Tonight: CNN Town Hall with TX Dem. Sen. Candidate James Talarico

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Good evening, they say everything's bigger in Texas tonight. Just an hour from now, nothing will be bigger in midterm politics than the town hall that CNN and Jubilee Media are hosting with James Talarico. You're looking at the venue right there in Fort Worth, where people are getting seated, waiting to hear from the candidate who now stands as the president of the United States Senate. The president of the United States Senate, and the president of the United States Senate, We will also hear from the candidate who now stands an essentially even chance of becoming the state's first Democratic Senator since 1993, and whose victory could hand control the Senate to Democrats for the last two years of the Trump administration. Two new polls tonight show him statistically tied with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, and though Paxton's out-and-out approach to the Trump administration has helped him with some voters, what also hurts him is the popularity of the president who pushed for him to be the candidate. President Trump is continuing his tour of states. He won in 2024, this time Arizona and deep red Montana. At every stop, he's been telling voters to pretend he's on the ballot at the very moment that his job approval has been reaching historic lows. And inflation is climbing in the wake of the deeply unpopular war he started with Iran. The latest numbers out today showed inflation rising to 3.7%, which is rising faster than expected, and the last inflation numbers voters will see before election day.

None of which is ever good news for the party in power, but this time that bad news, which voters can see with their own eyes, the pump, the checkout count, the doctor's office, being met by claims like these claims from the president.

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All your prices have been tumbling down. Prices are coming down very fast. Oil is coming down, the inflation's down. You know, we're bringing prices way down, but every time I go out, the fake news goes, affordability, meaning like I'm causing high price. No, I'm bringing the high prices down that they cause.

SPEAKER_2 (2:15)

The words of a man who says he wants voters to pretend that he is on the ballot, telling them things they see with their eyes are not true. Inflation not down, it's prices not coming down. They're going up, oil not coming down. It was $1.06 a barrel today. None of what you heard him say there was true. Today in Arizona, he continued painting a picture for voters that most now neither see nor feel.

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The golden age of America, and that's where we are right now. We're in the golden age. And despite all of the obstruction from radical left, lunatics, our nation is doing better now than it has ever done before.

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Well, voters, according to polling, at least, do not seem to see it that way. Just 33% of them in recent CNN polling believe he's doing a good job. By now, you've heard people from both parties, especially in red states, telling CNN's John King or Jeff Zeleny as they travel, and others, that the president is not doing enough to address their problems. As for what he is doing, well, let him tell you again.

SPEAKER_3 (3:19)

Has anyone seen the new heliport that I built? The white ass? You know, they were going to sue me in that because I get sued every time I do anything, right? They were going to sue me in that, but then they said it's so beautiful, we won't sue them.

SPEAKER_2 (3:32)

That was probably not in the teleprompter. It's more from the president's riff in Arizona. He also talked about the ballroom and the triumphal arch, which he now says will house sniper ammunition among snipers, as well as snipers. Late yesterday, after first posting video of a British man being mauled to death by a tiger, he then posted this AI version in which he wrestles and then tames a tiger.

It's causing an uproar in the UK. Here, it kind of barely registers. Voters say they have bigger things to worry about, which is one reason why Democrat James Talarico is so competitive, perhaps, in a state Donald Trump won by double digits. And it sets the stage for our town hall tonight. CNN's Jeff Zeleny joins us now from the venue in Fort Worth. So talk about the stakes tonight and why aren't Talarico and Paxton debating?

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