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Inside Politics

Democrats Want Sanders To Invest More To Help Handpicked Candidates; Wiener Makes His Case For Pelosi's Seat In Congress; CA Race Highlights Democrats' Challenge To Solve Housing; Trump: "I Could Use" The Insurrection Act Ahead Of Midterms; Trump: White House Construction Is "Relaxing" For Me. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired October 01, 2026 - 12:30   ET

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

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[12:32:46]

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: Senator Bernie Sanders' handpicked progressive candidates are fighting it out in battleground races all across the country. Now, Democrats are saying, we'd like a little bit of help from Bernie Sanders to actually make sure they win.

One Democratic leadership aide told CNN's Sarah Ferris and Patrick Svitek, quote, "At some point, the measure of success has to be bigger than beating other Democrats. It's about beating Republicans, winning real majorities, and actually governing so we can make change and hold Trump accountable. Governing majorities aren't won in July. They're won in November."

Wow. Sarah Ferris joins me now. Sarah, so the Senator announced this week he is giving, quote, "hundreds of thousands of dollars" to candidates in Minnesota and Florida. He has a $23 million war test, right? What are you hearing about how and whether he'll spend that money?

SARAH FERRIS, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: So I have been hearing almost every other day from democratic consultants and folks close to party leadership, when is Bernie Sanders going to spend this money, when is he going to spend this money. And he finally this week announced that he is going to in Minnesota and Florida. And any initial relief from inside the Democratic Party that he was opening up his war chest pretty much evaporated when they saw where it's going.

Florida and Minnesota are not seats that Senate Democrats are prioritizing. We heard in your last segment, people are talking about Alaska as a swing state. All of these other seats as swing states, this is not where they're spending Florida and Minnesota. So Democrats are just waiting to see like, are -- where's the rest of this money? I hear this $23 million figure tossed around so much because there's simply not that much money left for the midterms among their key players.

BASH: And that's really something we should underscore, that we're talking about money. Because if you kind of take a step back and think Michigan, for example, it's not as if what these Democratic strategists are telling you is that Bernie Sanders should go to Michigan and campaign in a general election for Abdul El-Sayed.

No, what they're saying is they would like some of his money because what Senator Sanders has done is taken -- when I started covering politics sort of -- was considered fringe ideas and made them, for lots of reasons, very much in the center of where the Democratic energy is, and they want him to help to push it over the line.

[12:35:16]

FERRIS: Yes, absolutely. And what we've seen from Bernie Sanders and the left, there's a lot of other groups on the left, too. Over this really 10-year period, he's been able to mostly play in these deep blue seats. And so there haven't been a lot of crossover where he's had to -- where the top Democrats have had to lean on Bernie Sanders for money, right?

They do rely on his grassroots organizing, which he's famous for. They do rely on him really ramping up the energy among the base. But this is the first time we're seeing where he and his candidates are in some of the most competitive races of all across the map in November.

So it's not just the Michigan Senate race, although, of course, that's the one that I hear the most about, the one that's getting the most attention. There's also candidates that he endorsed and really got over the finish line in Maine, in Michigan, in California.

His candidates beat Democratic preferred Moderates in these races. And so this is where there's -- this is where the tension comes. There's been this clash that we've been watching for years. And right now we're seeing it happen just five weeks out from the Election Day.

And just the Democrats are being so badly outspent in so many of these places, the Senate races and these House races. So, you know, the Democratic Party here in D.C. and these groups are just shaking all the couch cushions looking for more money. And who is one of their biggest names? It's Bernie Sanders.

BASH: Yes. What fascinating reporting from you and Patrick. And I think that last point about the fact that Senator Sanders has been so successful in areas where it's a primary and you're done because it's a blue area, that this is new territory -- the territory that he was so desperate for and worked so hard for. And the question is whether or not it will ultimately pan out in the general.

Great reporting, Sarah. Thank you so much.

FERRIS: Thank you.

BASH: Up next, Nancy Pelosi's California seat has come down to two Democrats. I'll speak to one of them after the break.

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[12:41:48]

BASH: It's a race to decide the successor to Congresswoman, Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi's California district. It's the heart of San Francisco. Pelosi's pick, Connie Chan, faces fellow Democrat Scott Wiener. I spoke to Chan recently, and now joining me is State Senator Scott Wiener.

Thank you so much for being here, sir. So this seat --

SCOTT WIENER (D), CALIFORNIA CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: Thank you.

BASH: -- of course, has been represented by Pelosi for decades. Since she endorsed your opponent, what is your message to voters who trust her judgment?

WIENER: Well, thanks for having me. And Nancy Pelosi is an icon and she's moved mountains for the country and for our city. But my message is the same that it was before the endorsement. And it's the work that I've been doing for years, that life is too expensive for people.

We need to make housing more affordable and build housing. We need to reduce the cost of health care because people are falling through the cracks. People can't afford childcare, and we need to protect our community from Donald Trump, including the terror campaign that ICE has inflicted on our immigrant neighbors.

I've been doing this work for three years, long before I was a candidate for Congress, and that's what San Franciscans want, and that's the work that I do, and that hasn't changed.

BASH: You mentioned the cost of living. It is, of course, a top issue for voters all across California, critical, I don't need to tell you, in San Francisco. I want to play the Democratic candidate for governor, Xavier Becerra, and the proposed solution that he put forward in CNN's debate last night.

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XAVIER BECERRA (D), CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR CANDIDATE: We have to at least double the rate of building of homes. How much can we do? It just depends. How much red tape can we cut? How fast can we try to expand down payment assistance programs? How fast can we make sure Wall Street isn't outbidding the teacher or the firefighter for a home in California?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: First, do you agree with that goal? And if you win on a federal level from Congress, how would you support it?

WIENER: Yes, I fully agree with what Secretary Becerra said. We -- California spent 50 years making it harder and harder to build enough homes, and so we now have a massive housing shortage. And this is happening in many parts of the country. And so we need to dramatically expand the number of homes that we are building for people including for working class and low income people.

And that means zoning and planning for more housing. It means dramatically expediting permitting. And I have done that work because of the work that I've done. San Francisco went from by far the slowest permit timeline for housing to one of the fastest.

And we need to take that work national because while we've been doing this work in California to deal with this disaster, Congress until very recently did almost nothing. And so we need the federal government to be a full partner in building the millions of homes that we need in this country, mixed income housing so that people at all income levels can have a place to live, can stay in their communities and not be pushed out. That is what we need.

[12:45:07]

BASH: You went viral this summer, not in a good way, not in a way that you would have liked. Pro-Palestinian activists attacked you. Some accosted you at a trans rights rally, despite the fact that you take every position you can that they support.

You condemn the Israeli Prime Minister. You argue that Israel's response in Gaza is genocide, which Israel strongly denies. Now that you've had some months to reflect, what do you think that moment tells us?

WIENER: Well, first of all, I want to be clear -- and I've attended the Trans March for over 20 years, and I work very hard to support trans people. And what happened to me, the harassment and the assault at the Trans March, or before the Trans March, does not reflect the vast majority of the people who attended that march. And a lot of trans people --

BASH: What does it reflect?

WIENER: It reflects -- well, that in particular reflects a very fringe perspective in terms of engaging in physical harassment of people. But we also need to be clear that San Franciscans, like me, are horrified by what Israel has done in destroying Gaza and killing so many people and the -- and its actions in the West Bank to push Palestinians out of their homes, out of their communities.

I believe that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. But regardless of what word someone chooses to use, they can disagree with me. It is horrific and it has to stop. There are 7 million Jews and 7 million Palestinians living in Israel, West Bank, Gaza.

No one's going anywhere and we need peace. And the U.S. needs to be a force for peace and we should not be funding destruction, which is why I do not support funding the Israeli military.

BASH: Right, which, again, is something that everybody who you're appealing to and presumably the people who harassed you also support. And again, as I was saying, it has been several months. And that's why I was just kind of wondering if after some time you've had some other thoughts about what their real goal was.

WIENER: Well, what I will say is 2026 is not, shall we say, an easy year to be a progressive Jew running for Congress. And we have seen Jewish candidates, Jewish elected officials be targeted here in San Francisco and around the country and held to a different standard than non-Jewish candidates with similar positions.

And so it is an issue. Jewish candidates, Jewish elected officials, not just me, others as well, have been getting targeted for several years now, and that needs to stop. I have no problem being held accountable for anything I do or say or propose or don't do or say. That's democracy, and I have hard conversations with my constituents all the time.

But when it rises to the level of straight-up harassment and intimidation and assault, that crosses a line, and particularly when you're only targeting certain elected officials and candidates, specifically Jewish elected officials and candidates.

BASH: California State Senator Scott Wiener, I know you have a debate tonight. Good luck with that. And I appreciate you joining me today.

WIENER: Thank you, Dana.

BASH: Coming up, President Trump sat for a wide-ranging interview with Time magazine and printed the whole thing. We'll get into it next.

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[12:52:43]

BASH: Time magazine covered a lot of ground when they interviewed President Trump, including concerns that have been raised about potential moves by the Trump administration and polling places. The Time magazine reporter asked, "Do you plan to dispatch ICE agents to poll places in the midterms?" The President said, "Haven't thought of it."

"Would you rule out declaring a state of emergency in the lead up to the midterms unless there's widespread violence in the streets?" "I don't rule anything out or in. We'll see. You mean the Insurrection Act?" "Yes." "No, I've never used it. I could use it. A lot of people think I should use it sometimes."

My panel is back now. Zolan, I know you've done extensive reporting on this question.

ZOLAN KANNO-YOUNGS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. Now, this answer, understandably, is going to cause concern among many in the lead-up to the midterms. It does align with the answer the President has given in the past when faced with this question of whether he would use the Insurrection Act.

I did reporting around Minneapolis during the protests there and the ICE deployment. And there was actually a scene where various top officials made the case to use the Insurrection Act to the President. When he was asked by reporters, he sort of said, look, I have the ability to, but I'm not going to yet. That's been the consistent answer he's had thus far.

But more often, we are hearing from advocates, from Democrats, from some Republicans who are concerned about this and are concerned about just the level of doubt that's been raised when you have an answer like this grouped with the other actions the administration has taken when it comes to changing the rules of the election or attempting to change the rules of the election in the lead up to the midterms.

BASH: Eliza, another topic they hit on was the construction projects. The President said the, "So the White House is a very special symbol. It's a symbol of America. It's a symbol of our greatness. It's, I think, maybe the most important symbol that we have. The White House was a dump. The moldings were falling off the outside of the building. It hadn't been painted in. It was just a disgraceful dump.

The doors were falling off. The locks were broken. And I said, I got to fix it. And I do that better than anybody else. Maybe I do it better than anything I do. And it's easy for me. It's actually relaxing. You know, for a lot of people, it drives them crazy."

Eliza?

[12:55:01]

ELIZA COLLINS, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: I think that's absolutely true, Trump is a builder. He knows he likes building, right, and he likes building big, fancy things. And that is what he's doing at the White House.

The question is, how is that resonating with voters right now who are seeing, contrary to what we've seen earlier with Trump talking about, you know, the price on everything going down? That's not what voters are seeing when they go to the grocery store or the gas pump.

And so Democrats are trying to make the case. That while voters are taking a hit economically, the President is focused on the White House and the ballroom. And really, we have reporting that Trump's focused on his legacy at this point. He really has two more years left.

If Democrats take control of one or both chambers of Congress, everything will be stalled and there'll be investigations. There's possibility of impeachments. I mean, this will be really a mess. And so Trump is focusing in on his ballroom.

And as the time points out, he's talking about like, an eighth of an inch here. He's talking about super, super hyper focused details which he says allow him to relax. The question is, is that what voters want him to be focused on right now when they do feel like he has broken promises such as saying he's not going to go to war --

BASH: Yes.

COLLINS: -- and we're now months into a war.

BASH: Ron?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, look, you know, to your first question, I think, you know, the President tried to weaponize the Postal Service and immediately after the Supreme Court stopped him, he's using government money to run ads accusing his political opponents of being communists, something that Roy Cohn is probably smiling at somewhere.

So I don't rule out anything between now and the election. I don't think there's any outer boundary of what could happen. And I think Eliza is definitely right. You know, part of the problem that the President faced is not only that voters think he hasn't made enough progress, they think he's not focused enough on their problems.

BASH: Ron, Eliza, Zolan, thank you so much for being here.

Thank you for joining Inside Politics. CNN News Central starts after a quick break.

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