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Mitt Romney Criticizes Donald Trump's Rhetoric; Appointment of Clinton Foundation Donor to State Department Board Examined; Singer Christina Grimmie Shot and Killed. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired June 11, 2016 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00] SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: Our CNN politics reporter Teddy Schleifer is there with details. So Teddy, specifically, what has Romney said today, what is he saying?

THEODORE SCHLEIFER, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Governor Romney is speaking to about 300 of his business friends, donors, previous Republican candidates. And he has some pretty serious words both for Republicans who failed to stop Trump in the past. He lamented candidates like Ted Cruz and John Kasich who he said did not take on Donald Trump sufficiently.

But the most emotional moment came when Governor Romney talked about the state of affairs today. He said "Seeing this is breaking my heart." Obviously we know that Governor Romney is not a fan of Donald Trump. And we know that he feels pretty strongly about this. At times he appeared to be beating back tears as he gave what he saw as the status of the party. And it was not very hopeful. You know, he kind of talked about other Republican candidates who he might have been more willing to support. He said, had there been a President Bush referring to Jeb Bush, President Walker or President Rubio, he might have been willing to serve on their administration. He then joked obviously that he's not going to be serving in the Trump administration. But some pretty emotional moments today from Mitt Romney here in Park City.

MALVEAUX: And Teddy, he seems to be admonishing the members of his party, but he also at the same time seems to be initiating a rallying call for them, that there's a need, that there's some sort of mission to get beyond this moment. What did he say about that?

SCHLEIFER: Yes, you know, Governor Romney said he was not going to actively campaign against Donald Trump. You know, his views are well known. He did not -- and obviously there are two other speakers in particular here this week who have been supporters of Trump, including House Speaker Paul Ryan who of course was Mitt Romney's running mate in 2012, and RNC Chair Reince Priebus, both of whom this week were encouraging people to get behind Trump.

Romney declined to pass judgment on them. He said, you know, I respect what they're doing. You know, they are very interested in saving the Supreme Court and making sure that conservatives are appointed to there. He said that was a, quote, "darn good reason to get behind Trump." But he's preaching sort of a tolerance for other Republicans who made different decisions in what he admitted was a tough call.

But these are -- this is a gathering of a lot of people who even four years after Mitt Romney ran really admire the man and are loyalists and helped him raise money, were maybe involved in the Olympics a decade ago not far from here in Park City, go back in business, a decade's long relationship with him. So they really take what he has to say seriously, and his comments today, even if he's not actively campaigning against Donald Trump, certainly sent a signal to people that this is where I stand and they can take it or leave it.

MALVEAUX: Teddy, I talked earlier today on this show with Republicans who share Romney's feeling, that their hearts are breaking or broken because of what is taking place right now. And one of the reasons they say is because they feel that he's racist and they feel that he is not adequately addressed that despite some of the things he's saying today, that he's the least racist person he knows, make America great again for everyone. These are new things Trump is saying today. And it's not convincing them. They don't buy it. I mean, what are people saying there about that?

SCHLEIFER: Yes, I talked with several donors here on the sidelines who are pretty uncommitted. They might not be -- Donald Trump was certainly not their first choice, they will readily concede that. But they might not be totally closed minded supporting him eventually. One thing that came up again and again in conversations here on the sidelines was just the basic blocking and tackling of presidential fundraising. It doesn't seem to be being done by the Trump campaign. I was talking with one major donor who lives in Boston, and Donald Trump is fundraising in Boston I believe on Monday. And this guy hasn't even been contacted about the event, kind of the basics. There's questions about whether or not Trump is going to be able to do pretty rudimentary fundraising.

He is launching a big tour. He has 10 events in nine days. And this major fundraiser said, he should be doing 10 events in two days. So Trump is definitely going to in a financial tough place. The question is, how much will it matter? How much wild kind of the deficit with Hillary Clinton's fundraising campaign, how much will that affect the fall race?

MALVEAUX: Those are all good questions. Teddy, there are people saying there's not much of a campaign, a structure to actually allow him to do the kind of fundraising and to support him to do the kind of fundraising that he needs to have and run a successful general election campaign. So Teddy, thank you very much, excellent reporting, really appreciate it.

Donald Trump due at a campaign rally in Pittsburgh in the next hour as he's going to pivot towards the general election. Already he was on the attack today in the battle ground state of Florida. He told a crowd of supporters that former GOP candidate Mitt Romney choked and failed in his 2012 bid against Barack Obama. And he's continuing to blast Hillary Clinton.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) [14:05:10] DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Hillary Clinton was saying the other day temperament, that's her whole thing, temperament. Number one, I built an unbelievable company, a great company. I filed papers with federal election. You don't build companies like that unless you have the right temperament, believe me.

But Hillary Clinton, they just came out with a book. A Secret Service agent was with her for a long time, said she's a total mess, a mess. She's not qualified to be president. You know who said that? Bernie Sanders said that Hillary Clinton is not qualified to be president. And he said it because she has bad judgment. And she does have bad judgment. Look at the mess she's got us into with Syria. Everything she touches. And you're going to have four more years of that? We won't have a country left, folks, believe me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: All right, CNN's Kristen Holmes is joining us from Pittsburgh. That is where we're going to see Donald Trump. Kristen, first of all, tell us about the venue itself. How many people are expected? Are we seeing the kinds of crowds we would normally expect, very large crowds at a Trump rally?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're not sure exactly how many people we are going to see here today. It is supposed to rain. We are getting a little bit of hedging from the campaign here, telling us it might not be as big of a crowd as normal. But Suzanne, we can still expect some more of that fiery rhetoric. Donald Trump is not known for mincing words. And we're going to be watching for those same reactions today as well as reactions on those allegations of racism.

Now, a GOP source inside of the campaign tells me that as Donald Trump continues to defend himself against these accusations of racism, there is a general worry that this is taking away from the precious time he needs to unite the Republican Party.

Now, former GOP nominee Mitt Romney added fuel to the fire this week when he told CNN's Wolf Blitzer that a Trump presidency could change the character of America through what he called, quote, "trickledown racism." Now, as I mentioned, Trump is not one to mince words and likes to hit back. Here's what he said about Mitt Romney just now in Florida.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I watched this poor, sad Mitt Romney this morning. He suffers from misogynist. I don't think he knows what misogynist is. He's sitting like a real stiff. Don't forget, this guy let us down, folks. He choked and he let us down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, Trump went on to say he was facing more opposition from the GOP than he was from the Democrats themselves. This will be -- his trip here to Pennsylvania will be his third battleground state in the last 24 hours. And we'll keep you posted.

MALVEAUX: The critical state of Pennsylvania. Kristen Holmes, thank you so much.

Coming up, Hillary Clinton's campaign now responding to why a donor got a top spot on a State Department intelligence board after he donated $1 million to her foundation.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:11:55] MALVEAUX: Hillary Clinton under fire now for appointing a major Clinton Foundation donor to a sensitive intelligence board while she was secretary of state. It's an issue that Donald Trump is now hammering on the campaign trail. Today Clinton's campaign is dismissing claims of wrongdoing. Our CNN's Drew Griffin has the inside story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RAJ FERNANDO, CHOPPER TRADING: Hi. I'm Raj Fernando, founder and CEO of Chopper Trading.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Raj Fernando is a Chicago-based stock trader, and for a very short period of time he was an appointee to U.S. State Department's International Security Advisory Board. He qualifications did he have for that? Apparently none.

What he does have is big money ties to Bill and Hillary Clinton. He has donated $1 million to $5 million to the Clinton Foundation. He has donated to Mrs. Clinton's 2008 primary campaign and even served as a so called bundler of large campaign donations for Democrats. On the campaign trail today, Donald Trump called his appointment just another example of his "crooked Hillary" campaign theme.

TRUMP: She even appointed to the national security board someone with no national security experience. Instead he was a donor, a recent donor, to Hillary Clinton's campaign.

GRIFFIN: It is clear Raj Fernando had no diplomatic experience and no background in international security affairs, which could explain why just one month after taking this photo during his very first meeting with the board, Raj Fernando was writing a letter to Secretary Clinton resigning. And e-mails just released show behind the scenes political panic was setting in as a State Department official struggled to explain what this big donor to the Clinton Foundation was doing with top security clearance inside the State Department.

On August 15th, 2011, an e-mail from an ABC News producer asks for Fernando's qualifications. The follow-up e-mail shows State Department officials scrambling to come up with an explanation. They discussed how the appointment came directly from Hillary Clinton's long-time aide and State Department chief of staff, Cheryl Mills. "The true answer is simply that Cheryl Mills added him," the State Department official writes in an e-mail. "He was added at their insistence." Someone else writes, "Can we dig up a short paragraph about his distinguished career and a sentence about selection and approval process?" The next day, a senior adviser e-mails "We must protect the secretary's name as well as the integrity of the board." And through a colleague, Cheryl Mills chimes into the e-mail chain, asking the State Department to stall in its response to ABC news for 24 hours.

No real qualifications for Fernando were ever sent. Instead, the next day, August 17th, Raj Fernando suddenly resigns. At the State Department today, answers on why were hard to come by.

[14:15:03] UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If he was at all qualified, why did he resign so suddenly after ABC News started asking questions?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You'd have to ask him.

GRIFFIN: Drew Griffin, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MALVEAUX: The Clinton campaign is now responding to the donor controversy. Our own Chris Frates joining us live from Washington with what her camp has to say about this. Chris, what are you learning today?

CHRIS FRATES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I can tell you Clinton press secretary Nick Merrill put out a statement, and he said this. He said, quote, "This was an unpaid volunteer advisory board and one of several foreign policy focused organizations that he was involved with. As the State Department itself has said, the ISAB, or International Security Advisory Board, charter calls for a diverse set of experiences for its members. That's all there is to it." So a pretty terse response there, Suzanne.

MALVEAUX: And Chris, you've been covering Hillary Clinton, the controversy coming after this week, a very good week, becoming her party's presumptive nominee, getting several big endorsements. Next week she's hitting the campaign trail with President Obama. How do you think they're going to handle this? How important do you think it is for them to get beyond this?

FRATES: There's not a lot of evidence yet that she's losing a lot of momentum because of this story so far. As you pointed out, she's had a really excellent week. But she's certainly hoping that the president helps continue uniting the party.

Next week, President Obama and Clinton are campaigning together for the first time. They're going to stump in Green Bay, Wisconsin. But the White House is saying, aside from that, for the most part the president will campaign solo. He's going to hit battleground states on Clinton's behalf. And her campaign is hoping that the president's approval rating and popularity among Democrats and frankly some independents will be a real boon to Clinton.

But the president wasn't the only big name Democrat to get behind Clinton this week. She also saw endorsements from Vice President Biden and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. Remember, Warren is carving out this role as one of Donald Trump's chief antagonists, calling him a thin-skinned, racist bully this week. So there's kind of no surprise that Warren and Clinton met yesterday at Clinton's Washington home, stoking a lot of speculation that Warren could be on Clinton's vice presidential short list.

An endorsement she hasn't got yet, Hillary Clinton has not got an endorsement from one Bernie Sanders. And Sanders tomorrow is set to meet with his top advisers and senior supporters at his home in Vermont to try to figure out a way forward. And so we'll have to see what comes out of that meeting.

He's still campaigning through Tuesday's primary here in Washington. But he's already dropped his attacks on Clinton and he's really kind of upped his jabs at Donald Trump. So despite this long, tough primary season coming to a close, the party really does seem to be uniting behind Clinton. Nothing seems to bring Democrats together quite like bashing Donald Trump, Suzanne.

MALVEAUX: You have a lot to cover there, Chris, a lot to work with this week.

FRATES: A lot to work with.

MALVEAUX: All the different events and moving pieces. Good to see you, Chris, as always.

Coming up next, police revealing new information. This is about the shooting of Christina Grimmie. What they're saying now about the gunman who opened fire on the singer, cutting her life tragically short.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:22:06] MALVEAUX: Police are revealing new information in the shooting death of pop singer Christina Grimmie. Grimmie, would rose to fame on the show "The Voice" was killed in front of fans last night while signing autographs after her concert. Police held a news conference earlier today detailing what they know so far about the shooter.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF JOHN MINA, ORLANDO POLICE: The suspect in this case is not from Orlando. The suspect traveled to Orlando apparently to commit this crime, and then had plans to travel back to where he came from. What our detectives are doing right now is they're going through the suspect's cell phone and computer to see if they could find a motive for this crime. The suspect had two handguns on his person. He had two additional loaded magazines for those handguns and a large hunting knife.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: Our CNN's Boris Sanchez joining us live from Orlando. And Boris, just a tragic story. What do we know about this guy, the shooter, and whether or not he was targeting her? BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Suzanne, this certainly is a

tragedy. Unfortunately right now what you heard from police is the extent of the information we have about this 21-year-old gunman. We know he's from somewhere in Florida. He's not local to Orlando. And the belief is he came here to the Plaza Live specifically to target Christina Grimmie, the YouTube sensation. Apparently the gunman had two small caliber handgun on him as well as a hunting knife as you heard.

And after the concert, as she was signing autographs for fans, this gunman came up to her and simply opened fire. That's when police tell us her brother Marcus bravely jumped in and tackled the suspect to the ground. They say her brother Marcus likely prevented other people from getting hurt. In that scuffle with the gunman it appears that the 21-year-old male opened fire on himself, killing himself before police could get to him.

There's still no indication as to a motive in this case. That's what police are looking for now as they scan his computer and phone. There were online reports he may have been familiar to her and he family. But as we heard from the chief of Orlando police earlier today, it doesn't appear that they knew each other personally.

So there's still a lot of questions to be answered here and the story of Christina Grimmie, really a young performer in the prime of her career. She was a YouTube sensation, had more than 3 million followers online. As you mentioned she was a finalist on "The Voice" and her career seemed to be ticking upwards. So certainly a major loss for all of her fans and obviously her family as well.

MALVEAUX: Very big loss. And Boris, we were learning from the police earlier today, they don't believe that there is a video of this shooting. Can you give us a sense of this security of the venue, what was that like?

SANCHEZ: To give you an idea, this is a really, relatively small venue. There are only 120 people or so at this meet and greet where Christina Grimmie was shot.

[14:25:02] What we've heard so far is that there are unarmed security personnel here at the time. There were also no metal detectors. So no one was really getting padded down as people were coming into the event.

But from what we heard from Orlando police, that is not really unusual for an event of this kind, specifically because of the kind of crowd they have here. These kind of events draw usually young children, young teens. So there was no expectation that there would be any kind of incident of this sort here. Obviously now that may change the kind of security at events like this moving forward, Suzanne.

All right, just a tragic story all around. Our thoughts and prayers for her family. Boris Sanchez, thank you so much.

And thank you so much for joining us. I'm Suzanne Malveaux. More Newsroom coming up in 30 minutes. "Vital Signs with Sanjay Gupta" starts now after the break.

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