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Sanders Pushes On; Romney Ends Third Party Recruiting. Aired 2- 2:30p ET
Aired May 18, 2016 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[14:00:17] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Here we go. You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Thank you so much for being with me on your Wednesday.
Listen, we are just a couple of months away from selecting America's next president, and both Republicans and Democrats are as divided as ever within their own parties. Once again, the electorate is angry. The electorate playing an integral role here, but this time it is Bernie Sanders who is being asked to rein in his own supporters.
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BALDWIN: After Nevada's Democratic Convention spiraled into chairs being tossed and just absolute chaos there, furious Sanders supporters say Democrats are stealing the election and favoring Hillary Clinton. Some even issuing death threats to state party leaders. The chair, I spoke with just yesterday, told me she's threatened one every one or two seconds. U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer was booed in Nevada and since then she tells CNN she has spoken with Senator Sanders.
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SEN. BARBARA BOXER (D), CALIFORNIA: There was no way to control what was happening. And I did fear for my safety. I did call Bernie a couple of times and he did phone me back last night. And he was very - he was very distressed about it. And it was a very warm conversation. And I told him - he expressed shock that his people would do it. I did tell him the vast majority of those Bernie supporters were sitting in their chairs. They were fine. But there was this group of 50 to 100 people. They were not young people. They were older people. And that he ought to check out to see who these people are. And he said he would.
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BALDWIN: At a rally in California, Sanders signaled to his supporters that the Democratic leadership is not on their side.
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SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: So I say to the leadership of the Democratic Party, open the doors, let the people in!
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BALDWIN: Senator Sanders just won the Democratic primary in Oregon. He lost Kentucky to Secretary Clinton by a razor-thin margin. He holds another California rally in just a couple of hours in San Jose.
Let's kick this hour off with my colleague, CNN's senior political correspondent Jeff Zeleny there in California.
And so, you know, the question is, obviously it looks beautiful and calm where you are now. Is there any sense of that divisiveness that we saw in Nevada trickling over where you are in California?
JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brooke, there's no question that feelings really at this point are so raw between the Clinton side and the Sanders side, largely because many Democrats just want to get on with this. They want to start, you know, looking forward to this race ahead with Donald Trump here. But Bernie Sanders supporters feel entitled and they want to have a vote, particularly here in California. Now, there are some 475 delegates up here for grabs in California on June 7th. That's three more weeks of a heated contest with Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton.
Now, I can tell you, among Bernie Sanders supporters, they believe that this is much ado about nothing really. They believe that they have every right to stay in. And it's important to note the Clinton campaign is not calling for them to get out at all, but, Brooke, I had an interesting conversation last night after that Sanders rally with a brother and sister who are firm committed Sanders supporters. I asked them if they would ever be able to support Hillary Clinton when she becomes the nominee. Let's listen.
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ZELENY: Do you think Hillary Clinton can unite the Democratic Party if -
ANGEL HUIPIO, BERNIE SANDERS SUPPORTER: I do not think so, honestly.
ZELENY: Why not?
A. HUIPIO: I know a lot - I know a lot of people who would, even if she gets the candidacy, would refuse to vote for her because they do not believe in anything that she stands for. They think she's two- faced, a liar and they would rather vote for someone else or do a write-in ballot. They say Bernie or bust. They just - I don't think that she can unite the party.
ZELENY: So is it Bernie or bust for you?
MICHAEL HUIPIO, BERNIE SANDERS SUPPORTER: Well, absolutely. In the state of California, we're a firmly blue state. The Electoral College guarantees that no matter who the eventual nominee is, they will get all 55 of our electors. So there's really no reason for me to vote for Hillary Clinton in the general election. It's Bernie or bust for me. I'll write in him name.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZELENY: Now, Brooke, we have yet to hear directly from Bernie Sanders on this - on these - on this violence in Nevada. He talked to Senator Boxer, as we heard earlier, but he has not yet addressed it. He may do that later today here in California.
BALDWIN: We'll listen for that. But let me just pick up. We mentioned Kentucky, where Secretary Clinton won -
ZELENY: Right.
BALDWIN: But, you know, it was a very, very thin victory on terms of margins. What are you hearing from the Sanders campaign? I understand there are reports that they may be looking to - to recount.
ZELENY: It is the smallest margin of victory. We're talking just several hundred votes here. But the Sanders campaign is leaving open their option to review these. They do not think that anything is wrong in the numbers at this point. Last night I talked to a senior adviser who said they were not going to request a recount. Now they are saying today, the senator's spokesman is saying, they are still looking at the numbers before they make that determination.
[14:05:17] But, Brooke, this sort of gets to the bigger point here that angers some Democratic Party officials and the Clinton campaign for sure. They are wondering if Bernie Sanders and his campaign are trying to, you know, keep hope alive unnecessarily for some of his supporters and not leveling with them in terms of the math of all this, because the bottom line in all of this is, math doesn't lie. Hillary Clinton is 88 delegates away from winning - from clinching the nomination. Bernie Sanders is more than 10 times that, Brooke. So his supporters like him, no question, but the math here is the truth, and that's what we have to follow in this case.
BALDWIN: I know it's the math, but on your note of keeping hope alive, think back to '08, think back to those last slew of victories that Hillary Clinton had before she ultimately bowed out.
ZELENY: Right.
BALDWIN: Jeff Zeleny, thank you so much.
Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders' campaign manager spoke out against the threats that some Sanders supporters have been making, specifically in Nevada, but also laid blame on the chair of the Democratic National Committee.
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JEFF WEAVER, SANDERS' CAMPAIGN MANAGER: He categorically condemns any kind of threats that went on. Absolutely unacceptable. You know, Debbie Wasserman Schultz - we could have a long conversation just about Debbie Wasserman Schultz and how she's been throwing shade on the Sanders campaign since the very beginning.
(END VIDEO CLIP) BALDWIN: On that shade, we heard from Debbie Wasserman Schultz herself talking to Wolf moments ago.
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REP. DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (D), CHAIR, DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE: My response to that is #smh, if we're going to talk about throwing - that comment about throwing shade. We need to focus on one thing, get through this primary and work to prepare for the general election. So I understand that there are people that would like to fan the flames and - and, you know, distract from our task at hand. That plays right into the Republicans' hands. We're going to be united and we're going to come together.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: Let's talk about this. Joining me now, the author of "The Essential Bernie Sanders and His Vision for America," political strategist Jonathan Tasini is here, and CNN commentator Bakari Sellers, who is supporting Hillary Clinton.
Gentlemen, nice to see you of both.
BAKARI SELLERS, CNN COMMENTATOR: Good to see you.
JONATHAN TASINI, AUTHOR, "THE ESSENTIAL BERNIE SANDERS AND HIS VISION FOR AMERICA": Good to be here, Brooke.
BALDWIN: Mr. Tasini, to you first. You know, on the fact that Senator Sanders had a mega platform last night and, you know, understand the frustrations from him and folks in his campaign and supporters and their passion for Senator Sanders, but, you know, he never once sort of spoke to the supporters and addressed what had happened in Nevada. Instead, the frustration over it, listen, Democratic Party, you need to be fair to us as well. Should he have said more though?
TASINI: I think in a statement that he made previous to the rally, I didn't actually see his speech in the rally. It was late at night. I had to go to bed. But in terms of the statement he made earlier, I think he addressed it. And I think that if you also put this in context, if you look at the entire year that Bernie has ran - run in this campaign, tens of thousands of people, there's not been a single act of violence in any of those campaigns all throughout the country and there was no violence at that convention. There was a lot of raucousness. There was yelling, you know. I've been in politics a long time and I've been at union meetings that were a lot more raucous when people were debating strike votes and lots of other things. People waved signs. They booed. They yelled -
BALDWIN: But chairs being flipped? The chair of the convention saying that she's being threatened?
TASINI: No, first of all, show me - no, show me one - show me - hold on. Let's separate the two things.
BALDWIN: Sure. TASINI: At the convention itself -
BALDWIN: Sure.
TASINI: Show me one video there where it showed chairs being thrown. Bernie and everybody else, show me where the chairs are actually being thrown. There wasn't (ph). I reviewed some of those videos. But let's be clear, everybody has said that the threats against the chair of the party, the death threats, were totally unacceptable and out of bounds.
BALDWIN: Right.
TASINI: That is absolutely abhorrent and I don't know the delegates at the convention were not those people. People, you know, phoned in over the phone that it was posted. That was unacceptable. That was out of bounds. Nobody in the Sanders campaign supports that. And those people don't -
BALDWIN: Here's the chair. You've seen this.
TASINI: And those people - they're picking it up. Where are they throwing them? No, this is - honestly, Brooke. But I'll be - I've been in politics a long time. It was raucous. It was unpleasant for some people. Sometimes that's the way political conventions get. Political -
BALDWIN: Barbara Boxer said she feared for her life.
TASINI: Shouting.
BALDWIN: That's not nothing.
TASINI: All I'm saying is that to me the idea of freedom of speech, of being able to stand up and voice your displeasure, and let's get to the core of why people are upset, which is one thing people don't want to -
SELLERS: But that's -
BALDWIN: Jump in.
TASINI: But let me - let me finish. Let me - let me - let me just finish that and then you can (INAUDIBLE).
SELLERS: (INAUDIBLE) OK. OK. Finish your thought.
TASINI: The thing that we actually don't talk about is the fundamental question of why people got agitated, which was their feeling that 64 delegates from Bernie Sanders were disenfranchised and were not allowed to vote.
SELLERS: There -
TASINI: That's the core thing that we've not really dug into.
SELLERS: There's no excuse for that. There's no excuse for that. And for anyone to say that there's an excuse for that, for anyone to give an apology and use the word "but," which negates everything before it is not leadership. What Bernie Sanders had the opportunity to do last night and which he didn't, what Jeff Weaver had the opportunity to do last night and this morning was make an unequivocal apology and actually - and show leadership for what happened. No, you're not responsible for all of your supporters. By no means. And is this all the Bernie Sanders' supporters? No. In fact, it's a very small number.
[14:10:17] However, leadership - you're running for president of the United States. You have to show that leadership. You have to show that courage, not when it's easy, but sometimes when it's difficult. Now, this isn't the first time the Democratic Party has been here. In fact, in 2008, we were here and we had PUMAs (ph) - party unity - well, I'm going to have to let your viewers google what PUMAs meant. But at that time you had Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, they both showed leadership at that point. Hillary Clinton even told her PUMAs not to show up in Denver. Barack Obama actually sat down Samantha Power and Jesse Jackson for some of the things they were saying about Hillary Clinton. That is the type of leadership that we have to have.
TASINI: But you're combining -
SELLERS: And to say - and to say that - and to say that this process is rigged is frustrating because of the simple fact -
TASINI: (INAUDIBLE) yes. My friend (ph). Let me -
SELLERS: And I will - let me - let me finish this thought.
TASINI: But we're conflating many, many things.
SELLERS: Let me finish his thought. Let me finish this thought.
TASINI: OK. Please, go ahead.
SELLERS: The fact of the matter is, that the reason that Bernie Sanders is not winning this race has - it's not the DNC. The fact of the matter is, Hillary Clinton has 3 million more votes than Bernie Sanders, and those are facts.
TASINI: Right. Fair enough. Let me separate and go back for a second. I do not think that in the United States of America we should say to people, you should not stand up and protest. You should not yell. You should not scream. You should not say things.
BALDWIN: Absolutely, First Amendment.
SELLERS: Absolutely.
TASINI: Which is - which is fundamentally what happened at that convention because - because - hold on -
BALDWIN: But there's one thing in expressing yourself and the First Amendment -
TASINI: But I - BALDWIN: It's another to chuck chairs, threaten people -
TASINI: To - again, I want to - their -
SELLERS: Well, but, I mean, but you -
TASINI: Wait a minute -
SELLERS: You can't tell Barbara Boxer that she - when Barbara Boxer, who is a lioness in the Senate, says she feels threatened, that's OK?
TASINI: No, but I happen to think Barbara - I like Barbara Boxer and I think she's been terrific as a progressive senator, but whoever was yelling at her, they had the right to do that. And Barbara's in the public arena. That's part of the, if you will, politics ain't beanbag. And I think that's a very dangerous road to go if any campaign, whether it be the Sanders campaign or the Clinton campaign, anybody says, you should not stand up and protest. You should not voice your displeasure.
SELLERS: No one is saying that.
TASINI: That's very different and I said from the beginning and the Sanders campaign has been clear, the death threats and the threats of bodily harm are totally unacceptable in political discourse.
I do want to say now to Bakari's other point about the questions between the PUMAs, the ongoing conflict. Look, we have a party that is divided about fundamental issues. And I think that's going to expression itself at the convention. That does not mean, in my opinion, that we can't come out of the convention and know that whoever's the nominee we have to defeat Donald Trump. But their -
BALDWIN: Can we - thank you for bringing him up because this is my final thought.
TASINI: Yes. Yes.
BALDWIN: And I love this conversation and I appreciate it and I think that - I'm wondering if Donald Trump - we talked so much about the rift and the civil war, whatever the headline was in the Republican Party. I mean is he just kicking it and loving this because it's painting a rosier picture on his side?
SELLER: Well, they - the issues - the issues that Democrats have are issues that are not the politics of personal destruction, although there are some instances of that. Donald Trump engaged in the politics of personal destruction. You saw that with Jeb Bush. You saw that with Ted Cruz. You saw that with Marco Rubio. The list goes on and on and on. And so those rifts may not be able to be mended.
This - what we have right now is, is a vacuum. And - and all I'm asking for - I'm not asking for anything that's - that's special or anything that's outrageous. I just want Bernie Sanders - I'm asking Bernie Sanders to step up at this moment in time and show the leadership that we all know that he's capable of doing. That's all I'm saying.
TASINI: So to - so if I - if I can respond. I have two things quickly.
BALDWIN: Please. Yes.
TASINI: The vacuum is partly the incompetence, and I consider the moral bankruptcy of Debbie Wasserman Schultz. I think she should resign this week. She should be replaced by other people who are much more independent. She has lost complete - we have -
BALDWIN: Because why? What would you like to see her do instead?
TASINI: Well - well, first of all, this has a long history going back to what we think has been a fairly - her attempt to tip the scales towards the Clinton campaign when she didn't organize enough debates, when she put them at times that people wouldn't watch. There's a feeling of mistrust between the Sanders campaign and Debbie Wasserman Schultz. I think someone like Donna Brazile, Tulsi Gabbard, any of the other DNC chairs should be the temporary chairs of the convention.
BALDWIN: OK.
TASINI: If we want to have an orderly convention.
BALDWIN: OK.
TASINI: But I do think Bernie Sanders has shown enormous leadership throughout this campaign and continues to do so, as he calls for political revolution, which, yes, is a challenge to the party.
BALDWIN: We have to go. I appreciate both of you. Again, he's holding this rally again in California. Will he say anything? You say he's, you know, exemplified his leadership, shown his leadership, and you're asking for more. We'll see. Bakari and Jonathan, thank you for now.
SELLERS: Thank you.
BALDWIN: A quick programming note for you. Tomorrow afternoon - yes, pat - pat him on the back.
Tomorrow afternoon -
TASINI: (INAUDIBLE) pizza. (INAUDIBLE).
BALDWIN: There you go. I'll take a slice, thank you.
Tomorrow afternoon, Hillary Clinton sits down for a live one-on-one interview with Chris Cuomo. Do not miss it, 1:00 Eastern, right here on CNN.
[14:15:02] Coming up next, let's talk Republicans. Breaking news in the efforts to take down Donald Trump. Hear what Mitt Romney is now doing, what he's saying after word broke that he has been recruiting potential third party candidates. We have more on that.
Also, more breaking news. The head of American intelligence says the 2016 campaigns are under cyber-attack. We'll tell you who might be behind that.
And Trump says he would meet with one of the world's most infamous dictators, Kim Jong-un. Why? That's ahead.
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BALDWIN: Welcome back. You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin.
Some news just into us here. It appears Mitt Romney is giving up hope of finding someone to launch a third party bid against Donald Trump. A source familiar with Romney's thinking tells CNN that the 2012 Republican presidential nominee is not actively recruiting anyone else now for this third party bid. As we've been talking about, you know, he reportedly had reached out to Nevada Senator Ben Sasse and Trump' former rival Ohio Governor John Kasich. They have both said no.
[14:20:09] So let's begin there with CNN's chief political correspondent Dana Bash and "Washington Post" political reporter Ed O'Keefe.
So, Dana, hello.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Brooke.
BALDWIN: A piece of this reporting, a never Trump adviser acknowledged to - and I think this is Jim Acosta's reporting, that their efforts, the never Trumpers, that it's looking grim.
BASH: Right.
BALDWIN: Is this the end of never Trump?
BASH: I don't necessarily think it's the end of never Trump, but it's the - I should actually, in answering that question, make clear that never Trump has been shrinking dramatically since it became clear that Trump was going to be the nominee. People who we never thought would be anywhere but the never Trump camp are now shifting and that what these conservatives, and I've been talking to many of them for weeks if not months, but in the past couple of weeks were hoping to do, as you said, is push a third party idea. But their big problem was they haven't been able to find a candidate.
BALDWIN: Everyone's saying no.
BASH: Everyone is saying no and that continues to be the case and so, you know, the end of this road appears to be pretty close, if not here for them.
BALDWIN: Ed, would you like to chime in before we move on to Ivanka Trump?
ED O'KEEFE, POLITICAL REPORTER, "THE WASHINGTON POST": I think the only - the only element of the so-called never Trump movement at this point that really has a shot at doing anything to slow or blunt Trump, if you will, are the conservative activists who have been elected delegates to the convention who might try to use the different rules committee -
BALDWIN: Yes.
O'KEEFE: And credential committee meetings that happen before the convention begins to either tweak the party platform, make a last- ditch effort to allow somebody else's name to be put into consideration, or make other changes that at least require Trump to make some concessions. But this idea of finding a white knight to ride in, I think that died, frankly, back in the spring when Mike Bloomberg decided there was no way to do it. He's one of the few Americans who has the billions and the bandwidth to do it and he said it just isn't possible.
BASH: And the one thing I will add to that, Brooke, and I, of course, agree with my friend Ed on no white knight, but there are tactics that they still insist that they're going to use, like trying to convince fellow grass roots conservatives who simply don't trust Trump as a conservative, to write somebody in, to basically have a protest vote. Obviously most of them are not going to vote for Hillary Clinton, but to have a protest vote, focus their efforts on the Senate and the House -
O'KEEFE: Yes.
BASH: Which is still not a great thing for Donald Trump if you need to, you know, rally the base behind you, as every presidential candidate needs.
BALDWIN: Get everyone together. Yes. Yes.
Let's move to Donald Trump's oldest daughter. She is speaking out. She's coming to his defense. Ivanka Trump is calling "The New York Times" much talked about expose from over the weekend of her father and his alleged mistreatment of women. She's calling it disturbing.
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IVANKA TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP'S DAUGHTER: I was bothered by it. But it's largely been discredited since. So most of the time when stories are inaccurate, they're not discredited. And I will be frustrated by that. But in this case, I think they went so far. They had such a strong thesis and created facts to reinforce it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: You know, looking at you and watching all of that it's like, I don't know if it's - I mean she's so extraordinary, Ivanka Trump, right, that that's sort of one piece, or the fact that you have to hear Donald Trump's oldest daughter saying, you know, essentially, my dad isn't a groper.
BASH: You know, in any other year, in any other cycle, for any other candidate, having a candidate's daughter come out and say, my father's not a groper, would mean that there is a five-alarm fire going on inside the campaign. But for Donald Trump, it's not good. It's clear that it shows that he needs to work on female voters for the general election.
BALDWIN: Yes.
BASH: But it's not the end of the world for Donald Trump because he's been through this kind of thing for months and months during the primary. It's a different electorate. It's a different kind of vote that they need. They need to pull over independent voters and women who don't necessarily vote in primaries, who didn't necessarily vote for him if they did.
BALDWIN: Right.
BASH: But are more - tend more to vote Republican. I mean that is clearly a problem. And the fact that she had her come out and - they had her come out or she chose to come out and say, I'm a feminist and I don't think my father is bad for women, pretty - pretty intense.
BALDWIN: I agree with you.
BASH: Yes.
BALDWIN: I agree with you.
And, finally, Ed, on, you know, Trump ending his self-funding promise, you know, reached this deal with the RNC. Tell me more about that.
O'KEEFE: Yes. It looks like a deal that will allow them to raise almost $500,000 in some pops from individuals that would go to his campaign, to the RNC, potentially to some other accounts and down ballot races. This is tradition, what goes on, between a presidential nominee and his or her party. The Democrats have already set up similar accounts. It hadn't happened on the Republican side. They've been desperate to do it because they need the cash and they believe they can raise a lot of it quickly now.
[14:25:15] Trump is going to have to rely on at least some outside financial support. He can't bank roll the whole thing. And this looks to be further evidence that the party is now beginning to coalesce around him. And another reason why, as Dana pointed out, if you have certain members of the party saying focus on the House, the Senate, the statehouses and don't worry about the presidency, that there is potential - there's a potential that tens of millions of dollars could be left away from the RNC and Trump as they try to take back the White House.
BALDWIN: OK. Ed O'Keefe, Dana Bash, thank you so much.
Up next, would Donald Trump rewrite the U.S. foreign policy playbook? The presumed Republican nominee definitely raising some eyebrows, saying he would have, quoting him, "no problem" speaking with the leader of North Korea. Now a top member of Congress is using Trump's plan as a punchline. We're going there.
Also, more than two years after they vanished, a significant development today involving one of the more than 200 Nigerian girls kidnapped by Boko Haram terrorists. Where she was found alive. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
