CNN national security analyst Juliette Kayyem joined CNN This Morning Weekend host Victor Blackwell on Saturday to recap the previous night’s press conference featuring Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on the FAA’s ground stop order. According to Kayyem, Duffy’s request that Congress provide $50 billion for air traffic control modernization is tantamount to “a shakedown.”
Blackwell began by wondering, “Let's start with the news conference that we saw yesterday with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and the Transportation Secretary, Sean Duffy. What they said, how they said it. What's your assessment of what we've heard from the administration?”
CNN's national security analyst Juliette Kayyem is back with more weird hot takes. She says Sec. Sean Duffy asking for money to upgrade ATC at a press conference "was a lot of denial, deflection, blame. And it felt a little bit honestly, Victor, like a shakedown, like Secretary… pic.twitter.com/nWM1pTpL20
— Alex Christy (@alexchristy17) November 14, 2026
Kayyem responded, “Well, it was a lot of denial, deflection, blame. And it felt a little bit honestly, Victor, like a shakedown, like Secretary Duffy was sort of like, ‘Well, now I want even more money.’”
She further alleged, “They used it for political purposes in a crisis. We know that the American public wants three things. What do they know? What do they not know? And what are they doing to close that gap? That is basic crisis communications. Instead, it was used as, sort of, a political praise of Trump. So I thought it was a very ineffective crisis press conference. It may have been something else for purposes of the administration.”
Duffy asking Congress to provide funding for a priority is about as a normal reaction as could be imagined, but Kayyem’s desire to turn it into something more sinister is also just standard operating procedure for her. Kayyem has previously blamed the Trump administration for flooding damage. Meanwhile, Kayyem is the kind of analyst who tries her hardest to downplay any leftist or Islamist motivation for terrorism or politically motivated violence. Of all her infamous hot takes, her most infamous was asserting that Charlie Kirk’s assassin’s motivations are no big deal and then doubling down after his leftist agenda was confirmed.
The whole point of having a national security analyst, as opposed to a standard political commentator, discuss the situation with the FAA was to make the audience smarter by rising above partisan politics, but Kayyem couldn’t do that, and as a result, CNN’s audience suffers.
Here is a transcript for the November 14 show:
CNN This Morning Weekend
11/14/2026
6:31 AM ET
VICTOR BLACKWELL: With me now is our national security analyst, Juliette Kayyem. Juliette, thank you for being with me. Let's start with the news conference that we saw yesterday with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and the Transportation Secretary, Sean Duffy. What they said, how they said it. What's your assessment of what we've heard from the administration?
JULIETTE KAYYEM: Well, it was a lot of denial, deflection, blame. And it felt a little bit honestly, Victor, like a shakedown, like Secretary Duffy was sort of like, “Well, now I want even more money.”
It didn't — they used it for political purposes in a crisis. We know that the American public wants three things. What do they know? What do they not know? And what are they doing to close that gap? That is basic crisis communications. Instead, it was used as sort of a political praise of Trump. So I thought it was a very ineffective crisis press conference. It may have been something else for purposes of the administration.
