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Don Lemon Tonight

Trump's Alabama Pep Rally; Cheering Crowd Turn Out for Trump; Former "Apprentice"; Contestants Weigh in on Trump Candidacy; Trump Supporters Speak Out; The Stump for Trump Girls

Aired August 21, 2015 - 21:00   ET

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

DON LEMON, CNN TONIGHT HOST: It is 9:00 p.m. on the East Coast, 8:00 p.m. in Mobile, Alabama where Donald Trump is speaking to a crowd of thousands. This is "CNN Tonight." I'm Don Lemon. Let's listen.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: So they're going to call him the head of Ford and you're going to say, Mr. President, we want to build it. He'll say, "Well, we don't want to built." The next day or the next hour, he's going to get a call from the lobbyists and the special interests and his donors and they're going to say, "Hey, Jeb. We gave you $8 million of your $120 million that you raised. We gave you $8 million. We want that thing done. You can't do that to our people." Oh, well, okay. I'll approve it. It's going to get done, okay. The plant will get built. That will be it. Now let's take Trump as president. Okay, is that better? Is that better? Here's a simple question, who would you rather have negotiating with China, Japan, Mexico, any other? Trump? Or Bush? Actually...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Trump! Trump! Trump!

TRUMP: What a group. What a group. Well you know it is sort of interesting. Thank you. CNN does this big report that came out last week said I was leading in the polls. It was a poll. And everybody says why don't I have a pollster. What the hell do I need a pollster. Everyday I wake up there's another poll, right? They pay these guys $100,000 a month. And they can't function because unless they go and have it vetted with their pollster, they can't talk. And I say, why do I need a pollster when everyday there's a new poll and they give like 30 pages. I don't have to get a pollster. What the hell do I need it. Save your money.

But CNN did this really very expensive, very well done poll. It's only well done because I was leading by a lot. If it wasn't, I'd say it wasn't. They had leadership. I was way ahead of everybody. They had -- actually, I was very good in warrior. You know the thing I'll be great at it. That people are thinking -- but the thing -- and I do very well at it. Military. I am the toughest guy. I will rebuild our military. It will be so strong, and so powerful, and so great. It will be so powerful and so great that we'll never have to use it. Nobody is going to mess with us, folks. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody is going to mess with us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: USA! USA! USA! USA!

TRUMP: Beautiful. So, I look at the various things to do with our country. And by the way, one of them. Boy are we going to take care of our vets, right? Right? They did a poll, another poll. But they did a poll on like who's one of the most popular with the vets. I was the most popular person. They like me. And I love them. Because you know why? Because for 35 years, these senators and these other than Jeff, of course. I take Jeff. But, these senators, these congressmen, these people in Washington, including presidents they have done nothing for the vets. They have done nothing. And we're going to take care of our vets.

So they do this poll. And in the poll, I score really high marks on almost anything. Other than they thought I wasn't a nice person. They said who's the nicest, and I was like pretty low on that part. And I'm a nice person. But who cares. A woman came up to me, she said "I'm not sure that you're nice enough to be president." And I said, "You know what, this is not going to be an election based on a nice person. It's going to be based on a competent person. We're tired of the nice people." So I won on the economy. I won on jobs. I won on leadership. I have massive numbers, like massive. You've seen it. I won on all these categories, I said "Why do we need an election. We don't need an election. These are such important categories." But I have had an amazing experience because from the time I announced almost, other than the first week, that was a rough week. They were hitting me.

But the press, which is by the way largely very dishonest. I have to say this, the political media. I actually think, I actually think that the political media is less popular than Congress. Can you believe it? And Congress is almost -- Congress has almost no rating. And in all fairness because look at all those cameras, they're all live and they're trying to shut off the camera right now. But you know what, they're all live. So many live cameras. But look at -- thank you.

But I will say this. The media is very dishonest. But there is a certain group that are fantastic people. And every once in a while I'll get an honest story and I love it. I cherish those stories. Not often. But I cherish those stories. But we have -- you have to understand, and they have, they really started treating me much better. Don't forget, when I first ran, I said, you know it's amazing. Went to a great school. Excellent student. Smart guy. My uncle was a professor at MIT who is a smart guy, you know, good smart guy, right? Good family. Do we believe in the gene thing, I mean I do. Right? You know, I do. Like they used to say secretariat doesn't produce slow horses. Actually secretariat wasn't one of the best if you want to know the truth.

But in theory that's -- but then I went out and made a tremendous -- built a tremendous fortune and great company. I did "The Art of the Deal" and many books that were bestsellers. "The Art of the Deal" was one of the biggest selling -- maybe the biggest selling business book of all time. I did "The Apprentice". We love "The Apprentice", tremendous. NBC hates me. You know, NBC hates me because they renewed the apprentice and I said, excuse me, I'm not doing it. I'm running for president. I'm going to make the country great again. They actually came up to my office and the top people, great people from NBC. And they said, "Please, please, run, run." And I said "I'm not running. I mean, I'm not running." We already renewed the show. They sold most of the advertising. They renewed the show. I said, "I'm going to run and I'm going to make our country great." We are going to do something that's -- we are going to do something. I'm hired. You're hired.

So, I look at the landscape of our country. I look at where we're going. I look at where we've been. We've had a horrible number of years. A horrible number of years. We can't beat ISIS. I watched the general the other day on television, who's just retiring, which is fortunate. How do you think we'll do against ISIS? Oh, I don't know. It's going to be very tough. Can you believe this? General George Patton, General Douglas Macarthur are spinning in their graves as you listen to this. They're spinning in their grave. He talks about a hard time.

And I look at what's going on with the landscape. And then I get to meet all of the people that I've met over the last period of time. And I want to tell you, it's been amazing. It's been really amazing. I want to finish up with a couple of little points. One of them is the Ford deal, right? Israel. I love Israel. Oh, by the way.

The bottom line, some of you, I love the story because there's -- so when I get the call. I say, no, no, no. You're going to build in the United States. They're going to say, "No, we don't want to do that." I say, "Let me tell you, sir, you're going to build in the united states." And I will be called by people. But I will not have any of their money. So I don't care. And they're going to say -- I'll call them in. And I'll say, listen here's the story. You are building $2.5 billion in Mexico. We're going to charge you a tremendous little 35% tax. Okay. Thirty five percent. And that tax is going to be for every car and every part and every truck that comes into the United States. And here's what's going to happen. Here's what's going to happen. As sure as you are standing or sitting. They're going to come back to me the following day. I would say the following afternoon. Let's say it's 12:00. I say by the time of the day and I don't need Carl Icahn underneath. This one is too easy. And they're going to come back and they're going to say, "Mr. President," then I'm going to get called by the lobbyists, I'm going to get called by the special, and I'm going to say, "No interest, no interest." Within 24 hours, they will call and say, "Mr. President, what you're doing to us is terrible. We will build in the United States. We will build the plant in the United States." 100%.

And I'll say the same thing to NABISCO. It doesn't help us. It doesn't help us when you look at what's going on, when you look at what's going on, where NABISCO is closing and so many places are closing. When you look at the kind of money that these countries are making and I'm naming a few. I mean, so many countries. We don't have anything left. We're running on fumes. We're running on fumes. There's nothing here. When you look at what happens. They're so much sharper, they're so much smarter. And we're not going to have a country left. We need to have our borders. We need to make great deals.

You know -- the man in the back just shouted Israel. How would you like to be Israel right now? They relied on us. They're a voice of sanity. They're great people. And we have a deal that is so incompetent, so bad. Think of the deal. We make a deal, our chief negotiator goes into a bicycle race at 73 years old, he falls he breaks his leg. That was the good part of our deal. That was the only thing that happened. No, think of it. And I told people last week because I told this last week. I swear to you, I will never ever ride a bicycle, at least in a race, but I won't ride one anyway.

But, we have a new thing that just came up yesterday. The deal. We know all about the 24-day period. Right. But the 24-day period that doesn't start, that clock doesn't start ticking for a long time. For a long time. So, that could be forever. So if they're doing something, believe me, by the time we get there. But here's the all time great. First of all, why aren't they giving us back our prisoners? And second, can you believe this? Can you believe it? And second of all, the other day it was determined that Iran in a very important section, maybe the most important, right, is going to do their own policing. They are going to police. They are going to police and they are going to tell us we swear we're not building anything.

It's so -- it's so sad. It's so sad. Obamacare. We are going to repeal and replace Obamacare. We are going to come up with a plan and there are so many different ways. You know, you don't know this because you don't think of Obama this way. Do you know who the biggest beneficiaries of Obamacare are? The insurance companies. The insurance companies. Remember I told you, special interests and lobbyists. The insurance companies love it. We can have such great plans if we'd get rid of the artificial lines around everything. I have a huge -- I have a huge company. And when I negotiate, like, get one group. They don't -- you can't negotiate. Some of the people that own businesses know what I'm talking about. The insurance companies are so protected they're making a fortune. Were going to end that. We're going to make it so competitive. We're going to get rid of the artificial barriers. You're going to get such great plans.

And Obamacare, I mean, you look at what's happening with your premiums. I mean, look at this. Look at what's happening. Just take a look at what's happening to the deductibles. They're so high it's impossible. It's impossible. Trade. We're going to fix it. Health care. We're going to fix it. Women's health issues. We're going to fix it. You know, my wife came up to me the other day, and she said, "It's really sad because people don't understand how you cherish women." I will protect women, so important to me. So important. And I heard some of the other candidates, Jeb and some of the others the other day, saying we're not going to fund various women's health issues. Can you believe this? I said that's the end of his election. Women I don't think like that too much. Do we agree? And he said we're not going to fund women's health issues. A few hours later he came back and he said he misspoke. Oh, okay. He misspoke. But women's health issues so important.

We're going to end up taking our country, we are going to make it so strong, so powerful, so loved by people again, so loved. You know, one of the problems that we have and you don't see it tonight, but you see it, is the tremendous lack of spirit. And I actually thought that President Obama, the one thing he was inexperienced, never produced a job. Lots of other things. But I actually thought that he would be a great, a really great cheerleader for the country. When he was elected. I thought that he would. And he's really turned out to be a great divider as opposed to a great unifier. Really has. And you look at Baltimore. You look at Ferguson. You look at Saint Louis last night. Over the last week. You look at all of the things that are happening. We're sitting on powder kegs. There's no spirit. There's no jobs. There's no anything. We are going to take this country, I am going to be the greatest jobs president that God ever created. I will tell you that. I will tell you. You are going to be so proud. You know I oftentimes say, the American dream is dead. But I'm going to make it bigger and stronger and more powerful than ever before. And that's what's going to happen. I am going to make this country bigger and stronger and better and you're going to love it and you're going to love your president and we're going to turn this place around. And you're going to be so proud. And you know our whole theme is make America great again. We are going to make America better than it's ever been. And we're going to love doing it, and we're going to have fun doing it. And I just want to thank everybody. Because this has been really, really special. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

LEMON: Well, there you go. That's a pep rally for you, huh? I'm Don Lemon. This is "CNN Tonight." Our breaking news is Donald Trump rallies the cheering crowd in Mobile, Alabama. So let's discuss all of this as he is shaking hand. Pressing the flesh out in the crowd, at Ladd-Peebles Stadium in Mobile, Alabama.

I'm going to bring in Maeve Reston, CNN national political reporter; Katrina Pierson, spokesperson for the Tea Party Leadership Funds; Maggie Haberman, our presidential campaign correspondent for "The New York Times". Also with us Ana Navarro, republican strategist who is a supporter of Jeb Bush and adviser for other GOP candidates. As we keep this up, we're going to let this play out. But I want to got to Rob Nobles -- Ryan Nobles who's out in the crowd now. We'll get to Ryan in just a little bit. Let's get to Maeve. Maeve, what do you make of this?

MAEVE RESTON, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER: You're going to start with me with that question, right? That was amazing. As always, special as he said. Pure stream of consciousness. Pure Trump. And I think that the question for voters out there as they watch events like this live as he pointed out I believe on many, if not all of the networks is, is this the person that they want as their president? Do they want him as their negotiator? And, you know, are they, the points that he is making and the way in which he makes them, is that what they want to see in a president because that was a great show. I mean, the crowd is on their feet. As he said he wanted to be a cheerleader for America. But for a lot of people, the final day it comes down to do you want this person to be your president, do you trust this person to make the decision for you in the oval office. And I think it's going to be a really interesting.

LEMON: Ana Navarro, you know, he's a real showman. He flew over in his jet. He did a flyover. He's got a big crowd. He's at a stadium. But he did mention and I want to get your take on this. he talked about jobs, the economy, immigration, talked about the Iran deal, he talked about Obamacare, he's going to repeal and replace it. He talked about trade. Women's health issues. He even brought up Ferguson and St. Louis, Ana Navarro. ANA NAVARRO, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yeah, but you know, Don he brought them up with about, you know, a millimeter of depth. This was really a great spectacle. It was political theater at its best. And it was a very me-centric speech, Trump-centric speech by Donald Trump. I wrote the "Art Of The Deal." I own hotels in Florida. I'm suing Univision. I have a friend called Carl Icahn, who's going to solve China. I love NABISCO, but I'm going to -- I love Oreos, but I'm not going to eat them again. it was all about me, me, me and very little policy. Very little meat, you know, very little of anything that really to hang on to. But at the same time, it was incredibly entertaining. Look it's 80-plus degrees, hot in Mobile, Alabama right now.

LEMON: Yeah.

NAVARRO: Eighty percent humidity and those people stuck there for hours. That's an impressive show.

LEMON: Maggie, Maggie Haberman, you know what, you stick to the television as well to watch him. As Maeve said, it was stream of consciousness and it was very interesting.

MAGGIE HABERMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: It was. But you know, it's interesting. While it was absolutely stream of consciousness, I think that's part of the theatrical aspect of this. We've heard him give a pretty similar speech over several points in the last couple of weeks. It's actually often very similar. You can see it moving. You know, he had that line about his wife, Melania telling him that people don't really understand that he cherishes women.

But the other day I think he said it was his daughter who had said that. This time it's his wife. He threw in some Alabama-specific references, about steel and sort of local references. Remember Alabama is one of the SEC primary states on March 1st so it's more important than it used to be. He is behaving more and more like a politician. I do wonder, two questions, one if he starts acting more like a politician, will that impact how people view him. As Maeve said, I think that when people start asking themselves the question, is this who you want in your president? I think at the end of the day, that may not be where they are but right now, I think a lot of people want to see the show and they're going to keep coming back.

LEMON: Katrina, it was definitely a very favorable crowd. I mean, they came there to see him, and yelling USA! Trump, trump, trump!

KATRINA PIERSON, SPOKESPERON FOR THE TEA PARTY LEADERSHIP FUND: Well, not to mention, the largest crowd of the political season. And I love how everyone is saying, oh this is just political theater. But guess what in 2008, Barack Obama was king of the political theater. And today this in translation is winning. If you're in business, you know that 60% of your sale is your visual aid. And Trump is dominating nationwide.

LEMON: All right, everyone stay with me. When we come right back, more highlights of Donald Trump's big 'bama pep rally. Plus our apprentice face-off. Two people who were fired by Trump, one supports him, the other doesn't. Tonight they fight it out.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Back now with our breaking news, Donald Trump just wrapping up a pep rally in Mobile, Alabama and we're waiting for him to take questions from reporters. We're going to carry that for you live. It is our breaking news tonight. Cheering crowds there in Mobile, Alabama. At the Ladd-Peebles Stadium. Back with me now is Maeve Reston, Katrina Pierson and also Maggie Haberman and Ana Navarro. They're streaming out of the stadium. They were excited. They got to listen to Donald Trump talk about his favorite subject here, one of them, let's talk about the word -- the term I should say, anchor baby.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Illegal immigration what's going on. We got to stop it. We're going to build a wall. And it's going to be -- you know it's amazing. The politicians ten years ago, 15 years ago, they all wanted a wall. But it never went. It never happened. Because somebody didn't want it. Probably a lobbyist. You know all these guys like Bush and like Hillary Clinton, they're all taking care of, I don't know if you know -- no, but when hillary has $60 million and when Jeb Bush -- when Jeb Bush who's totally in favor of common core, weak on immigration, right? Very weak on immigration. Wants to let people come in. Although now he is using anchor baby. You know, he put out a memo, you cannot use anchor baby. Now because I used it, he's using it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So Katrina, a lot of people are offended by the term anchor baby, or anchor babies. Others say it's for political correctness. What do you think?

PIERSON: I say, so what, this is America. This is freedom of speech. They are anchor babies. We have babyboomers, we have gen x, we have millennials. So what? We have a country -- economy on fumes. We have Christians being beheaded. Nobody cares about what somebody is going to go cry about if they're being called a name. It's anchor baby, so what, Don.

LEMON: Ana Navarro, you want to weigh in on that?

NAVARRO: Look, I think this is -- this is an unfortunate discussion that we're having. I think there are better ways of describing it that are less offensive. But the truth of the matter is the term exists. It's out there. I think that you know, whether it's offensive or not is irrelevant to Donald Trump. We've seen him say other offensive things over and over again since he started this campaign. And it's not done a thing to him. He is Teflon Don when it comes to whether he's offending Mexicans, he's offending POWs, he's offending...

LEMON: Jeb Bush used it.

NAVARRO: Go ahead Don.

LEMON: And someone said that they were offended by these, said, hey listen, you know, I'm going to use the term. I'm not upset that I used it and if you find a better term, then I will use it. So if it's not going to hurt Donald Trump, is it going to hurt Jeb Bush?

NAVARRO: I don't think so and I'll tell you why. First of all because let's put it in context. He used it as a term of reference. I remember Don when you were on the air one time with the word -- with the n word, and people got very offended. Some people, you know, you got a lot of strong reaction from that. That's not your language. I know you. You're my friend. Jeb Bush is my friend. That's not his language. You were using it as a term of reference that is used by others. That's the way that Jeb Bush used it. He's got a lifelong record and look at where he is on the policy. He has repeatedly come out against amending the 14th Amendment and ending birth right citizenship. So how can you attack the guy who's actually on the right side of the issue?

LEMON: Let's talk about continue this discussion because it has to do with immigration, anchor babies, that term that he's used. Let's talk about the 14th Amendment now. Here's Donald Trump.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I just got these numbers today. I said what are they? 7.5% of all of the births in this country are illegal immigrants. Okay. We can't afford it. And they're supposed to stay. And I turned out to be right. The 14th Amendment. You know, I had these guys, you can't change the 14th Amendment. It will take so long. That I agree. But you know what, an act of Congress -- the 14th Amendment I was right on it. You can do something with it. And you can do something fast. You can do something fast. So we have 300,000 babies a year. 300,000 that you have to take care of. We all have to take care of. And you know, in the case of other countries, including Mexico, they don't do that. It doesn't work that way. You don't walk over the border for one day and all of a sudden we have another American citizen. It doesn't work that way. Mexico doesn't do it. Other places don't do it. Very few places do it. We're the only place, just about that's stupid enough to do it. So...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So Maeve, Donald Trump says he is not sure that the 14th Amendment guarantees citizenship for any one born here. Will that kind of talk you think drive Latinos over to the democratic side?

RESTON: Well I think, you know, obviously the polls right now show that Latinos generally are leaning towards democrats any way. I mean, this is -- let's go back to south deportation in the 2012 race. Other terms of ours, Tom Tinkrito, the immigration debate has been very unhelpful to republicans who really need to win over Latinos in a lot of the states out here out west for example. Colorado and Nevada. And you know I think that what this is doing though, him talking about debates like this and there's a huge debate around what he said tonight, is that he is forcing a conversation that actually does show you that there is a broad range of opinion even within the republican party on some of these issues. I don't know in the end whether or not that will be helpful or not to the Republican Party. But the rhetoric right now certainly has not been helpful to them because it's created an image around the party that they've been trying to get rid of for sometime.

LEMON: All right. Stand by everyone. Up next, two former contestants from Trump's show "The Apprentice" go head-to-head. One supports him. The other does not. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Welcome back everyone with our breaking news tonight. Donald Trump fires up thousands of supporters at a pep rally tonight in Mobile, Alabama. Joining me now two people who not only know him. They were both fired by him. That's Katrina Campins and Kwame Jackson. They competed against each other as contestants in season one of "The Apprentice." So Kwame, last you were here, you weren't planning on running out and voting for Donald Trump. Guess what? He is out now mainstream candidate. Has your opinion changed now?

KWAME JACKSON, "APPRENTICE" CONTESTANT SEASON 1: My opinion hasn't changed Don. I talked about last time I was in the show, the toxic ecosystem that Donald Trump was creating was some of his rhetoric and lo and behold, unfortunately, we had the Boston incident, the Hispanic homeless gentleman who was assaulted by two individuals based on Trump's rhetoric and name that. Not that there's a direct line there, but once again, that's creating that toxic ecosystem. My opinion hasn't changed for a number of reasons. One because we need an inclusive leader in America. We need someone who understands the changing demographics, Hispanics becoming majority population in California. We need someone who understands that two women just became the first women to finish the ranger program in the United States Army, that women are on the rise and they're leaning in. We need a leader who realizes that Hispanic Americans are going to be the next great voting block in America and I think that Donald Trump is not that person. He's not the person who's creating inclusion. He's not celebrating diversity. And it's not just a matter of being politically correct or divisive, it's a matter of frankly being rude and not understanding.

LEMON: But Kwame, you say that, you say that. Yet he is gaining on Hillary Clinton in the polls. Thousands and thousands of people are showing up to his rallies. His poll numbers are getting higher. Hillary Clinton's poll numbers are getting lower. So are you sure that you know the words that you're saying is just because you don't like Donald Trump?

JACKSON: No, I don't have anything against him personally. I'm just speaking as a concerned American and a voting citizen. I think that for me, you know, a broke clock can be right twice a day. So great that he's doing well. Great that there's hopefully a cap on his support whether that's among the working class, the blue-collar voters, folks with the high school education. I always say that you know, one Leonard Skynard concert and one Wrestlemania cage match does not win you an election. So God bless the good people in Mobile and I love them, but at the same time I think that represents a limited slice of the future demographic of America.

LEMON: So listen, you know, Katrina, there's no question now that Donald Trump is now a legitimate serious candidate. I want you to take a listen to what some of the folks in Alabama were saying. Here they are.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The next president of the United States!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thumbs up to Donald Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need a true leader like Mr. Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is literally talking about the things we here in America are all saying at the kitchen table, in our living rooms, at work. Everybody is talking about this. Because he is actually going to do something for the common Americans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So, Katrina, there you go. They said he's a straight talker. So where does his campaign go from here?

KATRINA CAMPINS, "APPRENTICE" CONTESTANT SEASON 1: I've said this before and I'll say it again. I think that he's striking a chord with American people and the numbers reflect that because he's the one candidate that is completely independent from lobbyists and small interest groups and has the best and greatest chance of fixing the political corruption in this country. And that's why Americans are showing up for him. He addressed it tonight at the rally. He talked about health care. And let's face it, our healthcare system in this country is a disaster. And part of the reason that it's a disaster is because insurance groups are some of the biggest contributors to campaign fund to politicians. And they're the ones that are winning. The American people are losing. As somebody that has worked with him...

LEMON: Go ahead, go ahead. Finish your thought.

CAMPINS: Go ahead.

LEMON: OK, so here's what I want to know.

CAMPINS: I'm saying he's now -- go ahead.

LEMON: OK, sorry about the delay.

CAMPINS: No, it's okay.

LEMON: So what Kwame said, he said -- Kwame said, you know, he doesn't represent women. He doesn't represent minorities. He doesn't represent all of these people. He is not looking out and he doesn't represent the diversity of America. Yet and still he's doing well in the polls and people like him. What do you make of that?

CAMPINS: Well, I'm an Hispanic woman and I like what he is saying and I'll tell you why. It's because he is speaking truth. There's no filter. Whereas all these other politicians, they have an agenda. They are being swayed by special interest groups and lobbyists and we as Americans are suffering. Immigration, let's talk about that for instance. To become a legal immigrant in this country, it's extremely expensive. I know because my husband is going through it right now. So if you're wealthy, sure you can afford to pay for that. But most Americans don't have those funds. So there's more incentive to come to this country illegally. And who suffers? The Americans. Because we end up paying for those illegal immigrants that come into this country and cannot afford to be here. and I come from parents that are legal immigrants that came here years and years ago, but they did it the right way. So I'm speaking as an American. Sure, I still work with Donald Trump and I believe in what he's saying. But as an American, I believe he has the best chance to fix the political corruption. I as an American, am fed up with all of these politicians feeding us what we want to hear, and then getting into office and not doing anything about it. We as Americans are the ones that are suffering. And that's why I believe he has such a great chance and that's why people are showing up.

LEMON: All right, Katrina, Kwame, stand by. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Donald Trump changing the way candidates run for office and his fans are loving it. So should his rivals be taking a page out of the Donald Trump playbook? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Let's assume that somebody else becomes president. Wouldn't that be horrible? Wouldn't that be horrible? So let's assume somebody else becomes president. Let's assume a very low energy person, very, very low energy, so low energy that every time you watch him, you fall asleep. Let's say -- he said, Hillary. Yeah, Hillary too. So let's say Jeb becomes president. Not good. Not good.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Breaking news tonight here on CNN. Thousands turn out tonight in Mobile, Alabama at a pep rally for Donald Trump. Joining me now is John Brabender, a senior strategist for Rick Santorum, Rick Wilson, republican strategist, and Douglas Brinkley, CNN presidential historian. Good evening to you, gentlemen.

I said earlier, I never thought I'd be glued to my television on a Friday night watching Donald Trump and here we are. So, John, you know what, you're a campaign guy. You're advising Rick Santorum, who was on CNN earlier today. You know, how challenging is it for Santorum, and anyone, if they're running against a Donald Trump?

JOHN BRABENDER, SENIOR STRATEGIST FOR RICK SANTORIUM: It's challenging for all of them because if nothing else, Donald Trump is entertaining. We like watching him. He makes us laugh. The question is should he be president? If you -- I'm a republican consultant. But if I was running the democrats and you gave me Ellen Degeneres, I think I could probably get her the democrat nomination over Hillary because she ideologically fits who they are, she would be funny to watch and so forth. But that's not the same as saying that he should be president. The other problem is he's difficult to attack. We saw that when Rand Paul tried it, when Rick Perry tried it, and Lindsey Graham tried it and it backfired on them. So this is very challenging for all these candidates.

LEMON: Hey Rick, he didn't talk much about Hillary Clinton. I mean, he's talked more about President Obama.

RICK WILSON, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well look, I mean he -- tonight was a lot of the usual stuff he does. But I think he believes as a lot of people do, that we're in a phase now where Hillary Clinton may be a declining stock in this market and we may be looking at something else. So he is trying to frame up against an opponent, particularly that he knew that the audience tonight would be very responsive too because Barack Obama's numbers throughout the south are about as low as they can get mathematically at this point.

LEMON: Hey Rick, real quickly. I want to ask you this. He talked about doing interviews regularly. He mentioned CNN, he mentioned Fox, he mentioned MSNBC with jeers and some jeers from the crowd. Should other candidates be doing the same sort of thing if they want to be relevant?

WILSON: Absolutely. You know, Don, we've have this discussion a couple times Don. I've actually encouraged two of the other campaigns to get more engaged in terms of, you know, if you're going to be on a spectacle, you're going to be in a contest where people are playing this by ear and running, calling audibles on every play, you've got to be in that game too and be more accessible and start to fill up some of the vacuum that Trump tends to fill with being on the phone with folks all the time. And you got to also play by the same rules. You guys already know what Marco Rubio or Rand Paul or Ted Cruz call in and not have them, you know, only be in a studio or only be in a package piece.

LEMON: Well if they want to call in, they're welcome to call in to this show. Hey you know, I want to ask you this, Douglas and I want you to put this in historical context for me before. But let's listen to the sound bites. Because he's talking about Jeb Bush, Jeb Bush talking about anchor babies. This is the first time he really took on Trump. Listen to this.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, do you regret using the term anchor babies yesterday on the radio?

JEB BUSH, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No, I didn't. I don't. I don't regret it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You don't regret it?

BUSH: No, do you have a better term?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm asking you.

BUSH: You give me a better term and I'll use it. I'm serious. Don't yell at me behind my ear though. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sorry about that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... language anchor baby is that how...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: OK, so Douglas, historically I think the last time I remember any term that really set people off, I think it was welfare queens. They probably were more. What do you make of this whole incident in the historical context? Or Donald Trump playing the birther card about Barack Obama.

DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: I think there's a lot of what they used to call the 19th century no nothingness, no nothing party was anti-mormon, anti-catholic, anti-Jewish. I mean here tonight in California -- I mean, in Alabama tonight watching this, you think about that George Wallace with segregation now and segregation forever, plays well with a certain audience. But is that the brand the GOP wants to have represented. In other words, Trump did well tonight. He had a lot of momentum.

LEMON: Do you think it's on that level though? Do you think it's on the same level as segregation now?

BRINKLEY: I do. I think it's basically Mexicans go home. That's the code language what's going on with the wall and that's what anchor babies is all about. It's deeply offensive to Mexican Americans and it's going to kill the republicans with the Latino vote. It doesn't mean it's not entertaining. Demagogues are often entertaining, but there's too much -- the China bashing, Japan bashing, the Saudi Arabia bashing, going after all of our allies. Basically, it's nativism on steroids and it's tracking right now. It's going to be awful hard for Jeb Bush to go after Trump. I'm not quite sure how he does it effectively because Trump is a master at media manipulation.

LEMON: Donald Trump talking more about immigration now, listen.

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TRUMP: And you know, when I announced that I was running for president, I brought up the subject of illegal immigration. And I took a lot of heat, that I can tell you. Rush Limbaugh actually said, incoming. He got more incoming than anybody I've ever seen. And two weeks later, everybody was apologizing to me. They saw that I was right between what happened in San Francisco to incredible Kate and her family is such an incredible family and Jamile and so many people have been so badly hurt the other day in California last week. A woman, 66 years old, a veteran, was killed, raped, sodomized, tortured and killed by an illegal immigrant. We have to do it. We have to do something. We have to do something.

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LEMON: So when he brings up immigration, he often will bring up crime, as he did there. Douglas Brinkley said it's nativism, do you think -- it's a scare tactic. Do you think it's a scare tactic for voters? This is for John.

BRABENDER: Sure. Well, you know, first of all, I found it more entertaining that Trump took that much credit. At some point, we're going to have to do random drug testing for all these presidential candidates because they all think they were the first of topics that we've been discussing for a long time.

People are missing the entire point right now. It is not about Donald Trump. It's about the large number of people who are enthused about somebody because they think he's authentic and they've been greatly disenfranchised and so that's why he's doing so well. The other important thing that you got to watch for is his 15 minutes of fame were supposed to be up after the debate. But now he's in 16, 17, 18 minutes. So people like Bush and others have decided they're going to ratchet up and go right after Trump. And as far as I'm concerned, the real race is now beginning.

LEMON: But Douglas, OK, if you look at -- history will show and correct me if I'm wrong, that the people -- you know, we're -- we've got eight years of a liberal administration so the pendulum is swinging the other way. But isn't it the people who are upset and who are more angry and who feel that they have something more to fight for, don't those people often go out and vote more so than the people who are in power?

BRINKLEY: Well, it's true. Donald Trump is bottling up lightning. There's no question about it right now and there's a lot of ways you remember when Ross Perot talked about a lot of this. She got 19% of the vote in 1992 against Bush and Clinton. There's a real third party feeling in the country. I think Donald Trump is attracting a lot of independents and he gives a great speech, but it's a problem for the Republican Party if he's the nominee because he alienates so many people that aren't part of the hard right. I do think thought after McCain and after Romney, the conservative wing, if you like, the nativist wing of the Republican Party is demanding that they have a player in the game and it's really Trump or Ted Cruz and it's been interesting that Trump and Cruz have kept a bit of an alliance to all these. They're standing up to the GOP establishment.

LEMON: Hey, I got to go. Rick, I'll give you the last word. Fifteen minutes of fame, can that turn into four years?

WILSON: You know, I think that 15 minutes of fame are still -- I think he's still on the clock. And I think this is really going to become a contest between a Republican Party that believes in limited government conservativism or Republican Party that believes in sort of a native stateism.

LEMON: Rick Wilson, Douglas Brinkley, John Brabender, thank you gentlemen, have a good weekend.

BRINKLEY: Thank you.

WILSON: Thanks Don.

LEMON: Coming up next, two of Donald Trump's biggest fans, the Stump for Trump Girls are as fired up as ever. There they are. They are next.

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LEMON: Our breaking news tonight. Thousands of cheering supporters turn out for Donald Trump in Alabama, the mogul who wants to be your next president taking the campaign by storm. And my next guests are Trump fans taking YouTube by storm. Here they are.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What I can't understand is why everybody is so upset with Donald because he said, "Well, we may have to deport the children, too." But here's the deal, when people get locked up here in this country, they are separated from their children. Why aren't people outraged about that? Listen Donald. You are going to have to bust this truth open just like a pinata and let it all...

(Crosstalk)

Clean house, baby. Clean house. We are looking for you to clean house.

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LEMON: I can't help but -- they make me smile. Joining me now is Lynette Hardaway known as Diamond and also Rochelle Richardson known as Silk. Diamond and Silk, thank you. They are the Stump for Trump Girls, how are you ladies doing tonight,. Welcome back to the show.

LYNETTE HARDAWAY, STUMP FOR TRUMP GIRLS: Doing wonderful.

ROCHELLE RICHARDSON, STUMP FOR TRUMP GIRLS: Doing wonderful, thank you for having us.

LEMON: Did you watch tonight and what did you think of the rally?

HARDAWAY: Look, we did watch the rally tonight. We thought it was phenomenal. We like his stance on immigration. Hey, we can no longer have illegal immigrants coming over here ripping at the holding on to the bag (ph).

RICHARDSON: That's right.