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The Situation Room

LaGuardia Airport Crash Investigation; Trump Postpones Attacks on Iranian Energy Sites; Interview With Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA). Aired 11:30a-12p ET

Aired March 23, 2026 - 11:30   ET

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

[11:30:01]

SARAH SALDANA, FORMER ICE DIRECTOR: But there is a lot of logic and reasoning to the idea that somebody who's not trained in what they're supposed to be doing is asking to step in to TSA agents' jobs.

So I don't believe in any extreme positions left or right, and this sounds a little extreme to think that ICE agents are going to be bearing their arms and waving them at people and haranguing them. So I trust it doesn't develop into that.

However, the administration, unfortunately, has spent the last few months undermining the integrity and the credibility of this agency. It's probably not the greatest idea to be putting them out in a public setting where they don't even belong at these airports.

They are there actually in connection with their -- usually with their Homeland Security Investigations job. They're there behind the scenes. They're certainly not doing TSA job -- TSA's job there.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: All right, Sarah Saldana, as usual, thank you very much for your expertise. Appreciate it.

SALDANA: Sure.

BLITZER: And just ahead: shutdown talks stalled. President Trump says there will be no deal to end the partial government shutdown until Democrats support his voter I.D. legislation. So how long will all this last?

I will ask Democratic Senator Alex Padilla about that. He's standing by live.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:36:53]

BLITZER: Breaking news.

We have some incredible brand-new video just in to THE SITUATION ROOM. This is the view from the tarmac, look at this, just moments after that air Canada flight collided with a fire truck on the tarmac at LaGuardia Airport last night. Jack Cabot was a passenger on that flight. He shot this video after evacuating that plane. You can see in this video passengers appearing to climb out of the plane from the wing exit and lose two people. The pilot, the copilot are confirmed dead, and dozens more are injured. CNN has also learned that a flight attendant was ejected from that plane during the crash. She's in the hospital.

Happening now also, gridlock up on Capitol Hill creating misery at the nation's airports. Lawmakers and the White House are still at odds over reforms to immigration enforcement.

ICE agents are being deployed to help TSA agents working without pay during the partial government shutdown of the Homeland Security Department. President Trump posted on social media last night that the GOP shouldn't strike any deal with the Democrats unless and until they vote with Republicans to pass what's called the SAVE America Act.

Joining us now is Democratic Senator Alex Padilla of California. He serves on the Judiciary Committee.

Senator, thanks so much for joining us.

with President Trump now linking the Department of Homeland Security funding and his voter I.D. proof of citizenship legislation to vote, does that mean this partial government shutdown will drag on even longer and longer?

SEN. ALEX PADILLA (D-CA): Well, it sure seems that way. And it's precisely what they want, right?

As we have paid attention to airports, especially this morning, the question about TSA, my response is, it doesn't have to be this way. Democrats have been suggesting for weeks now, look, the Department of Homeland Security includes a number of agencies. Let's fund TSA. Got no issue there. Let's fund the Coast Guard, by the way, and FEMA and our Cybersecurity Agency.

But when it comes to ICE and CBP funding, no additional money without important and necessary reforms. So let's fund the other agencies while we continue to negotiate here. Republicans have said no. Leader Thune has taken that deal to President Trump, apparently, and Trump has said, don't make any deal, because they want this SAVE Act, which is anything but a voter I.D. bill.

BLITZER: So, Republicans from your perspective, and I know you have been talking with them, are totally opposed to any reforms at all for ICE? Is that what you're saying?

PADILLA: I think there's a split, both on what sort of reforms should be put into statute.

And, honestly, what we have proposed is commonsense best practices for law enforcement across the country. But I guess the procedural way to make progress here, funding the other agencies while we still negotiate the ICE and CBP-related elements, I know there's a lot of support within the Republican Caucus. I think that's why Leader Thune took that to President Trump. Trump

has said no.

BLITZER: Because, as you have been noting, there's been a lot of reporting, as you know, that the Senate majority leader, John Thune, told President Trump specifically yesterday that Republicans would support funding of all of the Department of Homeland Security, except for ICE, and that ICE would be dealt with later in a party-line reconciliation vote, as it's called.

President Trump rejected that offer, as you note. So where do you stand on that proposal?

PADILLA: Well, and let's be clear. Again, that proposal was made by Democrats.

Let's be clear as to where we are with ICE and CBP funding. They have no shortage of cash. In the not-so-beautiful bill that was passed last year, they front-loaded a lot of the immigration enforcement agencies and activities, not just for this fiscal year, but beyond.

So this is a partial government shutdown of their choosing. And why the emphasis on the SAVE Act for them? Trump has said the quiet part out loud. They think they're dead in the water in this midterm elections unless they manipulate the rules of the elections.

And if they get their way, not just through a slanted voter I.D. policy here, but giving DHS access to the personal information of every voter in America for the purposes of voter purging, if not worse, and now they have amended into the bill some non-election- related items, no trans athletes in sports, gender-affirming care, those sorts of things.

[11:40:14]

It's -- that's why this bill is dead on arrival, but I think Trump sees it for political survival.

BLITZER: I know you strongly oppose President Trump's so-called SAVE America Act, but supporters of the bill argue that requiring proof of citizenship and photo I.D. are simply popular ideas.

Do you have any concerns at all that Democrats potentially could be falling for a political trap here?

PADILLA: Well, it may sound good, until you read the letter of the legislation.

Most people think, well, I have a driver's license for my state I.D. I can go in and vote. That will not get you into the polling place under the language of this bill. This bill specifically says passports, which half of Americans don't even have, or your original birth certificate.

If you're a married woman who happened to change her name and your I.D. doesn't match your birth certificate, now you have got to go find -- bring a copy of your wedding certificate down to the elections office. These are all extra obstacles to voter participation that are not necessary.

It is already a crime for noncitizens to vote, and the rate of the voter fraud is exceedingly, exceedingly rare.

BLITZER: Senator Padilla of California, thanks so much for joining us.

PADILLA: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: Appreciate it. We will stay in close touch with you.

And we will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:45:52]

BLITZER: Just a short time ago, President Trump said the U.S. has had what he's calling productive conversations with Iran. And he's calling off threatened strikes on Iran's power plants if the regime didn't reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Joining us now is John Bolton. He was President Trump's national security adviser in his first term. He's also the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Ambassador Bolton, thanks so much for joining us.

As you know, Iran denies there's been any dialogue with the U.S. But what do you make of these talks between the two countries, based on what President Trump is saying?

JOHN BOLTON, FORMER U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Well, both Qatar and Oman also deny that they're engaged in any mediation.

So I'm not sure where the talks were. I think it's pretty clear, though, that the Asian markets overnight took a pretty big hit. The Nikkei average in Tokyo was down 3.5 percent. So was the Shanghai exchange average down about 3.5 percent.

And so it's certainly convenient that there were productive talks going on, so that our markets would come back up in terms of price stocks and down the price of oil. I hope that's right. We'll find out soon enough.

But I think the basic problem is -- remains the regime. As long as they're there, they now have palpable proof that, if they close the Strait of Hormuz, the world's economy suffers. So their leverage is significantly up if we allow this to continue and allow the regime to remain in place.

BLITZER: As you know, Iran has now threatened retaliation against power plants of U.S. allies and to keep the Strait of Hormuz closed indefinitely, that's what they're promising, if the U.S. attacked Iran's own power plants.

Do you suspect the Trump administration took those threats seriously?

BOLTON: Well, it's hard to know since the threat to attack Iran's civilian energy capabilities sort of came out of nowhere with a 48- hour deadline. I don't know how that decision was actually made.

But the Gulf Arab states have warned us for a long time not to go after certainly Iran's export capabilities or its oil infrastructure broadly precisely because they feared retaliatory attacks on them.

I don't know what produced the Saturday ultimatum from Trump. I think ultimatums are fine in this case, but there's still plenty of military targets to go after to achieve the objective of opening the strait. If we can't open the strait through military means, then we're in serious trouble, given the implication that we've taught the ayatollahs in Tehran for how they can leverage the strait, open or closed, into the future indefinitely as they choose.

BLITZER: Ambassador, has the U.S. done enough damage to Iran that the president can now simply walk away and declare victory, in your view?

BOLTON: Certainly not as long as the strait of Hormuz is closed, but I think what he's done so far, he started out as far back as January calling for regime change.

If you leave a wounded beast in control in Tehran at this point, they will rebuild the nuclear capability. They will rebuild the terrorist infrastructure. They will strengthen the regime again. And we're just going to face this. It's only a matter of time when.

I think that the regime is under enormous pressure. I hope, I've said from the beginning we should be working with the opposition, coordinating with them, assisting them, providing them resources, including weapons. They are the ones who can help carry out regime change inside Iran, based on the destabilization of the regime that our attacks has caused.

And to give that up now, I think really it says to the regime that they've got the patience and the resolve, and we do not.

BLITZER: What do you expect this factoring into the urgency right now for all these new talks? And there's some indication that Egypt and Turkey may be intermediaries between the U.S. and Iran.

BOLTON: Well, I think Trump is worried about the effect on markets obviously caused by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which again raises the question, why wasn't this made a priority earlier in the military action?

[11:50:05]

It was absolutely correct to go after Iran's air defenses, to go after its ballistic missiles, which were a big part of their retaliatory capability. But closing the Strait of Hormuz was obviously a part of that capability and known to everyone, known to everyone. So it should have been a priority earlier so that we might not be

under this pressure now.

BLITZER: Ambassador John Bolton, thanks, as usual, for joining us.

BOLTON: Thank you.

And coming up: brand-new images just coming into THE SITUATION ROOM from LaGuardia Airport, what they could reveal about the deadly collision between a plane and a fire truck at LaGuardia.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:55:08]

BLITZER: Breaking news, Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport is now warning passengers it could take as long as four hours to get through security lines.

The airport has five terminals and 130 gates, but right now it's only using two security checkpoints. We will watch that story as well.

We continue our breaking news coverage of the deadly collision at New York's LaGuardia Airport just before midnight. An Air Canada jet coming in for a landing slammed into a fire truck on the runway. You can see the nose of the plane ripped away. The pilot and the co-pilot were both killed. And dozens of people, passengers on board were injured.

Joining us now is David Soucie, a CNN safety analyst and a former FAA safety inspector.

David, thanks for joining us.

I want to show you and our viewers images and the video shot by a passenger on the plane. Jack Cabot, the passenger, took these images from the tarmac. As you can see he and his fellow passengers had just made an emergency exit. These still images show the extensive damage from the impact, the plane's nose completely obliterated.

The fire truck looks like it exploded. And you have investigated and analyzed, as we all know, hundreds of these flight accidents over the years. Just after this collision after midnight, what stands out most to you?

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN SAFETY ANALYST: Well, you can see clearly that the damage to the front of the nose is so significant.

It's about 25 to 30 feet of the front part of the aircraft is missing. So, because that's gone, you can see that the aircraft goes from a nose down position to a nose up position, just because the weight behind the wheels is more than what's in front of the wheels now. So you can see that it's changed and moved up forward.

So, one of the things that really strikes me is that, because that aircraft hit directly in the middle of the fire truck, the fire truck was moved forward and the aircraft was damaged in the nose, this could have been much, much worse, Wolf.

Had that truck then 40 feet further or 40 feet back, then that it would have struck against the wing, the fuel cells, the engines. It would have created a huge fire and would have had many, many fatalities. So, as tragic as this is for the two that we have lost, it could have been much, much worse, and just out of pure luck that airplane hit in the middle of that fire truck and reduced the number of fatalities significantly.

BLITZER: Yes, two fatalities, the pilot, the copilot; 41 passengers, other crew members were injured, some significantly.

Will investigators seek out videos and images from other passengers and crew members in hopes of finding more information?

SOUCIE: Yes, they will.

And there's a -- the FAA as well will be investigating this from an air traffic perspective to see what the FAA failed to do. And that would be the air traffic controller. At this point, it appears, listening to the video -- or listening to the audio from that, is that the truck was cleared to go across this runway for a different incident, but was cleared to go across.

And almost immediately, the air traffic controller started saying, stop, stop, stop, don't go onto the runway, but it was too late. The fire truck had already entered the runway. So one of the things I would look at as an investigator is, number one, why was it cleared to go when there was aircraft coming in?

But number two is, when he said stop, stop, stop, did he evaluate if it was better that the truck continue? And should he have said go faster to get to the other side? I'm worried that, when he said stop, that the fire truck said, OK, we're going to stop and stopped in the middle of the runway.

BLITZER: Yes.

SOUCIE: So it's too early to know exactly those details. But, as an investigator, I'd be looking at that time sequence to see what all happened.

BLITZER: And right now, David, what especially worries me are the -- is the fact that the nation's air traffic controllers are clearly overworked, often working six days a week, 10-hour shifts. How does that impact the nation's aviation safety system?

SOUCIE: Well, it has a great impact.

But I don't think it's a direct safety impact necessarily. Each one of the airports is under strict mandates now to make sure that they're meeting the requirement of two controllers and that they're overseeing it properly. As you recall, less than a year ago, we had a very significant issue with a lot of air traffic controllers that were not manning properly each of these air traffic control centers. But as far as I know at this point, I think the mandates that have

been put into place to make sure that there's proper staffing is there. And if it's not, then, Wolf, what they're doing for the first time in history that I'm aware of, they're actually reducing the number of flights based on capacity of what that air traffic control center can handle.

So I think that it's not a direct safety concern for passengers, but it does have impacts as far as what availability of the aircraft and, as you know, the delays that are being caused at the airports both now from the TSA and as well as from the air traffic controllers.

BLITZER: Yes, there's a lot that needs to be investigated. And they have to come up with some answers to make sure it doesn't happen again.

[12:00:01]

David Soucie, thanks so much for joining us.

SOUCIE: Thanks, Wolf.

BLITZER: And, to our viewers, thanks very much for joining us as well. You can always keep up with us on social media @WolfBlitzer and @PamelaBrownCNN.

We will see you back here tomorrow morning, every weekday morning 10:00 a.m. Eastern for two hours.

"INSIDE POLITICS" with our friend and colleague Dana Bash starts right now.