Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Trump Camp Faces New Dilemmas; Trump on Tax Returns; Fighting for Campaign Cash; Trump Seeking to Unify GOP. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired May 14, 2016 - 16:00   ET

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


[16:00:05] JEANNE MOSS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Joe, I'm sorry, it's like talking to Donald Trump. Is it ever going to be ever, like, a dating site?

UNIDENTIFED MALE: At this time I really can't say for sure. We're really trying our hardest.

MOSS: Maple Match is asking who you'd like to shack up with before the shack is built.

Jeanne Moss, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: You're in the CNN "NEWSROOM," I'm Ana Cabrera, in for Poppy Harlow. Thanks for being here. Two days after Donald Trump, "found common ground" with Republican leaders in Washington, the presumptive nominee is now confronting new questions about his policies and his past.

A leaked audio recording from the 1990s reveals Trump may have posed as his own PR representative during several phone interviews. Now, Trump has whole heartedly denied that it's his voice on this tape, and he's also refusing to release his tax returns, and now the Clinton campaign is alleging he might have something to hide. Trump taking a hit from challenger, Hillary Clinton, in a new video that asked why won't he release his taxes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDEDNTIAL CANDIDATE: It's none of your business.

CABRERA: But the billionaire, he's not budging.

TRUMP: When the audit ends, I'm going to present them. That should be before the election. I hope it's before the election.

CABRERA: Sounding defiant.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOUS: What is your tax rate?

TRUMP: It's none of your business, but you'll see it when I release, but I fight very hard to pay as little tax as possible.

CABRERA: He's not required to release his taxes, but --

SEAN SPICER, RNC CHIEF STRATEGIST COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: I think he's got to decide sooner rather than later about whether or not to release his tax return.

CABRERA: Then there's this voice from the past.

SUE CARSWELL: What's your name again?

JOHN MILLER: John Miller.

CARSWELL: You work with Donald Trump?

MILLER: Yes, that's correct.

CABRERA: That sounds a lot like a voice from the present.

TRUMP: And we're going to start winning, winning, winning

CABRERA: What do you hear, Trump dogged by questions about whether he posed as imaginary staffers, to deal with reporters asking about his love life and personal dram in the 1990s. Listen to this "People" magazine interview about his breakup with Marla Maples.

CARSWELL: What kind of comment is coming from your agency or from Donald?

MILLER: Well, it's just that he really decided that he wasn't, you know, he didn't want to make a commitment, he didn't want to make a commitment. He thought it was just some -- he's coming out of a marriage, and he's starting to do tremendously well financially.

CABRERA: Trump has admitted to using a pseudoanym in the past but he says that call wasn't him.

TRUMP: No, I don't think -- I don't know anything about it. You're telling me about it for the first time, and it doesn't sound like me voice at all. I have many, many people that are trying to imitate my voice, and you can imagine that, this sounds like one of the many scams. Doesn't sound like me.

CABRERA: But there's some evidence the presumptive GOP nominee is settling in as a party leader. When his former long time butler argued on Facebook that President Obama,"should have been taken out by our military and shot as an enemy agent," Team Trump acted fast to say "we totally and completely disavow the horrible statements made by him regarding the president."

MARK DAGOSTINO, AUTHOR: I think Donald Trump did the right thing by disavowing and distancing himself from it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: All right. Let's talk about this with our political panel Boris Epshteyn, Republican strategist and Trump supporter, also with us, columnist for "The New York Times," Charles Blow, CNN commentator, he leans left, and CNN political commentator, Doug Hyde, former communications director for the RNC, not a fan of Trump.

I want to start with you, Boris. First. This "People" magazine reporter on the other end of these phone conversations spoke with Michael Smerconish this morning, and she floated a very interesting theory about how these tapes got out and released to the "Washington Post," listen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN HOST: Did you release this tape?

CARSWELL: No.

SMERCONISH: Did you have the tape? How did it get into play?

CARSWELL: All right. Two people had the tape. I had a tape. Trump had a tape and I don't have the tape.

SMERCONISH: How do you think it got into play?

CARSWELL: Well, it didn't get to the "Washington Post" through me.

SMERCONISH: So?

CARSWELL: Trump.

SMERCONISH: You think Trump dropped this tape?

CARSWELL: Yes.

SMERCONISH: Why would he do that?

CARSWELL: Look what's going on this week. Taxes. Paul Ryan. The butler. The butler did it. Now Trump seems to like to pull "People" magazine type stories into the array.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: All right. Boris, so, I guess who is lying -- who is fibbing here? Because she says there were two tapes, she has one,

Trump has one, and she didn't leak it.

BORIS EPSHTEYN, TRUMP SUPPORTER: I'm not going to engage in guess work where the tape came from. I think it's a complete nonissue. Tape from 25 years ago, that is completely innocuous. There is nothing in there that is newsworthy. Otherwise, we would be talking about the contents of the tape, not who is speaking. We should be focusing on issues right now like Hillary Clinton possibly being indicted, being under federal investigation by the FBI.

[16:05:09]

She said it was an inquiry. It's an investigation. That's what we need to be talking about, not some tape of 25 years ago. I will know that before this came out this reporter was not very well known now she's all over the news. That's kind of interesting. CABRERA: So you think she has vested interest?

EPHSTEYN: I'm not saying that, but it benefitted her to some degree, right?

CABRERA: Boris says it's a nonissue, is it?

DOUG HEYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I'm reminded of a line that Kramer uses in "Seinfeld," a story that crazy's got to be true. I think ultimately it's a fascinating story. I think there are a lot of Republican members of congress who wish that they had come up with the idea as well. I don't think it hurts with the Republican voters at all, I think this kind of is, as fascinating as it is, a nonissue.

I think there's a whole lot more troubling things about Donald Trump that we have seen this week and in previous weeks. Just this week, there is a headline in the hill that the Trump campaign selected a white nationalist to be a delegate. That's a bigger problem to me, and the pattern we see with race with Trump than some mysterious possibly Trump creative spokesman.

CABRERA: Charles, do voters care or should they care?

CHARLES BLOW, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, there's two different groups of those, the voters who support him who don't care, and I think what we've seen with his candidacy is that it is a kind of injuring of the very concepts of consistency, of truth, of honor, of character, and those concepts have been eroded because people are willing to turn a blind eye to certain things when it comes to him in order to support him.

That is a very real thing, and whether or not it's from a recent period or this tape is from a 25 years ago period, Mr. Trump himself is the person who is digging into 25-year-old news to make news. Right? So every time he attacks Bill Clinton for the Monica Lewinsky affair, that is a 25-year-old investigation. One second, I'm talking. I'm talking. Not you. I'm talking. Not you.

EPSHTEYN: OK.

BLOW: And he is digging into that, and trying to make that news, so I think that any time you -- if you want to make a decade's old news new again, then you --

EPSHTEYN: Clinton was president and was impeached, underwent impeachment proceedings for this. He was almost removed from office. Very different than some audio tape of a phone call to a "People" magazine reporter.

BLOW: Everything is very different, but it's about character. The entire impeachment process was about truth, whether or not he was telling the truth, and it was about the character of the person who is in the Oval Office.

EPSHTEYN: Right. BLOW: And everything that we are hearing about what he said on this

tape and also what he has said about minorities, what he said about women, a lot of it in the past, not --

EPSHTEYN: A --

BLOW: What is -- the problem -- the character issue here would be if, in fact, it is him and he's lying about it, that is a character issue. The -- at the crux of the --

EPSHTEYN: Can --

BLOW: If you let me finish, I will finish. If you want to talk, you can talk.

EPSHTEYN: Is that a criminal offense?

BLOW: You talk.

EPSHTEYN: No.

CABRERA: Let's bring Doug into the conversation because --

EPSHTEYN: They can go. I won't interrupt.

CABRERA: I think you both have made your points, but, Doug, as a Republican who has had reservations about Trump to begin with, does a tape like this make cause for more concern, do you think?

HEYE: No, not at all. I think it's an ingenious things that Trump did, that he was successful, obviously for a long time, the many, many concerns that I have about Donald Trump I could probably write a long book about it. This is not one of them. It's just more of the kind of diversion thing that Trump very skilfully creates --

CABRERA: So you don't think it's not going to hurt with party unity?

HEYE: No. I think there's a million things that will hurt with party unity, and this isn't just not one of them.

CABRERA: What about the tax issue?

We talked about how -- Clinton has this new web video out attacking Trump for not releasing taxes. He went on "Good Morning, America" this week and said "it's none of your business." Boris, presidential nominees even for the past 40 years have put out their tax information before the general election, why should Trump be held to another standard?

EPSHTEYN: There's no federal requirement. There's no IRS requirement. Talk about the IRS, let's talk about the Clinton initiative, (INAUDIBLE) four years of tax returns.

CABRERA: (INAUDIBLE) Donald Trump from releasing those tax returns except for Donald Trump himself.

EPSHTEYN: The IRS audit.

CABRERA: Legally, the audit is not going to be a barrier there?

EPSHTEYN: Both mean you can release?

CABRERA: Right.

EPSHTEYN: We're not running for president.

CABRERA: We're not. He's an American, it's his decision. It's the voter's decision how to evaluate that. That hit on him on the taxes, it's been out for months now. Did not work in the primaries and will not work in the general. What will work in the general, what will be important is to remember that Clinton Foundation, released four years of tax returns, after she says she would not take -- the Clinton Foundation donations from foreign governments, $20 million in donations from foreign governments came into the foundation while she was secretary of state. That is a huge problem.

CABRERA: So Charles, you can react.

[16:10:00]

BLOW: Again, this is a character issue and a consistency issue. If he was going to say about Mitt Romney, that part of Romney's problem is his kind of dragging his feet on issuing his tax returns, then he should also be willing to produce his tax returns, right. That's a character issue. Whether or not the people who support him continue to believe in consistency, character, truth and honesty, that's up to them.

And a lot of them have decided that is not really important to them and what is important to them is that this person is against the establishment, he is giving voice to their anger, rage and fears, whatever, and that is what is important to them. So they are basically turning a blind eye.

The Republican party has to, after this is all over, take kind of an assessment of what they have given up in order to support him and have him as their nominee. And that, I believe, in the long stretch of history, will be quite a lot.

CABRERA: I think it's interesting --

EPSHTEYN: Charles' perspective into their own.

CABRERA: I think it's kind of interesting because I hear agreements between Charles and Doug on certain things and I hear Boris and Doug agreeing on certain things. It goes to show what --

HEYE: What do we get --

CABRERA: Well, it just goes to show that this is an interesting election cycle nonetheless for Republicans that aren't going straight down the line. Boris Ephsteyn, Doug Heye and Charles Blow, thanks for all offering your thoughts and opinions. Coming up next, Hillary Clinton's strategy against Donald Trump. Should she take on his attacks or take the high road? We asked her supporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFED MALE: You don't stand up to a bully, they keep going.

UNIDENTIFED FEMALE: I don't believe in mud slinging. I don't think that helps anyone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: Hillary Clinton's campaign continues to slam Donald Trump for his refusal to release his tax returns. Take a look at this new web ad she released just today.

[16:15:04]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFED MALE: He will not follow the example of every single democratic and Republican presidential nominee 1976.

Mitt Romney posting it is disqualifying for a presidential nominee to refuse to release tax returns to the voters.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Well, that ad is part of Clinton's response to the personal attacks lodged by Donald Trump. She says she's going to stick to the issues. CNN's Randi Kaye takes a look at whether that strategy could work.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They came to hear Bill Clinton speak in Paterson, New Jersey, but long before the former president arrived, these voters were already fired up.

UNIDENTIFED MALE: Why do you stoop into the gutter with someone who wants to bring you there?

KAYE: The gutter is where many of these Hillary Clinton supporters believe Donald Trump is trying to drag her, using personal attacks about her husband's extramarital affairs dating back 20 years.

TRUMP: She was an unbelievably nasty, mean enabler and what she did to a lot of the women was disgraceful.

KAYE: Instead of hitting Trump back on his own personal transgressions, Mrs. Clinton is sticking to the issues.

HILLARY CLINTON, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have said repeatedly, I am not going to respond to the insults and the attacks coming from Donald Trump in this campaign.

KAYE (on camera): Is Hillary Clinton playing tough enough?

FRANCINE WISE, CLINTON SUPPORTER: Well, I think she's playing tough enough because I don't think slander is the name of this game. I think that she should stay focused on the agenda at hand.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't believe in mud slinging. I don't think that helps anyone.

KAYE (voice-over): But not responding to Trump's personal attacks is risky.

(on camera): Are you at all concerned that this could backfire on her? Because look at what happened to the other 16 Republican candidates who did not take on Trump.

SHAYLYNN BIVENS, CLINTON SUPPORTER: Right. I believe as time approaches closely, that she should, you know, maybe take a couple shots, but nothing too extreme because she doesn't want to be anything like Donald Trump.

KAYE: Are you at all concerned that those kinds of things could sink into the American public's view of her if she does not say something?

CHARLES FERRER, CLINTON SUPPORTER: I think the American people are intelligent enough to know what to look for, to do their research, to do their homework and not fall into the games of name saying.

KAYE: There's also the question of how Hillary Clinton should handle Donald Trump's harsh words for her husband. Trump has called Bill Clinton the worst abuser of women in the history of politics. Hillary Clinton has not responded to those remarks either.

(voice-over): A few here feels strongly that Mrs. Clinton needs to defend her husband and her family. That she's making a big mistake letting Trump, "bully her."

BOB BROWN, CLINTON SUPPORTER: If you don't stand up to a bully, they keep going. For her to sit there, let him get away with it, it's like a cancer. If you don't treat it, it metastasizes then what's going to happen? You're going to die.

KAYE: How exactly should she strike back? Use Trump's favourite weapon against him, says this supporter.

(on camera): So you think she should go after him on social media?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, he's using twitter, let her use twitter.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I would hate to be in her shoes to have to take all that.

KAYE: And staying above the fray may be harder and harder the closer we get to election day.

Randi Kaye, CNN, Paterson, New Jersey.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: All right. Let's talk more about what we could see as we head toward a potential showdown between Clinton and Trump. With me, back with me, Republican strategist and Donald Trump supporter, Boris Epshteyn, also with us in this segment, democratic strategist, Maria Cardona, who currently does work for a pro Clinton super pac.

Maria, I'll start with you. Hillary Clinton says she's going to stay above the fray, not respond to Trump's personal attacks, but as we saw in the primaries, when his Republican counterparts ignored these attacks, just didn't seem to work. What do you think of the strategy?

MARIA CARDONA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, first of all, the Republican primary electorate is very different from the general election primary electorate, and if Donald Trump continues to be obsessed with going negative, and trying to blame Hillary Clinton for what her husband did in office, the 80 percent negatives that he has with women are going to go up to 100 percent.

When you are facing a general election electorate where 53 percent of that electorate are women and the majority of that electorate are women of color, who right now have hugely high negative perceptions of Donald Trump to begin with, that's not a strategy that I think is going to work. Secondly, when he goes that way, that route, it betrays an incredible ineptitude and lack of ability on his part to meet Hillary Clinton on the battlefield of ideas, on real proposals to meet solutions that we need today as a country, and that is where she is going to hit him and hit him hard.

CABRERA: Boris, do you think that he's going to continue with personal attacks, or do you think it will shift now that it's getting closer to the general election?

[16:20:00]

EPSHTEYN: Well, you've seen Donald Trump talk a lot about policy, foreign policy, national security, immigration, the economy, taxes, so a gamut of points and proposals he has put out there, more and more as the weeks had gone on, and there will continue to be more as we turn toward the general, and, listen, depending on who his opponent is, looks like it would be Hillary, but Bernie is still in it as you reported in the final hour.

Of course he's going to turn to the history of the Clintons, they have been around for so long, and Hillary Clinton is partly here because she's been around for so long since the Bill Clinton presidency, so you can't just say she just came up yesterday, and everything that happened last 30 years doesn't have application.

To Maria's point. Donald Trump attracted not just Republicans, but a lot of independents, a lot of democrats to himself in a lot of those open primaries that were held. That's why he got more votes than any other Republican candidate in the Republican primary, and overall, he'll have a million votes of Hillary. He's in the 17 percent primary, she was in the three percent primary. Think about that. It's a huge point, and that's why Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States.

CABRERA: And Maria, I want to ask you a little bit about the demographics, because as you pointed out, Donald Trump is struggling in some areas with the minority vote, with women. But Hillary Clinton is struggling when it comes to white working class men that Donald Trump did extremely well with people in the upper midwest who really fit that category, what is Hillary Clinton do to try to make in roads there?

CARDONA: Well, I think what she'll do is to continue to fight for every vote, which is what she is doing now in the primary and when she wins the primary, she will turn and do that in the general election, and I think she'll do that by talking about her accomplishments as well as her proposals in terms of getting middle class families, working class families to succeed again, making sure they have a pathway to meet the American dream and to be able to reach their god given potential, which is why she has been in public office and in public service for the last 30 years.

But I will also say that the electorates that Hillary Clinton is now winning with are actually the voters and electorates that are getting larger and growing. The electorate that you mentioned is an electorate that keeps getting smaller. In fact, Mitt Romney won that electorate with 62 percent and he lost the election.

So, again, if Donald Trump does not focus on trying to get more women and more minorities on his side, there is no path for him, there is no path for him, no realistic pathway for him to the White House.

CABRERA: Boris, what does Trump need to do to get some of those voter groups?

EPSHTYEN: Well, he did very well with Hispanics in Nevada, did well with Hispanics --

CABRERA: There are a lot more Hispanics that are democratic than Republicans.

EPSHTEYN: Hispanics in Florida as well, which is obviously a vital state. Now, the key for Donald Trump is to talk about his proposals, and talk about what he's bringing, which is completely new and fresh. You know, Maria talked about Hillary Clinton's accomplishments. What accomplishments? She was an inconsequential senator and a terrible secretary of state. Everything she did is worse now than when she came into office as secretary of state. The Middle East. China. Russia. This country's unquestionably worse off now than before she was secretary of state.

So Donald Trump needs to focus on that contrast. Talk about what he has done, his success as a businessman, what he brings to the presidency. Hillary Clinton, hey, she's been around a long time, but just because you've been around a long time doesn't mean you're successful or good at anything, it just means you've been there for a while. CABRERA: Maria, last word.

CARDONA: This is why I think the contrast will be absolutely great for Hillary Clinton, because while Donald Trump was running around Manhattan in the 1990s (INAUDIBLE) his credentials as a playboy billionaire going on the Howard Stern show -- talking about women's bills and talking about sex acts, Hillary Clinton was actually giving health care to eight million children and focusing --

EPSHTEYN: What happened to not going for the personal attacks, Maria?

CARDONA: ... lives better. And I think that's a contrast that she will win.

EPSHTEYN: That was a personal attacks that the Clinton folks that they're going to stay away from, and the reason they are doing it --

CARDONA: That's not a personal attack, but a fact. I just -- i just talked about an accomplishment, Boris.

EPSHTEYN: It's a generic statement.

CARDONA: No, it's not. It's actually pretty specific.

EPSHTEYN: If that's an accomplishment, maybe it's Bill Clinton's accomplishment, it's not hers.

CARDONA: When you fight for and get health care for eight million children, that's very specific. Donald Trump has never fought for anybody.

EPSHTEYN: Are you talking about Obamacare now?

CARDONA: No. I'm not talking about Obamacare, I'm talking about the child care called S-chip. You should go look it up. Donald Trump has never fought for anybody except for himself and his own self-interest.

CABRERA: All right, guys. We're going to have to leave it there.

EPSHTEYN: Trump created millions of jobs --

And built a lot of buildings in this country and he's done much more than Hillary Clinton ever has.

CABRERA: All right, Boris Epshteyn, Maria Cardona. It is going to be a fun election going forward. We appreciate you both.

Coming up, our Christine Romans, on the Trump tax debate and the last time a presidential candidate withheld their forms before an election.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: What is your tax rate?

TRUMP: It's none of your business. You'll see it when I release, but I fight hard to pay as little tax as possible. (END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:28:45]

CABRERA: Renewed scrutiny for Donald Trump and the release of his income tax information. So far, the likely Republican nominee says he will not release that information, at least, not yet, saying he's waiting for an IRS audit to finish first.

Now he even told ABC's George Stephanopoulous that his tax rate is, "none of your business."

More now from chief business correspondent, Christine Romans.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: All right. Ana, Trump's taxes, this is the big controversy this week. Will he release those before the election? He says he won't release them before the audit is done, and that could actually mean that we won't be able to see his tax history before November.

It would be turning it upside down quite frankly. It's been since 1976 since the last time a presidential candidate would not turn over tax information for the voters to peruse before an election, 1976, Gerald Ford, after that every single one of these candidates has released the tax information to the public. This is, after all, the biggest job in the world, this job interview and this is one of the pieces of information that we have become used to see from candidates.

[16:30:04] You might recall Mitt Romney in 2012 released his 2010 tax returns and it showed an effective tax rate of 14.1 percent. At the time, he was criticized because the middle class pays higher taxes than that.

Now Mitt Romney himself is asking for Donald Trump to release his tax information suggesting that perhaps there's a bombshell in there that he is not -- he is hiding.

So what has Donald Trump said about why he won't release his taxes? Let's listen to this, these different explanations.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

TRUMP: I mean closer to releasing your tax returns. Well, I'm thinking about. I'm thinking about maybe when we find out the true story on Hillary's e-mails.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

ROMANS: That's one explanation. And then he said this.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

TRUMP: We're working on that now. We have big returns as you know and I have everything all approved and very beautiful. And we'll be working on that over the next period of time.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

ROMANS: Working on that over the next period of time. And a reminder, the IRS has told us, "There is nothing legally preventing him from releasing those tax returns while he's under audit."

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

TRUMP: Nobody would ever put out their returns that's under an audit. You're in the midst of negotiating and talking to the IRS. You never put it out. You would never do that. Your lawyers would never allow you to do that.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

ROMANS: In fact Richard Nixon was under audit, he was running for president and he did released his tax information. And then there's this.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You don't learn anything about it. A tax return you learn very, very little.

ROMANS: But I just think there's some years outside the audit that might be release ballistically if they give ...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: First of all, if there are, they're meaningless, OK.

ROMANS: All right (inaudible).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It doesn't matter because they're so far back.

ROMANS: Meaningless. Well, here is what you can find in that tax information. You can find how much is the tax rate of the person. This is the person who is going to be trying to set policy with congress on tax reform. You also find out how much money they made.

Donald Trump on every campaign stamp, it is his success in business that he often talks about. Investment in business income, what do these businesses look like. And then there's this, how much money does he give away to charity? What are his deductions? On that all valuable information for voters, all information they may not see.

CABRERA: Thanks so much, Christine Romans.

Now, this is one of Trump's signatures lines saying he is self-funding his campaign, but now he's reaching out for help.

Coming up, we'll take you inside the donor wars.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

TRUMP: So I'm self-funding, all of this is mine. When I fly in, it's on my dime, right? It's on mine.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: The fight is on for campaign cash. Republican presumptive nominee, Donald Trump and Democratic front runner, Hillary Clinton, both sent their respective teams to a high profile Las Vegas event for the biggest names in finance.

The purpose of this trip, court potential donors.

And CNN's Phil Mattingly reports, the campaigns are making their case directly to the super wealthy people who will likely help fund this election.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The war is on. Here in Las Vegas behind closed doors, a crucial fight for big money. It's one of the biggest gatherings in the financial world with more than a thousand potential donors all with deep pockets.

Sprinkled with star power from sports legends like Kobe Bryant and Hollywood stars like Will Smith and Ron Howard. Millionaires and billionaires picking their sides and how they see their roles in each campaign.

THOMAS BOONE PICKENS, JR., AMERICAN BUSINESS MAGNATE AND FINANCIER: It would be helping with other people. Of course it should be money, and I would contribute to each campaign.

MATTINGLY: Billionaire energy tycoon T. Boone Pickens pledging his cash. The presumptive GOP nominee who wants shunned Wall Street money, now facing a stark reality. He must help raise as much as $1 billion with the bare knuckle general election fight that looms. But not everyone here where there is a clear Republican majority is sold.

RAY NOLTE, CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER AND CO-MANAGING PARTNER OF SKYBRIDGE: There's certainly some nervousness around some of the rhetoric that we've, you know, that we've heard and some of the policy positions that, you know, he's kind of said without a lot of depth behind them.

MATTINGLY: Something that Hillary Clinton supporters see as an opening.

ROBERT WOLF, FORMER PRESIDENT AND CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER OF UBS INVESTMENT BANK: There's a lot of one-liners that seem to literally be magnified in the airwaves. But I think when it comes to substance, Secretary Clinton is by far away the one candidate that actually talks with real substance.

MATTINGLY: Robert Wolf is one of President Obama's top fundraisers and liaison to Wall Street. Now an outside adviser to Clinton's campaign.

WOLF: When you ask people here, you know, why do you support, you know, Donald Trump for presidency. Most of the answers are, it's either, "I'm a Republican." or "I don't like the secretary."

Seldom is it because I think Donald Trump is the right person to be president.

MATTINGLY: Trump's team trying to close that gap. Sending his top finance official, Steve Mnuchin, here for private meetings. Top supporter and former senator Scott Brown also here talking to potential donors. All in an effort to give a critical impression to donors. Trump's liaison finance operation is for real.

NOLTE: The growing sentiment though is, he is going to put together a very strong team. He's going to surround himself with good people.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

CABRERA: Our thanks to Phil Matinggly for that report.

And coming up right after the break, we're going to break down this campaign donor wars. Stay right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: Welcome back.

But just before the break, we told you about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton sending their campaign reps to that high profile finance conference in Las Vegas to find wealthy donors. So I want to bring in CNN Politics Reporter Tom LoBianco.

Tom you wrote about Trump's proposed ban on Muslims entering the U.S.. And how Trump suddenly says now he's flexible about this issue. Do you think that has anything to do with him kind of changing his position on this because of potential donors?

TOM LOBIANCO, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Absolutely. I mean, the question is tone. That's what you hear from everyone.

You don't necessarily hear a change the policy and part of the reason why is because it's so hard to figure out precisely what his policy is. That's been one of the big questions, but tone is absolutely.

We heard that from Phil Mattingly piece earlier. And, you know, we heard it up on the Hill this week from the Republicans, the Republican lawmakers that we're meeting with them. They want to see the tone change. That's absolutely what has to happen here.

CABRERA: Like you said, there seems to be a little bit of mysteries surrounding policy even far because Trump's seems to be shifting his position. You could say at the very least last week, he changed his tone on increasing the minimum wage. And his conservatives responded kind of negatively to that.

Do some republican donors worry about Trump's loyalty to the traditionally conservative causes?

LOBIANCO: Well, you know, there's interesting behind the scenes stuff happening here. You know when he became the presumptive nominee, there was a ground shift, right? If you were a conservative, as a traditional conservative, a traditional Republican, you couldn't look to Ted Cruz anymore as kind of the savior, if you will. You couldn't count the convention.

So there's a couple ways you can go, right? You can look at the Never Trump Movement which is maybe we go with the third option. That's the one way they've splintered off.

Another way is they're saying, you know, to heck with the presidential stuff. We're going to go down ballot. We're going to look at senate races. We're going to protect the senate. We're going to protect the House.

You can look to Paul Ryan, not as presidential candidate, but as the standard bearer, as someone you can support for a clear conservative agenda.

They fractured, all right? And -- but what's happened is that, Trump has to bring the folks back in. You know, we heard during that piece from Phil that it's a billion dollars, all right.

OK. Trump put in a fair amount of money during the primary, but a billion dollars is quite a bit cough up, you know, even for a billionaire right?

So, you got to have the money, you got to have that money, forget the air time for a second because, you know, he clearly has no problem with that. You got to have the money for staff. You got to have the money for events. You got that money to -- for sustained events. You got to have -- a billion dollars is in many ways your baseline.

So he's got to go to these donors and he's go to -- here's Republican standard bearers. If you look at, you know, Sheldon Adelson, the casino magnate is now on board with him. He's saying he's going to pledge a $100 million.

[16:45:08] Look at that and that comes from Newt Gingrich, presumably that's the tie, all right. Adelson is a huge supporter of Newt Gingrich. Gingrich is now a supporter of Trump. He is been supporting him more or less behind the scenes. There has been a big connecter for Trump behind the scenes for months now, but now it's official. You need more of that. And that's that we're trying do right now.

CABRERA: All right. It will be interesting to see what that means in terms of the trickle down effect, because he's made such a big deal during the primaries saying he was going to be a self-funder and that big money comes big influence. And he way was -- and going to have anything to do with that, but that seems like that's not the case anymore.

Tom LoBianco ...

LOBIANCO: Not anymore.

CABRERA: ...thank you for providing your expertise and insight there.

LOBIANCO: Thank you

CABRERA: Well, the fight continues as Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders battle for delegates in a couple more states. Watch our all day coverage of the Kentucky and Oregon primaries happening this coming Tuesday.

Still ahead, Donald Trump calling for Republicans to unite. But he claims he doesn't need that to win. So is he right?

We'll talk about it, right after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: Donald Trump and top Republicans took a big step this week trying to heal the wounds left by that brutal primary season.

[16:50:03] Will the presumptive Republican nominee met face to face with House Speaker Paul Ryan who still has not officially endorsed Trump but they have said that they are moving forward.

Will it be that easy to unify a heavily fractured Republican Party? Well let's talk it over.

CNN contributor and Princeton University Historian Julian Zelizer is joining me now. All right. Let's go way back and hear the history about here. 1850, that's when the wig party went out the window and the Republican Party as we know it came to be. As what we're seeing now, this election's cycle reminiscing at all what happened back then?

JULIAN ZELIZER, CNN CONTRIBUTOR AND PRINCETON UNIVERSITY HISTORIAN: No, I don't think so. I think the Republican Party generally is in pretty good shape. They have contentious candidate, and there are divisions about Donald Trump. But I think overall, if you look nationally in the states, and even in Washington, in the House of Representatives, the party is pretty strong. So I think it will overcome this, even though it might lose in November.

CABRERA: What do you see as far as history? Is there anything that you can compare this to?

ZELIZER: Sure, we've had contentious primaries in 1976, Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford, the president really went at it, and it was divided right into the convention in 1980, the same thing happened between Ted Kennedy and Jimmy Carter on the democratic side. So there are kind of examples whether deep divisions, and it hurts the party, but the party in the long run does survived.

CABRERA: What's causing such deep division, what's making for this perfect storm of sorts?

ZELIZER: Some of it's the candidates, some of it's the party. So Donald Trump is part of the reason. Now, this is who he is, and he brings this kind fire wherever he goes. But part of these are divisions in the party. I mean, there are many republicans who are unhappy with the situation in their communities including their jobs, and they are unhappy with their own party. And so, I think some of this is playing out through Trump, even though it's not all about him.

CABRERA: And on that note, he thinks that he can do it without unifying the party that he could still become president. I want you to take a quick listen to what he said.

(BEGINAUDIO CLIP)

TRUMP: So I want to bring the party together. Does the party have to be together? Does it have to be unified? I'm very different than everybody else perhaps it's ever ran for office, I actually don't think so.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

CABRERA: Is Trump underestimating what a fracture could means for him in the general election?

ZELIZER: Well, certainly it could be disastrous. In 1964, republicans were divided over Barry Goldwater, and the party got devastated in the election, but he's also right. A party doesn't have to be totally unified. And it's not clear at this moment how divided they will be, come September and October.

Many republicans are now endorsing Donald Trump, nine house committee chairs endorsed him on Friday and many other republican leaders are falling in line. So we have to see how deep these divisions are.

CABRERA: And I want to read you something that another historian wrote, Eric Foner, he told the Washington post quote, "The parties both the republicans and the democrats are certainly weaker than they have been in some time." Really, it seems that they have ever been before. You know, he talks about the influence of big money, growing number of independence. Do you agree with this comment?

ZELIZER: Well, we don't know about the independents yet. How extensive they are? But he's right, looking at both parties, there's been basically a revolt against the party leadership. It doesn't mean the parties are going to collapse yet, but there's a lot of unrest in both parties with the status quo, with the candidates who have been around several election cycles, and there's clearly a demand for change.

So, it could be like after the '60s when both parties underwent a generational change of leadership, you know. The Ronald Reagans for the republicans, the Jimmy Carters for the democrats, and we entered into a new era. That could very well happen with the parties still remaining in tact.

CABRERA: What about the idea of a third party candidate? Is the political system or structure in the U.S. such that a third party candidate could succeed?

ZELIZER: I doubt it. Very difficult. We haven't seen that happen for a long time. But they certainly could cause problems for one of the major parties. They could run, they could steal away some votes, and after damage maybe the republican nominee, but I don't think there's going to be a third party success. The power of the parties are very strong in our political system and it's hard to move them.

CABRERA: All right. Well, great insight, thank you so much for joining us. Good to have you Julian Zelizer.

ZELIZER: Thank you.

CABRERA: Now we'll take a quick break. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: A Colorado adventurer is redefining what it means to be blind. He is breaking down barriers. In his own life, he's also helping others to do the same. CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta has his story in this turning point.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Erik Weihenmayer has scaled the seven summits and braved the violent Colorado River rapids in the dark. At four years old, he was diagnosed with a rare eye disease called juvenile retinoschisis. By high school, Erik was completely blind.

ERIK WEIHENMAYER, FIRST BLIND PERSON TO REACH THE SUMMIT OF MOUNT EVEREST: I wanted to be with my friends and going on dates. And I was afraid that I wasn't going to be able to participate in life.

GUPTA: But he did, joining the wrestling team and learning how to rock climb

WEIHENMAYER: You're just feeling way off the rock phase.

GUPTA: He become an accomplished mountaineer and set his sights on Everest.

WEIHENMAYER: Himalayan experts said, "You cannot stop if you fall, you can't think at high altitude, it wouldn't be a good place for a blind person."

GUPTA: Erik disagreed, and in 2001, he became the first blind person to reach the summit of Mt. Everest.

WEIHENMAYER: Going around the top.

(OFF-MIC)

I can't believe it.

GUPTA: Seeking out new adventures, Erik trained for six years to kayak, 277 miles of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon.

WEIHENMAYER: Well, I'm not just doing these things, so I could prove that blind people can do this or that. That's kind of shallow. You do it because that's living fully.

GUPTA: The now 47-year-old is using that mantra to help others facing challenges through his nonprofit, no barriers.

WEIHENMAYER: I think in our lives, all of us in a way are climbing blind.

GUPTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: You are in CNN NEWSROOM top of the hour. I'm Ana Cabrera and so Poppy Harlow, thanks for joining us.

Just as Donald Trump and republican leadership agreed to work towards party unity, there's a new potential controversy dominating the headlines.

An audio recording from the 1990's just surfaced, and it's raising questions about whether Trump may have post as his own P.R. guide during the phone interview with the reporter.