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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin
Donald Trump Accepts Republican Nomination; Clinton to Unveil Running Mate Today. Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired July 22, 2016 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[04:30:28] DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: The most important difference between our plan and that of our opponent is that our plan will put America first.
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JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Donald Trump, you heard it right there, he promised to put America first, just part of his acceptance speech. The final night of the Republican National Convention speech this morning. A speech this morning that some people are calling dark.
Welcome back to EARLY START, everyone. I'm John Berman.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Christine Romans. It is dark. Literally, it's dark outside. It is 4:30 in Cleveland right now.
And behind us, they're tearing down the stage. The party is over here at the GOP convention. You can see and you can hear the clean up under way right now, overnight, what a night.
Donald Trump accepted the Republican nomination for president, painting a dire picture of America in crisis, citizens in danger, the economy he says a disaster, lawlessness in the streets, immigrants flooding the borders and driving down wages -- all threatening American peace and prosperity.
Listen.
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TRUMP: Our convention occurs at a moment of crisis for our nation. The attacks on our police and the terrorism of our cities threaten our very way of life. Any politician who does not grasp this danger is not fit to lead our country.
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ROMANS: CNN's Manu Raju joins us now with more on Trump's big night -- Manu.
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MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: This was Donald Trump that was tapping into the economic anxiety of the country, painting a rather bleak picture of the United States right now and promoting what he believes would be a strong United States if he were to become the commander in chief. He was railing on trade deals. He was taking a very hard line as he's done all this trade deals.
Listen to the hard line he took by saying the country's immigration is leading to the economic problems that are happening here in this country.
TRUMP: Americans want relief from uncontrolled immigration which is what we have now. Communities want relief.
Yet, Hillary Clinton is proposing mass amnesty, mass immigration and mass lawlessness. Her plan will overwhelm your schools and hospitals, further reduce your jobs and wages.
We are going to build a great border wall to stop illegal immigration, to stop the gangs and the violence, and to stop the drugs from pouring into our communities.
RAJU: Now, the question out of the four-day event, Christine and John, how much does Donald Trump reach out to swing voters, the independent voters? Because we know those kinds of remarks that he made really riled up this crowd and conservatives base. But what does it mean for his candidacy headed into the general election? We won't know that for a few days and we won't know until the Democrats have their convention next week in Philadelphia.
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BERMAN: All right. Manu Raju, thank you very much. Let us discuss last night. We are joined by CNN political analyst Josh Rogin, columnist for "The Washington Post", a trio of CNN political commentators, Ben Ferguson, host of "The Ben Ferguson Show", Democratic strategist Maria Cardona, host of "The Ferguson Show", and KABC radio host John Phillips.
Good morning to you all.
We've been here a little bit, sorry for that.
Donald Trump last night gave a speech where he depicted a country in serious trouble in a number of ways. He said he would be the law and order candidate, and depicted, again, a nation that he said was rampant with lawlessness. Listen to him talking a little bit.
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TRUMP: On January 20th, 2017, the day I take the oath of office --
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-- Americans will finally wake up in a country where the laws of the United States are enforced.
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[04:35:02] BERMAN: So, it is interesting. Donald Trump's convention speech here in July and some ways reacting more to the last three or four weeks than the last year of American history. John Phillips, do you think that law and order, which is what Donald Trump talked about last night, can sustain his candidacy until November?
JOHN PHILLIPS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think so, because if you watched CNN, what you have seen over the last year? You saw the massacre in Orlando. YOU saw the massacre in San Bernardino. You saw the massacre in Paris. It's just one right after another.
And then you have the police shootings, where police officers were assassinated for no other reason other than the fact they wear the badge and they protect us for a living. So, he's striking a cord.
This speech was not for the luxury boxes where we are sitting. This speech was for the seats above us. And I think those people get. Maybe many in the media don't, but I think the people will.
ROMANS: Another interesting thing about the jobs issue, that's where he was striking at what is not for the luxury boxes, but for the people who are earning a paycheck and that paycheck is not going up. Listen to what he said.
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TRUMP: I am going to bring back our jobs to Ohio and Pennsylvania and New York and Michigan and all of America. And I am not going to let companies move to other countries, firing their employees along the way, without consequence. Not going to happen anymore.
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ROMANS: Some context here. Four years ago, when Mitt Romney was on the stage, he promised to bring down unemployment rate to 6 percent if a Republican is president. It's now at 5 percent. He promised to create millions of jobs, 9 million jobs have been created. They promised, GOP promised $2.50 gas. It's now $2.20. The stock markers are at a record high.
Wages are flat. Too many people feel they are not evolved in the labor market.
But is Donald Trump wrong on how terrible jobs are, Ben?
BEN FERGUSON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think you ask the average American out there who is unemployed and they're going to say it's absolutely awful.
BERMAN: But the average American is not unemployed.
FERGUSON: The average American that is employed, I think there's a lot of people that feel stagnate. ROMANS: But, wait, I'm going to push back, because in the primaries,
we asked people what they felt about the economy. They said felt terrible. They said Donald Trump could do a better job. They were asked about the personal situation, oh, I'm fine.
So, there's a perception problem. A low self esteem problem and Donald Trump is feeding it.
FERGUSON: Right, and I think there maybe -- part of it is low self esteem, but I think there's a lot of people that feel like, wow, I'm not making what I honestly thought I was going to be making eight years after hope and change.
Remember, hope and change was really supposed to economically -- remember it was not foreign policy that got Barack Obama elected. It was the economy and I'm going to make things better. You're going to have a better life.
ROMANS: That's 10 percent unemployment to 4.9 percent.
FERGUSON: But there are a lot of people that aren't even in the job, work force, who just stopped working, period.
ROMANS: Some of those are retiring. Some of them are left behind.
FERGUSON: Some are left behind.
And I think if you look at the average American city, people feel like we should be doing a lot better than we are right now. That's a vulnerability of Hillary Clinton because it is an extension of Barack Obama. It's going to be hard for her to convince people that things are great right now.
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BERMAN: I want to talk about the tone a little bit last night because if you are looking at the headlines today and hear a lot of talk. You hear people saying one of the darkest speeches in convention history, "midnight in America" I heard it called. And a lot of people saw it like that, Josh.
The focus group, they didn't see it like that. They didn't pick up on that. I want to know what you saw.
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JOSH ROGIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, we socialize the idea in this cycle that negative is the new normal, right? Hillary is going negative. Donald Trump is going negative. And the electorate is sort of become accustomed to nothing but negative campaigning.
So when Donald Trump gives us a one hour and a half speech that's basically all negative, not just doom and gloom, but anti-Hillary, anti-Obama, not a lot of positive ideas, not a lot of policy plans to speak. People see that and say that makes sense. The question is, can you just drive negatives up until you win? Can
you run an entire presidential campaign and be the president of the United States without actually putting forward a detailed policy and political agenda that is aspirational and has any meat on the bone? And we're going to find out. I mean, right now, I think people are sort of used to it, right? And that's a problem. And whether or not that will last in November.
PHILLIPS: You know, and thematically --
MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: His speech played very well in the arena and to his supporters. His problem is, though, and what conventions are supposed to start to do for a candidate is to reach beyond and to start appealing to the broader section of voters that you will need in order to win. He got 13 or 14 million votes in the primary. He needs upwards of 65 million votes. And when you write off full communities like he has done, and he did it again in his speech, and I think that was a calculated risk that he's taking. He wrote off Latinos.
And that rift, when he talked about immigration, everything he talked about immigration is actually wrong.
[04:40:02] Immigration is at a net negative right now. So, you look at that, but he is using the fear-mongering, because to your point, that has been effective for him up until now.
ROMANS: Last word, John.
PHILLIPS: That theme applies to economics because it used to be, you had one job and you had it your whole life. You had two or three jobs, you had those and then you retired.
Now, people have two or three jobs at once, and they think those jobs are transient. They think that those jobs can be gone any day.
FERGUSON: Tomorrow.
PHILLIPS: People do not feel secure about their jobs.
ROGIN: My life to a T.
BERMAN: If we don't go to a commercial, our jobs will be gone tomorrow.
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ROMANS: Speaking of getting paid. Donald Trump with new warnings of what will happen to America if Hillary Clinton is elected as the Clinton campaign gears up for its own convention and maybe a big announcement soon. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [04:45:03] ROMANS: Donald Trump's acceptance speech last night emphasized doom and danger facing this country if Hillary Clinton is elected. And Clinton responded overnight, saying this.
Tonight, Donald Trump painted a dark picture of America in decline. His answer is more fear and more division and more hate, was yet another reminder that he is temperamentally unfit and totally unqualified to be president of the United States. If I had a nickel for every time I heard temperamentally unfit.
We are now on the finals hours before Clinton unveils her choice of running mate. That rollout is expected may be as soon as later today, ahead of the Democratic convention which starts on Monday.
We've got our panel here to talk about all this. Josh Rogin and Ben Ferguson and Maria Cardona and John Phillips.
So, the big question is, who will she pick? Maria, who do you think?
CARDONA: I think the smart money is on Tim Kaine. Now, obviously, we don't really know, and it could be different and could be anybody else on the short list, or somebody completely different, you never know. But I think that her qualifications or her criteria is going to be somebody who can step into the job immediately.
ROMANS: She has said that.
CARDONA: She has said that and somebody that she knows well, that she feels comfortable with. And so, she knows Tim Kaine very well. She has worked with him in the past. He's got a lot of experience. He speaks Spanish fluently. I think there are a lot of qualities that I think point to him being the one.
BERMAN: John?
PHILLIPS: If she could pick wall paper, that would be her running mate.
BERMAN: Why?
PHILLIPS: She wants to make Donald Trump the focus of the campaign.
CARDONA: No question about that.
PHILLIPS: She doesn't want a strong personality.
FERGUSON: Agree.
PHILLIPS: She doesn't want anyone that's going to up stage here. She wants somebody there to hold her purse.
ROGIN: But she wants that for the whole convention, right? She wants no drama, right? A boring convention for Hillary Clinton is a perfect outcome, right? She doesn't want to make waves. She doesn't want to take any risks. She is feeling confident. They think they are ahead. They think all
they have to do is point to Donald Trump and let him collapse under his own weight, and they will be fine.
BERMAN: Remember, the only thing it prevents you from doing is winning.
FERGUSON: Well, I think one of the interesting things is I go back months ago. Do you remember when Hillary Clinton said I would talk to my husband when it comes to VP picks? Al Gore was quite possibly the most boring by ever in the campaign. And it worked really well for Bill Clinton because it showcased Bill Clinton as a governor.
I think she probably look at the same way. I want a really person I can put in a box where there's no fanfare in a negative way. There's no worry that something is going to go weird and it's safe.
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ROGIN: She wants somebody who she wants to be the vice president, right?
CARDONA: Right.
ROGIN: If you are Hillary Clinton, you think you are going to win, you have to deal with this guy for four years. She wants --
CARDONA: Or gal.
ROGIN: Or gal.
ROMANS: She needs somebody who the lunch bucket Democrats, working class Democrats, men can relate to?
CARDONA: Sure.
ROGIN: Sure, yes.
FERGUSON: But she doesn't pick Elizabeth Warren.
ROGIN: She's going to break a huge glass ceiling. She doesn't need to break two. She can put in the white man and he can go to the Rust Belt states and talk to the other white men and that's fine.
FERGUSON: You mean pander to white men? That's kind of fun, right?
ROGIN: That's what Barack Obama did.
CARDONA: I think the focus of this, though, once she makes her pick, yes, a lot of fanfare, it will be terrific. But going into next week's convention, it's going to be night and day with what we just saw with these four days of dissonance, chaos, you know, disunity, dysfunction, dishonesty, all of the disses, were these last four days.
ROGIN: Disaster.
CARDONA: The Democrats are unified. Disaster as well.
PHILLIPS: Do you need more alliteration here?
CARDONA: Democrats are unified. You have Elizabeth Warren. You have Bernie Sanders. You have the president of the United States. You have the V.P.
FERGUSON: Your biggest liability is you have Bernie Sanders supporters that will not like the V.P. pick and how do you get them to still like you as a candidate? That's your biggest problem.
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FERGUSON: You might have to do it.
CARDONA: That's not going to be an issue.
ROMANS: We have to leave it there. Awesome. Nice to see you. Thanks for being with us.
BERMAN: You must dismiss.
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BERMAN: Coming up at the top of the hour now, Donald Trump accepted the Republican nomination with an hour and a quarter speech that spent much of the time painting a dire picture of the nation in crisis. Here is the opening section of Trump's address.
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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Friends, delegates and fellow Americans: I humbly and gratefully accept your nomination for the presidency of the United States.
ISIS has spread across the region and the entire world. Libya is in ruins, and our ambassador and his staff were left helpless to die at the hands of savage killers. Egypt was turned over to the radical Muslim Brotherhood, forcing the military to retake control. Iraq is in chaos.
[04:55:02] Iran is on the path to nuclear weapons. Syria is engulfed in a civil war and a refugee crisis now threatens the West.
After 15 years of wars in the Middle East, after trillions of dollars spent and thousands of lives lost, the situation is worse than it has ever been before.
This is the legacy of Hillary Clinton: death, destruction, terrorism and weakness.
The most important difference between our plan and that of our opponent is that our plan will put America first.
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Americanism, not globalism, will be our credo.
As long as we are led by politicians who will not put America first, then we can be assured that other nations will not treat America with respect -- the respect that we deserve.
(CHEERS)
The American people will come first once again.
I have seen firsthand how the system is rigged against our citizens, just like it was rigged against Bernie Sanders. He never had a chance. Never had a chance.
But his supporters will join our movement, because we will fix his biggest single issue: Trade deals that strip our country of its jobs and strip us of our wealth as a country.
In this cause, I am proud to have at my side the next vice president of the United States: Governor Mike Pence of Indiana.
We will bring the same economic success to America that Mike brought to Indiana, which is amazing.
He is a man of character and accomplishment. He is the man for the job.
America was shocked to its core when our police officers in Dallas were so brutally executed. Immediately after Dallas, we have seen continued threats and violence against our law enforcement officials. Law officers have been shot or killed in recent days in Georgia, Missouri, Wisconsin, Kansas, Michigan and Tennessee.
On Sunday, more police were gunned down in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Three were killed, and three were very, very badly injured. An attack on law enforcement is an attack on all Americans.
As your president, I will do everything in my power to protect our LGBTQ citizens from the violence and oppression of a hateful foreign ideology. Believe me.
As a Republican, it is so nice to hear you cheering for what I just said. Thank you.
I am your voice. So to every parent who dreams for their child, and every child who dreams for their future, I say these words to you tonight: I'm with you, and I will fight for you, and I will win for you.
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ROMANS: Donald Trump presenting a bleak picture of America. He says he knows how to fix it. "NEW DAY" is next.
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(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DONALD TRUMP: ISIS has spread. Iran is on the path to nuclear weapons. Refugee crisis threatens the West.
IVANKA TRUMP, DAUGHTER OF DONALD TRUMP: When my father says he will make America great again, he will deliver.
DONALD TRUMP: USA! USA!
Attacks on our police and terrorism on our cities threaten our very way of life.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Our country is divided. Our people are afraid.
REINCE PRIEBUS, RNC CHAIRMAN: I have a message to America: Hold on. Help is coming.
DONALD TRUMP: On January 20th of 2017, safety will be restored.
ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo and Alisyn Camerota.
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CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is "NEW DAY" live from the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
Last night was the big night and Donald Trump certainly went big in accepting the party nomination -- big and bad -- painting a picture of desperation and crisis in America, insisting only he can make us safe and prosperous.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Trump blasting Hillary Clinton and blaming her for making America less safe. This morning, some voters described his speech as the best of his career.
