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Politico: Obama Cuts Ads For 24 Senate And Governor Campaigns; Can Obama Still Sway Voters 10 Years After Leaving Office?; Vulnerable Swing-District Republican Looks To Hold PA Seat; Analysis: Trump's Tariffs Have Cost Pennsylvania Additional $11B; Democrats Game Out 150 Plus Possible Threats To Midterms. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired October 06, 2026 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: You think about what they did in Michigan, Kamala Harris was also there, right, for Abdul El-Sayed, but it was a very small event, right, because they know that she doesn't have the kind of popularity --

MANU RAJU, CNN ANCHOR: I mean, it just shows you the Democratic bench, how thin it is, right? There's really not a whole lot of people who could have that kind of sway, what --

PATRICK SVITEK, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Yes, I was going to say, he's especially, I think, helpful in Michigan for Democrats, in terms of bringing the party together. We forget about this now, but there was a massive Senate primary there, where Haley Stevens and her allies ran millions of dollars of ads highlighting how she was chief of staff to his auto rescue --

RAJU: Yes.

SVITEK: -- task force, even though he didn't endorse in the primary. And so, a lot of voters in that state equated Haley Stevens with Obama, not Abdul El-Sayed. So I think it's especially helpful for Democratic unity in Michigan for him to go there on October 24th to rally with El-Sayed.

RAJU: Yes, and you look at the polls of Obama, and, you know, you mentioned the number of Independents. He does have support, according to the recent CNN poll, actually that was out a few months ago, but it's a 56 percent view of -- in Obama, a favorable view among Independents. That's a pretty solid number for any politician.

It kind of helps that he's no longer in public life. People's numbers -- presidents' numbers tend to go up after they've left office. And then you look at the NBC poll asked recently, the view of possible candidate endorsements among registered voters.

Let's compare Obama to Trump. Would you be more supportive if Obama endorsed? 43 percent would be more supportive. 37 percent say less supportive. And then the Trump number, just 30 percent would be more supportive, and 52 percent would be less supportive of Trump endorsed. So you're seeing the difference between the current president and the former president.

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean, as you said, when you're out of office, you do tend to have your numbers bump a little bit. But I think at this point, there's very little anyone can do to, you know, who's not running themselves to boost candidates. If it boosts enthusiasm, great, but I think Obama's been great at fundraising as well, which I know is helping Democrats. But at this point, it's going to be about affordability.

RAJU: Yes, and, you know, oftentimes, as you said, he's known to throw shade. Look at what he said in 2024, in October of that year, when he was in Detroit.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, 44TH U.S. PRESIDENT" If your grandpa was acting like this, you'd be worried. But this is somebody who wants unchecked power. We do not need to see what an older, loonier Donald Trump looks like, with no guardrails. America's ready to turn the page. We're ready for a better story.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: And Toluse, they lost Michigan. So it doesn't always work to transfer how people view Obama to the candidate.

TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, STAFF WRITER, THE ATLANTIC: That's right, and the party has changed in the last several years. They have shown some concern over the Moderates within the party or the establishment. Obama seems to have been able to sort of float above some of that, and he's been able to keep support from some Progressives as well as some Moderates.

And so that's part of the reason why he comes out at the final stretch of the campaign, to try to unify the party and bring people together. It didn't quite work in 2024. Kamala Harris was up against sort of a shortened campaign and a little bit of a weird dynamic there, but they're hoping -- Democrats are hoping that Obama, as their closer with their very thin bench, can come and do what other Democrats can't do, which is --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: -- bring Progressives and Moderates and win over some Independents, even though in the past Obama was sort of seen as the socialist and --

RAJU: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: -- Republicans used to attack him as this left-leaning guy. Now, in hindsight, he's seen as more of a Moderate figure.

RAJU: It's really remarkable, because I remember the 2014 midterm election cycle, the Democrats ran away from Obama. It had nothing to do with Obama. He didn't really campaign much for those swing state district -- swing state Democrats, but how times have changed, especially when you leave office.

All right, coming up, Democrats think they can flip as many as four Republican seats in Pennsylvania. I'll talk to one of the GOP members fighting to hang on to his job. Congressman Ryan Mackenzie, that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:38:33]

RAJU: The House majority could come down to a handful of seats that Republicans won by just a few thousand votes back in 2024, like Pennsylvania's 7th Congressional District, centered around Allentown, one of the key bellwether races in the country. Republican Ryan Mackenzie ousted incumbent Democrat Susan Wild two years ago, winning by just 4,000 votes. This time, he's facing off against Democrat Bob Brooks, a veteran firefighter.

Congressman Mackenzie joins me now live. Congressman, thank you so much for joining me this afternoon. Really appreciate your time.

As you know, the key question in every election for voters are things are better than they were the last election, but now the cost of nearly everything is higher than it was back in 2025, when you and President Trump, others were sworn into office then. Gas prices are higher, mortgage rates are up, and, you know, President Trump campaigned on lowering costs for Americans immediately. Are you satisfied with the job he's done on that?

REP. RYAN MACKENZIE (R), PENNSYLVANIA: Well, I think there's certainly work that we want to continue to do. We started by putting more people money back in people's pockets with historic tax relief, which people really appreciate here in our local community. We've passed bipartisan housing legislation to bring down the cost of housing, which is a key concern for us in our local area.

But as much as these races are about national issues, it's also a clear contrast between the two candidates that are on the ballot. We've been delivering for our community in so many ways over the past year and a half, and my opponent, Bob Brooks, who you mentioned, is a scandal-plagued individual who just recently is facing allegations of COVID fraud and are really dogging his campaign.

[12:40:09]

RAJU: I want to ask you just more about the issue of cost and cost of living, because, yes, there are local issues, but, of course, people are just feeling the cost as well. According to the National Taxpayer Union Foundation, President Trump's tariffs have cost Pennsylvanians an additional $11 billion since January 2025. That's about $2,000 more for each Pennsylvania household. Has the President's trade war gone too far?

MACKENZIE: Well, what you see in our local community is manufacturing is coming back. We are different than a lot of other places in the country where we have a lot of manufacturing. We have legacy manufacturing, and then also on a regular basis, we have new manufacturing that is being created right here in our community.

We have Eli Lilly, who broke ground on an over-billion-dollar new facility to manufacture GLP-1s. I was just at Kerry Coffee, who opened a new manufacturing and distribution center for coffee production.

RAJU: So you want the President's trade war to -- do you want the President's trade war to continue then?

MACKENZIE: I think it's critically important that you have an appropriate trade policy that brings back American jobs. For 30 years, we saw the flow of jobs go out of this country. Now what we're seeing right here in the Lehigh Valley is that jobs are coming roaring back in the manufacturing sector.

So, again, you always have to be careful when you're doing trade policy, making sure that it's actually helping those jobs and job creators in our local community. And what we're starting to see is we're starting to see those results right here on the ground. Pretty hard to argue with.

RAJU: I wanted you to respond to something President Trump said last night in Nebraska, another we're hearing pretty often for him on the campaign trail. Just listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm asking you to do me one favor. Pretend I'm on the ballot, please. We got to go --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: So President Trump won your district by three points in 2024. You carried it by one. Do you want voters in your district to pretend that Donald Trump is on the ballot?

MACKENZIE: Well, I think what we see, the reality is that Democrats have placed President Trump on the ballot. And we know that they have been fired up and energized over the past year plus since he defeated their hand-picked candidate in 2024. And so what we need, and what I think the President is saying there, is that we need Republicans to see that he is going to be on the ballot in the sense that his policies and his agenda are going to be on the ballot.

Because Democrats have told us we don't need to pretend it's anything otherwise. They have said if he is back in office, they are going to run impeachment. They are going to run investigations. They are going to do nothing but obstruct for two years. That's not good for the country. That's not an agenda that would bring down costs or help the American people in any way.

So what we are seeing and hearing from the President is he's saying, Republicans, if you want to continue to advance positive policy to help our country, you need to actually get out and vote.

RAJU: But you're saying that his policies are on the ballot. Congressman, roughly 70 percent of Americans think that his policies have increased prices, that's according to a recent poll. Do you really want his policies to be on the ballot when so many Americans are blaming him for increasing prices?

MACKENZIE: I think we need to make sure that everybody gets out and votes. We saw in 2024, when we had the largest turnout in history, they repudiated the Democratic policies from the Biden administration and my predecessor. We want to make sure everybody gets out and votes in this election.

And we are happy to let the chips fall where they may. But what we are also going to see is that voters do look here in our swing district. The reason it's a swing district is they go race by race and look candidate by candidate.

So I appreciate that we're on a national show and you want to talk about national issues. But again, when you put up a track record like mine of delivering for our community, bring back over $160 million for our local community, against somebody like a conman and fraudster in Bob Brooks who defrauded his own family. And that was proven in court.

He actually just repaid them after over a decade in the past week --

RAJU: Congressman --

MACKENZIE: -- over $162,000. And now he is facing allegations of COVID fraud because he didn't talk about that judgment on his COVID applications, that's lying to the federal government. These are the things that voters care about. So --

RAJU: Yes.

MACKENZIE: -- you can't disentangle national issues from local candidates because a candidate like Bob Brooks is a conman and a fraudster. And he is going to carry the Democratic water. So some people might like that.

RAJU: And --

MACKENZIE: But at the same time, he have to answer those charges that he's facing right now.

RAJU: And we'll hope to get a chance to ask him. We have invited him to come on and talk about the issues. But I do want to ask you, you talk about their national issues. Because the national issues affect what's happening back home and your constituents back home. Perhaps no bigger than the war in Iran right now.

And we are seeing such an increase in gas prices, in diesel prices, in fuel prices. So Congressman, is it worth it for your constituents to pay higher prices because of the war in Iran?

MACKENZIE: Well, we always want to see lower fuel prices. The -- we're sky high under the Biden administration. And now that you see the Strait of Hormuz opening up, prices are starting to come down. Obviously there were refineries --

[12:45:09]

RAJU: Diesel is still about $3 higher than it was at the beginning of the war.

MACKENZIE: The biggest constraint on diesel is refinery capacity. We haven't built refineries in this country in decades. And then when refineries are blown up in Russia because of an ongoing conflict in Russia and Ukraine, that's what really drives up those prices.

The flow through the Strait of Hormuz is back to record levels and where it was previously. And so we're -- we have to focus on actually building American industry. We have to build refineries again in this country. But, again, far left radicals have stopped that kind of progress for many years and so --

RAJU: And you don't think it's worth limiting the President's war powers at all? You've consistently voted against it. You don't think it's worth limiting his war powers at all, given the impact that it's having on your constituents?

MACKENZIE: I think when you're dealing with foreign policy, there are four main levers. There's diplomacy, information, military, and economics. And if you want to resolve a crisis, you can't go and take one of those levers of power away from an executive during a time of conflict.

That is going to lead to a lesser outcome for our country because you've tied his hands in one particular area. So I don't think when you're involved in a conflict like this that is ongoing that you want to take any of those away. In fact, I'm glad that we added powers to the President and the executive by giving him additional sanction power, which had bipartisan --

RAJU: Yes.

MACKENZIE: -- support from both Republicans and Democrats in Congress. So we are actually giving the President more ability to constrain Iran and also Russia in that instance because both of those sanctions were included in that legislation.

RAJU: All right, Congressman Ryan Mackenzie, we're going to have to leave it there. I really appreciate your time. Thank you for coming on and giving us your point of view.

And we've -- as I mentioned, we've invited the Congressman's Democratic opponent, Bob Brooks, to join us as well. And we hope to have him soon as well.

MACKENZIE: Good luck getting him to answer any questions.

RAJU: Thanks, Congressman.

All right, coming up next, the go bags are packed. The legal briefs are drafted. We have new CNN reporting on how Democrats are preparing for any federal interference on Election Day.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:51:39]

RAJU: You could call it doomsday prepping. Democrats' intricate plan for what if on Election Day in light of fears that President Trump could intervene to subvert the voting process. In fact, more than 150 what ifs, like sending the National Guard to polling sites, are social media influencers spreading misinformation about where or when to vote. Even AI-generated videos claiming to show election fraud.

New York Democratic Congressman Joe Morelle is at the center of the planning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JOE MORELLE (D), NEW YORK: We're talking to groups all over the country. We have literally thousands of volunteer lawyers who are drafting proceedings. All the allied partners around the country who care not that Democrats win or lose. They just want to make sure that the will of the American people is carried out. We're building the largest voter protection effort in American history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: All right, CNN's Annie Grayer is on that reporting. She joins us at the table. Annie, really good story this morning. Tell us about what you've learned about the actual preps that are underway and how serious it is.

ANNIE GRAYER, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: So these are really serious efforts that have been going on behind the scenes for months because Democrats do not want to leave anything up to chance here. And what I learned through my reporting is that Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has been convening groups of senators, lawyers, outside experts to do these sort of role-playing scenarios where they're given very specific scenarios to talk through how they would handle potential intervention from the Trump administration, what that intervention could look like.

So this group has talked about what would happen if the National Guard showed up at polling locations, if the Trump administration tried to seize ballots from polling locations, or how they would handle different misinformation campaigns that took hold because of AI, deepfake videos, all those sorts of things.

And what we've -- what I've learned is that the senators in these groups were even role-playing different figures in the Trump administration. So playing the role of attorney general, playing the role of director of National Intelligence, playing the role of Homeland Security secretary to get in the position of what possible interference could happen and then talk through how they would respond to it as Democrats.

And in the House, a similar effort is underway. Congressman Morelle, who you just played a bit of earlier, has put together an assessment of over 150 threats. And he's walked through it with his colleagues, all the different scenarios, how he would deal with them. He's taking his message around the country to tell Democratic voters to raise awareness about these issues.

And Senate Democrats have also built -- are building the largest election observer program, the first time that we've seen that in the Senate, to send staffers out and around the country. And it's not just in Congress. What lawmakers realize is they couldn't rely on the national party here. They had to build something on their own in this off-election year for Democrats.

But -- so they've tapped into the legal community and built this really strong legal apparatus to be ready to respond at a moment's notice. I talked to one lawyer for this story who told me that she's a go-bag ready just in case she has to be deployed at a moment's notice.

So Democrats, you know, the lawmakers and sources and staffers who I talked to for this story are confident in the election system, but they are not leaving anything up to chance here. And they are casting a really wide net about what potential scenarios they could be facing on Election Day and beyond.

RAJU: You know, part of the thing is that President Trump has not ruled out taking some action, some emergency action. This is what he said to Time magazine on Thursday. He was asked, "Would you rule out declaring a state of emergency in the lead-up to the midterms unless there's widespread violence in the streets?"

[12:55:03]

Trump, "I don't rule anything out or in. We'll see. You mean the Insurrection Act?" The reporter says, "Yes." "No, I've never used it. I could use it. A lot of people think I should use it sometimes." He continues to dangle using the Insurrection Act.

KUCINICH: Which is, I think, what is mobilizing these Democrats. You see these sort of things during presidential years, but certainly, as Annie points out, this is unprecedented for a midterm election year. And listen, there are other things.

Yes, the President is dangling out, but there are some more concrete things, which I know Toluse has reported about, some of the election deniers that are in places of power in various states. So there is reason for Democrats to be concerned and hope that elections hold firm.

RAJU: And Toluse, the White House said -- to Annie, he said, "Every American should be asking why the radical left and Democrats refuse to pass the SAVE America Act" That's what they say is what they're focused on. It's just the SAVE America Act. Not this long-term effort that you've reported on to try to undermine some of the elections.

OLORUNNIPA: Yes, and the fact that the SAVE America Act did not pass gives the President potentially even more incentive to try to use executive power, because he says, oh, Congress will not do what I asked them to do, so I need to use my executive authority to take over elections or to use the National Guard or to use the military or other parts of the federal government to interfere, even though there's not supposed to be a major role for the federal government in running elections. But I would not be surprised if the President tries to do it.

RAJU: Yes, we'll see what happens.

Annie, great reporting. Thanks for joining me. I want to know who played who in that role-playing.

GRAYER: The same.

RAJU: Yes, and that's my first question there.

All right, thanks for joining Inside Politics. CNN News Central starts after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)