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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Sanders Campaigning In Virginia As Super Tuesday Approaches; Democrats To Make Case In Tonight's CNN Town Hall; Trump Looks For Third Straight Win In Nevada; Trump And Clinton Lead In Delegate Races; Michigan Shooting Suspect Charged With Murder. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired February 23, 2016 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:06] ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Coming up next, it's all about South Carolina for the Dems with tonight's CNN's Town Hall there ahead of Saturday's primary. Got a live picture for you from the Town Hall where Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders will be speaking live with our Chris Cuomo tonight. Might be surprised to find out where Bernie Sanders is right now, though.

We're going to hear from Mr. Sanders, Senator Sanders from -- yeah, see the upper right-hand corner of your screen? Norfolk, Virginia. This guy is moving on, folks, but he will be on that stage tonight.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:35:02] BANFIELD: Bernie Sanders campaigning in Virginia today, speaking at a rally tonight, actually, right now in Norfolk, Virginia.

Let's go live and listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERNIE SANDERS, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: ... fifteen bucks in Iowa.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

And I would hope that every man in this arena this afternoon will stand with the women in the fight for pay equity for women workers.

And let me say something else about the economy. When we talked about unemployment, what we usually see once a month on the front pages of the papers are official unemployment, which is now nationally about five percent, five percent. Anybody here believe that real unemployment in America is five percent?

Smart group. You're right. Because there's another report that you don't see so much that comes out, which looks at people unemployed and people who have given up looking for work, and people who are working part-time when they want to work full-time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: Bernie Sanders is speaking in Norfolk, Virginia. No, it's not wrong on your screen. He skipped ahead to the Super Tuesday state, spending some time there before he heads back to South Carolina because he's got four days until the Democratic primary in that state.

In the meantime, the candidates are making their last pitch to the voters there in a CNN Town Hall that is tonight. In the hours leading up to the event, Hillary Clinton is vying for support from the African-American community.

The mothers of Trayvon Martin, Sandra Bland, and Eric Garner are among those set to join a Clinton campaign appearance there.

And as we just saw, Senator Sanders on the stump, not only in South Carolina, rallying those voters in Virginia instead. So he's sort of hop scotching back and forth, which gives us a chance in the meantime to talk more about the strategies for both of them.

Jonathan Tasini is Bernie Sanders, supporter. He's the author of "The Essential Bernie Sanders and His Vision for America" and he is live with me now.

And he is live with me now. All right, so I am expecting that Hillary Clinton, who has sharpened her message against your candidate, is going to go after previous campaign, saying it's not appropriate to promise things that you can't deliver on.

And that he will come right back at her about her short message about the Wall Street speech transcripts, asking over and over again when will she release them. Am I wrong?

BRYAN TASINI, BERNIE SANDERS SUPPORTER: Well, let me answer the question, but I wanted to say one thing because I was listening to the segment that you had previously. And the nonsense that your guest put out about what happened in 1968 was legendary.

And i think you are absolutely right. Let's put a fine point on this. Donald Trump is a bully. He's a pathological liar, and a dangerous person. And that's something that Bernie Sanders had said. And so I'm reflecting what the campaign thinks. It was just -- it's outrageous the way he's fomenting this anger and violence in America.

So, to your point and to your question, first of all I think the Town Halls that you guys are putting on are terrific. They really give a chance for voters to hear at length from either candidate. I think both candidates have done quite well in those formats.

I think that Bernie is going to continue to talk about the things he's talked about for the last several months, which is the inequality in America, the fact that people don't have decent wages, the need to break up the big banks. And he's going to appeal to those people who have come to him in large numbers in the first three states. And he's done phenomenally well.

I think the reason he's going to Virginia and the other Super Tuesday States is, I think, there are a lot of delegates at stake. There's going to be a huge number of delegates in the next three or four weeks allocated. And he's going to go to all those states to win many delegates in those places. BANFIELD: Do you expect Jonathan -- I know that the Town Hall was

planned well in advance of what the tragedy that befell Kalamazoo, Michigan.

TASINI: Yeah.

BANFIELD: And we're going to cover that in the next couple blocks, what's happening with regard to that alleged shooter there. But do you expect that is beginning to make its way on to the stage and that Hillary Clinton will try to capitalize on gun control and where she thinks Bernie Sanders has a weak spot?

TASINI: Well, Bernie Sanders does not have a weak spot, as you point out, when it comes to that. Bernie Sanders has always been, actually, for taking those kinds guns off the street that create these huge death tolls, these massacres in schools.

BANFIELD: No, no, no. We're talking about handguns -- he allegedly had a handgun, not the aAr-15s that we're talking about.

TASINI: Let me finish. And everything that Bernie has talked about ties gun control to mental health issues. And there's no question that this -- not just alleged shooter. He is a White terrorist who killed many innocent people. That's a mental health issue. And Bernie has always talked about gun control in the context of us having to have a much better mental health system that deals with people like this. Who are quite clearly sick.

BANFIELD: I'm looking forward to see if this does get some treatment on the stage tonight and there's a lot more that's going to happen in the fact and details that come up of Kalamazoo.

Jonathan Tasini, good to see you as always. Thank you.

TASINI: All right, Ashleigh, see you again.

BANFIELD: OK, I hope so, and I hope soon.

Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton are going to come face to face with the voters tonight in South Carolina.

[12:40:04] Do not miss CNN's Democratic Town Hall moderated by our own Chris Cuomo, 8:00 Eastern tonight. Back right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Donald Trump is looking for his third straight win of the presidential nominating season tonight, and thanks largely to South Carolina, Trump holds a wide lead in these early days of the delegate race, 30 delegates are at stake tonight in Nevada.

Thanks to so-called superdelegates, Hillary Clinton holds a gigantic lead on the Democratic side. The so-called pledge delegates awarded during those primaries and caucuses are almost evenly split between Sanders and Clinton. [12:45:05] Before I get any further into that, I want to bring in

Republican consultant and president of the group Empowered Women, Mindi Finch. She's leaning towards supporting Marco Rubio.

And Democratic strategist Robert Zimmerman, who is a super delegate himself, pledged to Hillary Clinton. And since you're so super, I'd like to start with you, Robert.

First of all, could you explain to our viewers why it has been said that super delegates don't actually matter? And do they have to stay loyal? Those two competing with wisdoms.

ROBERT ZIMMERMAN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, first of all, I know you look very overwhelmed that I'm the super delegate Ashleigh, so I'll try to move past that. Hopefully, it doesn't intimidate you.

The reality is super delegates was this -- the super delegates, first of all, are all elected. Almost all of them are elected. There are members of Congress who are Democrats. They're senators, governors, or they're people like myself, who are members of the Democratic National Committee, elected by our local grass roots Democratic organizations in our states, for my case, New York state.

So, we all come from elected audiences. And the reason that we're part of the process is because we play a role in terms of providing another perspective of the discussion around the rules of the convention, the credentials of the convention, the platform. And we also play a role in the nominating process.

But let's be clear, Ashleigh. Super delegates have never played a role, a pivotal role, a decisive role in choosing who the nominee is. The nominees always come from the primaries and caucuses. It will again this year. Considering the fact that Democrats have won the elect-- won the vote in five of the six last elections, the formula is working pretty well.

BANFIELD: Well they might have a psychological effect. Because when you see those big numbers and you see delegate no matter what kind, it might have some kind of effect that any ...

ZIMMERMAN: Or the reverse effect too.

BANFIELD: Of course, you're right good point. Very good point.

Mindy, I guess that the critical question here is that you have to have scientific experts on a campaign to make sense of the actual delegate allotment in each of these contests. It's not simple. Almost every state has a different kind of system, whether it's winner take all or proportional, whether you hit a threshold, what number that threshold is.

I actually want to know, do these campaigns employ strict mathematicians to try to map out their strategies and do we know what strategies absolutely don't work when it comes to Math?

MINDY FINN, REPUBLICAN CONSULTANT: Well these campaigns do have experts from the individual states who are experts in that state. They've worked in politics. They're in touch with elected officials. And so they do understand this delegate math.

Maybe they worked at the political party during a presidential election year and had to wade through this.

So I think they're quite prepared of what's needed on the Math side of the equation. I think -- yeah for voters at home, it can get very, very confusing. The media tends to report who won a state or who's winning, and doesn't focus so much on delegates. Now that we're past a few of caucus and a couple primaries here, there's more focus on delegates.

But I think what's important to understand is yes. Because of the delegate math, it can be-- it can appear, for example, that Donald Trump, you know, he's won two states. So you might say he's running away with the contest, but then yet you hear that other candidates like a Marco Rubio or a Ted Cruz or John Kasich even have a chance.

And they do have a chance because in some of these states, it's not a winner take all. You can win a congressional district and then get a few delegates and be able to compete on the delegate front.

But still the delegates and the winners of states are not divorced. It's actually quite important to start winning states. And if you don't win, you have to be a very, very close second in order to win some of these congressional districts and of course delegates.

I think that's concerning for people who wonder is there a path for someone else beyond Trump is that we're still divided can anyone to see ...

BANFIELD: I have to jump in there, only because I think the most salient thing that I just heard was that it is super complex. I encourage everyone to go online at CNN.com and dig up these delegate thresholds. Honestly you have to have a degree for this speaking.

ZIMMERMAN: I would give you a clue though, I would give you a hint, though, it's always a sure sign that the campaign is in trouble when they start blaming and attacking the delegate rules or they start getting personal. Or in my part, they're start attacking super delegates.

BANFIELD: Or they start firing their communications strategist, I don't know. .

ZIMMERMAN: Exactly. With Bernie Sanders--

BANFIELD: I have to leave it there, Robert. Sorry. I'm just flat out of time.

Thanks so much for joining us, and we're back right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:53:16] BANFIELD: The Michigan shooting spree case not so much a "who done it", but of why.

Jason Dalton is now charged with six counts of murder and two counts of assault with attempt to murder in the random shooting spree in Kalamazoo that happened on Saturday.

The mystery, of course, is motive. We know that Dalton was picking up passengers for Uber in between these alleged shootings, and one of these passengers spoke with Anderson Cooper last night about a mystery phone call that happened during his wild ride. Have a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MATTHEN MELLEN, JASON DALTON'S PASSENGER: We got about a mile from my house and he received a telephone call. It was over the Bluetooth inside the car so I could hear kind of the conversation. He stated that he had a rider in the car and that he would call them back immediately after he had dropped me off. Once he hung up with that phone call is when he started driving really erratically.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: Our Nick Valencia joins me live now from Kalamazoo. There are so many elements of the story that people don't understand, especially those who are close to the people who were shot.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we know where the shooter was just a few hours before he carried out this alleged shooting spree. I spoke to an owner of Southwick's gun store, and that's where the suspected gunman was out just a few hours before he carried out this killing spree.

He didn't carry a -- or purchase a gun there or ammunition Ashleigh, but what he did do was buy a heavy duty 511 conceal and carry jacket. It's essentially a jacket that makes it easier to access a weapon if it's holstered on your side. Also has some pockets in there where you could conceal and carry a weapon.

The owner describes the suspected gunman as being in a good mood. He was smiling. He also entered the store with a friend. He was so regular of a customer that the gun store owner recognized him when he walked in and said it wasn't until the next day when he saw the mug shot of this suspected gunman that he put it all together.

[12:55:10] Now as you mentioned we have been talking to neighbors of the victims here in this shooting. One of them was a neighbor of the first victim that was shot there at the apartment complex. She called her neighbor a hero and actually stepped in between the gunman and children who he appeared to be aiming at as well.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TAMMY GEORGE, VICTIM TIANA CARRUTHERS: The car he drove by, asked if they knew "Missy" "Misty". And they said no. And then it had circled around again. And I don't know if it was her mother instinct, she just knew

something was wrong, told them to run.

VALENCIA: So she was a hero, could have been the kids that were shot.

GEORGE: Could have been the kids. And I really think that if any kids were out there, she would have done it for anyone's kids.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[13:00:01] BANFIELD: So distressing. Our Nick Valencia covering this for us live in Kalamazoo. Thank you for that.

And thank you, everyone, for watching. Kate Bolduan is in for "Wolf". She starts after this break.