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Inside Politics

Voters In Six States Head To Polls Today In High-Stakes Primaries; Reality TV Star Spencer Pratt Shakes Up Race For Los Angeles Mayor; Trump Announces Bill Pulte As Acting DNI; GOP Rep.: DOJ Fund Money "Better Spent In Bringing Down" Costs; Proud Boy Leader On J6 Payments: Trump "Will Find A Way". Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired June 02, 2026 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00]

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR, THE SITUATION ROOM: Going right in there. And it's such important reporting because she's really taking you inside to show you how bad this is for the patients. That 10-year-old little boy who's just coming out of the coma.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN CO-ANCHOR, THE SITUATION ROOM: It's so heartbreaking.

BROWN: And the, you know, heroism of the medical professionals, you heard them say, look, you know, there's a sense of humanity here. And that's what keeps us going. You really feel it. And you can't just say, I'm tired. I don't want to do this anymore. You have to keep going. Really incredible.

BLITZER: And to our viewers here in United States and around the world, thanks very much for joining us this morning. You can always keep up with us on social media @wolfblitzer and @pamelabrowncnn.

BROWN: We'll see you back here tomorrow morning, and every weekday at 10 Eastern. Inside Politics with Dana Bash starts now.

DANA BASH, CNN HOST, INSIDE POLITICS: It's primary palooza. Six states cast ballots with stakes stretching to November.

I'm Dana Bash. Let's go behind the headlines at Inside Politics.

Happy Election Day to all who celebrate. Right now, voters are heading to the polls in California, Iowa, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, and South Dakota. They're weighing in on a series of high stakes races that could shift the political calculus for November, but this primary day may feel a little bit like the upside down.

Democrats are holding out hope for an opening in ruby red Iowa, while Republicans are making a play in deep blue California. In Iowa, it is the first open Senate seat in more than a decade, and it is scrambling both parties. In California, candidates are vying to replace Gavin Newsom in the governor's mansion and have a shot at running the world's fourth largest economy.

Jeff Zeleny is in Des Moines, Iowa, for us. Kyung Lah is in Los Angeles. Kyung, I'm going to start with you. I know you're at a polling place. What are you hearing from voters? And let's start in the governor's race.

KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: We'll start in the governor's race, and as I talk, I'm just going to give you a view of what this polling place looks like. This is a community college, Los Angeles Valley College, and as voters are coming in, we're talking to them about how they're feeling about the governor's race. In large part, Dana, because it is such a wide open race, you can see that this is a polling place that is -- there are volunteers here, there's a lot of students here, and I actually love seeing this because there's an army of them ready to greet any prospective voters, and then the voters are going to be filling out a very long ballot.

California does rely on -- at least the voters here do rely on a lot of mail-in ballots. So, people are dropping off ballots, and people have up until today to put those ballots in the mail, so they may be counting for some time. Just to give you a little perspective, I was at a party with some of my neighborhood friends and no one had voted yet. They're waiting until the very last moment, and part of the reason is because of the governor's race.

There's no particular clear leader on the Democratic side. California is a bright blue state. There is some anxiety about that indecision and splitting of the votes on the Democratic side, that it could lead to a Republican getting in. And so, it's really -- they don't know who's going to win, they don't know who's going to make the final two into November. So, there's a lot of questions about what's going to happen with the top of the ticket here.

BASH: No doubt going to go into a runoff, because in California the primaries are everybody in and the top two finishers, regardless of party. So that's the governor's race. Kyung, while I have you, you are in L.A. The mayor's race is getting a lot of attention. Spencer Pratt, who is a former reality --

LAH: A lot of attention.

BASH: -- star AI ads, they've all fueled it. Talk about that versus what Karen Bass is facing, not just trying to get reelected against a potential Republican, but she's also got a challenger on the left. And just so you know, Kyung, we're showing an example of one of the AI ads that Spencer Pratt has been running and putting on social media that put him on the map.

LAH: Definitely put him on the map. Everybody seems to know who Spencer Pratt is. He is someone who is a registered Republican. It is important to state that the city mayor's race is nonpartisan, but because of his reality star background, because of his impact on popular culture he's been able to seize onto the imagination of a lot of people here in Los Angeles and certainly get on the map in a way that somebody who isn't a Democrat or registered Democrat normally would.

So, you have the establishment candidate Karen Bass, who is running for re-election. You have a challenger on her left, Nithya Raman, but here is the -- what's happening to the voters themselves. I stopped this woman just to ask her, how are you feeling about the governor's race? And she started talking about Spencer Pratt. Take a listen.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't want Pratt in. So, for me it was really -- I wanted Raman, but I didn't know with voting for her might take away votes from Bass, and then Pratt would get in. So, it was kind of a mixed thing, voting for the person I wanted, but also trying to keep somebody else out, because in my opinion our country is not being run well right now and I think he would just duplicate that.

You have to figure out, it's not only who you want in that you think could make the changes, but if your voting for them is going to cause someone that you think will not be good in the office. And I think you have to kind of change your vote based on that, which is unfortunate, but I think it's what we have to do nowadays.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAH: She didn't say his name, Dana, but in everything she was saying, you could hear Donald Trump's shadow looming over the mayor's race. So that is certainly a factor. It's going to be interesting to see what happens today.

BASH: I mean, these voters in Los Angeles, in particular, and all over California, they're voting their gut, but they're also trying to be tacticians as they do it. It's really remarkable because of the state of the process in California. All right, Kyung, thank you so much. Jeff Zeleny, I want to go to you. Iowa is now a red state. It certainly has been for the past, almost two decades. You're hearing some optimism from Democrats there. Tell us more about that.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Dana, there's one thing that so many Democratic voters have in their minds, and that is the first midterm election of the first term of Donald Trump. Back to 2018, not that long ago, but that is when Democrats picked up three House seats here in Iowa, largely a referendum on the president's policies. Well, certainly the race for control of the House is going to be, you know, razor thin, so every seat certainly matters.

So that is one of the reasons for optimism, but also there is an open U.S. Senate seat. Those do not come around very often at all. Of course, Joni Ernst, the Republican is retiring. So, that is one of the other reasons for optimism, but as we talk to voters here this morning in Des Moines, as they're casting their ballots in that Democratic Senate primary between Josh Turek, the state representative here, and Zach Wahls, a state senator, electability is weighing on their minds, but of course, there's no true definition of what that means.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think right now for Democrats it's going to be electability, so who can get in there and win those traditionally Republican areas? So, I think that is what kind of drove my vote today. I chose Josh Turek.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, it was a tough choice because both candidates are really, really good. So -- but when you vote, you got to make one choice.

ZELENY: What drove that decision? How did you make your decision?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Probably the one that I feel could best beat Ashley Hinson. Yeah, so -- and both are really good.

ZELENY: Who did you pick today?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I picked Wahls.

ZELENY: How about you?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

ZELENY: Same?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's same.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENY: So, look, this contest between Josh Turek and Zach Wahls has been pretty extraordinary on the power of biography, but also ideology, and also outside spending. Vote vets, the Democratic-leaning super PAC, has spent some $10 million here to boost the candidacy of Josh Turek. Will that be enough? Zach Wahls has cried foul on that. He says that Senator Chuck Schumer has been behind all of this. He's saying he would not support Schumer as majority leader.

Josh Turek is talking about affordability a lot, the rising price of costs, Medicaid cuts as well. So, this has actually been a very substantive primary here, and whoever wins this today will face Ashley Hinson, most likely she is a member of Congress as well on the Republican side. So, Dana, Democrats do see optimism, but there is also some reality infused in every conversation we have with voters.

BASH: Yeah. Again, just like Kyung, I mean, you're hearing those, so the wheels churning and trying to think ahead, in addition to voting who they believe in. Real quick, before I let you go, as somebody who knows Iowa well, former Des Moines Register reporter, before you became, you know, an international superstar on CNN. Can you talk about the fact that this is, as I mentioned, a Republican state has been since, I don't know 2012 at least, the very least, when the last time the Democrat won for president out of Iowa. But there's an open Senate seat, there's an open governor's seat that hasn't happened in nearly 60 years.

ZELENY: It's right. Not since 1968 has there been an open governor's and senate seat at the same time. That means that sort of all sides are in play here. Now, this Republican governor's race has been extraordinarily messy. Five candidates are in it. Randy Feenstra is a member of Congress from northwest Iowa, the most conservative part of the state. Most people thought that he would sort of run away with this, that did not happen.

[12:10:00]

So, late Friday afternoon, the president finally weighed in and endorsed Feenstra. Other Republicans have not been standing down, so we will see what happens here this evening. Most Republicans I've been speaking to believe that the president's endorsement, as we've seen for the last several weeks, is certainly the most important thing you can have in a Republican primary.

But look, you have to win by 35 percent of the vote in a five-way field to avoid this going to a convention, and that would be something that Republicans do not want, a messy summer convention. So, look, the Democrat in the governor's race, Rob Sand, rising star in the party. So, one thing we know for sure, Dana, the governor's race, the Senate race, and several House races will be important in Iowa for the next five months. Certainly, it's one of those important puzzle pieces of the midterm elections.

BASH: It sure is. Jeff, thank you so much. And Iowa, Kyung also in L.A., appreciate it. Coming up, an incumbent congressman is on the ballot today but hasn't been seen in weeks. But first, President Trump just put one of the men leading his retribution efforts in charge of U.S. intelligence. We have all the details after a break.

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[12:15:00]

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BASH: New this morning, the president announced that the head of an obscure housing agency will be the director of all of America's intelligence agencies. His name is Bill Pulte. What background does he have in intelligence? Well, none is immediately apparent. From the president's point of view though, he has won critical qualification, he's proven creative in coming up with ways to go after President Trump's perceived political adversaries.

Pulte used his job as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency to press the Justice Department to investigate Letitia James, Senator Adam Schiff, Fulton County D.A. Fani Willis, and Fed Governor Lisa Cook, all over claims of mortgage fraud, which they all deny. Pulte also accused then Fed Chair Jerome Powell of lying to Congress and pushed to remove him.

Joining me now is CNN's chief intelligence analyst John Miller. John, you used to work for the DNI. What's your take on Bill Pulte's appointment?

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, the part that jumps out is he has no background in intelligence as a collector, as an analyst, even as a consumer of intelligence. When I was deputy assistant director for national intelligence. My boss was Admiral Dennis Blair, 30 years in the navy, ran the Pacific fleet, ran all kinds of operations based on intelligence and collecting intelligence.

He was followed by James Clapper, a general from the air force, who was the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, the director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, that that runs the satellites around the world. These are people with great depth.

When Tulsi Gabbard was appointed, you know, that raised questions about could a member of Congress who was in the military, who had minimal, almost zero background in intelligence be the DNI. They may have selected the one official who has even less, so that's creating serious concerns in the intelligence community.

BASH: OK. So, then there's that, and then the other question is the experience that we know that he does have, separate and apart from the agency, the housing agency that he oversees, which apparently he's still keeping that job. But also, the way that he has the word I used before was creatively, he tried to help the president find ways to go after his perceived political adversaries. How do you take that and apply it to the DNI role, if you are the president?

MILLER: Well, you are looking at what is the intent and what is the capability. And all around the intelligence community, my former colleagues are talking about those two things, which is what is the intent of this appointment. If you take your number one attack dog, and you put him in-charge of the 17 agencies that collect the most sensitive secrets in the possession of the U.S. government, who have the most far-reaching collection abilities, and say, all right, what would that mean in the hands of someone who is known as a political target, that's one set of concerns.

The other is one you mentioned, which is if he's going to run the housing agency and be the DNI at the same time. What is the signal that that sends to our partners, Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Germany, Ukraine, France, everybody in the intelligence community of the globe, as far as, whether to consider the DNI a serious person.

BASH: And let me just put a finer point on it before I let you go. We saw Tulsi Gabbard go outside of what appears to be the DNI's typical political -- excuse me, non-political role to supervise an investigation into the 2020 election in Fulton County, Georgia.

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MILLER: So, one of the experiences we had in the intelligence community when I worked there, whether it was in the FBI or the DNI, was, we are legally barred from collecting intelligence on U.S. persons. The FBI can do that, but the CIA, the NSA, the rest of those agencies are strictly barred. So, what happens when the DNI starts to direct investigations on U.S. soil into U.S. persons, when the DNI has no legal authority to run operations, to direct investigations or to participate in them. That set off a lot of alarm bells, and that's ringing in the background of this appointment, which is, if this is doubling down on Tulsi Gabbard, where does that go?

BASH: John Miller, as I say pretty much every time we speak, we're very lucky to have you. Thanks for giving us perspective on this. Appreciate it.

MILLER: Thank you.

BASH: And our smart panel here today, as usual. And I want to start -- before we begin the discussion with what the Senate Majority Leader, John Thune, just said this morning about this DNI. Here's what he said. Well, we don't need a weaponized DNI, we need professionals there. So, again, I've just heard about it. I'll try to get more information about the current state of their thinking about that position, and again, if he's somebody they want in that position permanently, he's got a lengthy road ahead of him. Dave Weigel?

DAVID WEIGEL, POLITICS REPORTER, SEMAFOR: Yes. And you've seen from my colleague Burgess Everett, who's on the Hill, similar skepticism from John Cornyn, who has literally nothing to lose at this point if he opposed to the president's nominees. The Tulsi Gabbard example is helpful, because Republicans walked a limb, they did not want to walk in order to vote for her. They were skeptical, but she was part of the Trump-winning coalition.

Bill Pulte is not. Bill Pulte is part of the post-victory revenge tour that Trump has been on, and that is -- that was something that some Republicans would go for early in the presidency, maybe biting their tongues, biting their lips. Now they're that -- we've seen this in a couple of votes. There are enough Republicans to reject this, to at least spend today saying this is a bad idea. There might be somebody better for that job, because what is the job? I think we just said it very well. Is it carrying out various projects the president has, or is it the post 9/11 job of making sure that the terrorist attack is prevented?

BASH: Yeah. Jeff?

JEFF MASON, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, BLOOMBERG: It just struck me also as being in line with the way he appointed Rick Grenell during his first term, somebody who did not have a background in intelligence but did have a background in being an attack dog for Trump, so that's clearly what he's looking for here.

Also, your point is very good about the fact that he would have an uphill battle if he wanted to be confirmed. But he's got a long runway before then to do whatever the president wants, because the president likes having acting people in some of these roles. I think he can stay in for about a year without being confirmed, that's a long time.

BASH: Well, especially since the numbers are not with him anymore in the Senate. Speaking of that, a separate, but I guess maybe related conversation is about this nearly $1.8 billion even Republicans are now calling slush fund that the president was pushing and the acting attorney general was pushing to give to people who felt that they were wronged by the Biden administration.

The press -- there was a court ruling that said, it's got to temporarily stop. The president said, the Department of Justice disagrees strongly with the decision on the anti-weaponization fund, but then he also said the department will abide by the court ruling. Now, just to be clear, this ruling pauses the pause only goes until the 12th, meaning after June 12 the pause is lifted, unless there's another ruling.

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, BLOOMBERG POLITICAL & POLICY COLUMNIST and cnn senior political analyst: And listen, I mean, this was an example of Republicans pushing back, right? There's the court decision here, but there's also what we've heard from Republicans over the last few days about this, John Thune coming out first and being like this isn't something he likes. It's hard to find a Republican who thinks this $1.8 billion what has been dubbed a slush fund, is a good idea.

So, I mean, sort of related to this other issue of Bill Pulte, Republicans have shown, I think, over the last couple of weeks, days, whatever, that they can effectively push back against this president and sound the alarm about moves that he makes that they see as damaging on any number of fronts, damaging to their electoral chances in the midterms, damaging to the, you know, just sort of basic fairness and rule of law when it comes to this anti-weaponization fund.

So, we'll see if that same energy persists, if it persists around, particularly the Bill Pulte issue. You say maybe he can stay in a year. We'll see over the next couple of days, whether or not Republicans continue to sort of find pieces of their spines and push back against this president effectively.

BASH: And so, the Senate is now coming back. They were gone for two weeks. They left a little bit early because they were pissed. These are Republicans who were pissed about a few things, especially this fund. Ted Cruz talked about a meeting that did not go well among Senate Republicans and Todd Blanche, and this just gives you a sense of the flavor of the pushback.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): I got to tell you, the Republican senators were pissed. People were the entire meeting, they were screaming at the acting attorney general. I don't know exactly what will happen, but we will see the administration announcing at a minimum, a modification of this, because if they don't, they've got a full-on revolt in the Senate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: That's the Senate. Now, let me play something from a Trump supporter, a Republican, Kat Cammack, who was on Fox Business this week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. KAT CAMMACK (R-FL): This is the problem that we have in Washington. It's the idea of throwing money at a problem and hoping it goes away. I think that money could be better spent in bringing down the cost of everything and making life more affordable for Americans, while simultaneously addressing the system that allowed for the weaponization.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Dave?

WEIGEL: Yeah, I don't -- I don't think many Republicans were unhappy with that court decision. It took decision-making power away from them on something they did not. They talked about it there, but they generally don't want to talk about, because they do have a base that agrees with the president's version of history since 2020 and what happened to January sixers. It is not a good issue for them, and I think the way that Congressman Cammack put it there.

It is so easy for Democrats who had all these messaging problems to go in and say, look what the president's focused on, that's not about you. This, and the ballroom, I've seen it. Are these the most expensive things facing the president. They're not. They're just such easy elevator pitches to get the voters to say, look at -- look at the time and money Republicans are wasting when your bills went up.

BASH: Except, real quick, there's another side to the base, and those are the people who support the J sixers, like the actual J sixers, people who are at least were involved in January 6. Liz Landers talked to Enrique Tarrio and said, I believe even if this bond is killed in courts or at congressional level, the president will find a way. There are other options. We're going to sneak in a quick break. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is on Capitol Hill, testifying for the first time since the war in Iran began. We're going to bring it to you, next.

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