown and if it's a painful shutdown, which they almost always are, especially if it's a prolonged one? This what the Democratic leaders said in the aftermath of Trump canceled the meeting. Hakeem Jeffries said, Trump always chickens out. He said he canceled the high stakes meeting. He wanted to say the extremists want to shut down the government because they are unwilling to address the Republican healthcare crisis devastating America. Schumer said that it would -- Trump was throwing a temper tantrum, and that Trump would own shutdown. Is that -- what do you think of that political strategy?

NICHOLS: I don't know.

RAJU: And the messaging--

(CROSSTALK)

NICHOLS: I think we're going to shut down. I think I shouldn't make predictions, but seems like we're going to shut down. The conversation on Capitol Hill last week, with the exception of this little 24 hour news cycle where there might have been a meeting at the White House, which then Trump canceled. The general -- the smart question on Capitol Hill wasn't, if we're going to shut down, how long the shutdown is going to be?

Sure, all of us have picked that up in our reporting. The thing that shutdown is easy to get into, harder to get out. But yeah, I mean, like, both sides are convinced they have a winning hand. And like, normally you say that you're able to sort of judge, oh, he's bluffing a little bit, and that's just posturing. It doesn't seem like it right now. So, well, again, things can change but doesn't look great.

MCKEND: It's a gamble for Democrats, but I would argue it is a gamble that they have to take because their voters are demanding it. We remember the last time that we were in this scenario, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer got a lot of pushback, and so, they have to appear as if there are at least putting up a fight.

I will say, though. I remember when not long ago, when Mitch McConnell was the majority leader and he hated shutdowns. And he often said that it was because there was never a policy victory for the group that instigated it. And so, Democrats have to go into this sort of yes, showing their base that they're willing to fight, but also sober minded about what policy achievement they are trying match.

RAJU: I mean, that's the thing. It's like, what can they actually win? You know, because Trump's not going to reverse the cuts that are in the one big, beautiful bill, which is -- which they're demanding. They want to extend these Obamacare subsidies. And this is the impact. What would happen to the -- these Obamacare subsidies are expiring at the end of the year.

If they are not extended, 22 million people will see their premiums increase. 4 million people lose insurance. $350 billion is the cost of extending Obamacare subsidies. That's the cost to the federal taxpayer, but it's a complicated policy that requires a significant negotiation with Republicans in charge, that's not going to get done by Tuesday. So, what can they actually achieve? Democrats, if they don't supply the votes, they block a Republican bill and there's a shutdown? BLAKE: It's a really good question. I think that on its surface, this seems like something that could be politically wise. You know, you're highlighting an issue that's an increasing vulnerability for the President. The Medicaid cuts that were in Trump's big agenda bill were not popular. They'd like to keep the focus on that. I do wonder how much this is a messaging exercise and not something that they ultimately believe they're going to get something out of.

Are they going to focus things on this issue, recognizing that they're probably not going to get anything out of this and maybe having a short shutdown ultimately? You know, we've had a lot of shutdowns over the years, and it's kind of become less and less of a political factor in later elections. And so, this feels to me like Democrats feeling like they have to fight, we'll see if they actually feel like they need to take it that far.

[12:20:00]

RAJU: And remember, the Republican proposal is, is essentially a clean spending bill. There's really not any -- there's not a poison pill on there that Democrats can't accept. It's a seven-week extension of government funding.

KIM: Well, I think that's why Democratic leaders are so focused on the messaging war right now and trying to make a case, because, I mean, we've all covered a lot of shutdowns and various iterations. And if there is a general rule of who gets the blame, it's often the party that asked for something extraneous. And, you know, that was like--

RAJU: Defining Obamacare--

KIM: Defining Obamacare in 2013, you know, obviously the President Trump, in his first term, threatened to shut down the government. If he didn't get that additional funding for his border wall, he had that dramatic showdown in the Oval Office. This time, you know, you're setting aside just the value of these -- of these Obamacare subsidies that both Republicans and Democrats say they do want to work on.

It is technically something extraneous to funding bills. Republicans who are kind of arguing for the so-called clean government funding measure. And I don't know how -- I don't know if that will be a difficult factor for Democratic leaders to overcome here.

NICHOLS: I actually don't think it's that complicated. I think they're going to -- if they gain a short-term shutdown, you just have an argument about the ACA extensions. And it's a conversation about how long you extend them and who's eligible. And you know, the 350 billion that you mentioned, that's over a 10-year horizon, most Republicans are probably more comfortable. One-year, two-year fix, but you just have to do duration and eligibility and cost.

And you know, I'm not saying we can solve it at this table in this hour, but it's not -- I am, but it's not actually that -- it's not actually that complicated. That's the deal that's being there. It's just a November, December deal. It's not a September, October deal. RAJU: That's absolutely right. I mean, it could impact open enrollment, which is the one big concern about not trying to get done now, but what you said is a short-lived shutdown. I'm not so sure of your short-lived shutdown. It could be a prolonged shutdown, which x -- as you said earlier, it's always harder to get out of a shutdown and--

NICHOLS: It could be the seven-week horizon, right? I mean, you just -- the Republicans, if they're going to do a deal on the ACA, they're going to do it in the thanksgiving timeframe. So maybe the government just shuts down until then, and then they -- and then they cut this deal that's there for the offense.

RAJU: Yeah.

NICHOLS: Again, not rooting for these outcomes. It just -- you've been through enough of these, and you can kind of see where it's going, with the caveat that none of us have a crystal ball--

RAJU: Yeah. I'm not quite sure how this is going to go quite yet. All right, next. The Kimmel comeback. Democrats say, it's a victory for the First Amendment, but it may be a short lived one.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:25:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN COLBERT, HOST, "THE LATE SHOW WITH STEPHEN COLBERT": Our long national late nightmare is over because Disney announced that Jimmy Kimmel Live! will return to air on ABC tomorrow, Tuesday night. Come on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: As you can see there, Jimmy Kimmel's return to the airwaves tonight, sparked some celebration across late night but it might be too early to pop the champagne, because Sinclair and now Nexstar are two companies that own dozens of ABC stations across the country, say Kimmel will not return to their air, at least for now. Nexstar has a merger. It needs Trump administration sign off for. And Sinclair's owners well, they are particularly friendly to folks on the right.

My reporters are back at the table. So, what do you make of corporate America's handling of this Disney, the way they had to do a backflip here, and then you're seeing these stations dig in.

BLAKE: I mean, it is significant that the suspension was initially announced as being indefinite. I think people read that as potentially being more long lasting than it ultimately was. So, the fact that he's back. What is it five days later, I think, is it suggests that they saw some of the backlash, they were getting from this and they're bringing him back. It is interesting because this saga is not over. Those local broadcasters, which really, you know, played ball with what the FCC chairman was saying, Brendan Carr, and really forced this issue, are now signaling that they're going to continue to do this. But they could be limited in their ability to preempt this program, depending on what's in those contracts.

There's a big question here about whether the FCC is going to continue to apply pressure, whether publicly or privately. They got some blowback, even from Republican senators in recent days, a growing amount of it, even from some Trump loyalists. And so, this story is very much not over with, and we're going to have to see how it pans out.

RAJU: And Democrats reacted this way. Chuck Schumer said, this is big. This is about fighting for free speech and against these abuses by Donald Trump and Brendan Carr. Gavin Newsom said, it's a win for free speech everywhere. And said, thank you to everyone, but Brendan Carr. Hans, you wrote about this, dem eggs (Ph) teased victory.

NICHOLS: They tasted victory, right? They really drew a line of sand, and they held it for now, with all the caveats -- all the caveats out there. When we initially started this reporting, we were like, gosh, are we going to get enough comments and quotes in by deadline? And then they just all flooded in, right? And it was like, OK, now it's like, you know, it's a dealer's choice on what to pick.

Look, I mean, Aaron's raising some really interesting points about what's in the contract between Nexstar and Sinclair. Let me be very clear, I know nothing about network contractual law. I know, even less about late night television because it's past my bedtime. To me, the interesting thing is, what Aaron flipped that, it was that, at first Republican senators were squirming and we were all sort of down on the Capitol Hill. Are you comfortable with censorship from the state? And you got some sort of a lot of equivocating.

(CROSSTALK)

RAJU: Yeah. (inaudible) well, I didn't see Brendan Carr's comments.

NICHOLS: And then Ted Cruz, calls him a mafioso, calls him a gangster, does the Italian accent, and Cruz is the first to kind of come out. And it seemed like all the Republicans, sort of, most of them came into, Ted Cruz. And to me, that was the more interesting conversation.

[12:30:00]