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How Will Debate Affect Biden's Presidential Decision?; Clinton, Sanders Dominate Democratic Debate; Who Has Momentum After Democratic Debate?; Nevada Voters Weigh In on Democratic Debate. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired October 14, 2015 - 08:30   ET

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

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[08:32:26] CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to NEW DAY.

This must be right because it rhymes. The election is different now. The question is how. We're still out here in Vegas, as Alisyn calls doing the show "same day."

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: You know, I went to sleep. This is actually a new day.

CUOMO: Oh, for you.

CAMEROTA: For me, it is a new day.

CUOMO: I forgot, it's all about you. I forgot about that.

CAMEROTA: Yes, there you go.

CUOMO: So, here's the big deal though. One of the people not mentioned last night, not on the stage last night but very relevant to last night is the vice president, Joe Biden. What did that moment and what he saw on stage mean to his decision?

Let's bring in CNN's senior political commentator and former Obama senior advisor, Mr. David Axelrod.

Professor, good to have you with us this morning.

DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Good to be here.

CUOMO: There's a lot to discuss but let's deal with this news.

AXELROD: Yes.

CUOMO: Jeff Zeleny has it from the campaign, last night, during the debate I was hearing from FOJ, friends of Joe, and they were saying this doesn't change anything for us. We don't know who the alternative is on that stage if you don't want Hillary Clinton. There's plenty of room for Joe Biden. This doesn't change it. Are you surprised to hear that?

AXELROD: Well, I'm not surprised to hear it. I'm not sure I believe it. I mean the fact is, if his rationale is to be an alternative to Hillary, then I think he has to have watched that last night and said, you know, she's a stronger frontrunner today than she was yesterday. If that's not his rationale, if he's judging on some other measure, then - then maybe not. But there's no doubt -look, if you look at the polling, she and Bernie Sanders basically are taking about three quarters of the vote right now. I don't think anything happened last night to change that.

I think both of them had good nights. And that has to - if you're making a political decision - now Joe Biden may think that he has things to offer the country and he's a - he's - I'm a huge, huge admirer of his. He may feel like it doesn't matter.

CAMEROTA: Right.

AXELROD: But if you're just making a pure political calculation, you have to factor in what happened last night.

CAMEROTA: Well, therein lies the rub. If it's a - if the rub is about him and what he wants to do and about what his son's wishes for him were and about what his life's goal is, then it doesn't change the calculus. If it's about her and if she's a vulnerable candidate, last night does change the (INAUDIBLE).

AXELROD: I just think there are going to be fewer people this morning waiting for someone to ride in and save the party than there were yesterday morning. And - because she gave a very self-assured, powerful performance last night. Now that could change. You know, she's got another big test this month at those hearings. I suspect she's going to do very well there. And, as she pointed out last night, the committee is going to be a little bit defanged perhaps by all of this bad publicity they've gotten.

[08:35:00] CUOMO: Help me make sense of something. I heard this last night. You had Sanders, Clinton, O'Malley. Someone said to me, Hillary Clinton, last night, was flanked by better Democrats, but not by a better candidate to become president of the United States.

AXELROD: Yes.

CUOMO: Does that make sense? And if so, how?

AXELROD: Yes. I think Bernie - Bernie Sanders has run a spectacular campaign. Nobody would have predicted that he - he would be where he is. I still keep wondering whether he's running to president of the United States or running to marshal a movement to try and move the party in a direction. And I'm not sure they have to -

CAMEROTA: Why? Why don't you think he's running for president of the United States after last night?

AXELROD: Because - I mean he's clearly running for president of the United States. I mean I'm not - I'm not suggesting otherwise. But in his own mind, what his objectives are, I just don't know if Bernie Sanders wakes up every morning and looks in the mirror and sees the president of the United States. And I'm not sure that a lot of other folks do either. He is - he's a - he's a powerful guy in the sense that he believes deeply in what he believes. He's speaking some - some, I think, very resonant themes that he's embraced all his life. But, you know, he's a - he is a 74-year-old Democratic socialist from Vermont with a Brooklyn accent, no offense to New York. I know you're a queens guy.

CUOMO: That's right. Brooklyn. (INAUDIBLE) all the time.

CAMEROTA: But - but what do you think changed last night? After - what - what - how have the sands shifted if in any way last night for the lower tier candidates or for Hillary -

AXELROD: Well, I think the guys on the end of the stage, they came in as unknowns and I they left people wondering why they were there. I mean I think it was a tough night for those guys.

CUOMO: O'Malley too, or, no?

AXELROD: The guys on the end of the stage.

CAMEROTA: You mean Jim Webb and Lincoln Chafee, you -

AXELROD: I think for O'Malley - I think O'Malley had a good night. I think he had to have a spectacular night because, after all, he falls in the average of polls in that asterisk category. So if you're in an asterisk, you know, so I think he - I'm not sure he left the land of the statistically insignificant last night with his performance. Did well, but I don't think he did distinguished himself in such a way that he's going to catapult up to the - into the mix here.

CUOMO: Who on that stage last night has, in your opinion, what Barack Obama had when he was running eight years ago? Do you see on that stage somebody who can capture and inspire the American imagination the way he did?

AXELROD: You know, I think that's an unfair measure. I mean - and I'm a little bit biased in this regard but Barack -

CUOMO: I know, that's why I asked you.

AXELROD: Barack Obama is a - is a unique talent. Bill Clinton was a unique talent. I think everybody has different strengths. I think that Hillary Clinton was very strong last night. I think she was very fluent - fluid, which is not always the case with her. Sometimes she seems very wrote. She was clearly prepared, but she seemed very comfortable on the stage. I think she surprised some people with that - I think maybe -

CUOMO: Well, she's got to make people believe, especially Democrats. You've got to make them believe, you know?

AXELROD: No, I know. I think that that is the big - going into the debate I said that was the challenge. I think that continues to be the challenge. But she did - the first thing to persuade people to believe is to make them believe that you believe. And I think she crossed that first hurdle last night. She has to continue doing that. CAMEROTA: David Axelrod, great to get your insight, as always.

AXELROD: Good to be with you guys.

CAMEROTA: Thanks so much for being on NEW DAY.

CUOMO: Sorry to pull you away from the dice.

AXELROD: Yes, I know. Well, that's all right, they're holding my seat for me.

CAMEROTA: Yes, I bet they are.

We do have other news to cover. Let's go back to Michaela in New York City.

Hey, Mic.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: I feel like I'm getting too much of a window into what's happening in Vegas there. My goodness.

All right. The first Democratic debate going viral. Thousands of posts. Millions of hits online. What moments really popped though? We'll break it down for you, next.

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[08:42:41] PEREIRA: Well, what happened in Vegas was huge on social media. Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton duking it out on stage and also online - 4.2 million people in the U.S. engaging online about the debate. That is more than ten million times on Facebook during the broadcast. It includes likes, posts, shares.

The question is, who had the biggest buzz? Shall we take a look because we know, of course, this was a debate hosted by CNN and Facebook. So we'll look at the Facebook debate.

The top candidates discussed during the debate on Facebook, perhaps no surprise, the two front runners, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders came out at top, 41 percent and 35 percent respectively. And then the top issues discussed on Facebook. This is really fascinating. The top five issues there, what comes at the bottom of this top five is guns, which is perhaps surprising given the fact that we've seen gun violence in the headlines dominating recently and many incidences of that. The top of the concerns discussed on Facebook, racial issues comes in at number one.

Moving along, the big moment on Facebook, I could have predicted this one. The "damn e-mails" comment from Bernie Sanders, the senator from Vermont. If you didn't get a chance to hear it, let me refresh your memory?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think the secretary is right. And that is, that the American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn e-mails.

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you. Me too! Me too!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: What's interesting, many thought that he might have taken advantage of the fact that this was a big opening, but instead he essentially kind of defended her. This moment really, really rang true to a lot of people online.

All right, so speaking times. We always like to see how much time each of the candidates get and manage to find for themselves. Interestingly, 30 minutes and 26 seconds, Hillary Clinton coming out on top. The thing I find most remarkably, Jim Webb used his limited amount of time to complain bitterly to Anderson Cooper about how much time he wasn't getting. So that's an interesting kind of conversation to have.

And then we love a good word cloud here at CNN. We look at here, the words that are most uttered by the candidates on stage. Words that we see a lot of, obviously, the names of the candidates, Wall Street, gun, family, job, climate, college. What's interesting, notably absent are the GOP contenders, Trump only mentioned twice, Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina not mentioned at all.

[08:45:00] And last but not least, they took a poll during the commercial breaks of the debate of the people that were Facebooking along with watching the debate. 53,000 votes tallied. We asked who do you think won the debate? Interesting to see. Facebook voters, 75 percent of them said that Bernie Sanders dominated and won that debate. Interesting. Maybe it speaks a lot of both the Facebook generation and also Bernie Sanders' following.

This is unscientific. Again, it was just interesting to get this data from Facebook. We thought we would share it with you guys.

Vegas, what you got for me?

CAMEROTA: Very interesting, Michaela. Thank you for doing the math so we don't have to.

PEREIRA: Happy to do it.

CAMEROTA: That was great. Thanks. OK. Well meanwhile we've heard from the candidates, we've heard from the pundits, we've heard from the internet, as Michaela just showed us, but what do voters think? They are the voices that will ultimately decide. Who they think won last night? We have them next on NEW DAY.

CUOMO: Is the internet a person?

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CAMEROTA: We are back in Las Vegas. And we want to bring in our voter panel to hear what issues mattered most to them last night and if they were addressed.

So with us is our registered Democrats, Ericka Washington and Louie Overstreet, as well as Brandon Trahan. He's a former Republican, now a Registered independent. Welcome to all of you. Great to have your input this morning with us.

ERICKA WASHINGTON, UNDECIDED DEMOCRAT: Great to be here.

LOUIE OVERSTREET, CLINTON & SANDERS SUPPORTER: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Brandon, I want to start with you because I want to talk about an issue that is near and dear to your heart. That is the economy. You are a small business owner here in Las Vegas, you own a restaurant in downtown Vegas and last night the candidates talked about their differences on the minimum wage, which I know you watched with great interest.

[08:50:00] So let's listen to this moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SANDERS: If we want to raise the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour, workers are going to have to come together and look the Republicans in the eye and say we know what's going on. You vote against us, you are out of your job.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: What did you think about how they addressed the economy and minimum wage last night?

BRANDON TRAHAN, INDEPENDENT LEANING TOWARDS SUPPORTING SANDERS: It's got good ideas about, you know, working with the economy. They just need to make it easier for small businesses.

CUOMO: Minimum wage, you feel, doesn't do that.

TRAHAN: I don't think so. Not -- because you raise the minimum wage, everything else is going to go up. As a small business owner just starting out six months, it is really hard right now. So just raising the minimum wage? No. I got to have some other programs to help the small businesses. The big businesses, sure, they can deal with it. But not the small businesses.

CUOMO: So Louie, when we talk about helping the little guy. Everybody up on that stage last night said they want to help the middle class, income inequality. How much do you feel you got some meat on the bones about that? They were saying the right thing. But do you think that you could say -- I know you liked Hillary, I know you liked what O'Malley said and Bernie -- Do you think you could say what any of them would actually do and whether you believe they can get it done?

OVERSTREET: No. They can't get it done because of the division that currently exists -- currently exists in our society along racial, economic and religious lines. It will be very difficult. When I was growing up in the late '60s and early '70s in terms of political people (INAUDIBLE), Republicans were moderate and conservative yet still on those social issues that impacted the entire country, they were on board.

As a percentage of their population, Republicans voted more for the civil rights than Democrats. So I would like to get back where there is a two party system where we have economic concerns on both sides of the aisle where we can make America work for all.

CAMEROTA: Erika, what issue did you want to hear addressed last night?

WASHINGTON: So I really wanted them to address income inequality between men and women across the United States.

CAMEROTA: Did they do that?

WASHINGTON: I think -- They brought it up. But we don't have any real solutions to how to fix that. And I really think it is important. It is a fight we've been having for many decades. And I have three daughters myself and I don't want them to keep having the same issue. We should by now have been able to close the gap on income inequality. And it is so vast between just women and men. But then when you start talking about women of color, Hispanics and black women, the gap is so large and it's frightening that it's taken this long to even get to a point that we're even discussing it again.

CUOMO: Let me ask you something. How big a deal is it to you that Hillary Clinton is a woman?

WASHINGTON: When she ran -- When it was her and Barack Obama last time, it was a really big deal. This time, not so much to me. And I actually made a note last night watching the debate that she brought up the fact that she was a woman on more than one occasion. And I felt like she didn't need to do that. We know that she's a woman and she should be proud that she's a woman and running, but it is not the end all be all.

CAMEROTA: One issue that's a very big deal here in Nevada is Immigration. Last night the candidates talked about it, not so much drawing distinctions between themselves, as between the Republicans. So watch this moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: There is such a difference between everything you are hearing here on this stage and what we hear from the Republicans, who have demonized hard-working immigrants, who have insulted them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Brandon, as an independent, did you feel that they answered enough questions about how they would solve the immigration issue?

TRAHAN: No. I think it's a much larger issue than they went into. You know, just deporting people and kicking them out is not the direction we need to go.

CAMEROTA: So the Trump solution is not a solution to you?

TRAHAN: No. No. They are here. Let's deal with them. Let's control people coming into the country. Let's give them a path to citizenship.

CAMEROTA: Louie, what did you think on that topic?

OVERSTREET: It was unrealistic in terms of what Trump is proposing. I'm a retired civil engineer so I know a little something about math. You deport (ph) 400,000 people a year, that's two and a half years to get rid of a million people. Twenty-two times - two and a half times 22, you are talking about 25 or 27 years to get rid of the backlog. So it is unrealistic to put people out of country. Totally unrealistic.

CUOMO: Let me ask you something - back to you for a second, and I want your take on this as well, Ericka --Small business, OK, it is the engine of our economy. We talk about the big ones all the time. But most jobs are made by small business. What do you think the politicians aren't talking about that is the truth for you and your life as a small business owner?

[08:54:59] TRAHAN: Just regulations. More help, you know, getting small businesses started. But, you know, more regulations on small business is really hard. You know, I have six employees right now and before I had a commercial laundry (ph) in Louisiana. And, you know, I had 12 employees. So, you know, there's -- the income, you know, the tax rates definitely -- there need to be some more incentive to smaller businesses to invest. You know?

CUOMO: What is the best thing that you think that politicians could do that would help people get over the hump?

WASHINGTON: I think the best thing they can do is one, ask them what they need. And then also raising the wage. And I understand with small businesses that that is a little bit tough. But, you know -- and it doesn't have to jump from, you know, 7 dollars an hour to 15 dollars an hour overnight. But it should be tied to the economy. Obviously the cost of living goes up regularly. So we need to raise the wage at the same time.

CAMEROTA: Ericka, Louie, Brandon, thanks so much. Great to get your insights. Thanks so much for being on NEW DAY this morning.

OVERSTREET: Thank you. I enjoyed it.

WASHINGTON: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: And CNN's comprehensive debate coverage does continue on "NEWSROOM" with Carol Costello right after this short break. Thanks so much for watching us this morning.

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