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Ted Cruz Pulling Ahead Of Donald Trump In Wisconsin; Sanders And Clinton Neck and Neck In Wisconsin, According To Poll; Donald Trump Criticized From All Corners On Abortion Comments; Ben Carson Defends Donald Trump On Abortion Issue; Aired 3-4p ET

Aired April 02, 2016 - 15:00   ET

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


[15:00:17] POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York. Thank you for joining us.

To politics and every candidate for president. Four men, one woman, they are all focusing their campaigns right now on one key state. That is the badger state, the state of Wisconsin. It is the only primary on Tuesday and none of the White House hopefuls really have a lock there.

Senator Ted Cruz is pulling ahead of Donald Trump on the Republican side. Among the Democrats it is neck and neck between senator Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. Sanders has a slight lead, if you look at the latest polling.

Every candidate today appearing at campaign events either right now or later on in the day. We will bring you those live throughout the show.

And just few moments ago GOP front-runner Donald Trump spoke to supporters at the end of what some are calling the worst week of his presidential run thus far. The abortion blunders, fourth position on abortion in just a week and then a pretty deep burn from President Obama who said last night that Trump just doesn't understand foreign policy. One of Trump's messages today, it is attacking the media saying, the media twists his words.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The truth is, you can't, no matter what you do, no matter what you say, because they can take something you say and turn it around, like, I'll be on CBS "Face the Nation." What I said was perfect. And what I said was -- in fact, otherwise I wouldn't -- honestly, I'm going to be on tomorrow and I taped it yesterday. What I said was so good. It was so perfect. And then they looked. They said, maybe he should have added a word. Well, actually, the way it came out, they took words out that I said.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Senator Bernie Sanders earlier today in Eau Claire, Wisconsin pointing to his rising poll numbers against Hillary Clinton.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Some of you may know we began this campaign about 11 months ago. We were three percent in the national polls. About 60, 70 points behind Secretary Clinton. There was a poll that came out a week or two ago that had us one point in the lead. We have made some progress.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Chris Frates with the Clinton campaign in Wisconsin. Jeremy Diamond with the Trump camp in Rothschild.

Let me begin with you, Chris. This big issue right now between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders is about the debate. When will there be another debate ahead of the New York primary in mid-April? So Clinton's camp just came out in the past few hours and said the Sanders camp is playing quote-unquote "games" of the debate schedule ahead of the primary. What's going on?

CHRIS FRATES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Poppy. Well, you know, it's so interesting because both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton are in this little town in northern Wisconsin today called Eau Claire. In fact, Bernie Sanders just finished a rally here at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire.

And you know, what we are seeing is the mud-slinging, it started before they even hit the ground here. The Clinton campaign saying that the Sanders campaign has rejected three proposed dates to have a debate in the empire state. Spokesman Brian Fallon shot out this statement to reporters today. I want to read you right now. He said quote "the Sanders campaign needs to stop using the New York primary as a playground for political games and negative attacks against Hillary Clinton."

Now, the Sanders folks fired back very, very quickly. Their spokesman, Michael Briggs, responding with this statement. He said quote "unfortunately the dates and venues she proposed don't make a lot of sense. The idea that they want to debate in New York on a night of the NCAA finals with Syracuse in the tournament no less is ludicrous. We proposed other dates which they have rejected. We hope we can reach agreement in the near future."

So this spat back and forth about when exactly they will face-off continues. But it's important a little here, Poppy, to remember how we got here. After a big sweeping weekend with wins in Washington, Alaska and Hawaii, Bernie Sanders challenged Hillary Clinton to a debate on her home turf in New York.

Now, Clinton had been pretty publicly non-committal about whether or not she was going to commit to that debate. Then yesterday we heard from the Clinton campaign that they were trying to work these dates out, and then today this huge smack down from the Clinton campaign against the Sanders folks for quote/unquote "playing games" about this debate. The Sanders folks, of course, denying that saying they hope they can get a date on the calendar.

And the reason this is so important, Bernie Sanders is expected, you know, to do well here in Wisconsin. But he really needs an upset in New York. There's about 250 delegates at stake in Clinton's adopted home state. That's second only to California. So if Bernie Sanders can upset Hillary Clinton in New York, then he could help close that delegate gap. He is 240 delegates behind her right now. And because there's no winner take all, everything's proportional, he needs to win 75 percent of the delegates left, and that's a huge cash-in in New York. So when the debate is, where it is and how they face-off and in what format is going to be very, very important, as he tries to upset her on April 19th, Poppy.

[15:05:17] HARLOW: Yes. And both have New York ties. I mean, Bernie Sanders from Brooklyn, with that classic Brooklyn accent. You have Hillary Clinton, former Senate from New York setting up her campaign headquarters right in Brooklyn. So they both have those New York ties.

Jeremy Diamond, to you. All right. Donald Trump, we just heard from him a few moments ago addressing the interview he gave to CBS that airs tomorrow morning on "Face the Nation" talking about the four different stances, frankly, he has taken on abortion in one week alone. I just want to point out, he pointed to CBS and said they took words out, they edited it. CBS vehemently denies that.

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Yes, that's right, Poppy. I mean, we saw yesterday in that clip, that CBS released, you know, the full exchange, especially the words that Donald Trump was saying were not cut out of context. He said specifically at this moment the laws are set and I think we have to leave it that way. So that clearly was a shift from Donald Trump's previous position when he said that he would like to ban abortion in the United States here clearly saying that it should not be banned. That the laws should not be changed.

His spokeswoman yesterday hours later after the CBS interview was released said in fact Donald Trump does want to change the laws but that he change them when president which is a bit of a contradictory statement, given what Donald Trump himself said. But of course, this is coming after a week during which Donald Trump has consistently struggled with an issue of abortion.

You know, earlier in the week said in an MSNBC town hall that would like to see women who get abortions punished if abortion is in fact outlawed in the country. And then hours later he himself issued a statement saying in fact that women are the victim and that he would not want to punish them. Instead that the doctors or practitioners who could perform the abortions should be punished.

So, we are seeing Donald Trump kind of struggling on it. And this is an issue, you know, he has consistently done well with evangelical voters with social issue voters in this campaign and now we are seeing some questions about this authenticity on the issue. Of course, Donald Trump before used to about pro-choice candidate or he used to support abortion rights back in 1999, 2000. He changed those views in 2011 articulating it through the length of a very personal story. A friend of his who in fact, his wife did not have an abortion and saying that this person turned out to be a wonderful child. So Donald Trump expressed this, but we've seen him struggle with it

this week and could hurt him in Wisconsin where you do have a lot of socially conservative voters and some catholic Republicans as well.

HARLOW: Well, and it is certainly one thing to change your position evolve on something over the years. It is quite another to have different positions on an issue in the same week. And that's really the difference here.

Jeremy Diamond, thank you. Chris Frates, thank you so much.

Let's talk about all of this, our political panel is here. CNN political analyst and advisers to four former presidents, David Gergen. Jeffrey Lord is with us, a Trump supporter, former White House political director. Also with us Van Jones, a Democrat, CNN political commentator previously worked in the Obama White House.

Gentlemen, thank you for beings with us. So much to parch through this hour. I do -- got to jump to Tennessee, because this is sort of the latest in an, in the Trump versus the Republican establishment, just breaking in the last hour, Trump's camp comes out and says folks in Tennessee, the Republican party, is try to steal delegates. Here is part of the statement that just came out from Dan Scavino, the campaign social media director.

He says this. I can't believe I'm writing this but the Tennessee Republican appear wants to steal your vote today. There is a small group of Tennessee establishment insiders pulling a fast one. Don't let this happen.

Jeffrey, what they are talking about here is the fact that even though Trump technically won the state, he got one-third of the 58 delegates. There are 14 that aren't going to be allotted until the convention. And he is saying those are, you know, you're putting in delegates that don't want our guy Trump. When does this, Jeffrey, become less of a test of complicated convention rules and more of a test of whether Donald Trump can be the uniter that this week he said he would be after that meeting with the RNC?

JEFFREY LORD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think we're still on the primary process, the fight process, if you will. I mean, I believe -- some of this, in fact, is all restarted. He admit last week in Washington with a number of people, members of Congress, others, to sort of start to bring people together. But there is still very much a fight going on. I live here in Pennsylvania, as you know. And just yesterday I was -- yesterday and today, I was at an event called the Pennsylvania leadership conference, which is the Pennsylvania version of CPAC, and senator Cruz was there in person, as was governor Kasich, and they're fighting very hard. So this battle is still raging here and I think it will for a while.

HARLOW: So sounds like you're saying this is not the unite time?

LORD: Well, it happens and increments. But yes. I mean, you have got to win first because you can unite.

[15:10:02] HARLOW: The question is, though, how much damage do you potentially do to the party in the process?

David, to you. Trump has, you know, on this issue of abortion, he has made four clarify his position a week. He has walked them back. His spokeswoman Hope Hicks came out yesterday, clarifying what he said on CBS. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Told Bloomberg in January that you believed abortion should be banned at some point in pregnancy. Where would you --

TRUMP: So, I first of all, would have liked to have seen this be a state rights, I would prefer states' right. I think we would have been better if up to the states. But right now the laws are set, and that's the way the laws are.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But you have a feeling how to change there? A lot of laws you want to change, you talked about them everything from liable to torture? Anything you want to change in abortion?

TRUMP: At this moment the law, set. And I think we have to leave it that way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: OK. So he says the laws are set. We have to leave them that way. David, Hope Hicks comes out says actually, when he becomes president, he will change the law through his judicial appointments. What is he doing in terms of damage control on this front, David, ahead of Wisconsin where he is being beaten by Cruz in the polls?

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, he very wisely brought in Paul Manafort to help him with the convention, a veteran who can suppose stand up to him and organize things and needs a Jeffrey Lord or someone else come in and be chief of staff and work with him and his staff to bring some consistency.

What we're seeing is the inexperience and indeed the ignorance of the candidate revealing and really hurting him, because it looks wavering. How can you run a White House? How can you run a complex government if you can't make up your mind from day to day what you believe in?

HARLOW: Van, to you. I mean, to David's point, is this detrimental to him in the long run? Does this lose him Wisconsin? Because if you look at history, if history that an indicator, nothing has stood in his way.

VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, listen, by the time you are clarifying the clarification you were making when you are clarifying yourself, you are in a deep, deep hole and that is where he is. And he has never been in a hole before. And that is on the line is his key Trump card, to coin a phrase, which is his authenticity. He looks phonier and phonier every time. It's not just that he looks erratic. He looked erratic the whole time. Not inconsistent, ill- informed. Nobody cared about that because he was a man of convictions. Not this week.

HARLOW: But do you think, Van, that those loyal supporters, the ones that he says would stand by him if he stood in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shot someone, do you think they care about those inconsistencies?

JONES: They may, Poppy, they may and they may not. The thing is, they are not enough to win the presidency. They are a big plurality inside the Republican Party. What you may have seen, finally he's hit what looks to be the beginning of the ceiling that people have talked about mythologically almost a year.

The other thing is, rules matter. If he thinks it's tough to follow the rules inside the Republican Party, and deal with delegate counts inside the Republican Party? Wait until he gets to the federal government. Rules are tough when you're a leader. And he's starting to understand that there's something out there beyond his own aspirations and ambitions.

HARLOW: All right. You got Jeffrey Lord, the Trump supporter laughing. Hold that thought. I got to get a break in.

You gentlemen are with me for the next two hours. We'll address it all. Thank you all so much.

A lot ahead this hour. Wisconsin in the spotlight as the candidates crisscross the state. Clinton and Kasich set to speak this hour. We will bring you to them live.

Also, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton slipping in the latest polls in Wisconsin. We are going to breakdown how loss in the badger state to impact these two front-runners.

And later, he has gone a reputation for staying above the fray. But this week we saw John Kasich call out Donald Trump for his comments on abortion. A Kasich supporter joins live.

Stay with us. This is CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:17:28] HARLOW: Welcome back. We are just days away from the crucial Wisconsin primaries. Those are set for Tuesday. Our John King with the famous map on the magic wall breaking down what is at stake, and how it could impact all of the candidates. Look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wisconsin could be critical in both the Republican and Democratic races from a delegate perspective and from a momentum perspective.

Let's start with Republicans. Donald Trump enters with a big healthy lead, about 739 in our delegate estimate. The magic number, 1,237. Ted Cruz is a distant second. Now, if Donald Trump can come back and wins Wisconsin take most if not all delegates, that would take a lot of the air out of the stop-Trump movement because so much time and so much money has been spent against him there. But there are two polls showing Ted Cruz with a 10-point lead. So let's assume that Ted Cruz holds the lead and not only wins but wins by a big margin and gets all or at least most of the delegates out of Wisconsin. So Cruz inches a little bit closer. Trump still in the lead. And then the race shifts and the conversation shifts to Trump's alleged fire wall, his home state of New York.

If Trump can win in New York and right now there's a poll showing above 50 percent, if he wins with 50-plus one, then New York becomes winner take all, 95 delegates. If Donald Trump can do that, even if he get shut out in Wisconsin, a big New York win eases the pain. Right? He would be back on track and at this point, would need just 53 percent of the remaining delegates to get to the magic number. Is that easy? No. But it is doable.

But here is another scenario. Suppose Ted Cruz wins in Wisconsin, shuts Donald Trump out for the delegates and that hurts Trump's standing in New York. Cruz has momentum, maybe Kasich gets traction in New York. Donald Trump, let's assume wins his home state, but he wins only with 42, 44 percent of the vote. Then he has to share the delegates. It becomes proportional if he is under 50 percent.

For the sake of argument, say Kasich comes in second, Cruz comes in third. At that point, Trump still in the lead, but because he doesn't take all of the delegates out of New York, the math does changes significantly. At this point, if it looks something like this after New York, Donald Trump needs 60 percent of the remaining delegates to get to the magic number of 1,237 before the convention, 60 percent, a lot harder than 53 percent. If this scenario happens, the stop-Trump movement believes pack your bags. We are headed for an open convention.

So the next two states, Wisconsin and New York, critical to the dynamics of the Republican race. And guess what, critical as well, to dynamics of the Democratic side. Hillary Clinton enters with a healthy lead in pledged delegate. You see that. More than 200 delegate lead. Right now Wisconsin the poll shows it a toss-up. And even inside the Clinton campaign, they think it's going this way. They think Bernie Sanders is most likely to win. Under that scenario, I just gave it to senator Sanders 55-45. If that happens proportional delegations, he inches a little bit closer, but Secretary Clinton still in the lead. This is where New York becomes critical.

If Secretary Clinton can say, OK. You beat me in Wisconsin but I beat you in New York. Look at how many dell guilt. 291 total. If she wins 55-45, she gets a big lead there back and she says, all right. You're still around. But I have my big delegate lead back, if she can win New York by a 55-45 margin.

The Sanders scenario that would change the conversation in the race would be if he wins in Wisconsin and then can somehow stun Hillary Clinton at home. If Sanders win 55-45, it changes things. Now, only changes the math a little, but senator Sanders would be closer, the thing that would change the most, Wisconsin followed by Bernie Sanders in New York that would change the conversation the momentum of the race dramatically. Maybe not so much the math but momentum in the race would change, if senator Sanders can say I beat Hillary Clinton at home. But that is a big, big if and would depend on a lot of momentum out of Wisconsin.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[15:21:04] HARLOW: All right, John. Thank you so much, John King, with that. Be sure to watch "INSIDE POLITICS with John King" tomorrow morning, 8:00 a.m. eastern only right here only on CNN.

Coming up next, a very well-known actress says a Donald Trump presidency might help Democrats in the long run. Coming up, why some Democrats are up in arms after Susan Sarandon revealed her Bernie or bust attitude. Stay with me.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:25:13] HARLOW: Some Democrats jaws hit the ground this week when a very high-pro file actress revealed her Bernie or bust attitude. Susan Sarandon hinting she might not vote for rival Hillary Clinton under any circumstances even if Clinton wins the Democratic presidential nomination. Sarandon suggests that it's time to double down on Sanders withhold support potentially from Clinton even if that makes Donald Trump's political star potentially a little brighter. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SUSAN SARANDON, ACTRESS: But I think a lot of people are sorry I just can't bring myself to do that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How about you personally?

SARANDON: I don't know. I'm going to see what happens.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really?

SARANDON: Really.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I cannot believe that as you're watching the -- Donald Trump --

SARANDON: Donald Trump will bring the revolution immediately, if he gets in, and things will really, you know --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're saying the Leninist model?

SARANDON: Yes. Some people feel that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don't you think that's dangerous?

SARANDON: I think that what's going on now, if you think that it's pragmatic to shore up the status quo right now, then you're not in touch with the status quo. The status quo is not working.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HARLOW: My next guess, "New York Times" columnist Charles Blow says that is just plain risky. He writes in his column this week, assisting or allowing his, means Sanders ascendance by electoral abstinence in order to force revolution is heretical. This position is dangerous, short sided and self-emulating. What words, self- emulating.

The man is with me now. Charles Blow, thank you for being here. Make the case.

CHARLES BLOW, OP-ED COLUMNIST, NEW YORK TIMES: Thank you.

Well, I mean, here's the thing. So if the Democratic Party is ready for Bernie Sanders, Bernie Sanders will win the nomination, right? And if the party is not ready for him, and prefers Hillary Clinton she will win. Whichever one of those two people win the nomination, they are a far cry from the positions that are now held by the three remaining Republican contenders. None of the Democrats on the slate are talking about nuclear proliferation in the Korean peninsula or in Southeast Asia. None of them are talking about the possibility of using nuclear weapons in Europe. None are talking about --

HARLOW: That's only Donald Trump, neither is Ted Cruz or John Kasich.

BLOW: Then let me go to Ted Cruz. None of them are talking about carpet bombing in Syria until you can see if the sand glows. None of them are defunding Planned Parenthood which governor Kasich did last month and Ohio is only second to Texas in terms of the number of restrictions on abortion.

You go down the list of the things they have said that they would do and the things they have actually done and then you look at the gap between that and where the Democrats, both of them, stand, and there's a huge (INAUDIBLE) there.

HARLOW: How do you read what Sarandon was saying?

BLOW: I mean, she casted them a little bit right and she says she was not willing to go - to say she would vote for whoever the Democratic nominee was but then said, you know, some people says this would happen. Some people say -- she didn't group herself into it.

HARLOW: Let me ask you this. This, all of this really I think speaks to the fervor that Sanders has. Even though Clinton has the most votes, by the way, of anyone, Democrats or Republicans, she -- she doesn't have the fervor Bernie Sanders has.

BLOW: Right.

HARLOW: And she has the organization. She has the money. She has the legacy, name of the party, but how much of this falls on her? The fact she hasn't been able to get that fervor that Sanders has? What sort of responsibility should she be taking?

BLOW: Well, here's the thing about a primary, any contest, any political contest even in the primaries when you boil it down to two people, right. I believe that the high contrast position creates the fervor and the kind of practicality, where close together position, does not. She is failing because she is making the case of, we are very close together. So if there's not that much difference. That's not a very energizing message. He is making the, there's a giant difference between she and I.

HARLOW: You and me.

BLOW: And that should make you have to make a really dire choice.

HARLOW: She switched to that?

BLOW: Well, she can, actually because what Sanders is pitching is an enormous dream. Even if you put aside the possibility of passage, it is very attractive on principle to liberals, universal health care, expanding access to college, fighting against income inequality. If you think about, you know, the occupy Wall Street movement. He basically to me is the first occupy Wall Street presidential candidate. So all of that energy you saw around that movement is his energy. She is basically pitching, I have half that dream. Right? I know that --

HARLOW: Pragmatism versus idealism.

BLOW: That's not practical. But what I'm talking can actually happen because you had a Congress that is not likely to change. They control the mechanism. They control the --.

HARLOW: But voters vote on hope and change. Look at Obama.

BLOW: Exactly. And that's the thing. We will see. And Obama is slightly different from Sanders. Obama was coming into an environment where he was likely to have a favorable Congress, and in fact he did, the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress. So that was a very different thing.

And you look at the slate of his promises they were actually things he could do. And if you look at Politifacts lists of the promises that he kept versus the ones that he broke, he kept more than he broke, because there were kind of smaller but because he was running in the shadow of George Bush, those things seemed bigger to people. Sanders is pitching a much larger kind of slate of things that in light of this particular Congress are not as doable.

[15:30:37] HARLOW: We should remember that Sanders is continuing to poll better against all three of the GOP nominees right now. And in a hypothetical matchup in the general election, than Clinton is. But you know what, all hypothetical. So let's not put much weight in that.

That's a fascinating column. "Bernie or bust is bonkers" is the title on the "New York Times." Thank you, Charles Blow.

BLOW: Thank you.

HARLOW: Nice to have you on as always. You are looking, let's take a look, at live pictures of John Kasich at

a town hall in Janesville, Wisconsin that should begin any moment. How he plans to woo Wisconsin voters away from Donald Trump. Could he take the state? We'll see. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:34:20] HARLOW: Welcome back. You are looking at live pictures from Janesville, Wisconsin where a big crowd gathered there to hear Republican presidential candidate John Kasich speak at a town hall ahead of the state's primary on Tuesday.

Just this morning Kasich told CNN's Michael Smerconish there is no question the party is headed for an open convention listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. JOHN KASICH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I can't win enough to get to the convention with enough delegates and neither can Cruz. Donald Trump would have to win better than 60 percent. And as you know, he is never got anywhere close to that. So we're going to go to a convention. And when we go there, there is going to be two things that are going to be asked. Number one, who can win in the fall? And I'm the only candidate that consistently beats Hillary Clinton in the fall. And secondly, Michael, delegates take this seriously. They begin to feel the weight of big decisions on their shoulders and they are going to ask, who has the record, the accomplishments and who can be president?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[15:35:19] HARLOW: Joining me now, Republican Pennsylvania congressman and a Kasich supporter, Charles Dent.

Thank you so much for being with me, Congressman.

REP. CHARLES DENT (R),PENNSYLVANIA: Hey, thank you so much for having me, Poppy. Really appreciate being with you.

HARLOW: Yes, of course. Let's talk about this, what we just heard from Kasich and just this talk about, you know, delegates getting behind him, getting in his favor at the convention. I understand that. And we all understand the thinking here, if you don't get to 1,237 then the delegates can cast in a second ballot, third ballot, et cetera for Cruz or Kasich. Right?

But even if that happens, even if you win that way, aren't you disregarding the voice of so many millions of American voters who have supported Trump in a plurality potentially not 1,237? And then how does that hurt you in a general election, if you get there, and they feel like their voices were silenced?

DENT: Well, let me say this -- that the rules are very clear. That the nominee must get a majority of the delegates, not a plurality. If we were simply -- we've had many cases now where Republican presidential nominees did not have the most votes or delegates going into the convention. Abraham Lincoln. Dwight Eisenhower. He was second to Senator Bob Taft of Ohio. We have been here before. The issue for Republicans is, to nominate the most electable Republican. And that is John Kasich by far.

Every poll that we are seeing shows John Kasich beating Hillary Clinton on average by about seven points. Donald Trump losing to her by about 11 points, and Ted Cruz losing by a few points. Now, I don't think there's in question at all who the electable Republican is with a strong record and will perform well in swing states like Ohio and Pennsylvania.

HARLOW: Understood that that's your opinion and understood that we are talking about the opinion of the delegates, but what about the opinion of the American people, the voice of the American people, which arguably I would say in this campaign whether you are talking about Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders, who yes, isn't the front-runner but has the fervor of a lot of the Democratic Party is so loud. This is different than before. These are people lining up outside these Trump rallies for hours and hours on end. At what point are you disregarding the voice of the people and then you can't count on them to come out and vote for the Republican candidate in a general?

DENT: Well, look, just yesterday we had a town hall meeting with John Kasich and in my congressional district in Hershey, Pennsylvania. There is a tremendous amount of enthusiasm for this man. And it's only going to grow. Donald Trump has made a number of incendiary comments over recent months and most recently this week that frankly have called into question, you know, his fitness to serve in the highest office in land. And Ted Cruz, you have to also be honest about his candidacy too. He is only achieved two things as a member of the Senate. Shutting down the government and finding a way to get 98 our 100 senators to dislike him to vary degrees.

I mean, this is really where we are. Look, I think the Republican delegates understand what their responsibility is. These are people who know that they want to beat Hillary Clinton. And they understand that it's becoming increasingly likely that Donald Trump just doesn't have a path to victory in the fall. That's not -- I'm not speaking ill of any of Donald Trump's supporters. I'm just saying that he just doesn't have a path to victory and the goal here is to win.

HARLOW: All right. Let's move forward because I do want to get this. Look. We heard your candidate, governor Kasich, come out very strongly against Donald Trump this week on two fronts, on the nuclear proliferation argument and on the abortion position changes four times in one week. Your candidate is one who has really campaigned on staying above the fray, not insulting our candidates, et cetera. Did he wait too long in your opinion, to go hard after Trump?

DENT: No, he hasn't. I think he's been very smart to stay above the mud fight. He's been - he has been well positioned. He has been laying out thoughtful, carefully crafted policy positions, trying to talk about solutions to real problems, rather than getting into the name-calling and the mud fight. So I think John Kasich is right where he needs to be. Look at his net favorability ratings. He's about a plus-19 on a net

favorability rating when both Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are well into the negative territory. So I think that some things that we have to really focus. John Kasich's campaign has been so focused on solutions that it's resonated with a lot of people, not just Republicans, by the way, independents and Democrats.

HARLOW: Let me ask you one final question or foreign policy. I'm getting a wrap in my ear, but I want to get this from you. And that is that we heard Kasich go hard after Trump on his foreign policy positions on the nuclear proliferation comments then Obama came out last night and said Trump doesn't know much about foreign policy or nuclear policy or the Korean peninsula or the world generally.

To you, sir, do you believe President Obama is stronger on foreign policy than the GOP front-runner Donald Trump?

[15:40:16] DENT: Well, part of the reason why Donald Trump has picked up some of the momentum is because President Obama's leadership on national security issues has been frankly very weak.

HARLOW: Now who is stronger? Who's stronger?

DENT: Well, John Kasich is the strongest of any by far, of either party.

HARLOW: But I'm asking you between Donald Trump and the president, who is stronger on foreign policy? Who do you feel more comfortable with?

DENT: Well, I will tell you who's more -- I will say the president has more knowledge about foreign policy than does Donald Trump.

HARLOW: Than the front-runner of your party? Does that concern you?

DENT: Yes, it does concern me. But I'm saying that both have foreign policies that I would not agree with. The president of the United States, Barack Obama, you know, he diminishing and minimizing as many of the threats this country faces. Many of our allies around the world feel very uncomfortable because of the president's leadership. They feel that he is disconnected from them. Whether Israel or Saudi Arabia Europe or Egypt or many friends in Europe particularly eastern Europe, our friends in Asia are concerned about what an American commitment means. So there's been, I think, a big problem with the Obama foreign policy and national security strategy. We need somebody in there who is going to go and reassure allies that we will be there and yet talk in much more measured ways that's been the case to this point. I think John Kasich is the guy to do that.

HARLOW: Congressman, I really appreciate you joining me for a spirited discussion. We appreciate your time. We just saw John Kasich walk on to the stage there in Janesville. We are going to take a quick break and bring our viewers his comments live in just a moment. Thank you, sir.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You probably never heard of it, a sport that combine sled dog raising in cross country skiing.

This is (INAUDIBLE). And it change Dallas' dog his life.

DALLAS JOHNSON: The dog would there every morning. Let's go out. Let's go run. Knowing that I was working with that teammate and not wanting to let her down. It sounds kind of silly but gave me the emotional push to get me in control of my weight.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Let's get ready. I know the dogs are all ready to run.

GUPTA: Johnson lost more than 80 pounds and now races competitively every year in one of the country's largest Skyjor races.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The beautiful thing about skijor is the dogs remind you that the racing is secondary. Being out there and doing it is the important thing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I love comet. She's my buddy.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:46:32] HARLOW: John Kasich is speaking live right now in Janesville, Wisconsin ahead of the Wisconsin primaries on Tuesday. Let's listen in.

KASICH: -- than anybody and this other thing that we don't seem to pay much attention to, I beat Hillary Clinton consistently in every poll by a lot.

(APPLAUSE)

KASICH: And then one other little wacky thing maybe we will get around to considering when we get to the convention, and by the way, we are going to get to a convention. And when we get to a convention, you know how a lot of adult say have been saying how come they don't teach civics anymore in school, you know. People say, well, you know, they don't know who the vice president is, for example. But the way, I do know the vice president. I mentioned this at the last town hall I was at. I like Joe Biden, frankly. One time we got on a plane in Washington and were flying to New York and we got on the plane. I said, Joe, how you doing? And when we landed in New York, he finished.

And -- but you know, a lot of our young people don't understand how we pick a president. They don't understand a lot about the history of our government. And when we go to a convention, it's going to be really cool. They'll be spending less time with the biebs, less time with the Kardashians and more time thinking about how America works, and it's going to be very, very cool, and here's the thing. Not only will they think about who's going to win in November, but they're going to think about one other thing. Who could actually be president at a critical time in our nation's history? Not only domestically, but internationally. So --

HARLOW: There you have John Kasich making his case to voters in Janesville, Wisconsin, ahead of the Wisconsin primary there on Tuesday. Coming up next, this man -- there you have him. Dr. Ben Carson, he joins me live from Fargo, North Dakota. Stay with me.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:52:13] HARLOW: Welcome back. While the candidates barn storm across Wisconsin, Republican operatives are focus on North Dakota today. The state's delegates head to the convention there, as free agents and in a tight race, well, it could swing the nomination.

Dr. Ben Carson is with us. He is supporting Donald Trump. He joins me now from Fargo.

Thank you for being with me, sir. I know you are cold. I know that the sun didn't exactly come with you from West Palm Beach up there to Fargo. But thank you for joining us from there.

And I want to begin with this. On a very, very serious note you have been so outspoken about your passionate stance on abortion. And in the past week we have seen the man you are supporting in this race, Donald Trump, make four attempts to clarify his stance on abortion.

As a pro-life candidate does it worry that at this point he seems unable almost to explain his position on this issue?

BEN CARSON (R), FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No. It really doesn't. As long as the people can understand what he is saying. There is no question he could probably be a little better in terms of political speaker, but the fact of the matter is like myself he's not a politician. So those kinds of things are going to happen.

I think most people are smart enough to figure out what he really believes based on what he has said. And he did come back and clarify that. So, but that's been one of the problems that we have had throughout this election cycle. You know, we have incredible issues that we are facing but we have this tendency to get caught up in these little things and spend our time talking about them.

HARLOW: Well, I don't know if it's a little thing. I mean, you know, he came out and he told Chris Matthews that a woman who has an abortion, if it were illegal should be punished. Then he came out and said actually no, the doctor who does the procedure should be punished. And then he went on with John Dickerson on CBS "Face the Nation," and he said that the laws are set now and that's the way they are going to remain until they are changed. And then his spokeswoman Hope Hicks came out and said no way he wants to change the law in abortion in this country. He will do it with judicial appointments. So can you clarify for us where Donald Trump stands on abortion law right now?

CARSON: Well, here's the thing that's important. The president does not have the ability to make abortion law. Or many of the things that we ask the candidates who are running for president, will you do this, will you do that, they are almost irrelevant because they --

HARLOW: Because they can make judicial appointments. They can make judicial nominations.

CARSON: That's what I was going to say, they do have the power to appoint people. So it is worthwhile talking to them about how do they feel? Do they feel that we should have legalized abortion or should we not have legalized abortion? And what is your feeling about the women?

And I mean, I think that's where you should ask the question. And I think he will tell you that he feels that these women have been victimized already. And that they should not be put in jail. But what he was saying is that the people who are carrying out an illegal procedure wantonly obviously should face some kind of penalty. What that penalty is I think the legislator -- the legislation has to be passed to make that clear.

[15:55:44] HARLOW: So what then was he saying to CBS news when it pertains to Roe vs. Wade being a law of the land?

CARSON: I think he simply is saying that has been passed. It is the law of the land. We have to abide by the laws, but that doesn't mean that we can't try to change them. It doesn't mean that we can't try to reeducate people. What you noticed in the last 10 years is that a significant number of people have moved from pro-choice to the pro- life stance. There's a reason for that. It is because technology in medicine has improved significantly so that people can see that that is a living human being inside of that womb who is moving around, who is reacting to stimulus, who has a nose and toes and it gets more and more difficult to say that's a meaningless bunch of cells.

HARLOW: So Dr. Carson, before I let you go, I do want to look toward what could very likely be an open convention. And you have got your candidate, Donald Trump with the overwhelmingly big lead when it comes to the popular vote. But if he loses the nomination in an open convention, will you support John Kasich or Ted Cruz if they are the nominee?

CARSON: Well, if there is an open convention and it turns out to be someone other than the person that the majority of the people have chosen, obviously that's going to be like a holiday for the Democrats and they will be celebrating in the streets. Because it will be very hard to consolidate the opinions of everybody who needs to get behind the nominee.

Of course I will support whoever the nominee is, but I'm very hopeful that we will recognize that we don't want to do things that will fracture the support of the party.

HARLOW: Dr. Ben Carson, it's nice to have you on from Fargo, North Dakota. Thank you for taking the time.

CARSON: Thank you very much. HARLOW: Coming up, the battle for Wisconsin, you just heard from John

Kasich. Next hour, Hillary Clinton speaks, also Donald Trump. Speaks a lot ahead. Stay with us.

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