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Apple Battles FBI; South Carolina Primary; Nevada Fight. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired February 22, 2016 - 15:00   ET

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


[15:00:07]

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour now. I'm Pamela Brown, in for Brooke Baldwin. You're watching CNN.

With the critical Nevada caucuses one day, happening now, dueling rallies in the Republican race for president, one for Ted Cruz, the other for Donald Trump. Trump is now basking in the fact that every Republican who has won primaries in both New Hampshire and South Carolina has become the presidential nominee.

But Cruz also has some bragging rights, saying that he is the only one who has beaten Trump, referring, of course, to his victory in Iowa.

We have senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta in Las Vegas with the Trump campaign, but, first to CNN's Sunlen Serfaty also in Vegas at the Cruz rally.

So, Sunlen, what is Ted Cruz doing to get that last-minute support?

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, he's really barnstorming the state, Pamela.

He's holding a series of 11 events over the three-day stretch here. But he's also making a very specific, very tailored message specifically to the Nevada voters over the issue of land ownership. This is a wedge issue the Cruz campaign thinks that they can drive between him and Donald Trump.

So, he's really trying to make the case. We have seen him promise here on the ground, saying, look, Donald Trump is someone that wants to keep the federal government in charge of your land. In contrast, he's saying he would make sure that land ownership gets switched to the state.

So that's a big issue where the Cruz campaign wants to pick up libertarian voters, voters that potentially were for Rand Paul. They want to pull them into their corner.

Also, Ted Cruz is making an electability pitch here. He's making sure to draw contrasts at every turn with Marco Rubio and really holding up, as you said, that he has gotten a win against Donald Trump and saying where can Marco Rubio get a win instead? -- back to you.

BROWN: All right, thanks so much, Sunlen. Jim, to you now.

What are Trump's plans for tonight? Because, right now, there's a competing, shall we say, rally, about six-and-a-half-hours from where you are. His son is speaking, is that right?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Pam.

This is sort of a mini-campaign that is happening right now for the state of Nevada. Donald Trump is only holding two rallies himself, one tonight here in Las Vegas and another one tomorrow in Sparks, Nevada, before his watch party in Las Vegas. His son Donald Trump Jr. is holding that event up in Elko.

This is Trump being Trump. He's doing a lot of his campaigning on tweeter, saying earlier today the reason why Ted Cruz lost to evangelicals in South Carolina is because he is a world-class liar in all caps. And then Donald Trump went on later today to tweet that the reason why he won South Carolina is because of the angry voter.

Yes, we are angry. That's the message from Donald Trump. Pam, he really doesn't have to change a thing right now. If you look at the delegate count right now, the delegate estimate shows Donald Trump way out in front, nearly six times the number of delegates as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio.

In the latest CNN/ORC poll here in Nevada shows Donald Trump way out front. Last week, we had the results out. He's about quadrupling their support. Now, they do have to be careful because we saw with the caucuses in Iowa that polls sometimes aren't always 100 percent reliable. The polls showed Donald Trump comfortably ahead of his rivals in Iowa. He ended up losing to Ted Cruz.

The Trump campaign is not really taking this for granted here. And that's why you're seeing this last-minute sprint to certain parts of the state, not only from Donald Trump, but also his son, before tomorrow in the caucuses and those results that come in tomorrow, but no question about it, Pam, he is in the driver's seat right now.

If he wins here in Nevada as expected this is again going to be a candidacy that is going to be very difficult to stop, Pam.

BROWN: Sunlen Serfaty, Jim Acosta, thank you very much.

On that note, from what Jim just said, with the wind at his back, after back-to-back primary victories, is Donald Trump unstoppable? That is the big question.

To discuss this, CNN political commentator Matt Lewis, who is senior contributor at The Daily Caller.

Matt, we know polling in Nevada is not as reliable as in other states. Jim sort of touched on that. But Trump has been leading nonetheless. If he wins the Nevada caucuses tomorrow, does he become unstoppable?

MATT LEWIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: He's not unstoppable. But it will be very hard to stop him. He is clearly the front-runner. I do expect he will win in Nevada.

I do think then it becomes very important for the non-Donald Trump candidates to coalesce around somebody within the next couple of weeks. They do not seem like they're ready to do that though. Still, if you want to talk about delegates, even after Nevada, we're only about 5 percent of the delegates that Trump would need to become the Republican nominee.

But, quickly, when you get to Super Tuesday and all that, then the numbers start adding up. And he becomes a juggernaut that you can't stop.

BROWN: Clearly, Trump is gaining momentum here. But there's many frankly in the establishment in the Republican Party that are resisting coalescing around Donald Trump. Why is that?

[15:05:00]

LEWIS: Well, look, I think Donald Trump for one thing is not a conservative.

For another thing, I think he's seen as somebody who would take the Republican Party in the wrong direction. If you look at that autopsy the RNC did, if you want to reach out to Hispanics, to millennials, to more urban Americans, Donald Trump is really about doubling down on working-class white voters who are angry, but also happen to be a dwindling part of the population going forward.

I think there's a lot of reasons why Republicans are not comfortable with Donald Trump being the nominee. The good news is, I think he has a ceiling that's below 50 percent. I think if you could get Donald Trump one on one, if Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz could have a clear shot at him, I think they could win.

But if you have got six people in the race, I think Trump is the nominee.

BROWN: Yes, because then they're battling out for their votes and therefore Donald Trump gains more power.

So, talking about Ted Cruz, because Trump, as we just heard in the report before, called Cruz a world-class liar. I believe that that was the quote. His campaign once again facing accusations of being deceptive after Cruz's communications director tweeted out this video that falsely showed Marco Rubio dismissing the Bible.

Then the director apologized, saying he should have checked the accuracy of the report. And today Rubio said this. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R-FL), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's part of a pattern. If this just happens once, you look at it and say, all right, these are the things that happen in the campaign. It's every day there's something new. Perhaps that was the most offensive one, because they basically made it up. People in a lobby taking a video on a phone. And you can't just say it was people in a lobby. They actively promoted it and pushed it on people that somehow I had (AUDIO GAP) the Bible.

I know exactly what I said to that young man. I said the answer to every question you will ever have is in that book. And then I pointed to the Book of Proverbs, which he was reading, and I said particularly that one, because it's a book of wisdom.

And then for them to take a video and to transcribe words on it that are the complete opposite of what I said, it's incredibly disturbing. You guys have to be saying this now. It's every single day something comes out of the Cruz campaign that is deceptive and untrue and in this case goes after my faith.

So, I understand, I guess, one of their -- spokesperson apologized. And I accept his apology, but this is a pattern now. And I think we now are at the point where we start asking about accountability.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Last week, the Cruz campaign used a doctored image of Rubio. Then of course there's the controversy over Carson and the inaccurate claim he dropped out of the race in Iowa and those voter violation mailers in Iowa.

Are these allegations of unfair and deceitful campaigning beginning to stick? Do you think it could hurt Cruz tomorrow?

LEWIS: I don't know about tomorrow, but I think there's a real danger that over time this does stick to Ted Cruz, because, remember, this is a pattern now. I went on TV and defended Ted Cruz when the whole Ben Carson Iowa controversy happened.

I think, look, political campaigns are rough. If you're on them, you're young, you're probably sleep-deprived and you want to be aggressive. Campaigns need to be aggressive. If Ben Carson sends a signal that he's going to be leaving Iowa and going home for a change of clothes, it's reasonable to suspect that, you know, maybe he's not committed to the fight, maybe he's going to get out.

But then we have the doctored image where they have a picture of Marco Rubio shaking Barack Obama's hand, a picture that never existed, that was doctored, using I guess models or something, and now we have the latest, this video, which is -- was misleading. And so it's not just Marco Rubio. You have Donald Trump calling him a liar. You have Ben Carson saying similar things.

Now you have Marco Rubio. I think there is a danger long-term that there could be an impression Ted Cruz is willing to do or say whatever it takes to win and that his team is playing dirty.

BROWN: All right. I want to bring in chief political analyst Gloria Borger. Gloria, a lot of people are talking today about the fact that not only

is Jeb Bush out, but what about all that money he raised and what about all those donors? I imagine the Cruz camp, the Rubio camp, they are trying to reach out to them.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, they are.

And, you know, I was speaking to some of the Bush donors and some of his campaign aides over the weekend. First thing that's clear is that Bush has not given anybody a signal about whom to support. That would be important to them.

Also, second thing that's clear is, there's a lot of bad blood between the Bush folks and the Rubio folks. And I think that doesn't go away overnight. The Rubio campaign has gotten some of Bush's big donors and they're very happy about that.

But I think a lot of them are just taking a little bit of time to kind of wait and see how this shakes out to a degree. I think the most likely heir to the Bush money would be Rubio. But there are some, for example, who are in Texas who might go for Cruz, and others who are more moderate who might decide to go for Kasich.

[15:10:00]

So it's really unclear where that money goes. And as I said, a lot of these folks are saying, you know what, we're just going to take a deep breath and sit back for a while and see what happens.

BROWN: It will be really interesting to see who Jeb Bush throws his support behind, because Marco Rubio was once his protegee and then we saw what happened on the campaign trail.

BORGER: Yes. Yes.

BROWN: So let's talk about John Kasich and Ben Carson. There is pressure for them to drop out so this can get down to a three-man race. How much longer do you think they can hold on?

BORGER: I think Ben Carson can hang in there until his money runs out. I don't know what Matt thinks, but I think so.

And I think Kasich is clearly planning to go through Ohio, which he'd like to win, his home state. He's the governor. Michigan, he thinks he has a shot at it. So, I don't see any of these guys dropping out right away.

And I think with Carson -- Cruz would love Carson to go away, so he could get his evangelical support. But Cruz and Carson aren't that tight these days given what occurred in Iowa, so I don't know when Carson will leave.

BROWN: Matt, what's your take on that?

LEWIS: Cruz and Carson did meet in a broom closet reportedly, so who knows. I guess that probably didn't go so -- that's the irony, is that people ostensibly should be friends, should be in the same lane, end up hating each other because they by definition are competing for the same donors, the same volunteers.

That's the irony, is that the more similar you are to somebody, the more likely you are to end up hating them. I think a couple things. One, if it looks like John Kasich is going to lose Ohio, I think he has to get out before Ohio happens, because it will be very embarrassing for him as the sitting governor of Ohio to lose it. That's one ray of hope if you're Marco Rubio, that he gets out.

But, yes, the problem is the only way to beat Trump is if you can get it down to a one-on-one contest. I think that Trump can't -- I think he has a ceiling that's below 50 percent. But unless that happens, and everyone has an incentive to stay in, so Trump, it looks like, I mean, he's clearly the front-runner and very likely the nominee.

(CROSSTALK)

BROWN: Go ahead, Gloria.

BORGER: It's hard to get all these, you know, 1,200 or so delegates wrapped up. Right now, heading into Super Tuesday, you would have to say that Donald Trump is the prohibitive favorite right now.

As long as Cruz and Rubio are going at each other, they don't help each other very much.

LEWIS: Yes.

BROWN: All right, interesting perspective there. Gloria Borger, Matt Lewis, thank you very much.

LEWIS: Thank you.

BROWN: And the five remaining Republicans will face off one last time before Super Tuesday. It's happening right here on CNN. Wolf Blitzer moderates the Republican presidential debate Thursday night at 8:30 Eastern. You won't want to miss it.

And up next, on this Monday, Bernie Sanders shrugging off a loss in Nevada, saying the wind is at his back, but he can stop Hillary Clinton as they head into their first big test in the South. That's the big question.

Plus, Republican John Kasich taking some heat for a comment he made about the role of women in his campaign. His national campaign chair joins us live to explain what Kasich says he really meant.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:17:06]

BROWN: Nevada is history and now the Democrats are hoping to be -- who are hoping to be the next president are looking ahead to South Carolina and beyond to Super Tuesday. For Hillary Clinton, she is hoping to win in a big way in South

Carolina this Saturday after a close win over Bernie Sanders in Nevada. The most recent CNN poll of polls shows Clinton with a 25- point lead over Sanders. It will be the first big test in the South for both of them.

Joining me to discuss all this, Democratic strategist and CNN political commentator Donna Brazile.

Donna, thanks for coming on.

As we know, Clinton narrowly won in Iowa, lost in New Hampshire, and topped Sanders in Nevada, though, by a small margin. Will she need a commanding win in South Carolina to really set herself apart?

DONNA BRAZILE, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, first of all, a win is a win, but it's not just about winning total number of votes, it's about winning and accruing delegates.

As you know, South Carolina's the last state to hold their contest before the window will open, which is the big bonanza in terms of delegates. I would think that both candidates need to concentrate not just on South Carolina, not just for delegates, but also try to gain some momentum going into Super Tuesday, when you have over 1,000 delegates that will be at stake.

BROWN: And Clinton, as well as Sanders, but Clinton in particular, is really hoping that African-American voters will show up in a big way for her in South Carolina. She has this endorsement from South Carolina Congressman Jim Clyburn, the highest ranking African-American in Congress.

Polls show her with a huge lead over Sanders. Of course, the question is will they get to the polls to vote for her? But what do you attribute the strong support for Clinton?

BRAZILE: Well, as you recall, back in '08, South Carolina voters turned the tide for Barack Obama. Hillary Clinton was leading in terms of the polls with black voters, but after the South Carolina primary, black voters decided to put their political support behind a candidate they believed was electable in the fall and that candidate was Barack Obama.

And once then Senator, President Obama began to accumulate delegates, it was very difficult for then Senator, now former Secretary of State Clinton to accumulate the same number of delegates. So, black voters will play a very important role.

But let me just say this. It's more than black voters. More than 56 percent of the Democratic electorate is white. But the rest of the electorate is people of color, Hispanics, black, Asian-Pacific Islanders. Half the delegates will be female. So you have to appeal to black voters in order to secure the nomination. You have to appeal to the diverse electorate.

Our party's electorate reflects a broad diversity of the Democratic Party, but also the broad diversity of our country. So, you have to appeal to these voters, not by talking about what you did for us 10, 15, 20 years ago, however important, but what have you done for us lately?

And I think on that message, Secretary Clinton has been not just appealing based on what she will do in criminal justice reform, economics, historical black colleges and universities, but, like Bernie Sanders, she wants to level the playing field. And she's talking about those issues, economic issues, that matter to black families as well.

[15:20:11]

BROWN: But there's also a trust issue she actually acknowledged that is occurring among voters. Listen to what she told CNN's Jake Tapper.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think there's an underlying question that maybe is really in the back of people's minds. And that is, you know, is she in it for us or is she in it for herself?

I think that's, you know, a question that people are trying to sort through.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: We have been hearing this over and over and over again, Donna. What must she do or say to overcome this challenge? Is there anything?

BRAZILE: Oh, absolutely.

Look, this is not just a political question that we put to Secretary Clinton as this is a character test. This is beyond just a character test. It's about whether or not you trust her to handle the very important issues that the president of the United States will handle.

Do you trust her with all the big decisions that she will make a president of the United States? She has to earn our trust in much the same way that Donald Trump is trying to earn the trust of Republicans and Senator Senators, Democrats and on down the line.

Trust is a big commodity in American politics. Character matters as well. But she will have to earn the trust of those that she wishes to stand for her in a long line to vote for her come this coming contest in South Carolina and beyond.

BROWN: All right, Donna, I want to show you a tweet just in from Bernie Sanders. It says: "It's been 17 days, 16 hours and 32 minutes since Hillary Clinton said she would look into releasing her paid speeches to Wall Street."

Is this an escalation from Sanders to seize on her Wall Street speeches, and does this go right into the whole trust issue? BRAZILE: You know, everybody wants to see Hillary Clinton, her e-

mails. They want to see her love letters to Bill. They want to seize upon her letters to her mother and perhaps her letter to her daughter.

She said that she will release them when all the candidates release them. As someone who makes paid speeches and lectures around the country, I know I have -- you know, sometimes, you don't own that property. Sometimes, there is no recording of that property. To the extent she can fulfill this so-called promise that she made in the debate, fine, submit it.

But I think this is just part of the political game we like to see in politics. Release this, expose that, so that we can have two more hours of criticism of somebody on television. So she will get to it. I'm sure she will, if she can find them. I know I gave a speech last week. They recorded it. At least I think they recorded it. If not, somebody might have a little clip of me, but I hope that this issue of releasing details her past will not get in her way of being able to communicate with voters about where she intends to take the country in the future.

BROWN: All right, Donna Brazile, thank you. We have got to leave it there. Appreciate it.

BRAZILE: Any time.

BROWN: And, by the way, Clinton and Sanders get their chance to answer voters' questions directly just days before the South Carolina primary. Tune in for the presidential town hall tomorrow night at 8:00 Eastern only on CNN.

And up next, your smartphone at the center of an intensifying battle between Apple and the FBI. I'm going to speech with a counterterrorism expert who says there is room for a compromise. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:28:45]

BROWN: The court fight to unlock one of the San Bernardino terrorists' phones is heating up, and Apple is now refusing a court order to unlock the phone.

The company must file its response to that order by Friday. Apple says privacy is the issue here. And CEO Tim Cook says if his company creates software to unlock one phone, that puts your private information at risk.

The FBI says it's just trying to stop terrorism and it needs Apple's help to keep the country safe in this particular case.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: It is a big problem for law enforcement, armed with a search warrant, when you find a device that can't be opened, even though the judge said there is probable cause to open it.

As I said, it affects our counterterrorism work. At San Bernardino, a very important investigation to us, we still have one of those killers' phones we have not been able to open.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And there's also this, a poll showing Americans are not siding with Apple in this fight. Pew Research Center says 51 percent of Americans believe Apple should unlock the phone.

Apple is now asking for a commission to be created with experts to deal with this issue.

Here to talk about this is Phil Mudd. He's CNN's counterterrorism analyst and a former counterterrorism official with the CIA.

So, Phil, you say that Apple should unlock the phone with one condition. What is that?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: The condition should be that the federal shouldn't be asking for the key that they use. Apple's concerned, I think appropriately, about whether hackers could get that key.

They should be able to retain it. And down the road, if they unlock a phone, I don't believe the government should request that they engineer phones to have what are called back doors. I think there are a couple things the government could do to step toward Apple, what it's already doing. That is, we only like the data from this phone and you get to keep the key.

But, again, there should be an agreement that we don't put an American company in a position of creating products that can be hacked from the get-go. I don't think that's appropriate in the terms of global competitiveness.

BROWN: But isn't what the FBI is doing? They're just saying, hey, we just need this phone to be opened. You keep whatever key you need to open this phone, so we can access it and see what is on there?

MUDD: No, in my view, these are fundamental distinctions that are getting sort of blurred during this debate.

The distinction one is, you go to the company and say, you have already built this phone. Is there a way that we can unlock it? That to me is hugely different than the government saying, in future phones, we need you to pre-build in the capability for us to access that phone.

In Apple's world, if I were the CEO of Apple, which is unlikely to happen, but, if I were, I would say, look, there's a Chinese company or an Indian company that's going to come in with its customers.