Tonight, President Biden turns up the volume on his critics will he drown them out, plus a CNN exclusive. The radio host who agreed to cut portions of his interview with the president speaks out. And a real-life Perry Mason moment in court that leads to Alec Baldwin walking out a free man, why the case was suddenly thrown out. Good evening, I'm Jim Acosta, Infallore Coates on this Friday night. Remember that Republican congressman a few weeks ago who said President Biden may be jacked up on Mountain Dew heading into that debate with Donald Trump. Tonight, it appears the president was jacked up on something, something called defiance. Now, defiance due doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but they were drinking it up at the president's rally in Michigan earlier this evening. We're going to show some of that to you. The president, to put it mildly, made it clear he is not going anywhere, at least for now. Despite the drumbeat of calls for him to get out of the race, breathless op-eds like this one from the Washington Post are rolling off his back. "Biden remains in denial. He needs to come to grips with reality," said the Post. But this was the reality in the battleground state of Michigan earlier this evening, a cheering crowd in Detroit. Take a listen. "We gotta go back, we gotta go back, we gotta go back, we gotta go back, we gotta go back, we gotta go back." You should probably notice, there's a lot of speculations lately. What's Joe Biden going to do? Is he going to stay in the race, is he going to drop out? Here's my show, I am running and we're going to win, I'm not going to change that. Apparently, the president believes he can win. He's ignoring polls immediately following the debate, showing movement towards Donald Trump and is instead focusing on the latest polls like this one. Take a look at this that has him within the margin of error, even the average of polls from after the debate show it is a close race. But plenty in his party think he's wrong, we're now up to 19 congressional Democrats, that last count calling for him to step down. They will argue, and they have argued, that he will lose to Donald Trump, but he can't make the case against him. Tonight, the president sought to prove those critics wrong. Take a look. Hand him a lecture, he says, "It's a nice guy." Now Trump would rather be an electric crew than be eaten by a shark. Now that whole thing, remember that? Poor Donald. He can't even watch TV this week because of Shark Week. He was convicted by a jury of his peers of 34 filaments for paying hush money to a porn star and hiding from voters in 2016. Project 2025 is the biggest attack on our system of government, our personal freedom. It has never been proposed in the history of this country. There will be a dictator on day one. He means it, folks. We're not going to let that happen. Over my dead body will happen. A Biden ally tells CNN there are two things they believe that could change the president's mind. If governors and senators came to him with polls showing a major collapse in support, and if fundraising fell off dramatically, for now the president is serving up some defiance. Joining us now to talk about this, Michigan Democratic Congresswoman Haley Stevens, who says she is sticking by President Biden, Congresswoman, thank you very much for joining us tonight. So where has that Joe Biden been? Well, you know what, truthfully, I've never ever done any doubt. Did you give him some Mountain Dew? Is that what happened there? I don't think so. You know, this is the president I was with in the Oval Office right after he announced tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles. We were with many union members from the steel workers, other colleagues of mine joking, laughing, discussing the trajectory of the nation. And look, he's doing two big things. And I think he's doing them really well. One, he's running the country. You saw him just yesterday conclude a big international summit where we have American leadership crystallized. And two, he's running a really strong good campaign. And this is what I have felt in my bones, what I know, because I'm doing it. And we've been doing it in Michigan since the beginning of this year, very rigorously. We had a great primary win in Michigan in February for the president. We have offices opening up. We have surrogate events happening. The president himself, along with the vice president, Kamala Harris, they're not taking anything for granted. They've been here over and over and over again. And Michigan voters and the people you saw at that rally tonight, feel it, know it, realize that Joe has their back and they have his. We're going to win this. And I mean, I have to ask you because obviously, you know, a lot of your colleagues right now in the House on the Democratic side don't don't feel the same way that you do. Are you honestly not concerned that the president could have a repeat of what happened at that debate? How are you dealing with that question when you have these conversations with your colleagues? Obviously, that comes up. What do you say in response? Oh, we loser. Uh oh. All right. We're going to try to get the Congresswoman back. She froze there. That was just a that was just a TV glitch. Standby. Standby will try to get to the Congresswoman in just a second. Let's continue this conversation. This happens. Let me go to Larry Sabato, the director of Center of Politics at the University of Virginia. Larry, just when I was starting to ask the hard questions there, you know, that the picture froze. I won't read into that. If we get the Congresswoman back control, please let me know. But Larry, what did you make of the president's performance earlier tonight? Maybe he was jacked up on Mountain Dew. Maybe I don't know. Maybe it was just the crowd. But that's not the Joe Biden we saw a couple of weeks ago. What's going on here? Well, it was a very energetic Joe Biden. And that's exactly what rank and file Democrats want to see. There's no question about it. And it will help to a certain degree because right now that's his strength. He seems to have the backing of rank and file Democrats. He doesn't have the backing of a lot of big donors. He doesn't have the backing of a lot of people in high public office who have access to private polling and other information that suggests to them that Biden is not doing terribly well in the handful of states where you have to do well. And look, Biden would rather have the rank and file. And Jim, he's decided I believe him. You know, first I thought, well, you know, he's going through that's what they always say. But I believe him. I think he's made his decision and assuming his health holds, he'll be in the race and Democrats are really have a choice. They can either bus and fight and divide and play 1968 again, or they can join together and try to defeat Donald Trump. Those are the two choices they have. Yeah, and just a quick second layer to our control of the Congresswoman joins us. Van Jones is also supposed to join us. We can just let this happen organically. They can join the conversation. But Larry, let me ask you this. According to this new national poll, and I'm sure you saw this earlier today, the president is now statistically tied with Donald Trump. He's up 40 or 50 to 48 percent in one of these polls in this NPR PBS news poll that was also conducted by Marist. I mean, that how in the heck is Joe Biden tied with or beating Donald Trump? Did we in the press misread the public? Is Donald Trump just that unpopular? What's going on? It's a combination of several things. I do think Trump backed and underplayed. Maybe this is happening next week. We're going to Republican convention, but there hadn't been much coverage of Donald Trump lately, and he always benefits from less coverage because we don't follow the outrageous things that he says and does. But I think that has helped Biden. But there are other things too. People have focused on the fundamentals in a very partisan polarized era. The vast majority of voters know for whom they're going to vote if they get out to vote. That's the real question is motivating people to vote. That's where Biden has to make up some ground, but they know how they're going to vote. And I think that's popping up in some of these surveys. But Jim, remember, he needs more than a tie, a statistical tie. He's got to win by three or four percentage points and a popular vote in order to be sure to carry Wisconsin and Michigan where he was today in Pennsylvania because he's not doing terribly well in North Carolina and Georgia and Arizona and Nevada, the other swing states. Yeah, and may come down to those blue all states yet again, Larry. And CNN political commentator, Van Jones, is joining us now as well. And Van, I was wondering, did you see a bit of the president earlier this evening in Michigan, and what did you think? I mean, this is, this was, I mean, we've heard a dark Brandon. Maybe this is jacked up Joe. What's going on here? Look, he's, he's fighting for his political life. He's like fighting for his future. And in some ways, he's fighting for America. He believes that he's the only person that can stop Donald Trump. He believes he can do the job. And he believes he just proved that with the successful NATO summit and with the successful press conference. And so he's trying to, he's trying to show you he's got the bigger people say they want bigger. Then he looks vigorous and they say he looks nuts. So he's trying. But I do think that we may have missed something. There is this countercurrent of people rallying to Joe Biden. Frank, there's a lot of African Americans, there's a lot of African American women. And we may have missed something here. Yeah, I'm wondering that too. And we did get the Democratic Congresswoman from Michigan, Haley Stevens back with us. So Congresswoman, I'll bring into the discussion as well. I was going to ask you when the, when the screen froze into our viewers out there, that was not a conspiracy. It just happened sometimes. We all live in this world of Skype or whatever you call it these days. And I was just asking, you know, I'm sure you're talking to your Democratic colleagues who don't feel the same way you do. Not enthusiastic about Joe Biden staying on top of the ticket and wondering, is he going to have another situation like we saw at the debate a couple of weeks ago? What do you say in response to that? Because obviously, if something like that, you've heard the doomsday scenario. So if it happens after the convention, September, October, what then? How do you how do you answer that? Well, certainly we don't want to be litigating very important questions about the future of our country in public and on the press like this, particularly interpersonal between colleagues. And I don't want to speak for anybody. But what I have said to folks very enthusiastically is come to Michigan. Look, this is just my slice of the world. This is where I spend every weekend. I don't have the luxury of not being on this campaign, right? I am in the thick of it and have been in part because it's not that Joe Biden is just trying to save his future. He's trying to see the future of this country, right? We heard him at the press conference yesterday. He says he wants to regulate and ban, you know, assault weapons and guns and not regulate girls. And so it's just it's really deeply important that we square this message around the economy and around the future and the palpable fear of what so many know that Donald Trump brings. And it's not just chaos. It is that project 2025 that President Biden outlined tonight in his speech. And I want to share something else with you because we did a stop at a restaurant in Northville, Michigan. This is the suburbs of Detroit, and it's a community I used to represent. And I campaign there very rigorously when I was flipping a seat in Michigan that voted for Donald Trump. And the restaurant we went to is called the garage. I spent a lot of time in the garage on the campaign trail, a lot of time in Northville. They still have a Republican township supervisor there. And I'll tell you that not only was the president engaged off script, making people laugh, painting his vision for this nation, but there was a crowd in a small suburban town, a mast, excited, engaged. These are those suburban voters we need to win. Those are those swing state voters. Donald Trump couldn't do that. He'd be booed. He doesn't have the stamina. I don't even know if he's campaigning right now. But my president, he's leading on the global stage, and he's running a world-class operation here in Michigan. And I do want to go back to Van Jones and ask, you know, we did hear the president lay out some of his promises for his first 100 days. Should he be reelected? Let's listen to a bit of that. We're going to restore Roe v. Wade as the law of the land. I mean it. We're going to protect the right to vote. We're going to fight for Medicare and Social Security, not cut it like the other guy wants to do. You know, Van, one of the criticisms of the president over the last couple of weeks after that debate performance was, you know, is this the guy who can deliver that message, draw the sharp contrast with Donald Trump, prosecute the case against Donald Trump. And he sounded like that kind of candidate tonight. Yeah, look, he did. Look, the people who are more critical say, look, he can have good days. He can have bad days of the good days. Give us, you know, encouragement. The bad days give us heart attacks. And so we, you know, I think some critics want a more stable, consistent performance. But you have to give credit where it's to. People said he's hiding. He's hiding, biting. He won't do any interviews. Well, he's doing interviews. You know, they're saying he can't do the job. Well, he just did the NATO summit. They're saying he doesn't have the energy. Well, he's giving big speeches. So at a certain point, you can't grade them on a curve and make every little mistake, a headline, and you can't grade them the other way and say no matter what you do, we just don't like you. I think you have to make a judgment. Do you think that what you're seeing now can hold up for four months or four years? And if so, he's a great candidate. But if you don't think he can hold up for four more months or four more weeks, it's understandable that you would have some concerns. And so as a mature party and not a cult, we are having discussion about what is this actual thing called the Joe Biden candidacy. And but he has acquitted himself pretty well the past 24 hours and nobody can take that away from him. Yeah, Larry, I mean, it's almost as though we're having the primary process now about six months too late. And I mean, one of the things that the Biden folks will say is that, well, the other folks missed their chance to run against Joe Biden during the primary process. But in a way, it's we're having this conversation now and Democrats are having that conversation now. I suppose better late than ever. Well, maybe it's not very helpful for a party unity, obviously, it's a legitimate discussion, you know, based on what people are seeing. But there there wasn't any significant challenge to to President Biden, no offense to the Minnesota Congressmen who did, but there really wasn't a significant challenge. That was the time for there to be a significant challenge. There wasn't. And so in the end, you have to accept reality. And the reality for Democrats is they have a nominee. Luckily for them, their nominee has a very good record from the first term. It's easily defensible. And it can easily be extended into the second term. There are arguments there. Plus, you have an opponent like Donald Trump. I mean, that's got to be a gift from God. I listened to that litany that Biden had in the speech in Michigan here today. And the litany was very powerful about the things that Donald Trump might well do or has said he will do. Most Americans are not going to sign on to that. All right. Well, Van Larry at Congresswoman, thank you very much. It was a great conversation. It just sort of happened organically. And you know, sometimes it works out great that way. Say hi to everybody back in Michigan for his Congressman and Van and Larry. Thanks very much for your time. We appreciate it coming up. I've seen an exclusive a radio host who interviewed President Biden speaks out what he says about the campaigns request to edit out portions of their interview. First, Alec Baldwin, crying tears of joy in court. The charges against him and the rust moving shooting trial tossed out by the judge. The dramatic ruling next. They say opposites attract. That's why the sleep number smartbed is the best bed for couples. You can each choose what's right for you whenever you like. 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Alec Baldwin weeping in court as the involuntary manslaughter charge against him was thrown out today. The judge overseeing his trial, tossing the case ruling that prosecutors withheld evidence. It was a dramatic end to a dramatic saga happening about three years since cinematographer Helene Hutchins was killed on the Russ movie set. How the prosecution's case unraveled today is a bit complicated, but it boils down to ammunition that was given to the Santa Fe Sheriff's office in March after the conviction of the movie's armorer, Hannah Gutierrez Reed, the man who brought it was a friend of her father. He told investigators he thought it could be related to the case. We learned yesterday that ammo was catalogued separately from the rest of the evidence. The defense says the prosecution never told them about it and moved to dismiss. We're talking about a prosecution that didn't preserve those bullets that didn't collect them at all that didn't turn them over. This case should be dismissed, Your Honor. This is over and over and over and over again. But the lead prosecutor wasn't having it. She claimed the ammo did not match the live rounds found on the Russ set. This is a wild goose chase. This has no evidentiary value whatsoever. This is simply a man trying to protect his daughter and he's doing it by providing information that doesn't even match. He's trying to provide evidence that doesn't even match the evidence that was found at the scene. Now it gets even more wild. The judge herself decided to investigate cutting open an envelope with the ammo in question. She then called a crime scene technician back to testify. The judge, that witness, and attorneys all put on blue gloves and inspected the bullets in the center of the courtroom. Then it was found at least one of the rounds did resemble those found on the set. Moments before the case was dismissed, the lead prosecutor went from questioning witnesses to taking the stand herself. The judge did not buy what she had to say. The case against Alec Baldwin cannot be brought again. Joining me now, former federal prosecutor and the president of West Coast trial lawyers, Nima Romani. Let's talk about this. This was pretty astounding what took place. This case rapidly fell apart. Was this the right decision from the judge? What do you think? Jim, it was the right decision. I'm stunned. This is the cardinal sin for a prosecutor to intentionally withhold exculpatory evidence. This is a case that's been botched by the Santa Fe district attorney from the beginning. It's been one constitutional violation after another, first charging a retroactive enhancement in violation of the expos factor clause of the constitution. Then appointing a special prosecutor who is a member of the New Mexico state legislature. That's a separation of powers issue. They weren't ready to proceed to the preliminary hearing. They had to dismiss, wait for a year and go back to the grand jury. Now, the greatest violation of all, the Brady violation withholding exculpatory evidence, intentionally. That's grounds for the ultimate sanction, which is dismissal of the case with prejudice they can't proceed. I fully expect Hannah Gutierrez-Reed to make the same argument and for her conviction to be overturned. Wow. That would be something. If you look at the video that we were just showing a few moments ago, I mean it looked like the judge was just not buying what the prosecutor had to say there, and the prosecutor almost looked like she had been busted. If there had been more competent prosecutors, do you think this case would have turned out the same? What do you think? I think so. I think this case wasn't won by Alec Baldwin as much as it was lost by the prosecution. The prosecution, it is not more to see the prosecutor's decision to make what evidence to provide or not. Seth Kenny, the props supplier, potentially provided the rounds that killed Helena Hutchins. Now, of course, the prosecution theory is that Gutierrez-Reed provided those rounds, but they can't unilaterally decide what evidence to present and what evidence to withhold. They have to disclose everything. That's something, Jim, that every first-year law student knows. And when Morrissey took the stand and when she testified that it was it willful withholding, that was enough for the judge. And it's also telling the other prosecutor, Johnson, resigned while this whole process was playing out. Now, as for Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, her attorney, Jason Bowles, is reacting to the decision. He says the judge found intentional misconduct, and we also have had the same failures in Hannah's case by the state. We will be moving for dismissal of Hannah's case. How will this impact her case? I mean, it sounds as though she may be led out of jail soon. I fully expect so, and Jason has a great argument. This evidence is more exculpatory. It exonerates Gutierrez-Reed even more than Baldwin. And the prosecution theory was that Gutierrez-Reed was using drugs, alcohol, brought the live rounds on set. It turns out that someone else entirely did so. That exonerates her. So her case is on appeal, but I fully expect out of the trial court or the appellate court to overturn that conviction. And it won't just be Alec Baldwin, who's a free man, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed will go free as well. And it's really a tragedy to the victims in this case, Matt Hutchins and the other members of the Hutchins family that have to deal with this because of prosecutorial misconduct. Very sad case all around. All right, Nima Romani, thank you very much for your time. We appreciate it. Thanks for having me. All right, in the meantime, Trump still has not announced his running mate on the GOP ticket. He is comparing his vice presidential selection to his old TV show, The Apprentice, a reporter with the scoop on that selection process joins us next. We're just days away from the RNC, and we are still waiting on Trump's vice presidential announcement. We do know who was on the short list, but those folks seem to have no idea whether we're not there actually going to be a part of the ticket. Nobody knows except President Trump. I don't know who the finalist are. I read the press like everybody else. Well, Sean, it's an incredible honor to be considered with those guys. I think Donald Trump has got a lot of talented people we could choose from. And at this point, it seems like Trump doesn't even know when he's going to make the announcement. At least that's the way he's making it sound. I'd love to do it during the convention, which would be, you know, or just slightly before the convention like Monday. I'd love to do it on Tuesday or Wednesday actually, but for a lot of complex reasons that you people understand, pretty much don't do that. Let's bring in Michael Bender, political correspondent for the New York Times. Hey, Michael, what do you think? I mean, you have some new reporting that Trump is closely analyzing how his vice president could help him. Electorally, what are you learning? Yeah, hey, Jim, Trump has been talking about it's been asked about whose running mate is going to be for a couple of years now at this point. It's that he's since he's been running. And really, for the past year, he's been talking about this in terms of who the best governor or who I'm sorry, who the best president could be, who could step in if needed, should something happen to him. But really, in the last couple of weeks, he started adding to that in his public comment, saying he wants someone who could be president, but also can help him win. And, you know, to be directed, I don't know exactly what he means there. You know, at the risk of climbing into Donald Trump's head, we can't kind of look at each of these three guys to see what they may bring electorally to the ticket. You know, who they who they may attract. Rubio is from a very big, diverse state. He's won that state three times the first Republican ever elected to three consecutive Senate terms. The fluent Spanish speaker, a very bootstrap story, you know, as the son of Cuban immigrants, JD Vance is more of a base play. He people like Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump, Jr., are polling for JD Vance. And then you have sort of the wild card, which is also maybe the safest pick, oddly, Governor Doug Bergum, who's a little bit older, connects with Trump, you know, generationally, closer, at least than the other two folks, and could maybe provide a bridge or they settle some pro-business Republicans who are, you know, uncertain about Trump's unpredictability for another four years. Yeah. And Michael Trump is comparing the VP selection process to the apprentice. And here's what he's saying about his potential choices. It's like a highly sophisticated version of the apprentice. Guy watched Tim Scott on television yesterday. He was fierce and great. He was great. I watched Marco over the weekend on television. He was incredible. JD's been great. You have a man named Bergum, who's a fantastic governor in North Dakota. And, you know, it's a state that's very, very prosperous, very successful. And he's done a good job there. You have some terrific people. Michael, I'm having some flashbacks to the first Trump term, where he did a lot of watching the shows and, you know, made up his mind watching the shows. And it sounds like that's what he's doing with his vice presidential selection process. Yeah, I think that's absolutely right. This process has been nothing if not theatrical, you know, more than anything else. I think that's how you would describe the last few months and what these contenders have been through going on, having to do interviews, come down for, you know, to mingle with Mar-a-Lago residents, go to rallies, that sort of thing. And it's been pretty flawless from Trump's point of view. I mean, he's run it like someone who has, as you pointed out, done this before. But now's the hard part, Jim. Now he has to actually make a decision. We've been on kind of on this watch for the better part of a week, you know, and a lot of people are talking about Trump sort of playing the media here and playing into our, you know, speculation. Right. But my report is that he had, his aides were ready for an announcement on Tuesday at his rally in Doral on Tuesday. His aides are ready for an announcement tomorrow at the rally in Pennsylvania. Trump wants to do it at the convention. And it looks like that's how this is going. You know, I have to say, I will be shocked if he picks Marco Rubio. There's a part of me that wonders if he is doing to Marco Rubio a little bit of what he did to Mitt Romney when he dangled the idea of being Secretary of State. And maybe this is just all part of Trump trying to settle a score once and for all with Marco Rubio. We'll see. Maybe that's not the case at all. Does the name Mike Pence come up in conversations, not as a possible running mate, but as somebody too, as a kind of person to avoid or perhaps has perhaps has characteristics that Trump wants, but somebody who will go along with it next time around if need be. Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. You know, I think I think Marco Rubio has been responding to this, maybe with that Romney comparison in the back of his mind, certainly with his 2016 experience. He hasn't done all of the, all of the things that others have. He didn't, he didn't go up to and sit with Trump in the courtroom at Mar-a-Lago. He's kind of said, here's my, you know, played it as, here's my hand, right? You know who I am. We've known each other for a long time and send a sort of, sending a signal that you can make your decision. And, you know, Pence helped him win over evangelicals. This time around, everyone knows who Donald Trump is and is going to be his president. And it's not clear he needs, he needs anyone to, to win over any kind of constituencies or as a bridge to any battleground state at this point. So it is an interesting decision out of the stands for sure. All right, Michael Bender, thanks very much. Great reporting as always. Good to see you. Thanks for your time. Thanks a lot, Jim. All right. Coming up next, an exclusive interview with a radio host who spoke to Biden right after the debate, but is now revealing he was given suggested questions by the Biden campaign and asked to edit out parts of his interview. Does he regret it? That's next. From politics to pop culture and everything in between. CNN's Five Things brings you the five essential stories to get you up to speed and on with your day five times a day. Hello from CNN. I'm Jo Beck with the Five Things You Need to Know for Tuesday. Follow CNN Five Things on Spotify and enable push notifications so you don't miss an update. Now to a CNN exclusive. My colleague Aaron Burnett spoke to a radio host facing controversy for agreeing to edit an interview with President Biden at the campaign's request. Here's Aaron. Tonight, a Wisconsin radio station in the station's host, Earl Ingram, apologizing for editing a post debate interview with President Biden at the Biden campaign's request. Now, this apology coming after Ingram also admitted Biden's campaign gave him suggested questions and Ingram tells out front that he was given five questions and he asked four of them during the 18 minute conversation that he had with the president. Another radio host, Andrea Lawful Sanders, also admitting she accepted pre-approved questions for her interview with the president after the debate. She has since resigned, which may explain why the interviews sounded similar. >> Can you address some of the concerns about your performance? >> One, I had a bad night and a bad night. >> A lot of people are talking about the debate and your performance. Is there any reason for the American people to be concerned? >> No, I had a bad debate. I had a bad debate. >> What's at stake for black voters this election? >> I got a guy I'm running against was embracing political violence, alleging the rule of the dictator on day one. >> What makes this one so important, sir? >> Well, first of all, the guy I'm running against started convict the felon who has said he wants to be a dictator on day one. >> Out front now, Earl Ingram, he is the host of the Earl Ingram show and you just heard him there speaking to President Biden, one of the president's first interviews following the June 27th debate. And he is my exclusive guest. So Earl, thanks so much for joining me. And I just want to be clear here, you're a radio host. You're extremely well regarded radio host in your city. You don't try to say you're a journalist. But I want to understand, you know, and everybody wants to know, what questions did they give you? You know, how specific were they? Were they topics? Were they just kind of bullet points or were they sort of word for word? >> Well, when you asked me if they were word for word, I can't tell you right now that it's about a week ago or so a little more than a week ago what those questions actually were verbatim. But at the root of them was things about the black community in which I live in Milwaukee, a city that is clearly struggling in its black community. And Joe Biden was talking about the things that he had done and was in the process of doing to do some things to make the lives of people who live in urban centers across this nation better. >> So I guess the question is, did you feel that the questions were what you would have asked anyway? Or were you worried they'd pull the interview if you didn't ask them? What was your thought process when you received these questions? >> Well, my thought process was number one, not so much the questions as it was the fact that I had an opportunity to interview the most powerful man in the world. And so I was a bit flattered and I'll be quite honest with you and a listening audience. I didn't give much thought to the questions. It was the fact that I was getting this opportunity and let my guard down, if you will, and made a mistake, learned some valuable lessons from that and hope to never repeat it again. >> I appreciate your honesty. I'm sure everyone watching can understand and very much appreciate that honesty and self-reflection. Do you feel when you look back on it or all that you did a good interview, that you asked questions that were illuminating? Or do you feel that they took advantage of you and the fact that they may have assumed you'd feel flattered to get that interview? >> Well, I can't speak for them. I can only speak for myself. And again, I can only tell you that those questions that they presented to me at the time were relevant from the perspective of a community and a city where I live that is one of the worst condition in the black community as many across the nation. And so the fact that the president Biden and his policies and addressing those issues in the city that I've lived for 70 years made me believe that this person is at least addressing those issues. Many who came before him did not. And so that was the perspective in which I addressed it. >> So Earl, I want to ask you about one other thing that happened. And it's important in the context of what's at stake right now, but certainly when your interview was conducted post that debate. You have been very direct and honest. You admitted that you and your producers cut 16 seconds from the interview. And you did that at the request of the campaign. Now you have subsequently apologized for that, but also put out the very specific two clips that they wanted cut. And I want to play those for everyone. >> In addition to that, I have more flax in my administration than any other president, all of the presidents combined. And major positions, cabinet positions. I don't know if they even call for their hanging or not, but they said they're convicted of murder. >> So Earl, why did they ask for those parts to be cut? And how do they ask? I mean, did they literally call and give you the verbatim of what they wanted cut? >> Well, they talked about some things that they wanted to clip from the interview. And those things, as I hear them now. And even as I heard them at the time, I did not see them as so overwhelming and so earth shattering. An issue, as this has turned out to be, for the life of me, I don't understand that the impact of those things that he said would be so met with so much consternation as it is today. I know now that if I had to do it all over again, I would have said absolutely not. But I'm relatively new at this radio station. Once they found out about it, did what I think is the more than laudable thing. They did what many others may not have the courage to do and put out the statement and apologize. And we apologized for our shortcoming and said that we would work diligently and we put in place things that will prevent this from happening in the future. >> All right. Well, Earl, I'm really grateful for your time. And I think everybody is very glad to hear you and hear you tell the story. Thanks so much. >> Thank you very much. Next, she's giving a second chance to dogs and children. We're putting the spotlight on a CNN hero you should know about. >> CNN Heroes is back and we're kicking off this year's campaign with an amazing woman from California. She's giving at-risk kids and cast off canines, a chance for futures filled with hope and possibility. Meet Melissa Wolf. Dogs know that you're safe and that you're kind to them. They're going to give back twice as much, just like humans. >> If you guys want to do some warm up with her now, take turns like five skills each. >> We bring that information to kids saying, we need your help. We need your help to get these dogs placed into a permanent adoptive home. Trait, Trait, always Trait. There you go. Sit, stay. He does down, right? >> Yeah. I feel like this is basic. >> When kids can contribute to giving a dog a second chance at a better life, we see the shift in them. I get goosebumps when I talk about this after 12 years. There's a vulnerability that the dogs allow to be able to care for them. Not only helps the animal, but it helps the child to develop a level of compassion and empathy for others. We serve kids that have great intellect, great creativity, great compassion. I will just be a crazy dog lady for the rest of my life, but I'm all in it for the kids. They are our leaders and we need to take care of them. >> Thank you. To learn more about Melissa's work, go to cnnheroes.com and while you're there, you can nominate your own CNN hero. Thanks very much for watching Anderson Cooper 360 starts right now. [MUSIC] They say opposites attract. That's why the sleep number smartbed is the best bed for couples. You can each choose what's right for you whenever you like. 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