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Analysis of New York Democratic Debate. Aired Midnight-1a ET

Aired April 15, 2016 - 00:00   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:00:42] ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Midnight here in Brooklyn, after a contentious night of debating. It was a high stakes brawl here, a little less than five days before New Yorkers go to the polls and vote, in the state's primary, between Bernie Sanders who came in with a lot of momentum; Hillary Clinton, who has more delegates. There were so many moments on stage that are already making headlines. We'll be talking about many of them tonight, fact-checking some of them as well, and seeing it through the eyes of the voters, whose decision on Tuesday could reshape the entire race. But, first, some of the key moments.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERNIE SANDERS (D-VT) DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Does Secretary Clinton have the experience and the intelligence to be a president? Of course she does; but I do question --

[Cheers]

SANDERS: -- but I do question her judgment. I question a judgment which voted for the war in Iraq, the worst foreign policy blunder in the history of this country; voted for virtually every disastrous trade agreement, which cost us millions of decent paying jobs; and I question her judgment about running Super PAC's, which are collecting tens of millions of dollars from special interests, including $15 million from Wall Street.

HILLARY CLINTON (D-NY) DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, it is true that now that the spotlight is pretty bright here in New York, some things have been said, and Senator Sanders did call me unqualified. I've been called a lot of things in my life, that was a first; and then he did say that he had to question my judgment. Well, the people of New York voted for me twice to be their senator from New York, --

[Cheering and Applause]

CLINTON: -- and -- and President Obama trusted my judgment enough to ask me to be Secretary of State to the United States.

[Cheering and Applause]

CLINTON: So look, we have disagreements on policy; there's no doubt about it, but if you go and read, which I hope all of you will before Tuesday, Senator Sanders' long interview with the "New York Daily News," talk about judgment and talk about the kinds of problems he had answering questions about even his core issue, breaking up the banks; when asked, he could not explain how that would be done, and when asked -- when asked about a number of foreign policy issues, he could not answer about Afghanistan, about Israel, about counterterrorism except to say if he had some paper in front of him maybe he could.

DANA BASH, CNN MODERATOR: Can you name one decision that she made as senator that shows that she favored banks because of the money she received?

SANDERS: The obvious decision is when the greed and recklessness and illegal behavior of Wall Street brought this country into the worst economic downturn since the Great Recession, The Great Depression of the '30s. Now, Secretary Clinton was busy giving speeches to Goldman Sachs for $225,000 a speech.

[Cheering and Applause]

SANDERS: So the proper response,

[Cheering and Applause]

SANDERS: -- the proper response in my view is we should break them up.

CLINTON: Dana, he cannot -- he cannot come up with any example, because there is no example -

[Cheering and Applause]

CLINTON: -- and it is important -- it is important -- it's always important, it may be inconvenient, but it's always important to get the facts straight. I stood up against the behaviors of the banks when I was a senator. I called them out on their mortgage behavior.

SANDERS: Secretary Clinton called them out? Oh, my goodness, they must have been really crushed by this. And was that before or after you received huge sums of money by giving speaking engagements to them? So they must have been very, very upset by what you did.

Of course we will release our taxes. Jane does our taxes. We've been a little bit busy lately, you'll excuse us; but we will -

WOLF BLITZER, CNN DEBATE MODERATOR: Senator -

SANDERS: We will get them out.

BLITZER: Senator, when -

CLINTON: Well, you know, there are a lot of copy machines around.

[00:35:02] BLITZER: Senator, when are you going - Senator -- you've been asked for weeks and weeks to release your tax returns.

SANDERS: Well I think we've got one that's coming out tomorrow.

BLITZER: Which one?

SANDERS: Last year's.

BLITZER: 2014?

SANDERS: Yes.

BLITZER: What about 2013, --

SANDERS: You'll get them.

BLITZER: -- all the other ones?

SANDERS: Look, I don't want to get anybody very excited. They are very boring tax returns.

I am sure a lot of people are very surprised to learn that you supported raising the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour.

CLINTON: You know, wait a minute. Wait a minute.

SANDERS: That's just not accurate.

CLINTON: I have stood on the debate stage with Senator Sanders eight prior times.

SANDERS: Excuse me --

CLINTON: I have said the exact same thing.

BLITZER: Senator, Secretary please.

CLINTON: If we can raise it to $15 in New York and Los Angeles and Seattle, let's do it.

BLITZER: If you're both screaming at each other, the viewers won't be able to hear either of you.

CLINTON: This is a serious difference between us and what I want to start by saying, -- it's not a laughing matter. 90 people, on average, a day die are killed or commit suicide or die in accidents from guns. 33,000 people a year. I take it really seriously.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you regret your advocacy for the crime bill?

CLINTON: Look, I supported the crime bill. My husband has apologized. He was the President who actually signed it. Senator Sanders voted for it.

SANDERS: But what about you?

CLINTON: I'm sorry for the consequences that were unintended and that have had a very unfortunate impact on people's lives.

SANDERS: Of course Israel has a right to defend itself; but long- term, there will never be peace in that region unless the United States plays a role, an even handed role, trying to bring people together and recognizing the serious problems that exist among the Palestinian people. That is what I believe the world wants us to do and that's the kind of leadership that we have got to exercise.

CLINTON: Well, if I -- describing the problem is a lot easier than trying to solve it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: Well, those are some of the more contentious moments throughout the debate tonight. The question is how are voters reacting to them? I want to go across the river to Manhattan where our Randi Kay is at a Debate Watch Party in Harlem; Randi?

RANDI KAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, good evening to you. We have been watching the debate here tonight with a group, a coalition of Harlem democratic groups. Everybody pretty fired up about this debate tonight. Tell me, first of all, with just a show of hands, who thinks that Bernie Sanders won tonight's debate?

[Cheering]

KAY: All right; let's see the Hill - let's see the Hillary supporters. Who thinks that Hillary Clinton won tonight's debate?

[Cheering]

KAY: All right; let me -- I want to ask people because, as we know, certainly this week and even tonight, the qualifications to be president, and who is more qualified to be president, was a big issue. Let me ask you, who do you think is more qualified to be president?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hillary Clinton is more qualified to be the president of the United States because she knows the issues and she takes care of business and she's one of the strongest women I know.

KAY: All right; I think she made her point. Now, I see a Bernie Sanders button right here, so you obviously disagree.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Yes; Bernie Sanders.

KAY: Why?

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Well, Bernie Sanders been on the front lines of civil rights ever since before I was born, and I'm 29; not to mention, thank you, not to mention he -- he cares about the people, number one, and he's for the people. He doesn't have Super PACs, such as Hillary Clinton does.

KAY: Okay, let me ask you another issue because one of the main issues tonight that also got a lot of passion out of this group was the minimum wage issue, which they were discussing whether or not it should be 12 or 15. What do you think about that?

UNIDENTIFED MALE: Well I think contrary to Secretary Clinton's views now is not the time for maintaining the status quo, nor is it the time for incremental change. Now is the time for real change in this country. The working class and the middle class in this country have the chips squarely stacked against them and now is the time to empower those people. One of the best ways is to raise the minimum wage immediately to $15 an hour.

KAY: Let me ask, also in this group here, a lot of you were -- a lot of you feel strongly about that, but also what got a big reaction from you tonight was the whole debate about guns and whether or not the manufacturer should be held accountable for a gun that's on the street that may harm or kill someone. You had a strong opinion about this.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely; I think it was Tipp O'Neil that said that all politics is local. If you take a walk two blocks away from where we are tonight, Randi, and you go to public housing, those parents, -- yes, we understand NATO; we understand Assad, but what they care about is the safety of their kids when they leave their house.

KAY: So you agree with Hillary Clinton on this?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely; the candidate that fights the NRA is the candidate that should earn our vote, and I think it's Hillary Clinton.

{Cheering and Applause]

[00:10:03] KAY: One thing that's really interesting is that some folks here tonight had come in decided on certain candidates and actually changed their mind. Let me just include one here, Walter, right here, you switched from whom to whom and why?

WALTER, FORMER SANDERS SUPPORTER, NOW CLINTON SUPPORTER: Well, I switched to Bernie to Hillary because Bernie seemed to be stubbornly set in the past and Hillary seems to be more adaptive to the future.

KAY: All right. All right; thank you very much. So we had almost 200 people here, Anderson, and I have to tell you that only about nine of them are still undecided. Back to you.

COOPER: All right, Randi; thanks very much, and thanks to everybody who stayed late to join us.

Joining us now is Conservative Columnist S.E. Cupp; Trump Supporter Jeffrey Lord; also Democratic National Chairwoman, Debbie Wasserman Shultz; also, Clinton Supporter, Bakari Sellers; Donna Brazile is here; and Bill Press, who supports Bernie Sanders. As for who Donna supports, she once told "The Washington Post" she supports Conservative Writer George Will, the "best martini mixer in Washington." I don't have personal knowledge of that.

DONNA BRAZILE, POLITICAL ANALYST, VICE CHAIR OF DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE: And I wish I had a drink right now.

COOPER: We are all counting the minutes for that. Thanks so much for being with us. In terms of what you saw tonight, did you expect it to be as contentious as it was? REP. DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, DNC CHAIRPERSON: Yes; I mean, we're sort of at the narrow end of the funnel now, as we wrap up the last stages of this primary nominating contest. So it's natural for it to get more pointed and a little bit more sharp in tone. They're exercising the muscle, there's no question about it, but I think what it shows is because they've stuck to the issues and they are robustly disagreeing on how to reach the same goals, and -- but take the different approach, it demonstrates that either one of these candidates are going to take the fight to the republicans and show that they're going to fight on the American people to build on the legacy of Barack Obama.

COOPER: As you said, this is the point we're at in the race. Things are very polarized between these two candidates --

SCHULTZ: Right.

COOPER: -- and their supporters. How concerned are you about the ability to come together after the convention?

SCHULTZ: Well, I mean, I think it's my responsibility as Chair to caution the supporters of the candidates who I'm actually -- you know, I want to caution a little bit more than the candidates. The candidates seem to get it. They know that tone is important and they have to make sure they take actions that are going to allow for their supporters to come back together easily.

But it was much more divisive. Any one of us that was involved in the campaign in 2008, by this stage, much more divisive and much more intense and we easily came back together and supported Barack Obama. I turned on a dime. one day I was on TV for Hillary Clinton. Two days later I was on TV for Barack Obama and gladly did so and then we not only nominated him, elected him president, he chose Senator Clinton as his Secretary of State and me as his DNC Chair and we were pretty darn unified.

COOPER: And in terms of the convention itself, I mean, how do you go about planning for what looks like to be a contested convention?

SCHULTZ: So it's a -- well we're not going to have a con - I don't think we're going to have a contested --

COOPER: Or at least it's going to go to the convention, maybe --

SCHULTZ: I don't believe it will go to the convention.

COOPER: You don't believe? You think a candidate will be chosen before?

SCHULTZ: I think the process will play itself out and result in a presumptive nominee.

COOPER: One candidate will get enough, you think, pledged delegates?

SCHULTZ: I think it's likely that we will know a presumptive nominee prior to getting to the convention. Now it's not to mean that candidates aren't going to remain - both candidates won't remain fully engaged because certainly there's a platform that we have to build and both candidates will have an interest in what goes into that platform; but I would expect, the way the process plays out, I don't have a concern that we'll have a contested convention.

COOPER: Critics of Senator Bernie Sanders and the Democratic Party said that he hasn't done enough to raise money for the Democratic Party, for other candidates out there. This came up in the debate tonight. He says he's raised millions for the Democratic Party. Are you satisfied with -

SCHULTZ: Well he said he's raised millions for the DSCC which is the Senate Democrats, so just to be specific.

COOPER: Are you satisfied with the efforts he's made thus far?

SCHULTZ: You know, I'm focused, as the Chair, on running two parallel efforts. I have to manage the nominating contest and I have to help prepare the Party for our eventual nominee and prepare for the general election. We're doing that. We certainly could use all the help we can get and would encourage both candidates to roll up their sleeves and make sure that we can be as prepared as possible because regardless of how we're laughing behind our hands about what's going on on the other side of the aisle, the country is quite evenly divided. This is going to be a real contest. This is not going to be a walk in the park and we are going to be needing to operating on all cylinders, fully unified.

COOPER: I know some of our other folks have some questions for you.

BAKARI SELLERS, HILLARY CLINTON SUPPORTER: I just wanted to know, what did you think about the tenor of tonight's debate? And moving forward, I mean, I'm not sure we expected this tenor. I thought it was good. I said that politics is a contact sport and I'm glad that we saw the --

SCHULTZ: You thought it was sharper than you expected?

SELLERS: I think it was sharper and how do you think that benefits us, because we had the spotlight tonight. How do you feel that Democrats going forward?

SCHULTZ: Well, it was as sharp as I expected it to be; I really did. I [00:15:01] thought, if you just looked at the last couple of weeks and some of the jabs that they've been taking at one another, this was not surprising. But look, again, it's all around the substance of the issues. I mean, voters looking at this debate tonight, got a really good picture of what each of these candidates would do to help move us forward. They looked at the Republicans and they're in a civil war food fight. I'm not sure -- I think frankly at the end of their convention, the Republican Party will not be the Republican Party of today and they will be likely blowing themselves to smithereens.

COOPER: Jeffrey Lord, let me ask you, in -

SCHULTZ: Whoa! JEFFREY LORD, TRUMP SUPPORTER: Thank you for the lead-in there.

[Laughter]

COOPER: But I mean Donald Trump was invoked on the stage tonight. Does it benefit Donald Trump to have, at this point, Secretary Clinton invoking him?

LORD: Sure.

COOPER: It helps him?

LORD: Absolutely. I mean, we draw these lines, as Ronald Reagan used to say, you draw the bright line between the two sides and you take your case to the American people. And absolutely, this helps. This helps in a variety of ways. I noticed on some issues, like NATO, your candidate sounded very much like Donald Trump tonight.

COOPER: Well it's interesting because he was specifically asked that, I think - I don't know - I can't remember who it was by - by Dana Bash, and he sort of tossed that aside and said well you'd have to talk to Donald Trump about his position.

S.E. CUPP, CONSERVATIVE COLUMNIST: There are some odd crossover, you know, issues and crossover problems that Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump share. It's a really remarkable season, one of many reasons why it's remarkable. But look, whatever benefit to Donald Trump Hillary is calling him -- Secretary Clinton is calling him out as -- presumably because since 1920 women can vote, Hillary Clinton is going to do much better against Donald Trump than -- then he will. I mean, it's just -- to pretend that the things he has said about women, over the course of this campaign, will not have an effect with women voters, and a sizable effect, is just a fantasy.

Now, that said, I really hope that some of the things that these candidates said tonight get repeated in the general election, like banning assault weapons.

LORD: Oh, they will be.

CUPP: Like expanding funding for Planned Parenthood; like some of the Israel bashing that I heard. That stuff is going to be very problematic in a general election, and I'm sure they'll try and triangulate; but you can't un-hear some of the things you heard tonight.

COOPER: Let's -- do you want to respond?

SCHULTZ: Yes. S.E. we had a pretty robust discussion in 2012 between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney over whether or not Planned Parenthood should receive funding. Planned Parenthood is one of the top two most popular organizations nationwide --

CUPP: The other being the NRA.

SCHULTZ: Yes, that's very true; unfortunate, but true. And so the American people have already weighed in on where they are on funding --

CUPP: But for Bernie Sanders to say he wants to expand it, I don't think plays --

COOPER: Although I've got to say, if Donald Trump is the nominee, --

CUPP: Oh, then forget it.

COOPER: -- he's said favorable things about -

CUPP: Forget it.

SCHULTZ: Women's health care is not where this election is going to turn and you're right, I agree; I hope they talk about it a lot.

COOPER: We've got to take a quick break. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, thank you very much.

SCHULTZ: Thank you.

COOPER: Appreciate it. A lot more to talk about with our panel coming up next. Also, see which statements on stage tonight actually fit the facts; a Reality Check, when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:22:08] COOPER: Well, the accusations from the debate stage were flying around Brooklyn tonight faster than, well, let's say a hipster on a hoverboard. We're putting some of the candidate's statements to the test to see if they stand up under the harsh spotlight of scrutiny. Tom Foreman joins us with the debate Reality Check; Tom?

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Anderson. Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton sparred with each other over who is the true champion of a $15 an hour minimum wage?

SANDERS: When this campaign began, I said that we got to end the starvation minimum wage of 7.25, raise it to 15. Secretary Clinton said let's raise it to 12. There's a difference.

CLINTON: I have said from the very beginning that I supported the fight for 15. I supported those on the front lines of the fight for -- it happens to be true.

FOREMAN: Well, let's break this into two parts here. Go to Bernie Sanders website and you'll see that he says "The current federal minimum wage is starvation pay. We must increase it to $15 an hour, from $7.25 an hour, over the next several years." His position is unequivocal. It is very clear. So we're going to say that his claim about himself is true.

Her position, however is more complicated. Go to her website and what does it say? "She has supported raising the federal minimum wage to $12," this is her own website, "and believes we should go further through state and local efforts, such as efforts in Los Angeles and New York to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour." so she admitted all of this in the conversation on stage today, but only after really hitting the idea that she's in favor of a $15 a wage."

In the end she's suggesting that she's been pushing it as strongly and as robustly on a federal level as Bernie Sanders, that is simply not the case. Nonetheless, we are saying that her claim was true, but it was also somewhat misleading.

You can find out a whole lot more about how we decide all these things and the many other things we checked tonight by going to CNN/RealityCheck. Anderson?

COOPER: All right, Tom; thanks for much. Back with the panel. Joining us also is CNN Chief Political Analyst, Gloria Borger, who stepped away for a short time. Nice to have you back.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Thank you.

COOPER: Anything fun happening out there that we missed?

BORGER: I don't know. The Spin Room is dying down here.

COOPER: What else tonight stood out to you, in terms of making headlines tomorrow? What do you think we'll be hearing about?

BORGER: Well I just think the intensity of this debate between these two candidates. I also think it was stunning, Bernie Sanders' position on Israel for example, stunning for a candidate in New York, a democratic candidate in New York to speak the way he did. I mean, you know, he basically sounded like Donald Trump on the question of Israel. he -- you know, Donald Trump who said you've got to have an honest broker. Also on NATO --

[00:25:01] COOPER: The difference is Donald Trump actually did go to AIPAC, which -

BORGER: Which Bernie Sanders did not.

COOPER: -- Bernie Sanders said he had a scheduling conflict and couldn't make it.

BORGER: And, by the way, as long as we're talking about Donald Trump, on NATO, Bernie Sanders sounded an awful lot like Trump on NATO --

LORD: That's right; yes, he did.

BORGER: -- saying, you know, we ought to get our European allies to spend some more money on that. So it was kind of interesting because we always say that Sanders and Trump are the flip sides of the same coin. In fact, tonight, in some ways they actually were.

LORD: You know, there are a number of republican senators who have apparently been saying behind closed doors that they're -- not necessarily saying that Donald Trump is right, but taking that position, that NATO members need to be ponying up a bit more for their own defense. So I'm beginning to think this point of view on NATO is catching on. COOPER: We actually have that exchange about NATO; let's play that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Donald Trump also argues that NATO is unfair, economically, to the U.S. because America pays a disproportionate share. So how is what you say about NATO and your proposal different than his?

SANDERS: Well, you've got to ask Trump. All I can tell you is with a huge deficit, with 47 million people living in poverty, with our inner cities collapsing, yeah, I do think countries like Germany and UK and France and European countries whose economy, or at least standard of living and health care and education they're doing pretty well; so I would not be embarrassed as president of the United States to say to our European allies, you know what, the United States of America cannot just support your economies. You've got to put up your own fair share of the defense burden.

BASH: There are 28 countries in the alliance and the United States gives more money to NATO's budget than 21 countries of those combined. If they don't agree to pay more, as you suggested, then what would you do as commander-in-chief?

CLINTON: I will stay in NATO. I will stay in NATO and we will continue to look for missions and other kinds of programs that they will support. With Russia being more aggressive, making, you know, all kinds of intimidating moves toward the Baltic countries, we've seen what they've done in eastern Ukraine, we know how they want to rewrite the map of Europe, it is not in our interest -- think of how much it would cost if Russia's aggression were not deterred because NATO was there on the front lines, making it clear as we move forward?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: It is interesting -- I mean, this question would not have been asked if it had not been -

LORD: Correct.

COOPER: -- for Donald Trump's comments which he made, I think, to Wolf Blitzer initially.

LORD: I think it's safe to say certainly his followers believe, this is another example of leadership, where he takes a position on an issue that other people are either afraid to take or have taken or have ignored for one reason or another, and then the next thing you know there seems to be some sort of building consensus on the issues; that yes, in fact, we must do something about it.

BILL PRESS, BERNIE SANDERS SUPPORTER: I think if you check the record you would find that Bernie Sanders talked about cutting back our sh -- making the European nations pay more of their share of the costs long before Donald Trump did. So I'm not sure it's leadership -- I don't know who's following whom here. Can I come back for a second?

COOPER: Sure. PRESS: One other thing that we haven't talked about that I thought was a very - you saw Hillary Clinton here, I thought was very weak on the minimum wage question, I think she was also weak, or Bernie Sanders was strong, maybe I should put it that way, when he talked act judgment. We knew that was going to come up because he had said she's not qualified. And he dismissed that and said of course she's qualified to be president. She's got the experience; I question her judgment. I thought he scored a couple of times, coming back to her judgment on Iraq and her judgment on Libya -

COOPER: Libya as well?

PRESS: -- which President Obama says was his number one mistake and she was the cheerleader, and she didn't have an answer for that.

COOPER: When you say she was weak on the minimum wage, do you think her actual position is weak or the way she described it?

PRESS: No, the way she could not defend her position.

[Cross Talk]

PRESS: Her position is totally incon - you cannot - just let me finish. You cannot say I want to raise the minimum wage to $12 an hour and then say, yes, but I also support raising it to 15.

CUPP: Right.

PRESS: It's 12 for her.

COOPER: Let's get a quick break in. We've got more with our panel ahead. We also do want to get some more - some more of your thoughts as well. The question: did Clinton and Sanders treat each other fairly? Go to cnn.com/vote to let us know. We'll bring you with the live results coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:33:31] ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Not much love between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders on the debate stage here tonight, that's an understatement, but plenty of interruptions. Take a look:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D-NY) DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No, wait a minute. Wait.

BERNIE SANDERS (D-VT) DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: That's just not accurate.

CLINTON: I have stood on the debate stage --

SANDERS: Wolf, can I -

CLINTON: -- with Senator Sanders eight prior times -

SANDERS: Excuse me.

CLINTON: -- and I have said the exact same thing.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN CORRESPONDENT AND DEBATE MODERATOR: Secretary, Senator, please. If we all -

CLINTON: If we can raise it to 15 in New York or Los Angeles or Seattle, let's do it.

BLITZER: -- if you're both screaming at each other, the viewers won't be able to hear either of you.

SANDERS: You made the point that what she said was totally absurd.

CLINTON: Let me say -- let me say --

SANDERS: Hold it. Whoa! Whoa!

CLINTON: Let me just say --

BLITZER: Secretary, let him finish.

CLINTON: Okay. I put it out --

SANDERS: I(inaudible) excuse me; I think I'm responding now.

BLITZER: Please, go ahead.

SANDERS: Secretary Clinton made this charge in previous debates and just repeating it doesn't make it true.

CLINTON: I know you're not shy when you oppose something, Senator.

SANDERS: Interesting comment, but you didn't answer the question.

CLINTON: I did, if that's the way we're going to --

SANDERS: No, you didn't.

CLINTON: Yes, I did.

SANDERS: Can I -

CLINTON: I did answer the -- well, don't put words into my mouth and say something that's not accurate.

BLITZER: Go ahead, Senator.

SANDERS: All right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: Hey. Hey. Hey. But, I mean, is this just -- I mean, Debbie Wasserman Schultz earlier was saying, look, this is where we are in the race. This is what always happens, this sort of contentious -- DONNA BRAZILE, VICE CHAIR, DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE: And there's nothing wrong with it. I mean, let's be honest: I know it's uncomfortable [00:35:01] for a lot of people to see two of their wonderful, courageous warriors going after each other; but for Democrats, especially for New Yorkers and others who are still prepared to vote, this was an opportunity to get some clarification on the issues, also to see their candidates spar.

Look, the republicans are dormant right now. You're not debating. We're still having debates. We're still --

JEFFREY LORD, DONALD TRUMP SUPPORTER: Thank god for that.

S.E. CUPP, CONSERVATIVE COLUMNIST: Listen, I think what's remarkable about the tone of tonight's debate, someone said to me, gosh, I think Bernie really landed some big punches tonight, and I said did he or is it that we're just not used to seeing Hillary Clinton get scrutinized by other democrats? I think through Benghazi democrats have really rallied around Hillary Clinton and it is rare to see a Democrat publicly confront her or question her or challenge her. And to see Bernie Sanders do that so frontally tonight was jarring. It was really -- it was new.

BAKARI SELLERS, HILLARY CLINTON SUPPORTER: Also outside of Bernie Sanders talking about the judgment issue, which I don't think that he won, because Hillary Clinton asked the question, can you show where any campaign contributions have influenced - no, no, no.

BILL PRESS, BERNIE SANDERS SUPPORTER: I mean, you're going to a different topic.

SELLERS: I'm talking about --

PRESS: That's on the foreign policy.

SELLERS: But - but - but - and it was a judgment attack. It was a character attack, but he swung and whiffed. He didn't connect on that; but outside of that interchange, what we saw was a very high level, very substantive debate about the issues. I do think there are two issues, going into next Tuesday, which directly affect New York voters, which were very important. The first was mass incarceration, and the fact that Hillary Clinton -- one of the headlines you're going to read tomorrow in many papers and publications is Hillary Clinton apologizing for the consequences, unintended, of the 1994 crime bill. That was very important.

Number two was -

COOPER: And that's as far as she's gone so far in this --

SELLERS: And I was a little taken aback because I do wish both would have talk more about the Clemency Project and what they were going to do moving forward about mass incarceration.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: I agree.

SELLERS: It was stuck in the 1990s and I'm tired of rehashing the cultural wars of the 90s when I was 10 years old. And Number -

BORGER: Hold on, how old?

COOPER: Ouch! That hurt.

BRAZILE: Look I was 16.

SELLERS: And Number Two, the issue of guns. The issue of guns was a near knockout blow that Hillary Clinton landed on Bernie Sanders and Bernie Sanders, for all of his conviction, one of the things he's never evolved on, with the rest of the country, is the issue of guns and I think that that is one of his Achilles heel, if not his most glaring Achilles heel -

COOPER: Bill?

SELLERS: -- and going into New York, that's going to be big.

COOPER: Bill?

PRESS: I'll say it again, I said it before, I personally, a Bernie Sanders supporter, believe he is wrong on that issue, that he voted the wrong way, which I understand where he's coming from, but what I don't understand is, it was nothing new tonight. We didn't learn anything new tonight. This was an issue that was debated. He had the same bad answer in the first debate and he gave the same bad answer tonight.

BORGER: But Hillary was better -- but Hillary Clinton was better tonight because she -

PRESS: She was. No, she was.

BORGER: She went back to his book; somebody did some great research. Went back to his book and said, look, the reason you voted this way was because you wanted to get elected in 1990 and you had lost in 1988 -

PRESS: Yes.

BORGER: -- and she -- so she kind of -- she kind of levelled him on that.

[Cross Talk]

PRESS: -- no candidate is perfect and that's an issue of where I believe that Bernie falls short.

COOPER: I think it's interesting that Secretary Clinton, toward the end, used some time to point out that question about women's right to choose had not been asked. Now my guess is it hadn't been asked because there's not much difference between these two candidates -

CUPP: It's a democratic primary.

COOPER: Right, and in a debate like this you're really looking for issues where there are differences that they're going to debate on. You don't necessarily just want them agreeing about everything on the stage.

BRAZILE: But you want to make the contrast with the Republicans, especially on reproductive rights, on gay rights, on human rights. These are issues that democrats have championed; that democrats care deeply about, and I'm glad that they brought it up.

Look, I just got to say something personal, and I love Bernie Sanders, I love Jane Sanders. I love Hillary, I love Bill. I love everybody, so let's get the love over with.

I am a Southerner and I understand that some people are upset that Southerners vote in a certain way. I am grateful that we have Southern Democrats and Southern Independents who are still willing to be progressive and still fight. So I just want to let Bernie Sanders know that we Southerners, we take tremendous pride in our heritage and our history.

BORGER: You think he was too dismissive?

BRAZILE: I do; and I don't think he meant it but it is a little bit too -- you're piling on, people. The poorest region in the country, people who are still struggling to find ways to get back on their feet, and to just knock us off.

COOPER: We've got to get another quick break in. A quick programming note, on the Republican side, Donald Trump's Campaign Manager will be on "New Day" tomorrow. Tune in starting at 6:00 a.m. here on CNN, actually, that's only about five and a half hours from now. You might as well stay up and, I don't know, have a drink or something.

Back in a moment as our debate coverage continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:24:04] COOPER: Debate night in Brooklyn; Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders facing off tonight on everything from gun control to the minimum wage to the situation in Libya.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SANDERS: According to "The New York Times," for President Obama this was a pretty tough call, like a 51-49 call, do you over throw Gaddafi, who, of course, was a horrific dictator; but "The New York Times" told us it was Secretary Clinton who led the effort for that regime change and this is the same type of mentality that supported the war in Iraq.

[Applause]

SANDERS: Look, Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein are brutal murdering thugs, no doubt about that. But what we have got to do, and what the President was saying is, we didn't think thoroughly about what happens the day after you get rid [00:45:01] of these dictators. Regime change often has unintended consequences. CLINTON: I would just point out that there was a vote in the Senate as to whether or not the United States should support the efforts by the Libyan people to protect themselves against the threats, the genocidal threats coming from Gaddafi, and whether we should go to the United Nations to seek Security Council support. Senator Sanders voted for that and that's exactly what we did.

SANDERS: No.

CLINTON: We went to the United Nation -- yes, he - yes, he did. We went to the United Nations Security Council. We got support from the Security Council and we then supported the efforts of our European and Arab allies and partners.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: And back now with our panel.

BORGER: You know, I think you have to listen to --

PRESS: Yeah.

BORGER: All right; you have to listen to Hillary Clinton's answer on this, because she's going to have to talk about Libya over and over again in the general election. She becomes the nominee --

LORD: Donald Trump will talk about it.

BORGER: -- because and the President has distanced himself and said this was a mistake. She said tonight -- she didn't come out and say that. She said we helped them hold two successful elections; right?

PRESS: Yes.

BORGER: And we got rid of the chemical weapons stock pile and so, she's -- this is going to be tied to her now because she didn't go as far as the President.

PRESS: But let me add also, she sort of slipped in, but she reiterated her support for the no-fly-zone in Syria -

BORGER: Exactly.

PRESS: -- which is almost -- that's getting close to regime change. She's a hawk on foreign policy and she just --

BORGER: And the President's not for no-fly-zone --

PRESS: And she did not back down tonight.

COOPER: Although in a general, you could argue, that kind of works in her favor somewhat with Independents or even some Republicans who may not want to go with Donald Trump.

CUPP: Well, I don't know. She's got a number of foreign policy landmines to navigate - COOPER: Well -

CUPP: -- in a general. Yes, and you know, she's kind of trying to have it both ways. She wants to claim Libya as a real significant foreign policy moment where she was really in charge and she led the way. The flip

side of that is, well, then, yes, you're responsible for the outcome.

What I heard that was remarkable, in terms of foreign policy, is when she was lamenting the fact that no one stood up to Assad. I imagine President Obama felt that one below the waistline and if she continues to use that line, I think then that's an opportunity for Republicans in a general, whoever it is, to say, look, like, what would you have done differently? You've talked about doing things differently in Syria. Would you be a more hawkish president that President Obama and what would that look like?

SELLERS: But the question also remains, is Donald Trump equipped enough to have a foreign policy debate with Hillary Clinton?

CUPP: Is that a serious question?

SELLERS: Because the answer is no.

CUPP: No.

SELLERS: I mean, everybody knows the answer is no. I mean, you're talking about a woman who negotiated a cease fire in the Gaza Strip versus Donald Trump. And, I mean, I think that -

CUPP: He says nukes for everyone.

SELLERS: He says nukes for everyone, who wants to destabilize not only the Middle East, but Asia. I mean, so - I mean, when you look at the comparison between the two, I know Hillary Clinton does have some landmines to navigate, even he sung the chorus on that, but the fact of the matter is, when you get down to the nitty-gritty in November, I don't think it's a question about who is more prepared to be commander-in-chief, Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton.

TRUMP: It will be a question of what her experience wrought. There's the Russian reset, whether it's Benghazi, whether it's Libya. It's been one disaster after another. There's a lot of problems there. So she can have all the experience in the world; if it takes her in the wrong direction, it's not very good.

COOPER: Let's take a look at some more results from your votes online. We asked you to weigh in on whether you thought the candidates treated each other fairly. The votes are being tallied at the bottom of the screen. 69-percent say yes; 31-percent say no. We'll be right back with another debate reality check.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:52:58] COOPER: We've got some time for another debate reality check. Let's go to Tom Foreman; Tom. TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Anderson. Hillary Clinton has tried to suggest numerous times that one of the reasons that New York has a gun violence problem is all the states around it, like Bernie Sanders home state of Vermont, having lax gun laws.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: The facts are that most of the guns that end up committing crimes in New York come from out of state. They come from the states that don't have the kind of serious efforts to control guns that we do in New York.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOREMAN: Well, the federal numbers are a little more complicated than she's suggesting there. In 2014 the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms recovered about 7,700 guns from crimes in New York. Out of this number, the number they could trace to initial source of registration somewhere, in some other state, or in New York even, that was about 4,600 of the guns. So right away, 40-percent we don't know anything about, roughly, on top of which authorities say they don't get all the guns that are used in crimes, so they certainly don't know where they came from. They don't trace all of the guns that they do get. They don't even try in some cases. So her numbers start looking a little bit squishy there.

But when she tries to link it to Vermont, as she has numerous times, that's when it gets really messy because out of this whole number, the only ones connected to Vermont, 55 of the guns there.

Now tonight she said she's not trying to blame Vermont in all of this, but the bottom line is while many Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, think that Bernie Sanders is vulnerable on his stance on gun regulation in his home state, you can't say that Vermont is to blame. In fact, the evidence is not there to support her entire claim tonight, that most of the gun violence is because of other states. That may be true, you may think that's commonsense, but the evidence is not there for that, nor is there evidence there to refute it. So all we can say about that, Anderson, is it's complicated.

[00:55:01] COOPER: All right; Tom Foreman, thanks very much. We'll get some final thoughts from the panel; Bakari?

SELLERS: It's complicated? No, I think that tonight, I think -- tonight I think that the Democratic Party won. Tonight was our night to shine. You saw both candidates, who have come a long way in this race; and it was a very substantive debate and I'm just very proud to be a Democrat tonight.

COOPER: Bill Press?

PRESS: I want to say also I think Brooklyn won. This crowd tonight was phenomenal. They both fed off the energy of it. I believe that New Yorkers knew Hillary Clinton tonight and now they know Bernie Sanders and I think that makes a very tight race on Tuesday.

COOPER: Donna Brazile, do you want to see more debates?

BRAZILE: Yes, because -

COOPER: Really?

BRAZILE: -- I get an opportunity to see you, Anderson. And I wanted to say, Wolf, Dana, Erol great -- they were great moderating, great panel, good questions. Yes, I liked it.

CUPP: Yeah, even some of those questions got applause -

COOPER: Right.

CUPP: -- because I think voters really wanted some of those questions to be asked of their -- of their rival candidates. I thought it was a great night for New York, as a former New Yorker, to be relevant at this stage of the election is truly amazing, and we're relevant on the Republican side as well. That's astounding.

LORD: It was a great night for the Republican Party because you can bet that somewhere in a basement in Washington the tapes were going to be rolling and they're going to be spitting out these positions by fall without any question.

BRAZILE: Thank you.

COOPER: We've got to end it there. Thanks very much for watching. (Inaudible, laughter) - right after a quick break.

(COMMERICAL BREAK)