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Republican National Convention Officially Kicks Off; Fallen Police Officers; Colors Presented By Cuyahoga County Veterans; Students Lead "Pledge Of Allegiance"; The Singing Angels Perform "The National Anthem"; Invocation By Rabbi Ari Wolf; Political Panel Discussing Convention. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired July 18, 2016 - 13:00   ET

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


[13:00:03] DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: And this is an opportunity for Trump to do something he has not done up until now which is really unify the party. That's a lot of what this convention is about.

And the other opportunity he has, as you well know, Wolf, is to command the stage, as he will do over the next few days, to kind of reset the image, the proposals that he wants to put forward.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: All right. Reince Priebus about to call to order.

REINCE PRIEBUS, CHAIRMAN, REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE (live): This convention will come to order. Delegates and alternates, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the 2016 Republican National Convention.

Before we begin the official business of this convention, I'd like to take a moment to recognize the fallen police officers in Baton Rouge, Dallas and elsewhere. The men and women who protect our safety and well-being, who put their lives on the line every day. They're our genuine heroes.

We also want to recognize all of the families who have lost loved ones during these troubling times. Our nation grieves when we see these awful killings. Will you join me in a moment of silence? Thank you.

Would everyone please rise for the presentation of colors? The colors will be presented by the Cuyahoga County veterans, including two World War II veterans. Let's give them a warm welcome.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Left, left, right, left. Left, left, left, right, left. Left, left, left, right, left. Left, left, left, right, left. March time march. Detail halt. Left face. Left arm.

PRIEBUS: Please remain standing for the pledge of allegiance, the national anthem and the invocation.

Thank you. It is my privilege to introduce students from northeast Ohio who took the Cuyahoga County GOP red, white and blue challenge. T. Williams, Celia Head, Thomas Wuertz, Jasmine Taurz and Jeff Umvarski (ph) will lead us in the "Pledge of Allegiance." CROWD: I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of

America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

PRIEBUS: All right. Performing "The National Anthem," please welcome The Singing Angels.

THE SINGING ANGELS: Oh say can you see by the dawn's early light what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming. Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight o'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh say does that star-spangled banner yet wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

PRIEBUS: Offering today's invocation, please welcome Rabbi Ari Wolf -- Rabbi.

RABBI ARI WOLF, CHAPLAIN, CLEVELAND POLICE DEPARTMENT: Please join me as we pray for God's blessings for our success of our mission.

(INAUDIBLE.)

Our heavenly father, we acknowledge your grace and your beneficence. We ask your blessings upon this Republican National Convention and all those gathered here. We ask for your blessings of our country and our people and we seek your guidance and continued protection.

Lord God, we live in perilous and dangerous times. Today, our beloved country is under attack, our family values, our moral principles, and even our very democracy is threatened. We beseech you for your continued watchfulness and protections as we renew our covenant of faith with you and with each other.

Lord, protect our leaders. Protect the members of our armed forces who serve so valiantly. Bring them home when their noble missions are done. Lord God, watch over and safeguard our police officers and all our first responders who work each day and night in every city, town and hamlet of our great nation to protect us and our freedoms. We ask you of this, oh, Lord, not because we have merit, but because we rely upon you and your merciful grace.

Lord, please bless all those engaged in this convention and that thy will be done in their deliberations.

(INAUDIBLE.)

May God bless you and keep you. May God shine his confidence upon you and be gracious to you. May God lift up his face to you and give you peace in a world of peace and let us say amen.

CROWD: Amen.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you. Please remain standing while the colors are retired. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right face. Forward march. Your left, your left, your left, right, left. Your left, your left, your left, right, left. Your left, your left, your left, right, left.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Imagine me and you, and you and me, I think about you day and night, it's only right to think about the girl --

BLITZER: All right. So, the Republican National Convention has been called to order. There's a little musical interlude right now. It's official, this is the Republican National Convention here in Cleveland, is getting down to business right now. We're here at the convention hall with all of our analysts and our guests. And you can see them with us right here.

Let's talk a little bit about what we anticipate during the course of this day. Katrina Pearson is here. She's a spokeswoman for the Donald Trump campaign. How does it feel to be here at this moment when this convention has officially been called to order?

[13:10:04] KATRINA PEARSON, SPOKESWOMAN, TRUMP CAMPAIGN: I think it's fantastic. The campaign is really excited. Mr. Trump is excited. We've been able to achieve something that no one's really ever done before outside the system with an insurgent candidate who's been controversial at times but still managed to captivate enough vote to break the record in the Republican primary. And here we are for him to accept the nomination.

BLITZER: Are there going to be some surprises tonight or do we basically know what's going to happen? His wife, Melania, is going to be speaking. That's the big speaker. And is he going to be showing up to introduce her?

PEARSON: He may. I mean, this is a tough event so I think anything's possible. This is not going to be your typical convention. He wants to entertain people. He wants to bring in more viewers. And, again, as you mentioned opening the show, this is going to be an event for people who may be on the fence or want to know what Mr. Trump is really about without that media filter. And this is what we're going to find (INAUDIBLE.)

BLITZER: Kevin Madden is one of our CNN contributors, a Republican strategist not excited about Donald Trump being the Republican nominee. But it's official now, this campaign, this convention is down to business.

KEVIN MADDEN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Right. Yes, and I think Katrina makes a good point. The focus of this campaign, I think first and foremost, has to be addressed, that unity issue. There are a lot of Republicans out there who are here today. They're in attendance. But many of them are conflicted.

So, I think addressing those that are not only here in the -- in the room, but also those millions that are around the country right now. That's going to be key to positioning Donald Trump for success in the general election. BLITZER: Mike Shields, our CNN Delegate Analyst, former Republican

National Committee chief of staff, has he managed to bring that Republican base around? Has he united the party going forward, at least enough to potentially get himself elected? Because there -- as you well know, a lot of Republicans are not very happy with this nominee.

MIKE SHIELDS, CNN DELEGATE ANALYST: Well, the polling would say no, he still has work to do. And I think that what you're watching here with the delegates on the floor, this is the business of the -- of the convention. This is where the unbind vote would have taken place that should have threatened his candidacy when we thought we were going to have an open convention. That's over.

So, we've mechanically gotten to the point of bringing everyone together. There is still some work to do to rhetorically bring people together. I think picking Mike Pence is a big step towards that. There is still some work to do. They could do it from the stage this week.

BLITZER: What do you think, Bakari Sellers, our CNN Contributor, he's a Democratic Hillary Clinton supporter? You're here in enemy territory right now. What do you think of the Mike Pence? From a Democratic perspective, from the Democratic Party perspective, what do you think of Mike Pence as the running mate?

BAKARI SELLERS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I think Mike Pence is very (INAUDIBLE.) I don't think he puts any fear in any of the -- any of the hearts of Democrats that could actually free Hillary Clinton up to choose a Thomas Vilsack or Tim Kaine or Thomas Perez and not have any pressure with any of them.

But I think that Mike Pence and Donald Trump have to do something today, they've been unable to do, at this convention. Because inside, it's a lot of excitement. But outside, once we go outside the security perimeter, we see how tense it is. And we understand we had Minneapolis. We have Baton Rouge. We had the cop shooting in Dallas and another cop shooting in Baton Rouge.

So, Donald Trump has a moment. This is his moment. This convention is his moment to show that not only can he describe that the world is in chaos, but show that he can be a unifier. I'm not sure that he can do that, but we'll see this week.

BLITZER: Sara Murray, you've been covering the Trump campaign now I think for almost a year. Melania Trump, she's going to be speaking tonight, the wife of Donald Trump. They really want, the Republicans and the viewers out there and there'll be millions of them, to get her perspective on who her husband is.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Right. Well, and in some ways, they learned a lesson from Romney in 2012 which is it's great to have all these speakers who are designed to make their candidate seem softer and have glossy videos. But that doesn't happen on prime time. It doesn't happen on television. And so, that's why you're going to have a Trump speaking every night in prime time to try to soften those edges.

And I was just talking to Paul Manafort who said, when we asked Melania if she wanted to do this, we sort of expected her to say no. She doesn't really like the campaign trail. And I have been out with Donald Trump for over a year, and we don't see her much. But he said she jumped at the opportunity.

It's kind of similar to how Ann Romney felt in 2012, where she just felt like people did not know the man that she knew privately. And she wanted to take that to the stage and make it clear that I know my husband best. Let me tell you what he is like. And we're expecting to hear a lot of that from Melania tonight.

BLITZER: And she's going to be speaking tonight, Ron Brownstein, Melania Trump, the wife. But the kids are going to be speaking Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, including Tiffany, the youngest daughter who just graduated from the University of Pennsylvania. She's going to be speaking as well about her dad. And the sons and Ivanka, the daughter, they're all going to be speaking, giving a personal reflection of who their father is.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: People prioritized by what (INAUDIBLE) more than to drive a policy message.

You know, look, first of all, you can't game say what he's done to this point. This is an enormous achievement to be standing here, from a year ago, from where he started, to be the nominee. But he's facing a difficult environment. He has the highest negatives of any general election nominee of either party.

[13:15:00] And the biggest one of those negatives is consistently a majority of Americans, 60 percent in the ABC/"Washington Post" poll this week say he is not qualified to be president. If they can't deal with that this week, whatever else they do, they're going to be facing an uphill climb the rest of the way.

BLITZER: Mark Preston, our CNN politics executive editor, there are going to be some other surprises here. Donald Trump, he's a showman. He wants to make this Republican Convention a bit different.

MARK PRESTON, CNN POLITICS EXECUTIVE EDITOR: (INAUDIBLE) so he's a showman, and he's done very well over -- as a reality television star. I think, though, what he said he was going to do and what he's going to deliver are two different things. The a-list guest that we anticipated that he would have here are probably not going to be here from what we can tell, from what they have set this out. Tonight we'll see Scott Baio, who was a star back in the '70s and the '80s. He's considered a big star. An LPGA golfer, who, you know, in her own right, is a, you know, a great athlete, but, again, not known by a lot of people. So not really the a-list a-list that we thought he would bring.

BLITZER: What were you saying, Ron?

BROWNSTEIN: I think he was a supporting actor back in the '70s and '80s. Yes. DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: But iconic nonetheless.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Yes.

GREGORY: Wolf, I think it's important what Ron is talking about. There's obviously a risk that voters see with a president Trump potentially. He's got speak to that risk. He's got to say to voters who are persuadable, look, it's worth taking the risk because of the environment that I'm in. So it's not just about him.

I think today begins an effort to really ratchet up this opposition to Hillary Clinton with the Benghazi theme, national security, to talk about the environment around the world and offer him as a kind of strong man, law-and-order kind of solution.

BLITZER: His big speech is Thursday night when he accepts the nomination, but tonight he will presumably be speaking as well.

Katrina, stand by. I'm going to come back to you in a moment.

We've got to take a quick break. Much more from the Republican National Convention, including my interview with a key Republican congresswoman, Marsha Blackburn. She's here as well. She'll be speaking. Much more right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:21:28] BLITZER: The Republican Convention here in Cleveland is now officially opened against the backdrop, though, of racial tensions. Black Lives Matter protests, ambush killings of police officers. One of the themes of the convention going forward is making America one again. That's the focus Thursday.

And Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee is one of the prime time speakers Thursday night. She's joining us now live.

Congresswoman, thanks very much for joining us.

REP. MARSHA BLACKBURN (R), TENNESSEE: Sure.

BLITZER: You'll be speaking Thursday night --

BLACKBURN: Right.

BLITZER: During the 8:00 p.m. Eastern hour. That's a good time slot, prime time, for you. Make America one again. What is your message? What does that mean?

BLACKBURN: My message is going to be unity again. Looking at the things that have made this country great. That should be what unites us, opportunity. You know, GOP is the great opportunity party, and that is part of the message that we have to communicate this week.

BLITZER: You know, there's a new poll that came out, a CNN/ORC poll, and it asks the question, will the Republican Party be unite -- unite -- will unite by November? Back in May, only 48 percent thought so. Now it's up to 68 percent. But 68 percent still isn't, you know, a large number among Republicans, is it?

BLACKBURN: Well, you know, I think it's better than the Democrats' numbers. And when you look at the number of new --

BLITZER: Well, the Democrats seem to be uniting now that Bernie Sanders has endorsed Hillary Clinton.

BLACKBURN: I'm not -- well, here's the thing though. When you look at the turnout in the primaries, Republican turnout is up, Democratic turnout is down. We realize that it's an opportunity for us to get our message out and focus on the things people are talking about -- national security, jobs and economic security. And also for women, a big issue is retirement security. So it's a great week for us to put -- to turn that focus. And I think that you're going to see that number continue to increase.

BLITZER: Was Mike Pence, the Indiana governor, your first choice to be the running mate?

BLACKBURN: Mike Pence is a great choice. And the first choice for me was to say, who does Mr. Trump think will balance him best on this ticket and help us win? And whomever that is, that's who the nominee should be and --

BLITZER: Do you worry though that they disagree on some really sensitive issues like trade --

BLACKBURN: Not at all.

BLITZER: Like trade.

BLACKBURN: Not at all.

BLITZER: The war in Iraq. Some of these sensitive issues.

BLACKBURN: Here's the reason why it's not a concern, because you're always going to disagree with individuals, and nobody is going to agree with you 100 percent. I like the fact that they are not in lockstep on everything, because it allows for that discussion and debate. How do you reach consensus and a great resolution to solving problems? You have people around you who are not yes men, but who bring a new set of ideas and adversity of opinion to the debate.

BLITZER: I want to play a clip. This is Donald Trump this morning speaking about President Obama and President Obama's reaction to the killings of those police officers in Baton Rouge yesterday. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESUMPTIVE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE (voice-over): So I watched the president. And sometimes the words are, OK, but you -- you just look at the -- the body language. There's something going on. Look, there's something going on. And the words are not often OK, by the way.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What does that mean, there's something going on?

TRUMP: There's -- there's just bad feeling and a lot of bad feeling about him. I see it, too.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right, he says, "there's something going on." He's implying that there's something sinister going on with the president of the United States. What was your interpretation?

[13:25:00] BLACKBURN: I -- I couldn't hear all of clip --

BLITZER: He said the president showed body language that was inappropriate.

BLACKBURN: Yes. I -- I think what people want to see from the president, they're waiting to see, is for him to say, look, I am standing with our police. I'm supporting the police. I'm supporting our local elected officials. And we have to get this under control. And I did not hear the clip that was playing very well. Music's kind of loud back there.

BLITZER: It's loud here.

BLACKBURN: But what people want is leadership on this issue. Tell us, Mr. President, what you're going to do, and how you're going to support our local police. Tell us that you're going to stand with them, a let's get this stopped.

BLITZER: Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, thanks very much for joining us.

BLACKBURN: Good to be with you.

BLITZER: We'll look for your presentation Thursday night during the 8:00 p.m. Eastern hour.

BLACKBURN: Absolutely. Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: Thank you.

Up next, six officers ambushed by a gunman looking to kill police officers. The latest on the investigation in Baton Rouge. That's next.

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