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Sunday Democrat Debate Preview; Trump in Michigan; How the World Perceives Trump; Romney-Trump Conflict Examined; Kathleen Kennedy Townsend Interview. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired March 04, 2016 - 13:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN: CNN is hosting the next Democratic Presidential Debate this coming Sunday night in Flint, Michigan.

Flint has become a flash point due to the awful water crisis there affecting the health and welfare of the city's residents.

Today a congressional delegation heard (ph) from residents. Leading that delegation is Democratic Congressman Dan Kildee, who represents the people of Flint.

He's joining us now. Congressman, thank you very much for joining us.

What do think the impact you're hoping for Sunday's Democratic Presidential Debate will have on the residents of Flint because of the awful water crisis that they've had to endure?

REP. DAN KILDEE, D-MI: Well, all of our work really has been about getting solutions and any time we can shine a big light on this terrible crisis this man made-man crisis in Flint. Hopefully, it will push those who have it within their power to fix this problem to actually do that. And of course, I'm referring to the State of Michigan, the governor and the state and the legislature, who are largely responsible for what happened in Flint. The fact that we're having a National Debate in Flint is not a coincidence and it will hopefully raise this issue in a way that continues to pressure them to do what's right.

[13:35:01] BLITZER: Listen to what Marco Rubio said. Now, the Republican Presidential Candidate at the Republican Presidential Debate last night in Detroit about the water crisis in Flint.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUBIO: Yeah, I give the governor credit. He took responsibility for what happened, and he's talked about people being held accountable and the need to change. That's Governor Snyder.

But here's the point, this should not be a partisan issue, the way the Democrats have tried to turn this into a partisan issue, that somehow Republicans woke in the morning and decided, "Oh, it's a good idea to poison some kids with lead."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Congressman, your reaction?

KILDEE: Well there's a big difference between taking responsibility and apologizing and taking responsibility to actually fix the problem that you created.

So, if people want to give Governor Snyder credit for apologizing to the people of Flint, that's fine. But he has a billion dollars of unbudgeted surplus that he doesn't know what to do with and people in Flint can't drink their water.

I don't give him credit for hiring lawyers and public relations firms faster than he's willing to put money up for public health nurses and to fix the infrastructure. His priorities are completely wrong.

BLITZER: What would you like to see the federal government do? And what was its responsibility in this disaster?

KILDEE: Well, I think the federal government should help because we have the capacity to help and the people in Flint are American citizens and I have legislation that would provide significant help. It doesn't offset what I think is primarily the state's responsibility.

In terms of the federal responsibility for where it took place, the Environmental Protection Agency has oversight, overstates that enforce clean drinking water loss. And I guess they made an error in judgment in believing the state was actually concerned about enforcing the new (ph) regulations.

The state was continually called upon by the EPA to deal with the problem of the corrosive water in Flint and the EPA took the state at their word that they were doing it when they were not.

So, you know, there's some responsibility to the EPA. But it's for the state or for the governor to somehow try to say there's equal responsibility. There's no equivalency of responsibility at all. The state government did this to Flint and because the federal government didn't stop them from doing it more quickly, is not the same thing as actually doing this in the first place.

BLITZER: Congressman Dan Kildee, who represents Flint, Michigan in the United States also representatives. We'll see you Sunday in Flint Michigan.

Thanks very much for joining us.

KILDEE: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: And don't forget, Sunday night, 8:00 p.m. Eastern is the Democratic Presidential Debate in Flint, Michigan.

Republican front-runner Donald Trump has a lot of tough talk when it comes to U.S. trading partners and allies. But how are those countries viewing him? What's the impression of Donald Trump around the world?

[13:37:57] We'll discuss.

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BLITZER: The Ohio Governor and the Republican Presidential Candidate John Kasich, he's speaking right now, as you can see these live pictures, at the Conservative Political Action Conference or CPAC that's taking in place here.

He will be live, by the way, next hour with our own Brooke Baldwin. Kasich will be speaking about last night's debate, what's ahead for him, the other candidates on the campaign trail?

Stand by, the live interview with Brooke Baldwin and John Kasich coming up in the next hour.

Meanwhile, Republican presidential front-runner, Donald Trump is campaigning in Michigan today.

Two of his platforms: Bringing back jobs to the U.S. and stopping illegal immigration.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: When you lose 505 billion, to be exact, in trade deficits with China, who the hell cares if you do business or not? Who cares?

Mexico, we have a trade deficit with Mexico of $58 billion a year. That's why a lot of people say these politicians come up the stage reasoning. They say "You can't get Mexico to pay for the wall." I said, "Of course, we can."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Donald Trump earlier today and we're in Michigan.

So what kind of message is he sending to the rest of the world?

Let's discuss world reaction with our guest. CNN Global Affair's Analyst, the Managing Editor of Quartz, Bobby Ghosh and our CNN Business Correspondent, the host of "Quest Means Business", Richard Quest.

Bobby, how are people -- I know there's no, you know, consistent or unilateral -- what's the word I'm thinking of? Strictly (ph).

RICHARD QUEST, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Monolithic.

BLITZER: Monolithic, that's the word I'm thinking of. Monolithic attitude towards Donald Trump. But what's the general reaction?

BOBBY GHOSH, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, it's interesting that the reaction has changed over the last several months. At first, it was of mild amusement, a little bit of snurk (ph). But as Trump has set of reason in the polls, as he has one more and more states and delegates, there is now I think a sense of impending doom in some quarters in people I speak with, places I travel, there's a sense that, "Wait a minute, this guy, A, could possibly win but, B, even if he doesn't he's already successfully he lowered the tone of the conversation, he's dragged, at the very least, the Republican Party down into the gutter.

And there's a sense of fear. I mean, we've said these a million times that America's election is in some ways the world's election. And then people around the world will tell you this, that, you know, they wish that they had a right to vote in the election because what happens if this country has an enormous impact around the world. So people are genuinely concerned. Things like "We'll build a wall. We'll get some extract. We'll extract some concessions out of the Chinese. We'll go into Iraq, take all the oil."

You cannot (ph) imagine what the Mexicans feel about that, what the Chinese feel about that, what the Iraqis feel about that.

[13:45:03] BLITZER: Richard, some of Donald Trump's appeal here in the United States, as you all know, is the sense that he will be a tough negotiator with trading partners, whether China or Mexico or Japan. He's argued for big tariffs if necessary to reduce the U.S. trade deficit. How is that playing?

QUEST: Well, it's playing rather badly for the simple reason. It ignores existing U.S. treaty obligation. First of all when you talk about Mexico, there's a role, the inconvenient fact that's called NAFTA which exists.

Never mind about building walls and that there's a free trade agreement between Canada, the U.S. and Mexico. So, you have that minor little problem to circumnavigate.

And for China, well, there you have the WTO, the World Trade Organization. Now, I know, I've read Trump's plans and I've read his trade policy and he said he will go to the WTO but you can't just unilaterally start imposing tariffs and he talks about how he's going to force China to open up and he's going to call China a currency manipulator and he's going to make China do this, that or the other.

But we're short on facts about how you actually do that and the final point on all these trade deficit numbers that he refers to, the deficit number is the difference between what you buy and sell.

The U.S. is still a huge exporter of many goods, manufactured goods, high-tech goods, pharmaceuticals to these countries as well. And nobody beyond to (ph) any fool that you don't just suddenly go in and say to China or Mexico, "Hey, this is the way it's going to be. There are rules, treaties and negotiated agreements."

BLITZER: Bobby, a brand new CNN/ORC poll we're just releasing right now shows that people were asked about which countries they consider here in the United States a threat to the U.S. look at these 77 percent consider Iran, 74 percent North Korea, 69 percent Russia, 63 percent China, 29 percent Cuba. I guess some people are wondering if the rhetoric out there including Donald Trump's rhetoric is playing into people's fears.

GHOSH: Well I'm sure it is. Particularly his rhetoric with respect to China, he hasn't said a whole lot about Iran, it has to be said. So the perception about Iran precedes Donald Trump.

BLITZER: He does always criticize. He says that nuclear deal that the U.S. and other world powers worked out with Iran was awful, it provided them $150 billion, he says, and they could do damage with that. Well, that's the constant message in his speeches.

GHOSH: That is true. He as and as you know I was in Iran late last year and the impressions there as Iranians were sort of leading up to their own election was one of fascination on the Donald Trump. It was also a sense that that can't possibly be that.

The things he's say he can't possibly mean. But as I said, as he gets closer and closer to the nomination, people are reassessing these things. I mean there's no question he's influencing not only the Republican Party but more generally the American public. How they perceive the world. If he's out there on television everyday portraying America as being under siege, if you like, that was sort of us versus them, the whole world is out to get us. That's will going to have an impact on the polls like the one we just saw.

BLITZER: Bobby Ghosh, Richard Quest, thanks very much. It's always fascinating to get world reaction to what's happening here in the United States.

Coming up, Mitt Romney says Donald Trump has taken presidential politics to a new low (ph). But is it just part of the American tradition in campaign politics?

[13:48:41] Member of the Kennedy family is standing by to fill us in.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: The war of words between the Republican Presidential Candidates is just the latest in a long history of nasty presidential campaigns here in the United States.

In a brand-new CNN series "Race for the White House," we explore six presidential races that involve dirty tricks. The first episode airs this Sunday night and it focused then on the 1960 Election between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They said in Chicago, the cemetery wards were common (ph) and strong for Kennedy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As time goes on, it leaks out that in one black district, there were more votes cast than there were people living in the district.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BLITZER: Earlier, I spoke to Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, she's the daughter of Robert F. Kennedy, the Chair of Correct the Record, that's the SuperPAC that supports Hillary Clinton.

I asked her what she thought her father and her uncle, President John F. Kennedy, would have thought of this campaign.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KATHLEEN KENNEDY TOWNSEND, DAUGHTER OF ROBERT F. KENNEDY: John Kennedy was, you know, we're going to get this generation going and we're going to take charge, and we're going to, you know, go to the moon, I mean, he sets high standards for himself and for what the country could do.

Rather than - and as you know, just on the issue of immigration, he introduced that legislation, which eventually became Immigration Act of 1964 that said, "To people around the world, come to the United States, build our country, make it stronger, make it more vibrant, get out the best ideas from all over the world."

I think my uncle and my father and certainly Ted Kennedy understood that you could build this country with diversity and with new ideas and new people. And obviously Donald Trump is appealing to people's fears, in a very sad way.

And, you know, I've seen the other side of Donald Trump, I mean, he wasn't always this way and I think it's really unfortunate that he's decided that this is the best way to win an election. I think you can win elections in a different mode. That's the way my uncle John Kennedy did and that's what I think my father would have done in 1968.

BLITZER: And I know you were just a little girl back in the 1960 presidential campaign, but what is anything do you remember about that campaign?

[13:54:53] K KENNEDY TOWNSEND: Well, I'm here, Wolf, with my mother, Ethel Kennedy, and she talked about how, you know, one of the big issues at that point obviously was the anti-Catholicism that was rampant and how could you ever elect the first Catholic President.

And I think John Kennedy said, "We cannot, you know, decide on the day that somebody's born or baptized that they can't be president of the United States." So he was trying to open up opportunities. But just the opposite of what's going on today.

And I remember as well and I think Doris Kearns Goodwin has said this about that 1960 campaign, it invited women in through the number of teas that my mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Jean Kennedy Smith, Rose Kennedy, my grandmother, head all across the country to say to women, "Get involved in politics. Get involved in supporting John Kennedy."

So, it was an inclusive kind of campaign. Not an exclusive campaign that we're seeing today.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BLITZER: That was Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, the daughter of Robert F. Kennedy. She's interviewed for the CNN original series "Race for the White House" that airs this Sunday night, 10:00 p.m. Eastern, right after the CNN Democratic Presidential Debate in Flint, Michigan.

That's it for me. Thanks for watching.

[13:56:09] The news continues right after a quick break.

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