face-to-face finally. the presidents of two su superpowers play nice after a year of no talk. that's tonight on "news talk". good evening. i'm abby phillip in new york. tonight, what president biden calls important progress between the united states and china. the specifics may seem small, but the american president calls the areas of agreement important on fentanyl, on keeping the phones open between militaries and on artificial intelligence. today we watched carefully orchestrated diplomatic theater between these two superpowers -- a handshake, a walk outside, a hollywood mansion in woodside california, but the stakes are far more consequential than fiction. to take a tumult uous year and basically put it to the side. >> that you and i understand each other clearly leader to leader with no misconceptions or miscommunication. we have to ensure that competition does not veer into confl confliction. >> a short while ago at a rare press conference, the president called it -- his tone measured. >> do you trust president xi? >> trust but verify. i know the man, i know his modus operandi. we have disagreements. he has a different view than i have the on a lot of things, but he's been straight. >> now, the president as always made sure to tell the public he knows personally xi jinping. >> i spent as much time with xi jinping as any world leader has. i've spoken and spent time with xi jinping than any world leader has. i spent more time with xi jinping than any world leader i'm told because i had 25 hours with him when i was vice president, traveled 1,700 miles with him. i know xi jinping. i spent more time with him than any world leader. i know him, he knows me. we have to figure out what the red lines are, the most important thing to each of us. >> but biden has been clear, don't mistake their relationship history for a friendship. >> let's get something straight, we know each other well. we're not friends. it's just pure business. >> today was mostly about the rebuilding of the abcs of how both the united states and china simply talked to each other. xi made sure to say that planet earth is big enough for both beijing and washington, and it's notable because the president and the chinese leader have spent the last year sounding like they're in the latest "top gun" movie. flash back to july when president biden said this to fareed zakaria about xi's intentions. >> do you think he wants china to replace the united states as the leading power the defining power? >> i think he does. i'm confident he wants to have the largest economy in the world and have the largest military capacity in the world. >> or this from february after china flew a spy balloon over the continental united states and the american military shot it down. >> i expect to be speaking with president xi, and i hope we have -- we're going get to the bottom of this. but i make no apologies for taking down that balloon. >> or this just last week. a campaign trail sounding promise to autoworkers in illinois. >> china's determined to dominate the electric vehicle market by using unfair trade practices, but i will not let them. [ cheering ] >> that kind of talk was mostly absent today except for one moment when biden responded to a shouted question with an answer that's guaranteed to get under xi's skin. >> mr. president after today, would you still refer to president xi as -- a term you used earlier this year? >> well, look, he is. >> and joining me now is republican candidate for president vivek ramaswamy. thanks for joining us tonight. >> thank you. >> and you tweeted earlier today that you wanted to see president biden secure a commitment from china not to invade or to annex taiwan, but you've previously suggested defending taiwan from invasion is not something you would commit to indefinitely. is this a reversal from you? >> no, i have been crystal clear that i'm the only candidate that believes that strategic ambiguity is a mistake. the current policy of the u.s. government is to not state clearly whether the u.s. would or would not defend taiwan. i think that's a mistake, and i have been very consistent on this. the correct policy is to say that we will defend taiwan, at least until we have secured semiconductor independence in this country, at which point we can resume the current status quo of strategic ambiguity. i want to say, i think china's been very strategic about when they set up this meeting. now when the u.s. is mired in wars in other parts of the world, like ukraine, china understands there's a position of the leverage with the united states. that's why i laid out if i was in that meeting we'd be talking about accountability for covid-19, the same set of rules companies to play by with respect to data theft, intellectual property theft or otherwise, and i'm disappointed not to see those on the agenda in addition to climate related topics biden put on the agenda instead, and i think that's a mistake. >> just to be clear, mr. ramaswamy, you said when the united states achieves semiconductor independence you would no longer care if china invaded taiwan, because you believe that's the most important strategic instance. >> that's not true. i would say -- >> let's just play the sound bite so our listeners can -- >> sure. >> we will defend taiwan until we have semiconductor independence in this country, which is where i will lead us by the end of my first term in office. after which point our commitments by definition will and should change. >> so, what you're saying today actually is a little different. you're saying that the position of strategic -- you said in the quote we will defend taiwan until -- until -- those are your words -- we have semiconductor independence. you've said that will happen by the end of your term, 2028, so after that point, you said -- >> at which point we'll resume strategic ambiguity. >> you said our commitments will change. >> abby, i'm right here. i can tell you my view. i don't know what kind of gotcha you're trying to play. we can get to the policy debate. it's an important subject for the u.s. right now, the u.s. posture is strategic ambiguity. both parties refuse to say whether the u.s. will defend taiwan, so much so that you'll remember you all derided president trump for picking up a phone call from the taiwanese president. i think that status quo sun acceptable. the u.s. currently embraces the one china policy. that strategic ambiguity is not strong enough, so i would upgreat from that, be crystal clear that the u.s. will affirmatively defend taiwan, something that no other politician is saying with clarity, until we achieve semiconductor independence, because we depend on taiwan for those chips that power or modern way of life. i don't want china having an economic gun to you are head if they control the supply chain. that would be a disaster for the u.s. so we will defend militarily. after we achieve independence we resume the status quo of strategic ambiguity. that would be a change now and later. with that clarity, xi jinping would have to be foolish to invade taiwan. that's how we -- >> just a final point of clarity on this. once the united states achieves semiconductor independence, do you believe it will be in the united states' national interest to deter china from invading taiwan? >> we will evaluate at that point in time. it will not be preferable for china to invade taiwan then. we'll then adopt what is our current -- >> you're not answering -- >> that is in the future. >> you're not answering my question. will it be in the united states' interests to deter -- >> do you understand what strategic ambiguity means? >> mr. ramaswamy, it's a yes or no answer. >> i'm happy to educate you if you're interested. >> strategic ambiguity will be what we resume. it's the current status quo, and that's what we resume after he achieve semiconductor independence. it's that simple. the status quo will be what we attain after he attain semiconductor independence. >> a simple answer to that question would actually be a yes or no, but i do want to turn now to a different topic, to politics. here's what your fellow republican -- >> it's more complicated than you're making it out to be. >> here's what your fellow republican nikki haley said about you earlier today. just listen. >> what happens? he comes out of the gate. he hits the female chair of the party. he hits the female anchor on the platform, and then he hits me, and i'm not saying anything. >> i'm not saying i'm just saying. >> but he might have a girl problem. i'm just saying he might have a girl problem. >> she's laying out three different women you've attacked. why is she wrong? >> well, she also left off that list dick cheney, lindsey graham, karl rove, mike bolton. there's a neoconpart of the party. what makes me crack up about nikki haley is she refuses to claim identity politics. mcdaniel lost the last four elections after she took over the chairman of the rnc. i don't care if she's a man or woman, she deserves to be held accountable. nikki haley came out of the u.n. in debt. >> why don't you blame donald trump for that? he elected ronna mcdaniel to the post? he's also the leader of the republican party when he was president. he claims to be the leader of the republican party right now. >> i'm ready to be the leader of the nation and of the republican party. abby i have been on your show and others. i stand for meritocracy. the best man for the job. that's why i'm against affirmative action. is ronna mcdaniel the best qualified person to be leading the republican party on that record when her salary has tripled in the meantime, no, she's not, and i'm not going to apologize for that. i think it's a shame when people who distance themselves from identity politics share. here we're based in meritocracy, and i'm not going to apologize, color, doesn't matter. speak the truth and we have to be willing to hold failure available. . that's kristen welker. i stand by it. >> there's no reason to bring kristen welker into your dispute with ronna mcdaniel. i want to listen to what donald trump said -- i want to you listen to -- >> you literally paid tape of nikki haley talking about kristen welker, so i'm responding to the tape that you played for your viewers. >> mr. ramaswamy, the question -- >> the question i was answering was an allegation about my statement about ms. welker. >> i was asking you why you would blame ronna mcdaniel. she was apointed to her position by donald trump, the president at the time. >> she wasn't appointed by donald trump. she was elected by the chairpersons of the rnc. >> a lot of losses you blame her for happened under his watch and you won't blame him for that. putting that aside, one final thing. >> 2022, 2023. that spans multiple different administrations. i believe in facts. >> a final thing i want to ask you about before i let you go. over the weekend -- i just want to play this from what president trump said to his supporters. >> we will root out the communists, marxists, and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country. the threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous, and grave than the threat from within. >> that language, they live like vermin, do you believe that that is, as your republican colleague chris christie has said, neo-nazi rhetoric? >> this is a classic mainstream media move -- pick some individual phrase of donald trump, focus on literally that word without actually interrogating the substance of what's at issue. >> the word was chosen for a reason. >> we're in a cultural war in this country for a reason. it's describing a group of behaviors. you have antifa and groups that have been during down the -- we have an invasion on our southern border. million os people crossing the southern border. let's talk about the substance of why we have to recognize we're not in ordinary times. the category of vermin or not is not what's important. i haven't used that language. if you look at the track record on my campaign trail, i talk about the issues differently but i'm not going play some game of focusing on some word somebody said without ignoring entirely the substance, a border crisis, economic stagnation we haven't seen in 50 years. a national identity crisis, and loss of national pride in the next generation that's potentially existential for this country. let's talk about china. today we're talking about china's xi jinping. you know what's vermin? what's running around san francisco before gavin newsom cleaned it up on a dime. we're talking about not the substance of that, but one word donald trump said in a speech in miami. this is what's wrong with the mainstream media. focus on the substance and let's have a policy debate and talk to a presidential candidate instead of policy substance, picking on some word donald trump said a certain day and asking me for comment, give me a break. >> look, mr. ramaswamy, the former president is saying people on the left live like vermin in this country. that's a pretty substantive thing, and the word choice was not accidental. >> look at the way people in san francisco are living in san francisco normally. >> up next, a cease-fire protest turning violent tonight in washington. i'll speak a lawmaker who was just evacuated from that building that you see there. plus, elon musk accused of anti-semitism over a post of jews and whites. and critics say the tv network univision is shifting to the right after a controversial interview with former president trump. we'll speak with the former univision host about all of that. tonight, a rally in washington calling for a cease-fire in gaza turning tense. just take a look at this. it happened outside of the headquarters of the democratic national committee. looks like there hundreds of protesters in favor of a cease-fire pushing and shoving, coming face-to-face with u.s. capitol police and d.c. metropolitan police. some members of congress have to be evacuated from the building. congressman brad sherman on x, formerly known as twitter, that he was one of them and he joins me now. thanks for joining me. can you tell us what happened when you were inside that building? >> we were gathered together to meet candidates from all over the country that will be our candidates in swing districts. our leadership was there, but they -- most of them had left, and there were many others there. we heard the demonstrators outside. they disrupted us a bit. and then we were told we were on lockdown and would not be allowedal allowed to leave, and then the police came in, the capitol police, who did an outstanding job, and evacuated us throughout the basement. >> you said there were leaders of membership there. which were there and did they leave before things turned violent? >> our three top leaders were all there. susan el bune also was there when the evacuation took place. >> we know there were some arrests and the area is now open again. senator schumer says there's going to be a vote tonight on the stopgap spending bill. how were you able to get out? and were you concerned at all for your safety as this was all going on? >> i have been doing this for 27 years. i don't get that concerned. some other of my colleagues were more concerned. we were evacuated in police vehicles to the capitol and went home from there. the one point i want to make is yesterday there were over 2,000 pro israel demonstrators with a permit, entirely peaceful, and here you have a demonstration less than 1,000th as large that's also getting publicity because of their willingness to attack police as they did with pepper spray, is a force multiplier. a few demonstrators willing to attack police, getting a fair amount of publicity, where as the amount of publicity for 200,000 peaceful demonstrators, proportionately less. >> i just want to make a note, we don't know who exactly was responsible for the pepper spray, but as we continue to report on this story, we'll learn more. congressman brad sherman, i thank you for joining us tonight. >> i believe the capitol police. >> thank you. and tonight, elon musk is under fire after apparently signing on to an anti-semitic racist rant known as twitter. we've got kara swisher and carrie champion next to discuss that. elon musk is once again making headlines for all the wrong reasons. musk, cosigning on an anti-semitic and racist rant by a user on x, formerly known as twitter them post accused western jews of supporting hordes of minorities who hate white people. musk responding by replying to the most and saying, you have said the actual truth. here to discuss this is kara champion and kara swisher. kara, starting with you here, musk calls himself a free speech absolutist, but the problem is this is not the first time he's use his own platform to amplify these hate messages. when is this going to actually have an impact? this is a business after all. >> well, it is having an impact, and i'm sure linda -- the woman. >> yak orino. >> sorry, is having trouble be advertisers. getting ads, getting business, and then he does this. he can't help himself. sometimes people speak online, make mistakes, everyone's a little emotional and people have said stupid things and that makes sense given the stakes that are happening here and the difficulty of watching a lot of this, but in this case, it's a consistent behavior of him to do this and not just for a short time, and then everybody's surprised that he does it. and so i don't know what to say. this is what he likes to do. he wants to create controversy. he wants to create attention to himself. he's an attention sponge, and he's saying reprehensible things, especially in replies, that's where he does it, so he gets in less trouble, but everybody sees it. >> you talk about everybody being overwrought or whatever. this is pouring gasoline on a really hot fire right now. and the role of social media in whipping up anger in this particular story on the israel-hamas war is really a big part of this. do you think that, you know, twitter or x or whatever right now is indifferent to its role in hyping up these kinds of rivalries on both sides. >> i think anything that calls attention to him is what he wants to do. i don't think he differentiates between declaring a fight with mark zuckerberg and this. it's any attention he can get. he's always in a permanent state of grievance. it's always about him. this has nothing to do with musk. he's promoting -- and there is a difference in free speech and speech designed to hurt people, and this is precisely that. paul pelosi's trial is going on in san francisco, and he ginned up a fake conspiracy theory right after this poor man was beaten with a hammer. he just wants attention, and he doesn't care how he gets it. >> carrie, some of this has spilled into the sports world right now. a civil rights group is calling for the suspension of cleveland clears' minority owner gary gilbert after he sent threatening messages to a pro-palestinian group calling for a protest. here's what he wrote on instagram -- we will be armed and ready for you cowardly punked this wednesday. he also wrote, we're armed and ready for you punks, and we don't have any ounce of fear. he said these messages have been misconstrued, but man, what is the nba going to do about this, carrie? >> it's interesting you bring that up, because the nba has a zero tolerance policy. they refer to issues such as hate groups or people promoting hate groups cannot be part of their fraternity. in 2016 they made donald sterling sell the clippers because he said he didn't like black people and didn't want to be around them. most recently robert sarver who owned the phoenix suns was also unfortunately forced to sell the phoenix suns because of his racist marks and misogyny in the workplace. so there's precedent for them to do this. however, the difference is gary gilbert is a minority owner. he doesn't really have, as the cleveland clears have said today, a major role within the company. his brother, dan gilbert, owns the franchise. so i do believe that they'll address this. i think they will take their time in response, but i also know that adam silver the commissioner has been very clear there's no room for that in the nba. the cleveland clears find themselves answering for an instagram post a minority owner felt like he wanted to share because he was very emotional, understandably. >> ports is typically a place where people try to go to escape maybe the news of the day, escape the tensions and the infighting, but this is a story that has boiled into even that space. i mean, does that surprise you, carrie? >> you know, abby, i would like to say that it does, but it doesn't. the intersection is so fragile. i think the common denominator is because we're all humans and we all feel, and we can't separate the two, not in this day and age, i think the problem here is that most people use social platforms to express themselves, and this topic, while being so nuanced, isn't a place for however many characters of an emoji or emotional outburst. so no matter how right you are in what you feel you have to say, these conversations need time, they have to be massaged. we're seeing extreme forms of people trying to express with their righteous righteousness, if you will, on a platform that doesn't allow for that. >> social media has been such a toxic force in conversations around something that is really complex, and people shouldn't shy away from that. great to have both of you on. thank you. >> abby, thank you. tv network univision is under fire for a controversial interview with donald trump. i'll speak with a former anchor of that network next. tonight a major shake-up at one of the country's biggest spanish language media companies, univision anchor leon crouse among the most prominent voices in the latino community announcing his exit from the company today. his departure comes days after univision's controversial interview with former president donald trump and a "washington post" article that revealed behind the scenes details about the network's shift on how it covers trump. he stressed in a post that his commitment to journalism that amplifies the voices and illuminates the stories of those who go unseen and unheard continues. in a statement, the company thanked him for his service but did not divulge further details about his departure. joining me now, maria, a former anchor for univision and telemundo. there's so much going on with this univision situation. first there's trump's controversial interview. and then there is this high profile exit of a top anchor. what do you think is going on? >> welsh tl, there's a lot goin as you said, abby. thank you for inviting me. i think the interview with donald trump was a missed opportunity. i think it was sugar coated. there were a lot of questions that should have been asked ginn the fact that donald trump has not been in any recent interviews and hasn't done many debates, this was an opportunity to ask many questions, especially questions hispanics needed to have answers for. during the interview there were several assertions that were false that needed to be challenged because there's ample evidence to prove the contrary, and that didn't happen, and the question is, why? you know, there's this new situation in which televisa, a powerful mega media company from mexico has great influence in univision, the number one hispanic television network, and it helps shape the perception of the viewers. and perception, as you well know, turns into reality eventually. >> televista and univision merged in 2021. trump hosted several of the univision executives during this interview. but one of the things that democrats are pointing out -- a couple of facts that have come out in the reporting which is that univision ad reps canceled biden's campaign spots purchased to run during trump's interview. they said it's because they have a rule against airing campaign ads during interviews like this. but do you think there is an effort by univision executives to get cozy with trump? is that what is causing this shift -- what seems to be a shift in the network's posture? >> honestly it seems to be that way. first after all, i think it's very unusual to have an interview with a former president and have the exe executives of your com -- which is a good reporter must have been through under those circumstances knowing that trump is bud by-buddy with his bosses and especially the son-in-law. very few people can stand up to that. there were several instances the reporter was smiling every time trump was answering a question. i don't think that's correct. i've conducted many interviews with former presidential candidates, and that's one thing that you don't do, because it seems like you agree with what they're saying, even if you don't. it gives way to be misinterpreted. and you know, what people have to understand is that televista and these executives are very powerful in mexico. they're the biggest -- they're mega media giant, which -- who for decades influenced the programming to favor their political cronies and friends and had a lot of benefits in return because of that philosophy. what we don't want is to have another mega media company from another country influencing our due electoral process of electing a president, and that's something we should be very worry about. >> that's interesting, and you're not the first person to raise televista's reputation back in mexico. one other scenario the sheer politics, the business of it all even. there's a new cnn poll that shows the former president only trails biden by four points among hispanic voters. i think we all have seen trump trying to gain inroads with hispanic voters. are univision executives looking at that and saying, well, some of our viewers might be trump fans, and maybe the network needs to make a shift. do you think some of this is also just about politics and perhaps public opinion? >> no, i don't think so. i have been in both networks, and i've worked for the networks and the plan at all times when you're in a newsroom, you have to be objective. you have to be conscious of -- you have to be in the middle and be very factual about things. however, when you have, like i said, a mega media company from mexico who used to do this kind of -- exert this kind of undue influence in their viewers through their programming, the danger is that they're trying to do the same here. there's a reason why the fcc is so -- has always been so cautious about media company mergers, especially with ones so power afl as televista, to make sure they don't have undue influence in the american electorate. >> it is a very serious question, allegation it raises. before we go, i want to ask you about one more thing. this week texas governor greg abbott is expected to sign a bill that would make illegal border crossings a crime. it would also give them the right to export migrants. what impact do you think this will have on that state where latinos make up 40% of the population? zblierchltsds. >> well, first of all, abby, i think there's a real problem at the boarder and action needs to be taken, but everything that happens at the border is going to be controversial no matter what, and there's a lot of latinos in texas that agree with these very strong laws, contrary to what most people think. however, the danger with this law that you just mentioned is very simple. it's allowing law enforcement at the local and state level to arrest people that they suspect -- keyword, suspect -- to be migrants that have crossed the border illegally, and that's where the danger comes, because suspecting is very objective and can lead to, as you said, racial profiling of people that live in texas, people that are going about their own business and get in trouble while it gets sorted out just because they have brown skin, just to give you an example. and also what worries me is this law does not contemplate funding anything for the education of the agents or making sure that they have knowledge of the immigration laws so that there's no issues that can affect an arrest. and you know all the things that we've seen in the media throughout the years concerning, you know, law enforcement and immigration and migrants. so, you know, these are concerns that need to be raised, and we're going keep an eye on them. >> we'll certainly keep an eye on this story. it's a very important one. maria, thank you so much for joining us. >> sure, thank you so much, abby, good night. pop singer pink handing out thousand of banned books at her florida concerts. cnn's at tonight's concert and will have scenes next. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> tonight, pink concert in sunrise, florida, fans are getting more than a huge concert with the highflying popstar, pink, also giving away 2000 banned books in partnership with the literacy and free expression group, pan america. she told her fans on instagram why. >> i am a ferocious reader and i am a mom of two kids who are also voracious readers. and i can't imagine my own parents telling me what my kids can and cannot read, let alone someone else's parents, let alone someone else that doesn't even have children that are deciding what my children can read. >> cnn's carlos suarez is outside of the pink concert at the bank arena. carlos, tell us what it was like there earlier today? >> well, abby, under a torrential downpour here in south florida, all of the fans that we spoke to tonight told us they were excited to see pink reform, and they were excited to pick up some of these books that have been restricted or removed from school libraries across the state of florida. pink gave away thousands of these books at both of her shows here and south florida. now, one of those books that were handed out here earlier tonight was by amanda gorman, the hill reclaim. that is the book that she read at joe biden's inauguration. now earlier this year, that book, access to that book was restricted at a school down in miami-dade county after a single parent, one parent, complained that the poem had no educational value, had some hateful messages, and was indoctrinating students. now, abby, at the time, when i reported on this story, i spoke to the parent who made that complaint. and she all but admitted to me that she had not read amanda's book. she couldn't point to a part of the poem that she found troubling. and she really couldn't explain why she thought the book had been authored by oprah winfrey. now, school districts across the state of florida had been dealing with this issue for sometime, after a new state law went into effect banning the discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in the classroom. supporters of these parental rights say that the law allows them to challenge these books, and that a lot of these book titles, we are talking about hundreds of them at this point, really are not age appropriate. but critics of these book bans, essentially, say, look, this is really about silencing brown and black authors, as well as silencing lgbtq+ community, rather. here are some of the fans that we caught up with earlier tonight on the broader message out here. >> one of the things i've heard them say, when you have a platform this big, you have to be responsible with the message that you carry. so, it is amazing to have someone like hair, saying something like this to us. >> i think this is phenomenal what pink is doing. good for her, for allowing the fans to represent and i'm giving this to my grandkids. they should learn that everybody should be accepted. >> and so, that concert is just wrapping up. and, abby, 1000 books handed out here tonight, and another 1000 were given out at pink's concert down in miami. abby? >> so interesting. you can see there, young and old, picking up books, enjoying the pink concert. interesting decision from, and really, a great night for the people who get to take home a ton of books. carlos suarez, thank you so much for staying out in the rain for us. and just in to cnn, we have a new statement from u.s. capitol police, giving an update on those tense protests we just told you about in washington, d.c.. in a statement, they say six officers were injured during that protest that you see there, including being pepper sprayed and being punched. we'll be right back. ♪ ♪ ♪