Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
Sanders, Clinton Battling for New York; Interview with Tad Devine; Interview with Gregory Meek; Interview with "Boston Globe" editor Kathleen Kingsbury; Trump Claims Rigged Delegate System; Aired 10-10:30a ET
Aired April 11, 2016 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[10:00:00] SCHOLES: Dan, green makes you look fat. Refuse the jacket. In another one he said -- he said, quote, Carol, "If the boy does what he should, I will be able to say I've shared a bath with a Masters winner." And we actually got to ask Willet about these tweets, and he just laughed it off, Carol, saying his brother is just such a character.
But, hey, cool story for Danny Willet being able to win when he may be not have been able to make the Masters. He was actually the last one to arrive, Carol, getting here on Monday.
COSTELLO: All right. Andy Scholes, reporting live from Augusta. Thank you.
The next hour of CNN NEWSROOM starts now.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Happening now in the NEWSROOM, Donald Trump back on the trail, back on the attack.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'll say it to the Republican Party. The people that don't like what's going on.
COSTELLO: His camp accusing team Cruz of using Gestapo tactics in the delegate race.
Plus Bernie Sanders says he is going all the way to the convention.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We think we have a path toward getting more pledged delegates than Secretary Clinton.
COSTELLO: But Hillary Clinton says not so fast.
HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I intend to have the number of delegates that are required to be nominated.
COSTELLO: And now zeroing in on Donald Trump.
Plus, road rage murder or something else? A Super Bowl champ shot dead after a crash. What we know about his suspected killer.
Let's talk. Live in the CNN NEWSROOM. (END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.
Right now it seems that Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton have one mission in mind, proving who is more New York. It's the former New York senator pitted against the New York native. And what's more New York than subways and hot dogs at Coney Island? Both candidates blitzing the state just days before their big Brooklyn faceoff. In minutes Bill Clinton is set to stump for his wife in the Big Apple. In the meantime Sanders is using his popularity with millennials to take a swing at Hillary Clinton after she said she felt sorry for his young supporters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SANDERS: I think that's a little bit condescending. I'll tell you, my experience with young people, man, you know, and I see them every day because they're coming out to our rallies. These are young people who want to be involved in shaping the future of this country. They're proud of this country. They want to make it a better country. I think they do a whole lot of research.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: CNN's Chris Frates is in Rochester, New York, with more. Good morning, Chris.
CHRIS FRATES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, Carol. Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton are barnstorming across New York and softening their attacks at the other as unqualified to be president. In fact, Hillary Clinton started to take on Republicans and sounding a lot like a general election candidate.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: I expect to be the nominee and I will hope to have a unified Democratic Party so that we can turn our attention to the Republican nominee. Either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz would be a terrible choice for America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FRATES: So Sanders, for his part, still questioning Hillary Clinton's judgment pointing out that she voted for the war in Iraq. That's a vote that Hillary Clinton has since said was a mistake, and Sanders also hitting Bill and Hillary Clinton after President Clinton defended his wife's use of the word super predators which some see as a racist swipe against black youth. Bernie Sanders of course trying to cut into Hillary Clinton's lead among African-Americans and minorities, constituencies that had helped make her the frontrunner in this race. In fact she's the frontrunner here in New York leading Bernie Sanders by double digits in many polls.
And Bernie Sanders working hard to erase that deficit. He's making three stops today in New York, in upstate and western parts of New York. Hillary Clinton campaigning outside New York City. So we'll continue to see this battle play out all day long, Carol.
COSTELLO: All right. Chris Frates reporting live for us this morning. So Bernie Sanders has dialed back on his attacks on Clinton but as you heard Chris say, she's appeared to move on, releasing new -- releasing new ads in New York attacking Donald Trump, not Bernie Sanders.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He says we should punish women who have abortions.
TRUMP: There has to be some form of punishment.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That Mexicans who come to America are rapists.
TRUMP': They're rapists.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that we should ban Muslims from coming here at all.
TRUMP: Total and complete shutdown.
CLINTON: Donald Trump says we can solve America's problems by turning against each other. It's wrong and it goes against everything New York and America stand for.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: With so much at stake, she's the one tough enough to stop Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Oddly enough, Bernie Sanders is getting support from Donald Trump. Mr. Trump says both he and Sanders are being robbed of the respective party's presidential nomination because of the delegate system.
Here's what Trump told FOX News.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: The system is rigged. It's crooked. When you look even at Bernie -- I'm not a fan of Bernie, but every time I turn on your show, Bernie wins, Bernie wins, Bernie wins. And yet Bernie is not winning. I mean, it's a rigged system. It's a rigged system, folks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It looks like it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: With me now is Tad Devine. He's the senior media adviser for Bernie 2016/
Welcome, sir.
TAD DEVINE, SENIOR MEDIA ADVISER, BERNIE 2016: Good to be with you, Carol.
COSTELLO: Nice to have you here. Does Senator Sanders feel he's being robbed of the nomination?
DEVINE: No. You know, I think, you know, Trump will invoke Bernie, you know, when he thinks it's good for Trump, OK, and that's what it's all tonight. The rules are the rules. We're prepared to play by them. We only ask that they be enforced fairly for everyone. We understand Hillary Clinton has a huge super delegate advantage. But we hope to appeal to those super delegates when the voting is done in June. To make the case that Bernie Sanders would be the strongest nominee for the Democratic Party, particularly if Trump is the Republican nominee. Bernie is beating him by 20 or more points in almost every state poll. So that's the case we'll make to the super delegates later but we're not charging that the process is unfair.
COSTELLO: OK. Just to be clear, you don't believe that the system is corrupt as Mr. Trump charges?
DEVINE: No. Bernie believes the economy is rigged in America. It's sending all new wealth to the top. And that rigged economy is held in place by corrupt system of campaign finance. We do believe that's rigged. But we're not alleging that the system on the Democratic side is rigged. We think it's -- there's some unfairness here, particularly if Bernie wins 82 percent of the vote like he did in Alaska and then, you know, delegates from that state decided to go against the will of the people. But we'll make that appeal directly to them and we think they'll listen to it.
COSTELLO: On the subject of Hillary Clinton saying super predator back in the mid '90s. Bernie Sanders at least intimated that that term was racist. Is that what he meant to say?
DEVINE: Well, I think what he meant to say was -- and we believe there was a deliberate strategy. I think if you look back in the '90s, you know, in both Clinton campaigns in 1992 with the Sister Souljah incident, in 1996 with the political strategy which was authored by Dick Morris, a Republican consultant who worked for them, called triangulation, they decided they were going not to be the Democrat, you know, versus the Republican. They were going to get in between the Democrats and Republicans, and used issues like welfare reform, for example, and other issues, crime, to gain advantage, political advantage, and push off Democrats in the process and push off the base of the Democratic Party in the process.
So I think now some of that rhetoric was very heated. It was also part of their political campaign. If you look at the ads, for example, they ran on radio -- conservative radio in 1996. You will see that they used these issues to gain political advantage. And I think what Bernie said the other in the Apollo Theater was correct.
COSTELLO: Well, let me ask you this. Let me ask you this because you know.
DEVINE: Sure. COSTELLO: I was an adult during those times. I actually was a
reporter and crime was terrible during that time, right, which is probably part of the reason that Bernie Sanders himself voted for that crime bill he's now complaining about.
DEVINE: Well, the reason Bernie voted for that crime bill is because, like a lot of legislation, there were some very good things in it. The Violence Against Women Act, for example, he supported. The assault weapon ban. He has -- the course of his entire career he's been for banning assault weapons. It's the reason he lost his first race for Congress in Vermont was his opposition to assault weapons and saying that they shouldn't be out in the streets.
So -- and there were aspects of that bill that were very bad. And Bernie Sanders at that time went to the floor of the United States Congress and talked about it.
COSTELLO: But sill Bernie Sanders -- but Bernie Sanders did vote for that bill, and he --
DEVINE: He -- yes .
COSTELLO: He voted for it in good conscience, I would think, right?
DEVINE: He certainly did, Carol. But like a lot of legislation, like I said, there were some very good things in it and there were some very bad things in it. Now what Bernie Sanders did and what the Clintons did not do, they did the exact opposite of this, is at the time he said listen, I support this legislation because there's a lot of good things in there that we need, but let me tell you what will happen if this legislation is implemented. And he pointed to all the problems, including mass incarceration that stemmed from that legislation. He also stated --
COSTELLO: But he still voted for it.
DEVINE: He did vote for it, Carol.
COSTELLO: And couldn't you say that about any bill? It has a lot of stuff in it that maybe not everyone -- isn't that compromise?
DEVINE: Well, sure.
COSTELLO: Isn't that unifying?
DEVINE: Listen, when Bernie Sanders was the chairman of the Veterans Committee in the Senate, he led into law, along with John McCain and the Republicans of the House, a fundamental reform of the Veterans Administration and added more resources for veterans health care than we've seen in a generation. Now he was not 100 percent happy with that bill. He wanted to do a lot more and he wants to do it differently, but he understands the way the legislative process worked. That's why he worked with Senator McCain and others and found unanimous practically support for that bill.
The legislative process is messy at times. Bernie Sanders, 25 years service in the Congress has taught him that sometimes you have to make compromise. And that's why, for example, he passed more amendments on roll call votes than any member of Congress.
COSTELLO: But couldn't you say that the Clintons also had to compromise to get a crime law passed to bring down the terrible crime levels that existed in the 1990s?
DEVINE: I would say certainly they had to compromise. But they didn't have to exploit these issues, which they did for their political advantage by using terms like super predators.
[10:10:03] By saying that we need to bring them to heel, talking about young African-American kids. OK. They didn't have to do that but they chose to do it to gain political advantage. I think this is well documented and I think Senator Sanders is absolutely correct to point this out now.
COSTELLO: All right. Tad Devine, thank you so much for stopping by. I appreciate it.
DEVINE: Good to be with you.
COSTELLO: Nice to have you here.
As the battle for New York intensifies, both candidates are trying to court black voters. Sunday the Clintons visited six African-American churches in Harlem and in Queens. Their tour coming just days after Bill Clinton was confronted by Black Lives Matters protesters angry over Hillary Clinton's use of that term, super predators, back in the '90s when she was first lady. Sanders says it is clear who Clinton was referring to.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SANDERS: I think we all know what that term meant in the context that it was said years ago. We know who they were talking about.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Black people.
SANDERS: That's exactly right. That's who it was. And I think that the president owes the American people an apology for trying to defend what is indefensible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: With me now, chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus PAC, Democratic Congress Gregory Meeks. He supports Hillary Clinton.
Thank you, sir, for being with me this morning.
REP. GREGORY MEEKS, CLINTON SUPPORTER: Good being with you, Carol.
COSTELLO: So should President Bill Clinton apologize for that crime bill and apologize for his wife's use of the term super predator? MEEKS: Look, I think that you had it exactly right in your interview
just a few seconds ago. People need to look at what was taking place in the '90s. In fact, when I listen to what was just said, some of what I think is insulting to African-Americans, you're saying that African-Americans don't know who or why they vote for individuals. You go back to 1994 and 1996, African-Americans voted for Bill Clinton 88 percent of us.
Are you saying that black people don't know who -- you know, talk and move in their best interest? It's almost insulting. And so to come some 20 years, almost 20 years later, I think what they are doing and what he's trying to do is exploit black people to say either you all did not know what you were doing 20 years ago in the '90s --
COSTELLO: So you think Bernie Sanders is exploiting African- Americans?
MEEKS: Well, I'm saying that if in fact what they're trying to do is to cherry-pick, you know, issues and a statement that was, I think, that clearly that Hillary Clinton has said she wished had used another word. And it's clear. But it's clear also in the '90s who was doing more -- you know, when you look at the African-American community, if you look at the wage gap, it was decreasing under Bill Clinton.
If you look at the unemployment gap, it was decreasing under Bill Clinton. If you look at the wealth gap, more African-Americans were gaining. If you look at participation in American society as African- Americans in the Clinton administration at that time, more than anybody in history. So I don't hear them talking about that. What he's trying to do is to pick certain things out and to imply that African-Americans were being taken advantage of by the Clinton administration.
COSTELLO: President -- you know --
MEEKS: That's not the case.
COSTELLO: Still when the Black Lives Matter protester, you know, shouted at Bill Clinton, and Bill Clinton chose to engage, right? Over the weekend Bill Clinton sort of said he wished he hadn't done that. Do you think Bill Clinton should have gone farther than that or --
MEEKS: No. You know what I really think? I think Bill Clinton did not have to, but I think individuals because when you think about what took place and what was taking place in the '90s, Mr. Sanders voted for the bill. It was members of the Congressional Black Caucus. I was not there at the time, but there were some that did vote for the bill because of the high crime rate that was going on, you know, at the time. A lot of it was in the African-American community when those guns that are being used, 33,000 Americans die today because of guns.
Mr. Sanders has been on the wrong side of the gun issue. So that's -- really that was a problem. If you look at the crimes that had been committed, let's talk about Mr. Sanders when he is defending the gun lobby and the gun manufacturers.
COSTELLO: So putting aside Senator Sanders for just a second, are the Black Lives Matters protesters, are they wrong?
MEEKS: Well, if, in fact, they are saying that the Clinton administration took advantage and was not advantageous for the African-Americans of the '90s, yes, they are wrong. I would say that they were not there then. I was there then. I lived it. I lived through it. I was in the state legislature at the time. I know that times were better, much better in the '90s than it ever had been. I know when times went wrong is when we began to have a Republican administration in -- in 2000, and we had that for eight years and six of that with a majority Senate and House that was Republican.
And I know that Hillary Clinton was out there fighting the try to reverse that. She was working for Democrats to get them elected so that we could get back the majority, so that we could take back the presidency.
[10:15:09] I know that Bernie Sanders was not one of the big individuals that would go out around the country supporting Democrats to get us elected so that we can win and the majority and dictate with the policies of the United States. We went backwards in that eight years. We were not going backwards in those -- in the '90s when Clinton was the president. We were moving forward.
We had a regression in those eight years and now when we need -- now when we had Barack Obama elected in '08 we started moving forward again. Hillary Clinton was part of that administration. Barack Obama knew and had confidence in her, in her ability, and we -- and she is the one that will continue the movement forward that Barack Obama has taken us in 2008.
COSTELLO: All right. I have to leave it there. Representative Gregory Meeks, thank you so much for joining me this morning.
Coming up on Thursday night, it's the Democratic presidential debate live at 9:00 p.m. from Brooklyn. 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time, I should say. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders face to face. Only on CNN.
Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Donald Trump firing back at the ""Boston Globe"" over its front page dis. The GOP frontrunner saying this publication belongs in the trash. The editor of the ""Boston Globe"" joins me next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:20:21] COSTELLO: The "Boston Globe" went where no newspaper of record has gone before. It devoted the front page of its opinion section to satire, imagining what the country would be like under a President of Donald Trump. From deportations to riots to trade wars. As you might expect, Mr. Trump is livid.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: It's sad for the paper. You know, it used to be considered a major paper, and now it's like a supermarket throw-out. They don't want to see strong borders. They don't want to see all of the things that you talk about over there. They don't want to see good trade. They want to see bad trade deals because that's all we have in our country is bad. We have the worst trade deals now that I've really gotten into it. We have the worst deals, the most incompetent deals I've ever seen. Our country is going to go bust.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: In the paper's editorial "The GOP Must Stop Trump," the "Globe" explains the move, quote, "It's an exercise in taking a man at his word and his vision of America promises to be as appalling in real life as it is in black and white on the page."
According to the Pointer Institute, the "Boston Globe" isn't the first news organization to imagine a Trump victory. It cites the "Atlantic." And other papers have given editorials -- the front page to push an issue including the "New York Times" and the "Indianapolis Star."
With me now is the editor of the "Boston Globe," Kathleen Kingsbury. Welcome.
KATHLEEN KINGSBURY, EDITOR, THE BOSTON GLOBE: Hi, Carol.
COSTELLO: Nice to have you here. Critics say the --
KINGSBURY: Thank you for having me.
COSTELLO: Thanks for being here. Critics say the "Boston Globe" is not "The Onion." Why do this?
KINGSBURY: Like you said, this is really an exercise in taking Donald Trump at his word. We've spent the last few months listening to his speeches, we have read his policy positions. We've considered who his advisers are. And we reported it out just like we do our editorials every day and the vision that we came up with is one that was deeply troubling to us, and we wanted our readers to see it in black and white.
COSTELLO: But why use satire? You're a paper of record. You cover the news. You don't make the news. Why risk your reputation?
KINGSBURY: Well, as you know, every day the editorial page works separately from our news room. It's something that's gone on at American newspapers for generations. This is just an extension of that. A unique way of commenting on politics and other news events that we do all the time.
COSTELLO: But I think that when people saw that -- because it looked like the front page of the "Boston Globe," I think a lot of people around the country took it that way.
KINGSBURY: We were very clear with readers. We included an editor's note. But really we were hoping that people would read our editorial which came on the next page, which, yes, this is political satire but it's also political commentary. It's not a joke. It's serious. We want the GOP to pause and to reflect and consider whether or not this is the direction it wants to move in for our country.
COSTELLO: I know part of the editorial you pushed for Mitt Romney or Paul Ryan, but the "Boston Globe," it didn't support Mitt Romney in 2012.
KINGSBURY: We actually have endorsed John Kasich in the Republican primary this season. But we just don't see John Kasich making it to the end of this, so we're hoping that the GOP's natural leaders including Romney and Ryan will step up.
COSTELLO: And I guess my final question is this. Aren't you just feeding into the notion that the liberal media is ganging up on Republicans?
KINGSBURY: No. We really wanted to create a conversation with this and we have, and we couldn't be more pleased with it.
COSTELLO: Some people might say you just did it to sell newspapers like the "New York Daily News" or the "New York Post" and you're no better than the tabloids.
KINGSBURY: You know, again, this is the editorial page making political commentary on the news. It's not part of our news operation. And this is something that we do all the time. We've just done it in a new way.
COSTELLO: All right. Kathleen Kingsbury, thank you so much for joining me this morning.
KINGSBURY: Thank you for having me.
COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Ted Cruz sweeps up in Colorado and Donald Trump throws down in the fight for delegates. The shifting battle lines and tactics just ahead.
[10:24:35]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.
Turning now to the Republicans and the latest shots fired in the bitter GOP contest. Donald Trump lashing out this morning at Colorado's delegate system. Over the weekend rival Ted Cruz swept every single delegate in the entire state. And that's without a single vote being cast by a voter in a Colorado primary or caucus.
Let's bring in CNN's Phil Mattingly to explain the confusing process in Colorado.
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Always got to love the campaign rules, right? This is what it's all about. So last year Colorado Republican officials changed the process. No longer would they have a preference vote. The delegates would be elected through congressional conventions essentially.
Ted Cruz swept all of those yesterday. Now this is completely legal and this is something we've seen over the last couple of weeks. Ted Cruz, with his on-the-ground operation, is taking full advantage of the rules as they said and starting to pick up delegates in a big way. Donald Trump not so thrilled about this development. This is what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: This was changed in the summer to help a guy like Cruz and it's not right. Now, you know, I won, as an example, South Carolina. I won it by a landslide, like a massive landslide, and now they are trying to pick off those delegates one by one.
