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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Democratic Debate; Debate for Hillary Clinton; Debate for Bernie Sanders. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired October 13, 2015 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00] TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Rise to the polls, and be closer to the middle next time around.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Tom Foreman, thank you so much. Just as easy as that.

Thank you all so much for joining us "AT THIS HOUR." We're going to be back here tomorrow live from Vegas again with all the drama from the debates.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: LEGAL VIEW with Ashleigh Banfield starts right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I will fight as hard as I can to earn every vote.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm in this race and we're running to win.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Feel the Bern. Feel the Bern.

LINCOLN CHAFEE (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm the only one running that has been a mayor, a governor and a United States senator.

JIM WEBB (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I will work for the well-being of all Americans and those who otherwise would have no voice in the corridors of power.

MARTIN O'MALLEY (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: These debates are make and break moments for - for every campaign.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, I'm Ashleigh Banfield.

We are just eight and a half hours now from showtime in Las Vegas. And just like the heavyweights, the five Democratic presidential candidates are getting ready to rumble for the most powerful position in the United States, and it is all happening right here live on CNN.

Our debate coverage begins sharp at 8:30 tonight. Set your DVR, or better yet, set your schedule. Two top contenders facing off for the very first time, Hillary Clinton and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, along with three underdogs, former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, Jim Webb, who's a former U.S. senator from Virginia, and former Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee. They're all set to arrive in just the next couple of hours. We've got our cameras trained on their arrival site and you're going to see it all happening live here on CNN.

CNN's senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta is live inside the debate hall in Las Vegas.

All right, so give me a bit of a rundown.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Sure.

BANFIELD: I know it's a little early out there at 9:00 in the morning for you.

ACOSTA: That's right.

BANFIELD: But, yes, give me a bit of a rundown as to the mechanics, where you are and how everything's going to shake out.

ACOSTA: Ashleigh, I'm inside the debate hall right now, and as you said, about eight hours or so from kickoff of this first Democratic debate of the season. The seats are all in here, but they're putting the finishing touches on this debate hall. You can see crews - our CNN crews are spread across the auditorium here, getting this ready for what's going to take place later on tonight.

And I can tell you, you know, the candidate walk-throughs will be taking place later on this afternoon. That will be interesting to watch.

And I just had a moment a little while ago, earlier this hour, I talked with Tad Devine (ph), who is one of the lead strategists for Democratic contender Bernie Sanders. He's been the upstart insurgent candidate, as you know, Ashleigh. And I talked to him for a few moments about what to expect tonight and he said, listen, you know, Bernie Sanders is not coming out here to attack anybody. He wants to talk about his issues. He wants to talk about Wall Street. He wants to talk about economic fairness. But he said he knows this is a debate. So if candidates come after him, get ready. And in the words of Tad Devine, you can't tame this tiger. So I think that might be the first time I've ever heard of Bernie Sanders being described as a tiger. He'll be showing those claws, I guess, later on tonight.

But just to run through some of the debate rules, Ashleigh, you know, each candidate is going to have about a minute every time they're questioned and then 30 seconds if one of the other candidates mentions him or her. And then Anderson Cooper, the moderator, will have the flexibility to extend that time if need be. And in terms of the strategy, Ashleigh, it's pretty simple. For Hillary Clinton, obviously she's the clear, you know, front-runner in this race right now. she has to make no mistakes. She hasn't debated like this since 2008. And so there's a lot at stake for her. You know, when she arrived in Las Vegas last night, she was already looking past the Democratic field. She went over to the Trump hotel, started firing off on the GOP frontrunner. So she has to be careful that she doesn't look past the Democratic contenders who are going to be sharing that stage with her tonight.

As for Bernie Sanders, you know, he want - he understands the knock on him inside the Democratic Party, that perhaps he cannot be elected president, and so he wants to come across as mainstream, serious and presidential. These others candidates, Martin O'Malley, Lincoln Chafee, Jim Webb, they want to have that breakout moment like Carly Fiorina, Marco Rubio in the last GOP debate on CNN. Those breakout moments can translate into poll numbers, and so that's what they'll be driving for later on tonight. It's going to be a lot of fun to watch, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Yes, they need those moment because, as we saw -

ACOSTA: They do.

BANFIELD: You know, our Alisyn Camerota went out and did a jay-walking style interview with people on the street and most people, I think all the people she interviewed, did not know who those three were. So, thank you for that, Jim Acosta. You've got your work cut out for you today.

ACOSTA: You bet.

BANFIELD: I know it's early. You've got a long way to go.

ACOSTA: Thanks so much.

BANFIELD: And we also have a long way to go to the finish line. And for Hillary Clinton, maintaining that big lead that she's got could be a tougher battle than you might think.

I want to do a flashback for a minute if I can. Let's go back eight years ago. On this day, in 2007, a Gallup poll among Democrats had Clinton far ahead of Barack Obama. Look at that commanding lead. Fifty percent of Democrats supported Hillary Clinton for the nomination. Now, President Obama, back then Senator Obama, was a very distant second at just 21 percent. And, yes, John Edwards was still in the race at that point, 13 percent.

[12:05:12] Fast forward to today, it doesn't look all that different, strangely enough. Take a look at the brand new CBS News polling numbers. Forty-six percent of Democratic voters support Secretary Clinton, 27 percent support Senator Bernie Sanders, and 16 percent support the vice president, Joe Biden, who, again, we need to remind people, not in the race at this point, but it is a possibility.

So, will Hillary Clinton stand out tonight, or is somebody else going to steal some thunder and send Hillary sliding in the polls. Who is going to be in the focus?

I'm going to bring in CNN's senior political analyst Ron Brownstein, who's the editorial director for "The National Journal."

Ron, thanks so much for being with us. That's really the big question, are we going to hear the name -

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Good morning.

BANFIELD: Well, it's good morning for you, good afternoon for us.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: Is it going to be the Hillary show? Is it going to be the Trump show? Will they all take the advantage to beat up on Donald Trump? Or will they actually be beating up a little on Barack Obama? Who are we going to see standing out as the main mention tonight?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, I think that the Democratic race is in a different place than the Republican race. And in part, the big backdrop, a context for the Republicans race and the Republican debate was the anger of the Republican base at the leadership of the party and you saw that reflected in a very kind of rollicking, tumultuous debate. Here, this - that isn't really the background. You don't really have that kind of disaffection among Democrats about President Obama or the congressional leadership. In fact, you have anxiety about the party's position in Washington. They've lost the House. They've lost the Senate. The White House is their last hold on power. And I think the overriding issue for most democratic voters is who is going to give them the best chance of holding the White House in 2016. And, in a way, this is as much a parallel audition for that role as it is a debate among the candidates themselves.

BANFIELD: Well, and - you know, all Democrats, I think it's fair to say, want to win the White House. They want to win the general election.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: No matter what they hear from the candidates, they are looking down the road at who's the winning possibility.

BROWNSTEIN: Right.

BANFIELD: I was just reading something that you released in "The National Journal" -

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: And you break it up really interestingly. You say that Hillary does so well among women and racial minorities, and Bernie Sanders does incredibly well among college educated whites and young people.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Right.

BANFIELD: And if you look at those early, primary caucus states, it seems to - it seems to bear true. But can those numbers be merged? Can either one of those candidates start stealing from the other? BROWNSTEIN: That's a really good question. And, you know, in 2008, we

saw a remarkable consistency across the 50 states in the way voters divided. Hillary Clinton, as you point out, was consistently better among Hispanic, blue collar whites, whites without a college education, and women. President Obama was - dominated among African- American and was much more competitive among white collar, socially liberal whites. In this race, a Hillary Clinton, so far, is running well with Hispanics. She's moved African-Americans over to her corner. You saw in your CNN poll in South Carolina yesterday, she was beating Bernie Sanders 15-1 among African-American and also holding her own with those blue collar whites. Bernie Sanders, as the moment, is gaining most of his traction from that one-third of the Democratic coalition who qualify basically as college educated, socially liberal whites. He's shown he can excite those voters, he can mobilize those voters, he can motivate them. If that's all he can do, though, he can't win the nomination. And I think the clearest task for anybody in this race tonight, in this debate tonight, is for Sanders to show whether he can begin to crack into that diverse base of the Democratic electorate because if he can't, it is very difficult for him to get over the top.

BANFIELD: So let's talk a little bit about the favorability factors for - at least for Hillary Clinton right now -

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: Because they are changing, they're shifting. She had a lousy summer, let's be honest.

BROWNSTEIN: Right.

BANFIELD: But now if you look at the "Washington Post"/ABC News poll which is just out, the favorability for Hillary Clinton is at 47 percent.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: That may not seem very high to folks who are watching, but if you compare it to August 30th, she's ticked up by two points. It was 45 back then.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Yes.

BANFIELD: Look, is that much ado about nothing or is that really significant for the senator?

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Yes, that's - that's polling variation, I think, and maybe reflects some small improvement. Not really.

Look, Hillary Clinton is a very polarizing figure. If she is the Democratic nomination and wins the election in November '16, her favorability rating in the electorate will probably still only be at the most 52 or 53 percent. She's never going to be a broad consensus figure. It's not clear anybody can be a broad consensus figure any more in our wholly - you know, entirely polarized times. What she, I think, has to do is reassure Democratic voters that she has not been fatality compromised by all of the controversies of the summer. I think this is fundamentally still, this race, even though Bernie Sanders has struck a chord, the race is fundamentally a referendum on whether Democratic voters feel comfortable with Clinton as the nominee. If they do, I think it's hard for anybody else to get past her. But as long as these doubts persist, there is an opening, to some extent for Sanders, depending on whether he can broaden his appeal, but also, as you alluded to, for the vice president. The vice presidential - the discussion of Joe Biden would not be happening if Hillary Clinton had not been weakened to the extent she has over the past few months.

[12:10:15] BANFIELD: All right, Ron Brownstein, thanks so much. Long day for you as well, so I'll let you go. Thank you for that.

BROWNSTEIN: Thank you.

BANFIELD: A great piece in "The National Journal," too. Thank you.

So how worried is Hillary Clinton right now about that whole history thing that we just talked about? What a difference a year can make. How is she worried about that maybe repeating? Can she hang on to this massive lead that she has in so many of the states. Tonight could be a make or break moment for her. We're going to talk strategy, not just for Hillary Clinton, but also, what's Bernie doing to make sure that doesn't happen?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:15:00] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I am prepared and ready on day one.

It is imperative that we have a president starting on day one.

And I've been involved in this now for 17 years.

I have 35 years being an instrument, an agent of change.

I'm not playing as some people say the gender card here in Las Vegas, I'm just trying to play the winning card.

We have made progress. You can look at this stage and see an African- American, a Latino, a woman.

People are not attacking me because I'm a woman. They're attacking me because I'm ahead.

There is a smart way to protect our borders and there is a dumb way to protect our borders.

I co-sponsored comprehensive immigration reform in 2004.

This has become a contentious, political issue. It is being demagogued and I believe that it is being used to bash immigrant, and that must stop. WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: We've got a long time to go. You'll have a

good opportunity.

CLINTON: We're just getting warmed up. Now -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: You can call that classic Clinton or you can call that her greatest hits. Whatever you want to call it, she is really, really good when she gets on a debate stage. So what's the strategy tonight in Las Vegas to try to do some repeats of what you just saw? Here with a preview from inside the debate hall, CNN political commentator and Democrat Hilary Rosen, and CNN national security commentator Mike Rogers, a Republican, and also the former chairman of the House Intel Committee.

All right, you two, thank you so much for doing this at such an early hour for you out there.

HILARY ROSEN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Hi, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Hilary, I want to start with you if I can.

ROSEN: (INAUDIBLE).

MIKE ROGERS, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY COMMENTATOR: Yes, thanks for having us.

BANFIELD: This is the first big audience, guys, for Hillary Clinton to - other than the news headlines that take snippets of what she does, this is the first big audience. What does she need to do to brand who she is and what she stands for and unbrand who she is and what she stands for? I'll start with you, Hilary.

ROSEN: Super tough to unbrand. So her best bet is kind of doubling down. I like to think of it as Hillary has the smartest girl in the class problem, which is, everybody knows she's capable, everybody knows that she can do the job as president. What Democrats want, though, is to fall in love all over again. She's still technically and by the polls the most popular Democrat in the race and so she has to just remind people of that. Why is that? She's going to rise above on the big picture, not get into policy weeds, but talk about real people, real problems. You know, that's what she's got to do.

BANFIELD: So, Mike, I want to play for you and for Hilary and for our audience a moment from the 2008 campaign against Barack Obama. It was just as the primary season was beginning. It was right after Iowa, right before New Hampshire, and nobody expected this to happen, but I think this woman stood up in the crowd and asked kind of a softball, like, oh, you know, Senator Clinton, how do you do it? How do you just get up every day and how do you have the fortitude to - who does your hair, for crying out loud. It seemed like a really easy, cute, adorable, laugh off question. But this was the response that came out and made headlines. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have so many opportunities from this country, I just don't want to see us fall backwards, you know? So - you know, this is very personal for me. It's not just political, it's not just public. I see what's happening. We have to reverse it. And some people think elections are a game. They think it's like who's up or who's down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: What a moment. I mean that was - that was really sensational. I hate to say the word, but it truly was sensational. Chairman Rogers, John Avlon said on our network early this morning something I thought really rung true, that she needs to take the risk of intimacy over steely ambition, and I'll add perfection. Do you think that the debate stage, Chairman Rogers, is the exact place where she does that best or can do that best or might do that best?

ROGERS: I think she's probably the best debate performer you'll see on the stage tonight. And I think she has something to prove, and it's not that she's steely. I think people have that image of Hillary Clinton. Matter of fact, I think she needs to humanize her campaign a little bit. It's been very scripted up to this point. She is a very careful, political player out on the campaign trail. This is the time for her for that kind of moment. She needs to personalize this in a way that draws people in.

Right now, I mean, that lackluster attention to her is because people don't feel warm or connected to her. I think if she takes that tact tonight, she can solidify her win. And you have to remember, though, there's going to be folks, if they're going to play at all, have to set themselves on fire and run around this stage, and that would include probably coming after Hillary Clinton. If she does this in a way that doesn't sound defensive and kind of that stuff person, I think she can be a big winner tonight in that regard.

[12:20:00] BANFIELD: It's a good point that you said that, that people are going to light their hair on fire and run around the stage maybe quoting her name as well because, you know what, John Avlon also said the Clintons have been blessed by enemies who overreach. So we're going to have to see if that happens tonight.

I have to cut it there, guys, because I also have to do equal time for Bernie Sanders and that's coming up next. So thank you very much, Hilary Rosen and Mike Rogers. Stick around. I'm going to come back to you guys in a little bit.

But just like eight years ago, this is Clinton's race to lose. So what could Bernie Sanders have up his sleeve to turn things around like Barack Obama did? We're going to dig deeper into that question next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:25:05] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Is there a problem? Yes. And you've described what the problem is. Does that mean there's a crisis? Does that mean today we've got to privatize Social Security tomorrow? Absolutely not.

What happens if they fail, who in God's name is going to bail them out? Are you concerned about that?

The question, Mr. Speaker, is not whether we like Saddam Hussein or not. The question is whether he represents an imminent threat.

There are about six debates scheduled. There will be more debates. This is not a debate and it's an embarrassment.

Mr. Terrant (ph), like the president, thinks the economy is doing just great. I don't.

But you have made it clear that you would vote for Mr. Gingrich for speaker, which means that that type of ideology would be the prevalent ideology in the United States Congress. Why would you support such a right wing extremist as Mr. Gingrich?

Because it's people like you and -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: He knows his stuff. A snapshot of Bernie Sanders in the debates gone by. But tonight in Las Vegas, the stakes couldn't be higher for what will be his most important debate yet. As you get a live look right now inside the debate hall, 9:26 a.m. Pacific Time out there, our panel is back with us live at the debate site. CNN political commentators Hilary Rosen, a Democrat, and Republican Mike Rogers, our national security commentator.

Thanks, guys, for both coming back.

So, you know, if you were to go out and do a jay-walking thing and ask people if they knew these five people who were going to be debating tonight, everybody knows Hillary Clinton, and almost everybody knows Bernie Sanders and the other three, I'm going to get to that a little bit from now.

But let's get to that issue about Bernie Sanders and how people know him or don't know him. And, Mike Rogers, I'll start with you. Not everybody knows him. So how does he change that tonight and then change those people who get to know him into being voters for him?

ROGERS: Yes, well, and I've traveled with Bernie Sanders overseas when I was in Congress and I would not underestimate Bernie Sanders. He is - he's bright beyond reason, and he is passionately liberal. I mean he just doesn't adopt the liberal, he is passionately liberal. So what he needs to do tonight, I think, is try to take that mainstream. Right now he's getting huge crowds, but it's a fraction of the Democratic Party. If he wants to challenge Hillary Clinton, he needs to try to take that mainstream so that the average person out there can identify, a, with his message and then who he is and how he presents himself. I think that's going to be critical for him. If he goes on the attack, I think it's a big mistake. If he sticks to his message only and that little sliver, I think that's a mistake. I think he has to broaden his message and do it in a way that is engaging. And he has that capability.

BANFIELD: So, Hilary, it's interesting that Mike Rogers would uses the phrase passionately liberal because Bernie Sanders himself has used the s-word, socialist. He calls himself a Democratic socialist. And we decided to dig up a poll about how Americans feel when they hear the word socialist and would they vote for a blank as president. And look at what the answers - I want to direct everybody's attention over to the "no" column. Would you vote for a Muslim? Thirty-eight percent said no. Would you vote for an atheist? Forty percent said no. And, Hilary, would you vote for a socialist? Fifty percent of those asked said no.

I guess that's the question. My God, if you got 50 percent of people, more people have said they won vote for a socialist than an atheist, and this guy's branding himself as a socialist, can he really win with that?

ROSEN: You know, it's going to be interesting to see who the first person is to bring up that s-word tonight, whether it will be one of the other candidate or whether it will be Anderson Cooper. But Bernie Sanders has to convince people that his philosophy of Democratic socialism, more like Sweden where the government does a lot for its people and takes care of things and pays for things with a very bloated budget, is different than the socialism that Americans remember, you know, with old communist Russia. That's a challenge, and that requires a lot of education.

I think Mike is right about Bernie Sander, he is a good debater, but he also hasn't been doing the give and take on the campaign trail the way Hillary Clinton has. He's been mostly speaking to big audiences, big rallies and getting a lot of enthusiasm, but he hasn't had the give and take of hearing what individuals are saying and batting around questions. Hillary Clinton's actually done at lot of that on this - on the campaign trail. So Sander has got to humanize some of that big, lofty rhetoric to make people believe he will be a president for all of America, for middle America. That's going to be, I think, his challenge tonight.

[12:29:36] BANFIELD: OK, so let's talk about another cross section of America and the key to winning this, you know, to - to winning this race for the Democratic nominees, and that is the non-white likely voters. This is what our most recent CNN/ORC poll says and I'm going to just direct you to South Carolina for these numbers. Among non- white likely voters, Senator Clinton, it is just - it's just a runaway. Look at her with 56 percent of the vote. Biden, again, not in the race, there at 26. So, if you look at Bernie Sanders he's at 6 percent. This is a massive section