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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Romney and McCain Slam Trump. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired March 03, 2016 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00] GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Can't possibly understand their anger. But he said, you know, in the past, presidents learn how to channel that anger and turn it into something positive, useful, productive. And he said Trump is directing our anger for, quote, "less than noble purposes," and talks about creating scapegoats, and talks about Muslims and the rest. And so I think he addressed it in the way that he could without getting into a longer speech about it, but I think he did, at least, acknowledge what is going on out there and making it very clear that you have plenty of other candidates out there, if you're angry, who you can vote for.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: You know, Bakari Sellers, it was surgical, it was prosecutorial. He was unprecedented. It is something we have not seen in this way, in this campaign to date. There were no jokes about small hands here. This was deadly serious. The question is, Bakari, is it too late?

BAKARI SELLERS, CNN COMMENTATOR: Well, I think it is too late. I thought part of the speech was a white paper somewhat enveloped in a campaign speech. I thought it was very sharp on policy and contrast. But to Gloria's point, I mean he did talk about this underlying fear. And I just think that the Republican elite - the Republican establishment are truly missing who these Republican voters are that are coming out in droves voting for Donald Trump.

Donald Trump has proven to be George Wallace on steroids. And the Republican Party has absolutely no way to handle what is going on with this Trump phenomenon. I think Mitt Romney was the - was - it was awful timing. I think Mitt Romney was an awful messenger. But if you step back for a moment, what we just saw in American political history is beyond theater. I mean it was - it was amazing to watch this type of level-headed, concise takedown of the frontrunner.

But what we're also going to see, and I think David Chalian can prove this point to be true, is Donald Trump is going to go up four or five points in the polls because it just misreads what's going on out there at the polls every single day.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And, Bakari, interesting you bring up polls because that's also something that Mitt Romney addressed in his speech in part, saying that Trump relishes any poll that reflects what he thinks of himself. But polls are also saying that he will lose to Hillary Clinton.

Barry, I want you to weigh in on that element because just look at the latest CNN poll. It does - CNN poll in a head-to-head with Hillary, Donald Trump loses to Hillary, where the other candidates would not.

BARRY BENNETT (ph): Yes, but you go back two weeks and you get a different result. I mean, you know, polls are snapshots in time.

BOLDUAN: But as everything changes day to day here.

BENNETT: Exactly. So I don't know what the polls are going to be tomorrow. I think this is going to be a very competitive race. I think the Clintons have even said that. Both sides - this is going to be a big election on the direction of our country. If you believe Washington is doing everything right and they can really help you, then you can vote for the Clintons. If you think we should try a different direction, maybe even burn it to the ground, then let's go in a different direction.

BERMAN: All right, Gloria Borger, David Chalian, Dana Bash, Barry Bennett, Bakari Sellers, Ryan Williams, who was with us before, our thanks to all of you for being part of what is truly an extraordinary moment in a campaign that just keeps getting more wild by the moment.

BOLDUAN: Keeps on getting exactly what it's getting. I mean it gets wilder and wilder. Our special coverage of this special moment in American politics continues with Ashleigh Banfield right after this.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Ashleigh Banfield. And welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

If anyone watching Donald Trump's scorched earth drive to the GOP presidential nomination was wondering, what do you think Mitt Romney thinks about all of this, well, now we know. In the latest bizarre upending of conventional politics, the 2012 Republican nominee just gave a speech, just wrapped it up, excoriating the likely 2016 nominee. Donald Trump tried to beat Romney to the punch with a series of overnight tweets, including this one, "failed candidate Mitt Romney, who ran one of the worst races in presidential history, is working with the establishment to bury a big "R," Republican win." I should also point out that in 2012, candidate Romney gratefully accepted the endorsement of businessman Trump. We're going to get to that in just a moment.

But first, what may go down as the ultimate death knell for Ronald Reagan's legendary commandment that Republicans not speak ill of one another. Here, for you, Mitt Romney at the University of Utah.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MITT ROMNEY (R), 2012 GOP PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Now, Donald Trump tells us he is very, very smart. I'm afraid that when it comes to foreign policy, he is very, very not smart.

[12:05:09] Now, I'm far from the first to conclude that Donald Trump lacks the temperament to be president. After all, this is an individual who mocked a disabled reporter, who attributed a reporter's questions to her menstrual cycle, who mocked a brilliant rival who happened to be a woman due to her appearance, who bragged about his marital affairs, and who laces his public speeches with vulgarity. Donald Trump says he admires Vladimir Putin. At the same time, he's called George W. Bush a liar. That is a twisted example of evil trumping good.

There's a dark irony in his boasts of his sexual exploits during the Vietnam War, while at the same time John McCain, whom he has mocked, was imprisoned and tortured. Dishonesty is Donald Trump's hallmark. He claimed that he had spoken clearly and boldly against going into Iraq. Wrong. He spoke in favor of invading Iraq. He said he saw thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating 9/11. Wrong. He saw no such thing. He imagined it. He's not of the temperament of the kind of stable, thoughtful person we need as leader. His imagination must not be married to real power.

The president of the United States has long been the leader of the free world. The president and, yes, even the nominees of the country's great parties helped define America to billions of people around the world. All of them bear the responsibility of being an example for our children and our grandchildren. Think of Donald Trump's personal qualities, the bullying, the greed, the showing off, the misogyny, the absurd third grade theatrics.

You know, we've long referred to him as "The Donald." He's the only person in the entire country to whom we have added an article before his name and it wasn't because he had attributes we admired.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: And that, my friends, was just a very small portion of what turned out to be a scathing and somewhat compendious amalgamation of everything that people have said they don't like about Donald Trump in the last several months. But there are plenty of people who have said the exact opposite. And while Mitt Romney was laying into Donald Trump, the Republican frontrunner was on his plane flying to Portland, Maine. And Romney hinted at the response that he most certainly is expecting from Donald Trump once that Twitter gets active again.

In the meantime, I want to bring in Jeff DeWit, who is Arizona's state treasurer, and a Donald Trump supporter. And also Trump supporter Barry Bennett, who was formerly Ben Carson's campaign manager.

Gentlemen, start your engines. I am so glad that you're here. Before I even ask you to react to some of the things that you have just heard, I also want to bring in this voice, because it's a very important voice. Mitt Romney mentioned him by name. It's John McCain, who is the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He released this statement. I'm just going to have to read it live for you as I get it.

John McCain says, "I share the concerns about Donald Trump that my friend and former Republican nominee Mitt Romney described in his speech today. I would also echo the many concerns about Mr. Trump's uninformed and indeed dangerous statements on national security issues that have been raised by 65 Republican defense and foreign policy leaders." He went on to say, "I want Republican voters to play close attention to what our party's most respected and knowledgeable leaders and national security experts are saying about Mr. Trump and to think long and hard about who they want to be our next commander in chief and leader of the free world."

If I can, Mr. DeWit, I'll begin with you.

I understand that the criticism that so many of Trump's supporters have about all the things that Mitt Romney laid out in his speech. They feel that Mitt Romney may be deaf to the things that they find important. But can you argue with what John McCain has just said?

JEFF DEWIT, TRUMP SUPPORTER: I'm sorry, was that for me?

BANFIELD: Yes, go ahead, Mr. DeWit.

DEWIT: Oh, yes. So instead of now just one failed presidential candidate attacking Mr. Trump, now we have the last two failed establishment Republican candidates attracting Mr. Trump. Yes, I argue with everything. These two gentlemen just don't get it. They don't see what's going on. And I'll give you another take on this. What it looks like is that when you have Mitt Romney get up there and say, OK, vote for Cruz in the states he can win, vote for Rubio in the states that he can win. What he's doing is trying to keep Donald Trump from getting the number of delegates he needs for the nomination and setting up a brokered convention.

[12:10:13] But we know that the GOP is abandoning Marco Rubio right now and that they don't want Ted Cruz. What I think we just saw was Mitt Romney throwing his hat in the ring saying, hey, if we broker the convention, here I am, so that he can go on and lose again. We can't keep doing this. That's why there's so many people standing up, rising up right now and why Donald Trump is getting more votes, just him, getting more votes than the entire amount of people -

BANFIELD: OK.

DEWIT: That turned out in some states before is because we don't want these failed establishment candidates and policies again. We want something different.

BANFIELD: So -

DEWIT: And that's what Donald Trump brings together.

BANFIELD: Barry Bennett, look, Jeff DeWit makes a very good point. Maybe these are two failed Republican presidential wannabes who are saying these things and these criticisms. But I'm going to go back at this very topic because a lot of people are bringing up foreign policy and temperament and stability, which was exactly what Mitt Romney just said. And I'm not going to reiterate what they said, I'm just going to list a few other names that are sacred to a lot of Republicans, Tea Party Republicans, neocons, sacred names in foreign policy and foreign affairs. Michael Chertoff, the second director of Homeland Security under George Bush, Robert Kagan, the leader of the neocon movement and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Eric Edelman, the former undersecretary of defense under Bush 41, Dr. Eliot Cohen, a counselor at the State Department from '07 to '08, Bryan McGrath, managing director for defense consultancy. They all said the same thing. They are very worried about a man they say is completely inept when it comes to the very critical issues of America's safety. It's not just Mitt Romney. It's not just John McCain. It's the thinkers that people who know best have trusted for a very long time. Can you react to that, Barry Bennett?

BARRY BENNETT, FORMER CAMPAIGN MANAGER FOR BEN CARSON: Yes, I mean, they are the establishment in the industry, right, I mean, by their very nature. They are - the neocons are very upset that they might not have any power in a Trump administration. You know, I'm sorry. He doesn't think like they do. So -

BANFIELD: But doesn't - doesn't the establishment also - you have to concede that establishment also offers experience and depths and knowledge, right?

BENNETT: Yes, but there are - there are more than 70 experts on foreign policy in America. You know, you have got a list of 70 who are all Washingtonians who are part of the establishment who can't wait to be part of the next administration and they know that that's not going to be part of the Trump administration. You know, it's - it's self- importance, if you will.

Listen, what we saw today, one I think was, Mitt Romney hit a new low. I mean I have not seen any former presidential candidate or former banner carrier for our party ever go quite that low, which is sad. But what is really happening is, the battle lines are being drawn, right? The establishment understands they can't win the nomination. So now they're going to try to steal it.

BANFIELD: Jeff DeWit, when -

BENNETT: They're going to try to stop Donald Trump any way they can in a brokered convention.

BANFIELD: OK, Jeff DeWit, when Barry Bennett says that Mitt Romney just hit a new low, let me ask you about how low things are going to go, because by all accounts Mitt Romney's speech today is the beginning of an avalanche, not just from Mitt Romney, but of a lot of people who are going to come into his wake and do the very same thing and hammer away at all of the things that he said were the weak spots of Donald Trump. And then it won't just be Republicans who do that. It's possibly the Democrats as well with the three-prong attempt that Hillary Clinton apparently has cooking in the hopper. Don't you think that this is the beginning of a lot of lows, Barry Bennett?

BENNETT: Yes, I do. Unfortunately -

DEWIT: Well, I agree. It -

BANFIELD: Sorry.

DEWIT: I agree that Mitt - Mitt Romney -

BANFIELD: I beg your pardon, Jeff DeWit. I'm sorry. Go ahead. DEWIT: Yes. I agree that Mitt Romney has hit a very new low for

himself, and I think he's destroying his political brand right now. I don't know that many other people are going to come out because I think what you're going to see is a backlash against Mitt Romney on this because he's so off the mark. And, honestly, what can him or anybody else, including the Democrats, say in a negative fashion about Donald Trump that hasn't already been a charged level against him already? We've seen all the attacks, we've seen all the talking points and they all are off the mark and they don't go anywhere.

So Donald Trump is one of the most successful business people our country has ever produced. We all know that. And trying to say, oh, we had this failure or this thing didn't go as planned, then if - by that math, we would consider Thomas Edison a failure. So here's a man that created the phonograph, the light bulb, the moving picture camera, had over 1,000 patents, and yet one of his most famous quotes is, "I don't have failures, I just 10,000 things that just didn't work." So that's - Donald Trump is a very, very successful man and that's what we want in our country.

BANFIELD: Jeff DeWit -

DEWIT: We've got to get it out of the hands of the political establishment and back into people that know what they're doing. And that's what Donald Trump represents.

[12:15:01] BANFIELD: You - you echo - you echo millions of voices that are out there without question. We see them daily at those rallies and we see those who stand behind him endorsing him as well. Jeff DeWit, thank you. Barry Bennett, thank you to you, as well.

DEWIT: Thanks, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: All important voices and there is one voice, not only important right now, but extraordinarily loud. And that is Donald Trump himself. So we are waiting to hear from The Donald. He is going to be speaking at a campaign rally in Portland, Maine. In fact, we're counting down the minutes to that at this point. It's scheduled for 1:30. It could be a little early. It could be a little late. You just never know. This campaign has been through the looking glass. We're going to bring it to you live as it happens.

And our breaking news, Mitt Romney, former GOP presidential candidate in 2012, just giving - I think it's fair to say - one of the most scathing assessments of the current GOP presidential frontrunner, Donald Trump, to date in this season. But will this speech hit a mark, or will this make no difference whatsoever? When you quote John Adams, it should be important, but will it? Digging deeper, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:20:10] BANFIELD: So just moments ago, presidential candidate John Kasich took to the Twitter and gave his response to Mitt Romney's remarkable speech, I can only say. An awesome - in terms of just how powerful, not people who would say awesome as in "good," but certainly powerful. This is what Kasich tweeted just moments ago. "Well-said, Mitt Romney. John." And look at the quote down below. A picture of the Oval Office. "The one who works here should make us proud."

I think you can expect there's going to be a lot of reaction like this on Twitter, and there will be the opposite. I'm not sure how the scales will play out on that one.

My colleague Jim Acosta joins me live now from Salt Lake City. CNN Politics executive editor Mark Preston is live in Washington. And joining me live here on the set is CNN chief political analyst Gloria Borger.

First to you, Jim Acosta. Things are quieter in the hall where you are now.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

BANFIELD: But you could have heard a pin drop, I swear, off the top of that speech.

ACOSTA: That's right.

BANFIELD: And then I wasn't sure how to assess the audience reaction afterwards. Just take me there.

ACOSTA: Yes, Ashleigh, I mean this was a very enthusiastic reception for Mitt Romney. You know, we are in the city where he saved the Salt Lake City Olympics. So, you know, this is a friendly crowd here.

I will say, after the speech was over, one thing that I took note of is that Mitt Romney worked the front of this audience here like it was a presidential campaign event rope line. You know, he was shaking hands, he was looking like a presidential contender all over again. Of course, if you talked to sources close to Mitt Romney, they say this is not about him jumping into the race for president, although we could get into the scenarios about a contested convention later on this summer. That we won't get into right now.

But, Ashleigh, I think what we just witnessed is the beginning of the splintering potentially of the Republican Party. Mitt Romney did what no other Republican establishment candidate has done up until this point, and that is to deliver a cool, calm, collected blistering of Donald Trump and everything that he stands for. The problem, though, for Mitt Romney and the Republican establishment is - and there are a couple of things. One is, it may have come too late. Donald Trump may be so far ahead that he may have this Republican nomination locked up. We'll have to see what the impact of this kind of speech will be on the poll numbers.

The second thing is, is that, you know, you have to account for Donald Trump's crowd, his audience. I mean we go to these events every day. He is bringing in five, ten, sometimes 15,000 people into these auditoriums and arenas around the country. There is obviously an appetite inside the Republican Party for what Donald Trump has to say, no matter what Mitt Romney has to say about that.

And the other thing that was left unsaid in the speech, and it was, as you said, it was scathing, it was blistering, it was an indictment of Donald Trump. But Mitt Romney did not talk about the fact that he sought Donald Trump's endorsement four years ago. These two men were standing side by side.

BANFIELD: Yes.

ACOSTA: Obviously now they're on other ends of the Republican Party. And it may be a sneak preview of coming attractions if this party breaks apart into a nasty fore (ph) fight at the convention later on this summer, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Which, Jim Acosta, is exactly why I used the word "awesome." I don't use the word "awesome" like teenagers do as in "great." I use it as in "jaw-dropping," because four years is a very short time ago.

ACOSTA: Yes.

BANFIELD: To see such an incredible change of pace for both of these two men. So hold that thought for a second.

Mark Preston, if you could step in here for a moment. Hearing that list of all of the complaints that Mitt Romney has about Donald Trump, and there are many people who agree with them. There are just as many who do not. I want to speak to the just as many who do not. Is Mitt Romney completely tone deaf to the Trump supporters who say, we don't care about your list. We don't care about all those things that you perfectly just had numbered in your spreadsheet. We care about the straight shooter who doesn't do things the way they've always been done, which is failing us.

MARK PRESTON, CNN POLITICS EXECUTIVE EDITOR: Right. And, Ashleigh, a couple things here. One is, Mitt Romney wasn't speaking to those voters when he took that lectern today. What he was speaking to were the voters on the edge, the ones who look at Trump and say he's a fighter for the Republican Party, but they're not quite sure if they can vote for him. Voters who are from the industrial Midwest, such as Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, even Indiana, states that have yet to vote, weigh in on this election.

A couple things, though, that I think we need to take a step back and think about here. For all the criticism that Mitt Romney lobbed at Donald Trump today, probably the most striking was is that he questioned his stability to be the president of the United States. Code word, he questioned his stability to be in charge of the nuclear codes. I think that is an incredible thing to say about somebody, and that's what Mitt Romney seemed to be telegraphing today.

In addition to that, we have to look at what Barry Bennett had said earlier, that he was surprised that Mitt Romney would do this. Barry Bennett, the supporter of Donald Trump. Why are we surprised? Donald Trump has been very critical of Mitt Romney. Donald Trump has been very critical of the 2008 presidential nominee John McCain. John McCain came out seconds after that speech was finished. He was critical of Donald Trump. George W. Bush, the last Republican president, was also critical of Donald Trump. We should not be surprised by this at all. [12:25:28] So what we should be surprised about, though, is where the

direction of the Republican Party is going to go. To Jim's point, there is going to be a splintering. The question is, will it be something that will be so devastating to the Republican Party it will take years to fix, or will this just be another bump in the road in politics as we normally see.

BANFIELD: Yes, that - that thing you just mentioned, stability was book-ended by temperament and suitability. He was nailing that towards the end of the speech, Mark.

Gloria Borger, I want you to come in on this notion that there is a ton of chatter already. It was instantaneous about -

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

BANFIELD: This looks like a guy who's throwing his hat in the ring. Plenty of your sources, plenty of people all throughout the Republican Party have thrown water on that. Are they still throwing water on that? Is there another name that may be behind the subtext -

BORGER: Yes.

BANFIELD: Is getting thrown into the ring?

BORGER: I think that you have to take Mitt Romney at his word. He had a chance to run. He met with Jeb Bush, if you'll recall, earlier on in this process. He was really thinking about running again. And he decided not to. So I don't think Mitt Romney is going to be a candidate for president.

What you're talking about is a contested convention. And whether Mitt Romney at some point would throw his hat in the ring. I think Mitt Romney would rather see one of the candidates who are running win in that contested convention, or his favorite son, who will always be Paul Ryan, the man he chose to be his junior partner when he was running -

BANFIELD: Say that name again, the guy who was just on Capitol Hill saying, we won't have any of this.

BORGER: Paul Ryan, the speaker of the House, would be - is a tremendous favorite of Mitt Romney's. But I think what - the speech Romney gave today, I have to tell you, he ran for president twice, was the nominee once. Whether he will drive people to vote for Donald Trump or not as a result of this speech, I think this is probably the most memorable speech of his long political career. We don't hear speeches like this very much. I think it was something he's been chomping at the bit to say. Yes, he went and kissed Donald Trump's ring when he was running for the presidency last time. A lot has changed. And it would have been interesting for me to hear what has changed in this speech. He did not address that.

But I think it was one of these moments in American political history when you see somebody who is involved in politics, has been a public servant, cares deeply about his country, who is not a candidate come out and say - and with an audience, with a natural audience, right?

BANFIELD: Yes.

BORGER: W. can't give this speech, his brother just ran for the presidency and failed. Come out and give this speech and say, this is what I believe from the bottom of my heart.

BANFIELD: And I've got no, you know, skin in the game at this point.

BORGER: I've got no dog in this fight.

BANFIELD: Yes.

BORGER: Now, you can believe him or not believe him, Ashleigh, like, you know, I could be completely wrong, right? But I don't think I am here. So that gives him a certain amount of credibility. And he, you know, he didn't speak for a very long time to the anger of the Republican voters, which we see every day.

BANFIELD: Nobody did. No one did.

BORGER: He did - he said, use it to a different purpose. Don't use it to have scapegoats, right? But I do think we ought to sort of stop and take note of this because we don't see it very often in American politics. Ronald Reagan, in 1964, gave a speech for Barry Goldwater in the middle of the election, a time for choosing, which Romney referenced, which was a speech in nature kind of similar to this.

BANFIELD: I think I know the answer to this, but I'm just going to get you to say it anyway. Because of your acumen and your platform, the fuel that this will provide to Donald Trump -

BORGER: Absolutely.

BANFIELD: In about eight hours, when that debate begins, between those candidates, what will the dynamic be, a, with him with what's happened and with the others on that stage?

BORGER: Well, I think it depends on the questions, obviously. It depends on the others on the stage. But Romney was sort of clever. He did a little pre-buttle (ph) today in his speech and said, just watch how Donald Trump responds to my attacks. See how he - how he responds. And that's what we'll have to watch tonight at the debate. And watch how the other candidates respond to what Romney said today.

BANFIELD: Yes, I have a feeling that the transcription services are already delivering those copies digitally to the -

BORGER: Well, we - we already heard Kasich, right?

BANFIELD: Right. Right. The tweets have already started.

[12:30:00] I should remind you, if you just joined us, that Donald Trump is in the air. I don't know if he's got wi-fi on Trump force one, but that's maybe why we haven't had the tweet yet as a response to what Mitt Romney has laid out. Again, one of the more