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Laura Coates Live
Trump's Self-Promoting Ads Risk Backfiring as GOP Voices Concern; Investigation Re-Opened; CNN, MS NOW, Politico Issue New Filing Over White House Press Ban; Pumping the A.I. Breaks; MAGA Diehards Fed Up. Aired 11p-12a ET
Aired September 28, 2026 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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Thank you very much for watching "NewsNight." "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
LAURA COATES, CNN HOST AND SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Tonight, a new self- promoting ad from the president paid for by taxpayers, except this one isn't so new, and even top Republicans say it crosses the line. Plus, a D.A. in New York reopens an investigation involving horrific rape allegations at a Cornell frat house. So, why did it take a lawsuit against the university for him to try to revisit the case? Plus, OpenAI scraps its latest model over safety concerns on the eve of a big meeting between the president and tech CEOs. That's all tonight on "Laura Coates Live." My opening statement tonight, what do you think of when you hear the term "public service announcement?" Well, I can think of a few. This is your brain on drugs, be cool, stay in school, maybe even something promoting open enrollment for Obamacare. But now, President Trump is arguing this belongs in the same category.
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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: This is the final battle. We will liberate America from these villains once and for all.
(END VIDEO CLIP) COATES: Did you catch what was on your screen at the end? Yes, paid for by the U.S. government just like the taxpayer-funded ad released by the administration last week. Now, the White House claims these are PSAs, not campaign ads. It says Trump isn't on the ballot and there's no call to action, except the one you just saw is nearly identical to an ad from Trump two years ago, a Trump 2024 campaign ad.
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TRUMP: We will liberate America from these villains once and for all.
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COATES: And several Republicans think it's a red line for American taxpayers to foot the bill for ads like that, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
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SEN. JOHN THUNE (R-SD), MAJORITY LEADER OF THE UNITED STATES SENATE (voice-over): It's a great message. I like the message, but it shouldn`t be paid for with taxpayer dollars.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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SEN. JOHN KENNEDY (R), LOUISIANA: I don't think any public official, including President Trump or Kristi Noem or John Kennedy, should spend public money on private ads for themselves.
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UNKNOWN (voice-over): What are your thoughts on that? Is it appropriate?
SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R), TEXAS (voice-over): No. It's not even a close question.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: Even though Trump and the White House says Trump is not on the ballot, he has repeatedly told his base to pretend that he is on the ballot, which is putting GOP candidates in a real bind, because many of Trump's own policies are deeply unpopular. I mean, take Iowa, a state that he won by more than 13 points just two years ago. Trump's decision to curb tariffs on imported beef has gotten a lot of pushback from the cattle ranchers there.
And GOP Senate candidate Ashley Hinson now finds herself in a competitive race against Democratic challenger Josh Turek. Now, Trump dismissed the polls as fake while Hinson was in the Oval Office today. He went on to praise her. But Hinson has been creating some distance between the president and herself because the message she's running on, well, it's not exactly Trumpian.
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REP. ASHLEY HINSON (R-IA), IOWA SENATORIAL CANDIDATE: It used to be that reaching across the aisle wasn't just OK, it was expected. Some people in Washington forgot that. I never have.
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COATES: And it doesn't end there. She's one of the growing number of Republicans calling for an end to the Iran war.
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HINSON: I've called for an immediate and successful end to the war in Iran.
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MIKE ROGERS, MICHIGAN SENATORIAL CANDIDATE: We have to bring prices down. The war with Iran needs to end, and end quickly.
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REP. THOMAS TIFFANY (R-WI), WISCONSIN GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I just believe that we should be exiting Iran, that it's time to move on.
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SEN JON HUSTED (R-OH), SENATORIAL CANDIDATE: We've got to bring the war to a close. We've got to get gas prices down.
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LISA DEMUTH, MINNESOTA HOUSE SPEAKER, GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: It is time to put an end to that war. I really believe that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: With me now, Democratic congressman from New York, Dan Goldman, who is a member of the House Judiciary Committee. Congressman, I have to know, is there anything Democrats can do right now to stop these ads from running?
REP. DANIEL GOLDMAN (D-NY): Well, look, I mean, there are lawsuits that could be filed. That would have to be from outside groups. But one of the consequences of being in the minority is that we don't have subpoena power. We cannot compel the administration to do anything. [23:04:56]
So, what we are going to do and what we need to do is turn this into a political advantage for us because the American people fully understand that their taxpayer dollars should not be going to support a particular candidate. That's not what they pay taxes for, that's not what that money is used for, and especially when costs are going through the roof, inflation is high, tariffs are taxing everyone, that the government would use -- the government, the Trump administration, and Donald Trump himself would use those taxpayer dollars, which could go for groceries and rent and healthcare, instead to promote himself. It is going to be self-defeating for him while also illegal.
COATES: Well, Congressman Jamie Raskin suggests this is not just a Hatch Act violation, which is significant in and of itself, but he also thinks it might be felony criminal theft. Do you agree with that assessment?
GOLDMAN: Look, I think it's possible. The problem is, as we know, Donald Trump fully controls the Department of Justice. Todd Blanche is his puppet, is his lackey, who will do whatever Donald Trump says. So, the idea that there would be any investigation, criminal investigation, is so unlikely, and that's why this is all happening.
The Hatch Act -- this is an obvious violation of the Hatch Act. The Hatch Act does not have criminal penalties, and that's because the Constitution assumed that the president of the United States would abide by his oath to faithfully execute the laws. We've never had a president like Donald Trump, who has flouted and broken so many laws, so many provisions of the Constitution.
I'm not sure that Congress before was ever prepared for it, and that's why there are no criminal penalties for the Hatch Act. It's really in the domain of the executive branch. The Office of Special Counsel can investigate it, but the punishment is not there to deter him from doing this.
So, this is yet another thing that Democrats will have to do, and we're in the majority, is to put more teeth with criminal penalties or significant fines for any violations of these good government laws.
COATES: You know, I always say there's this gap between what the law is and what it ought to be, and in between is what the American people think that it really is able to protect. And so, there is this gap to close. We'll see.
But Attorney General Todd Blanche, he made an argument on Sunday about a different issue, and he argued that the president has total authority over who is allowed on Air Force One and also at the White House. Listen to this.
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TODD BLANCHE, ACTING ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES: The President has every right to decide who gets to fly on his plane. And it is national security, especially in Air Force One and especially at the White House. And so, it's not just -- it's not just the fact that they refuse to report anything accurately.
By the way, that is what is a national security problem. When you have completely misinformation -- complete misinformation coming out of the White House, that affects our relationship with our foreign partners, that affects our relationship with our foreign enemies.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: Congressman, is there a world in which bad press equals a national security threat?
GOLDMAN: Obviously not. In fact --
COATES: By the way, that assumes -- that assumes there is bad press, but go ahead.
GOLDMAN: Right. I mean, the proof is in the pudding. When Donald Trump announced this, he made no mention of national security. He made it very clear that he doesn't like those particular outlets because they say the facts, and he doesn't agree with those facts. He wants to create alternative facts, but that they report the actual news, and he doesn't like that, so he wants to get rid of them from the White House and from Air Force One.
I don't know how Todd Blanche looks himself in the mirror at this point. It is so beneath him to claim somehow that this is a national security risk and that the president can choose which media outlets that gets to cover him and which don't, and that that decision is made based on whether he likes their coverage or not. It would be one thing if he said no more coverage for anybody in the White House or in Air Force One. You all have to figure out a different way of getting it.
OK, he's treating everybody equally but, obviously, it's a violation of the First Amendment for him to particularize and select a few that he doesn't like, and he's open and notorious about that, and say they cannot have the same access as other outlets that he does like. It is a blatant and egregious violation of the First Amendment. Todd Blanche knows that, and I'm embarrassed for him.
[23:10:02]
COATES: And yet, here we are. Congressman Dan Goldman, thank you.
GOLDMAN: Thank you.
COATES: I want to turn now to the host of "The Ben Ferguson Show," Ben Ferguson, former senior spokesperson for the Harris-Walz campaign, Adrienne Elrod, and White House columnist for "The Hill," Niall Stanage. Good to have all of you guys here on set with me. Good to see you guys.
Niall, I want to begin with you because Republican lawmakers, they have been calling out Trump for spending tax money on political ads in particular. There is a rule against this, I should remind people. The administration is going right past it and is continuing to do so. Is there any concern that this might backfire for the White House? NIALL STANAGE, WHITE HOUSE COLUMNIST, THE HILL: Oh, I think there's concern, for sure. For a start, just the mere fact that taxpayer money is being utilized for advertising from the president that pays homage to the president, there's an obvious problem there.
And you mentioned Republican lawmakers, Laura, but, of course, it's also the White House's defense here is that these aren't political ads, they are to remind Americans to be proud of their country.
We're talking about 30-second ads. I got my stopwatch out earlier. One of them, 27 seconds, is images of Donald Trump. That isn't a reminder to love your country, that is an encouragement to love Donald Trump.
COATES: So, reconcile this because, obviously, you know the Hatch Act and you know taxpayer dollars aren't supposed to be used for this. Do you see there a world where this is considered really a PSA to voters?
BEN FERGUSON, RADIO HOST, PODCAST CO-HOST: I think it's a PSA as much as it was when Barack Obama was doing the same thing with Obamacare and no one was complaining. The ads are still up on the internet.
ADRIENNE ELROD, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST, FORMER SENIOR SPOKESPERSON FOR THE HARRIS-WALZ PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN: This is totally -- this is completely different.
FERGUSON: No. That was --
ELROD: This is clearly a promotional ad for Donald Trump.
FERGUSON: No. This was actually an ad pushing for something called Obamacare. It was a political campaign ad for Obamacare.
ELROD: To tell people how to sign up to get health care.
FERGUSON: Again, if --
ELROD: The Affordable Health Care Act was a totally different thing.
FERGUSON: I go back to --
ELROD: That was to sign up for a policy so people get access to health care. This is a vanity project for Donald Trump.
FERGUSON: You had a piece of legislation that was named after Barack Obama, and they used government funds to advocate in support for his cause. If we're going to lose our minds about what Trump is doing now, then we have to lose our minds on that.
ELROD: First of all, it's probably Affordable Care Act, then nicknamed it Obamacare.
FERGUSON: Right, called Obamacare. Even Obama called it Obamacare. He called it Obamacare.
STANAGE: One of the things that I have found for years of covering Donald Trump now is when people on the right are asked, is he right to do this, they very rarely say yes. They almost always say, well, if you look at Obama, you look at Biden, you look at Clinton, the Obamacare thing was about informing people about tax credits that were available to reduce the price of health coverage.
There is no reasonable person who would see that as analogous with the kind of Trump-centric ads that we're seeing here.
FERGUSON: If you look at it from the lens of politics, if I have a policy called Obamacare, and I need people to think it's popular, and I need it to be popular for the midterm elections coming up because then I need to make sure that Democrats are winning, and I use those ads, if we're going to call them ads, let's just call it an ad then, that was an ad to help re-elect Democrats to office and make Obamacare popular with the voters.
ELROD: OK. Can I --
FERGUSON: So, if we're going to say that's terrible, now, I'll be clear about something else, if Donald Trump was running this ad right now and he was on the ballot, I'd be completely against it because I do believe that would then be a political ad for himself. He's not on the ballot.
STANAGE: But he keeps saying that they should vote as if he is on the ballot. He said that at the Dallas midterm conventions, among other places, vote as if I'm on the ballot.
FERGUSON: Yes. Policy. He knows he's popular with Republican voters.
STANAGE: So, you can't just -- you can't just pick and choose and say, oh, well, he says he wants --
FERGUSON: No, but it's no different than Obamacare.
COATES: Hold on. Let me ask this. Let's just say, and I don`t agree, but let's all concede the point the point that you have a similarity. You're saying if you think that's wrong, then be outraged by this as well. Are you not outraged about this if you believe that was a problem?
FERGUSON: I don't -- I didn't have a problem, by the way. And if you go back and look at the videos on this network, I never criticize Obama for those ads.
COATES: I'm using your hypothetical.
FERGUSON: Right. I'm giving you real. I have no problem with it.
COATES: All right. That's fine.
FERGUSON: I have no problem with the --
COATES: OK, I'm asking for -- I'm asking not your personal view, then, because you made it more universalized. If people had a problem with Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act and the advertisements surrounding those tax credits, you think that they should then be not hypocritical and not support these ads as well. So, is the same through line true?
FERGUSON: My point is I think the president -- I think the president of the United States of America is the president of the United States of America.
COATES: Yes.
FERGUSON: If he has a message that's a PSA that he believes is important to the voters, then he should be able to do that. That's why I didn't criticize Barack Obama when he did it.
COATES: What's your point, Adrienne?
ELROD: I was going to say two things. Number one, when President Obama was running the Obamacare ads, that was in 2010 when Obamacare was really unpopular because people felt like it was (INAUDIBLE) it was passed. So, it was not necessarily something that was helping him.
FERGUSON: He was trying to save it.
ELROD: This is something that Trump is trying to use as a vanity project for him.
FERGUSON: But it was a political ad for him, then.
ELROD: Secondly, I think the bigger point here is that we can all sit here and say, oh, you can say this is perfectly fine, etcetera.
[23:14:58]
What you're seeing from Trump voters, people who are hardcore MAGA voters, voted for him in 2024, have been longtime supporters, even they are saying, I don't want my taxpayer dollars going for a vanity project for Donald Trump when I can't afford gas, I can't afford groceries, I can't afford to feed my families. They are seeing this as, again, another tone-deaf moment for Trump where he's putting their taxpayer dollars to use for something that is not helping their bottom line.
COATES: I want to play for you, guys, what Congressman Ro Khanna has to say because he actually sees a silver lining in the use of these ads. Listen.
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REP. RO KHANNA (D), CALIFORNIA: The more they want to put President Trump on television, the happier I am. Obviously, it's an ethics violation. But here's my advice: Go spend as much money as you want putting Donald Trump on T.V. Please put him on T.V. all over America. Please have him talk about how he's still committed to the Iran war, how gas prices are going up and diesel is going up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: So, does the political end justify the means to you? STANAGE: Well, I mean, I think that putting Trump in the center of the campaign is obviously dangerous for Republicans because his approval ratings are so low. Now, their bet is that if you put him in the center, you can turn out Republican voters --
FERGUSON: Yes.
STANAGE: -- who might otherwise not do so. The question is, Donald Trump, for his whole political career, has been a big driver of turnout on both sides, right? So, do you end up with more people coming out to administer a defeat by proxy to him than you get Republicans coming out to support him?
FERGUSON: I got to say, I think Donald Trump is the best face for the Republican Party right now, full stop. This is a guy who won a re- election after everything that had happened to him, and did it, and the American people support him yet again. And what he's saying now is, if you voted for four years of America First policies, then you need to show up one more time and vote for two more years of it.
ELROD: He's also got the lowest approval rating of any president going into a midterm cycle since Bush '92.
FERGUSON: I go back to the core. I still think Donald Trump turns out voters, the fact that he was able to do what he did with the midterm convention. I was there. It was -- felt like an actual convention. No other politician I've seen in my lifetime could do that on either side of the party, pull that off.
He still has more momentum than any other Republican out there right now. That's why he said, it's either me. And look, if it turns out that he loses, you get to grin and say, see, people don't like Donald Trump. If he's my best player right now, I'll put him on the field with a quarterback. He's the guy.
COATES: I'm sure he does turn out voters. The question for a strategist is whether he'll turn out Democratic voters or Republicans. We'll see. Everyone, thank you so much.
Up next, prosecutors pull a 180 and decide to reopen an investigation into an alleged rape at Cornell. So, why did the D.A. change his mind now? And was his original choice a mistake or was he simply following the law? Plus --
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MICHAEL P. DESRONVIL, HOLDOUT JUROR IN LINDSAY CLANCY CASE: Hi. My name is Michael P. Desronvil, also known as the lone juror.
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COATES: Breaking tonight, the holdout juror in the Lindsay Clancy trial releasing a statement on camera for the first time. I'll play his message, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [23:20:00]
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COATES: All right, a warning to the audience at home. We're about to talk about the allegations of rape at Cornell, which are extremely disturbing to hear. And you know, when I first read about the allegations against the seven fraternity brothers, I felt three emotions: disgust, horror, and concern. And really, it triggered two parts of me. One, the mother. I'm always looking for teachable moments from my son, from my daughter, and I immediately wondered whether this could be one, should be one, and if so, what exactly was I going to tell them?
But the story triggered another part of me, everyone, the prosecutor, and that's what we're going to focus on tonight because, ultimately, this case will be decided by the law and prosecutorial discretion.
So, let's orient ourselves first, OK? This alleged gang rape happened in 2024 at the Chi Phi fraternity house. At the time, the former Cornell student reported the alleged assault to university police, but there were no charges filed. Why? Because district attorney says the student's story didn't meet the standard under New York law.
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MATTHEW VAN HOUTEN, DISTRICT ATTORNEY, TOMPKINS COUNTY, NEW YORK: There were two instances, she describes, where someone touched her in a way that she didn't want them to touch her, and she told them no, and they did not continue.
But consent or lack of consent is very specific under New York state law. You either have to be physically compelled, forcible compulsion, physical force, or you have to be physically helpless which is unconscious, or you have to be mentally incapacitated which is having been given drugs without your knowledge that rendered you incapable of consenting.
None of those things were articulated in her initial statement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: So, according to the D.A., the woman's original statement suggested that she willingly drank, willingly took ketamine, and willingly engaged or agreed to engage in an initial threesome.
Now, you fast forward two years later, and that woman has now filed a civil lawsuit alleging the school did not do enough to protect her. That has now triggered the D.A. to reopen that investigation, and he says it's because her story may now suggest that she never consented or that her memory may provide additional details that ought to be considered.
Now, in this lawsuit, Jane Doe claims she was 10 drinks deep and -- quote -- "visibly intoxicated" when she got to the frat house. She alleges two frat brothers -- quote -- "pressured" her into snorting a substance described as ketamine, which she says she had never done before.
[23:24:58]
She alleges that one fraternity brother posted a message to his frat's Snapchat that read, well, free -- expletive -- upstairs. And here's the key claim made in her lawsuit. Quote -- "In her drunken state, plaintiff was incapable of consenting to a threesome."
So that is what the D.A. says is now different about her story compared to 2024. But the woman's attorney says he doesn't buy the D.A.'s argument for not pursuing the case originally.
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THOMAS P. GIUFFRA, ATTORNEY FOR JANE DOE, CORNELL 7 CASE: I don't know how anybody who was grossly intoxicated and drugged can consent to anything. I mean, the fact is she went to the Cornell University Police to file a complaint because she believed she was a victim of a crime.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: Now, I've tried rape cases, including ones involving intoxicated victims and delayed reporting. And here is the unsettling reality facing every prosecutor deciding whether they can prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. Sadly, and I do mean sadly, victim blaming is still very pervasive. If you can get past victim blaming, you've got to contend with any inconsistencies in the victim's story and resolve why they are inconsistent.
And, you know, in my experience, there are reasons stories change that have nothing to do with dishonesty. Fear, ridicule, and shame can be powerful motivators and silencers. If you can get past any inconsistency, you have to contend with the passage of time where memories fade and physical evidence disappears.
Corroboration, hard to come by, of course, for a crime intentionally done behind closed doors. And if there's a civil lawsuit, you've got to fight the public perception of a money grab. And, by the way, this assumes you've got a cooperating victim who is willing to testify in open court because, of course, it is the right of the accused to face their accuser.
I don't know what's going to happen in this investigation. I have no idea what the facts will bear or whether charges will be brought. But I do know that no case is easy.
And here's what makes it specifically harder in New York. In New York, if the victim voluntarily took drugs or alcohol before the alleged assault, a defendant can use their voluntary intoxication as a defense and argue they were unable to know that the victim was incapacitated or unable to consent because of it.
That might describe the tension of this moment that we're all watching unfold. The allegations are disgusting. The laws, loop-holed. The presumption of innocence, unchanged. And prosecutors have a lot of discretion. I guess welcome to the pursuit of justice.
I want to convene my legal panel to talk about all of these. I want to bring in criminal defense attorney Elyse Hershon and trial attorney and legal analyst Monique Pressley. Monique, I want to begin with you. What's your impression of the D.A.'s claims that there was a discrepancy in whether or not the woman did, in fact, consent?
MONIQUE PRESSLEY, TRIAL ATTORNEY, LEGAL ANALYST: I think that if we credit what he's saying, and you know, I've never been a prosecutor, Laura, so that's where you and I diverge, I'm a defense attorney for life, but if we credit what the prosecutor is saying and that they went on the information that they had, and that now, a couple of years later, there is a more fulsome reporting of what happened, then we're left with the law, fortunately or unfortunately, we're left with a district attorney that maybe took something at face value and formed opinions that were based upon what he saw at the time.
But here's the thing for me: Even if he took whatever it was at face value, there are such awesome powers in the prosecutor's office that I believe investigating and figuring out what really happened was within those powers at the time.
And maybe there was just a lack of desire to do so because, you know, I'm first public defender service D.C., and then career public defender, and we never have the money that the government has, and they can do with it whatever they want to do with it.
And sometimes, we know, they prosecute people wrongfully with that money, and they spend millions doing it. But then, sometimes, it seems they're persuaded, we don't know the facts, and they sit on their hands.
[23:30:00]
It seems like maybe that's what happened this time.
COATES: Well, and I hear you on the idea of the questions, particularly on whether there was a fulsome investigation. And Elyse, I mean, a lot of people want to know why the D.A.'s office did not at least interview the Jane Doe in this case. In fact, he was asked this question. Here's what he had to say.
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VAN HOUTEN: When you have a comprehensive six-page, single-spaced document that was extremely detailed, extremely candid, extremely specific, we are not going to reach out to her and say, hey, what you said didn't allege a crime. Can you give us more so we can charge somebody? That's not ethical. That is not ethical for a prosecutor to do that. We do not independently investigate crimes in the district attorney's office. We rely on the police to investigate those crimes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COATES: Elyse, what do you think of that? Is that a valid reason? Because I know that if there is a suspicion a crime has been committed or probable cause, you can certainly ask the officers to investigate further a particular matter to resolve whether somebody, in fact, has committed a crime that you can prove.
ELYSE HERSHON, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: This sounds like pure C-Y-A to me. Clearly the D.A.'s office doesn't look good here, right? They didn't credit somebody two years ago that now it seems there's evidence mounting, at least allegations, that give her more validity.
And what the prosecution has done here inadvertently is undermine their own case by literally not believing or following up or pursuing or doing a solid investigation on someone who is alleging a very serious crime.
This is not, you know, a drunken bar fight where nobody really got hurt. Sexual assault cases are notoriously hard to prove because a lot of it is he said, she said. And a lot of it is there's delayed disclosure. So, that alone is not enough to, you know, not believe or believe someone, although that is something that defense attorneys bring up.
Now, what's interesting about this is that Cornell itself led the investigation here. So, as from what was reported, that this victim Doe, as she is not named, interviewed with a police officer, but then there was no follow-up there. So, there's no -- we have specific -- specifically skilled and trained interviewers in Massachusetts when I say we at the prosecutor's office that interview victims, child victims, adult victims of sexual assault cases.
There is a very long statute of limitations here, 15 plus years civilly, I think 35 years or more, because these delayed disclosures are common, either part of the story doesn't make it out, none of the story makes it out until a lot further along.
So, whether because of shame, and certainly you've had experience with these types of cases, because of shame, embarrassment, not sure if people are going to believe her, if there was one interview by one police officer right after it happened and no follow-up, well, no kidding that this wasn't very thorough, and the D.A.s office was satisfied that Cornell conducted its own investigation, had a panel of people that seemingly have a vested interest in clearing Cornell's name, this is obviously not good publicity for them or anyone.
So, it's really interesting that they let them lead the investigation at their own school.
COATES: Right. And again, it doesn't mean that they don't have jurisdiction if it happened in the state of New York. We do know that the university is one thing. Just because you're a student doesn't mean that you forsake and foreclose all of your rights to actually have justice pursued whatever ultimately happens in this case.
Elyse Hershon, Monique Pressley, thank you both so much.
Breaking news, up next, the attorneys for CNN, MS NOW, and Politico have just issued a brand-new filing against Trump's press ban. I'm going to unpack it all, next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:35:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COATES: Breaking news, everyone. The news organizations that were targeted by President Trump's press ban have just issued a new filing. This one asked the judge to extend his order that temporarily restored CNN, MS NOW, and Politico's access to the White House. The new filing calls the ban an unlawful assault on the most fundamental First Amendment freedom.
Former deputy assistant attorney general, Harry Litman, joins me now. OK, Harry, once again, the lawyers for the media, they used the administration's own words in pushing back against their claim that this ban was not about viewpoint discrimination, it was about national security. And this brief makes clear that they want the judge to disregard that because they call -- quote, unquote -- "the shenanigans" that have happened to undermine all those claims.
HARRY LITMAN, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: It's right. And Trump really made it pretty easy for them. When he issued this interdiction back on a week ago, Friday, he said flat out, I don't like what they write, and that's why I'm doing it. They've tried since to sort of attach a kind of national security rationale, but the decision under review, Laura, is the very thing that Trump did, so it's really far-fetched.
[23:39:55]
And this judge already held in doing the temporary restraining order that they didn't act on the base of national security, and there's no national security rationale here.
COATES: They also used Attorney General Todd Blanche's comments on a Sunday show about negative coverage, believing that that was really -- this is all pretextual.
But they also went on to talk about Air Force One and what was happening there. The lawyers took issue with his refusal to let CNN on Air Force One, saying that it shows that the White House has -- quote -- "persisted in unpredictability and inconsistently implementing the ban."
Walk us through from now the request from the TRO that's only two weeks in length to what they're asking for now and what could happen, especially in terms of the DOJ being able to appeal it.
LITMAN: Yes, and that's important because the plain stuff is a little bit different. What they're asking for is basically what he said in the TRO, but to make it an injunction that says they get to be put back in the position they were in before the 18th when Trump issued the ban.
Now, if Kelly does that, and I think there's every reason to think he will, now, they'll fight a little about the plane or other things where the administration will have an argument that, oh, that's not really a public forum, that's like the Oval Office. But I think that's why there'll be pretty big stakes in just how the temporary injunction reads. And if it says back to where you were before the 18th, then all of this should go away.
The one thing that's clear and we really need to emphasize, it's all viewpoint discrimination. If he couldn't take their passes away, maybe he can keep them from the plane or from the Rose Garden, etcetera. It's naked viewpoint discrimination which, as you know, the Constitution abhors.
COATES: Everything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. Let's see. Harry Litman, thank you so much.
New tonight, OpenAI suddenly pumping the brakes on the release of its new A.I. model as the company cites safety concerns. So, what does this mean for Trump's big meeting with the head of the A.I. companies that's happening tomorrow? And later, Trump's most loyal MAGA fans, some of the ones who sit front row at his rallies, reportedly fed up with him. So, how big of a warning sign is it? That conversation straight ahead.
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JANE WICKLINE, ACTRESS, COMEDIAN: A.I. is the devil and I its maker.
UNKNOWN: What?
(LAUGHTER)
WICKLINE: No, well, so, look, Sam Altman, myself, all the major A.I. players, we have talked about this extensively, and we are all on the same page here. We do not condone what we are doing.
(LAUGHTER)
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COATES: SNL did not pull any punches in their portrayal of anthropic CEO Dario Amodei. Just last night, Amodei attended a private dinner with President Trump at the White House. The two met despite having a history of not getting along.
And a CNN source says that CNN will be -- he will tell CNN, excuse me, that Amodei will be back at the White House tomorrow for a meeting between the president and other top A.I. executives, including Mark Zuckerberg, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang, OpenAI president and co-founder Greg Brockman, and Palantir CEO Alex Karp. Sources say the meeting will aim to get tech leaders and the government on the same page amid growing concerns over A.I. safety.
And tonight, OpenAI is announcing it will not release its newest model because the company says it didn't quite meet the bar for safety.
Joining me now is New York State Assemblyman and former Democratic candidate for Congress, Alex Bores. He made the A.I. issue front and center during his campaign and recently launched an advocacy group called "Who Decides" focused on A.I. safety.
Assemblyman, you know, these tech leaders, they have very different views on how to regulate A.I. Amodei wants regulation. Zuckerberg wants companies to figure it out themselves. Palantir CEO says A.I. companies might need to be nationalized because of liability risks. How do you see this meeting going?
ALEX BORES (D), MEMBER OF NEW YORK STATE ASSEMBLY, FORMER U.S. HOUSE CANDIDATE FOR NEW YORK: And Jensen Huang seems to contradict himself each time he talks. He was originally under no regulation, but then on Ezra Klein said, well, if they can't do it safely, shut the labs down entirely. It really is a lot of competing visions, most of which seem to be motivated by just making the most amount of money.
But the key thing is that this is five Silicon Valley CEOs in a room with the president deciding the future of A.I. when these decisions should be made by the American people.
COATES: You know, assemblyman, OpenAI, they are announcing that they will not release their latest model due to safety issues. And this is coming after Zuckerberg announced Meta delayed shipping its own model called Muse for months to focus on safety. Is this a signal to you that these companies are going to do more to police themselves or are they getting ahead of something?
BORES: I think it's a signal that the capabilities have reached such a level and safety has not kept up that they're starting to finally be worried that liability might bite.
Listen, there are always going to have competitive pressures to release things, to get them out, to get them to the market. And it's only if we make clear that they'll be liable for harms and maybe if we go further and put requirements that they not release unsafe models that we can actually change their behavior. Otherwise, we're just pushing against the tide.
COATES: I mean, just the notion that I have to require you not to release something unsafe seems very counterintuitive. And yet, that might be where we are. I mean, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang was asked about the recent cases of A.I. models going rogue and disobeying human commands. Listen.
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UNKNOWN: The problems that we've seen to this point where OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and others have had agents that have escaped and have gotten out and done mischievous things, maybe illegal things, the problems we've seen to this point, you think, is simply an engineering problem and a fault of those companies maybe not putting in the right restrictions?
JENSEN HUANG, CEO, NVIDIA: Well, I think the answer is we hope it's an engineering problem. I believe it's an engineering problem. I know it's an engineering problem. And we all need to hope that it's an engineering problem. If it's not an engineering problem, it's not solvable.
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COATES: That's the antithesis of hopeful. I mean, if it's not an engineering problem, it's not solvable, meaning what? It's too late?
BORES: That seems to be what he's implying. You know, it's tough to figure out exactly what he meant in that clip. He has a firm belief that the Hugging Face incident could have been fixed with better cybersecurity. And there were definitely things that OpenAI messed up in designing it.
But there were also what are called zero-day vulnerabilities, novel ways of breaking out of the sandbox that the agent discovered, that even the best security people would not have been able to prevent. It's pretty easy to be backwards looking and always fix the last problem.
And actually, NVIDIA should be complimented for today, putting out a platform where they try to build some of the safety into the chip to solve the last hack that occurred.
But the question is these models are going to continue to get more capable. They're going to continue to find new ways of breaking out. In fact, OpenAI just last week announced that their models broke out of the new hardened security posture that they put in because of Hugging Face.
So, each individual hack might be an engineering problem, but there's a bigger problem of how we solve this going forward when they continue to have more and more capabilities.
COATES: You know, Trump's former A.I. czar, David Sacks, recently said the consequences of regulating A.I. could, in fact, be devastating. Listen to him.
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DAVID SACKS, WHITE HOUSE A.I. AND CRYPTO CZAR: The Democrats want to do to A.I. what they did to crypto. They're going to drive the whole industry offshore. They're going to basically drive all the innovators out of the country. Chinese civilization will rocket past us. They will be the ones that make all the discoveries and discover this new world and accrue all the wealth.
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COATES: Does he have a point?
BORES: It's tough to count how many things he got wrong there. Regulation around A.I. is a bipartisan issue. It's not sitting in one party. Large majorities of both voters of both parties want there to be more regulation on A.I. and want A.I. development to slow down. They just want to get a handle on what's going on.
China is making advances, but is largely piggybacking on advances that we are making in America by distilling American models. And if we lose control of A.I., literally, no one benefits from that. So, this extremist position where he's trying to make this a partisan issue is pretty silly and I think easy to reject. We just need to remember that the American people as a whole want a say in the development of this technology, want it regulated, want to get our arms around the speed of it.
COATES: Assemblyman Alex Bores, thank you so much.
BORES: Thanks for having me.
COATES: You know, the mood in MAGAville is turning sour with less than 40 days to go before the midterm elections. A new report highlights the growing discontent among President Trump's own supporters.
Politico spoke to the members of the "Front Row Joes," the Trump supporters who follow him to every rally and sit as close as possible, and even some of them were starting to turn their backs on Trump. One called him a -- quote -- "fraud and liar." Another said Trump -- quote -- "can't be trusted."
And many of these supporters are in key battleground states like Ohio, like Texas. And while these aren't just a handful of Trump supporters, losing their support could make or break the GOP chances come November.
So, let's check on the Trump rally vibes with a comedy duo that has been on the ground to experience them firsthand, Davram Stiefler and Jason Selvig, hosts of "The Good Liars Tell the Truth" podcast. Good to see you, gentlemen, again. I'll begin with you, Davrum, because you guys have been going to these rallies for months now. Are you seeing any defections or discontent among Trump supporters?
DAVRAM STIEFLER, PODCAST HOST, COMEDIAN: Yeah, I think it's fair to say that that has been happening. Sometimes, you know, we'll ask someone what you think Donald Trump's greatest accomplishment is or, you know, what brought you to the rally today, and a lot of people start with, well, you know, gas prices are very high right now. And I don't know that I love that we're in a foreign war, which is something he promised we wouldn't be doing, and they start qualifying it in certain ways before you even get into the conversation. So, I think it's fair to say that, you know, things are changing, and we are seeing that.
COATES: Jason, are they mentioning things like the Iran war, the Epstein files? Politico reports that some supporters are upset about this. What are you hearing from Trump supporters about these very issues?
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JASON SELVIG, PODCAST HOST, COMEDIAN: Well, those are two big things that we've heard on the road, Epstein files and the war, and the gas prices are kind of in the same boat with the war.
On July 4th, we went down to the 4th of July fireworks display, the celebration. Trump gave the speech there in Washington, D.C. We ran into a guy named Uncle Jam. He goes to all of the Trump rallies. And he would sing songs. He would write songs and make songs up about how great Donald Trump was and how the 2020 election was stolen.
We talked to him at the parade there that day, and he said that he now had some major problems with Donald Trump, and it was those two things that you mentioned. It was the Epstein files. He hated how Donald Trump handled that. He thought it was going back on a campaign promise, and then also getting into another war.
So, if somebody who's writing songs about how great Donald Trump is, is starting to question their support, I would say there are definitely some cracks there.
COATES: I mean, certainly. And Davram, you asked a Trump voter to list one of Trump's actions or policies that he supported. I want to just watch how that went.
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STIEFLER: List maybe one thing that he has done that you really support.
UNKNOWN: What year?
STIEFLER: This year.
UNKNOWN: I don't know what to say. There's too many.
STIEFLER: There's too many to list?
UNKNOWN: I just can't put a finger on one thing.
STIEFLER: I hear you. But would you mind just saying just one?
UNKNOWN: No, I'm not going to point out one thing.
STIEFLER: Got it.
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COATES: How did you interpret that moment? And what are Trump voters telling you about why they're still supporting him?
STIEFLER: Well, I interpreted that moment as it's kind of hard to find one thing. I remember talking to one woman who said, we're living in the golden age, but then she couldn't really say why. And I think if people are trying to come up with things that Donald Trump has delivered on, campaign promises that he has delivered on, they can't really come up with them. And then Donald Trump just falls back on renaming bodies of water, I guess, which people feel a little bit mixed on. That really has been it lately. So, I think that clip kind of shows you that it's a little difficult to find that thing that he has delivered on.
COATES: Well, Jason, what about these $5,000 checks that Trump pledges to send to Americans if Republicans win the midterms? Did that somehow make supporters in support of him? I mean, listen to what they said. They squirmed a little bit.
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SELVIG: How did you feel about him saying everyone gets $5,000 checks only if the Republicans win the midterms?
UNKNOWN: Well, you know, sounds like he might be buying some votes.
SELVIG: Sounds like he's buying votes?
UNKNOWN: Yes.
SELVIG: Is that something that a president should be doing?
UNKNOWN: Probably not, but we'll see how it all falls into place.
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STIEFLER: Is it socialism to give Americans $5,000 from the government?
UNKNOWN: No. No because it's a dividend. It's a payout from the profits that our country is making. We're living in the golden age, right?
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COATES: There's that phrase, golden age. How do they justify that? You hear those two different supporters articulating their views on that. That's quite a moment and quite a split screen.
SELVIG: Yeah, look, we were at the RNC, the midterm RNC in Dallas, Texas. So, the day after he made this promise, we talked to people about it, and you could kind of hear them in real time trying to figure out what the talking point is with this.
Some people said they wanted to -- the best-case scenario would be Trump wins the midterms, and then they don't have to pay the $5,000 to everyone because that would be, you know, over a trillion dollars. But some people are saying that, yes, it is a pay, it's buying votes, Donald Trump is trying to buy votes, and they're OK with it if Donald Trump is doing it, but I have a feeling if there was a Democrat in office who was making the same promises, they would not be OK with it. COATES: We'll see. Not that many days to go to see how they really feel. He says, pretend he's on the ballot. We'll see what goes on. Davram Stiefler, Jason Selvig, thank you both.
STIEFLER: Thank you.
COATES: You know, we just got some late breaking news in the Nancy Guthrie investigation. The Pima County Sheriff's Department says they are aware of a new possible ransom note tied to the case. The department told CNN they were recently made aware of this potential note and that they are working to determine its credibility.
It has been 239 days since Nancy Guthrie was taken from her Tucson, Arizona home on February 1st. We've previously reported that one of the original ransom notes said that Guthrie was -- quote -- "buried in nature."
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The reward for information leading to her recovery still tops more than $1 million. Anyone with information is urged to call 1-800-CALL- FBI.
Remember, you can still stream my show live or watch on-demand anything you may have missed any time with an "All Access" subscription. Scan the Q.R. code on your screen or go to cnn.com/watch to learn more.
And thank you all for watching. "The Story Is with Elex Michaelson" is next.
