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Don Lemon Tonight

DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz to Resign After Convention; Did Hillary Clinton Know About DNC Favoritism?; Clinton "60 Minutes" About The Hillary Standard. Aired 11p-12a ET

Aired July 24, 2016 - 23:00   ET

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


[23:00:17] DON LEMON, CNN HOST: OK, I want you guys to get a gander of this. Look at that. Do you see who that is? Panel. That is Debbie Wasserman Schultz, live pictures from inside of the convention hall right now.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the chair of the DNC who has just tendered her resignation today, getting a walkthrough. She's supposed to speak tomorrow. The big question is, is she going to? Looks like she is because she's doing a little test run.

Just hours before the Democratic National Convention, the official gaveling, which Donna Brazile will now do it or will she do it? We're not -- is she going to do it? Who's going to do it?

KEVIN MADDEN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Congresswoman Marsha Fudge.

LEMON: Congresswoman Marsha Fudge is going to do it.

You're watching a special edition of CNN TONIGHT, I'm Don Lemon. We're back now live in Philadelphia where we were looking at the convention hall in Philadelphia and where Hillary Clinton will become the official nominee tomorrow, the first woman to ever get a major party nod. And tonight, with me, my panel, my political dream team, and CNN's Jeff Zeleny.

Jeff, you're inside of that convention hall, what's going on?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: I am indeed, Don. And just, I would say 10 minutes or so ago, Debbie Wasserman Schultz walked out on to the stage here. Our eagle-eyed photographer John Bodnar (ph) spotted her on the stage and it's really fascinating here. She clearly is getting a briefing for what appears to be a speech tomorrow, but then, walked across the stage in solitude by herself, as she walked the length of the stage there.

Look out into this. What is basically an empty arena except for television reporters who happen to be doing their live shots at 11:00 here on the East Coast. So you ha to wonder, surely her staff knew that that's why the lights were on in the convention hall at this moment. But you can see from these pictures, Don, she is huddling with her staff, that is her aid, her traveling aid right to the left of her there. He was the one flying with her yesterday from Miami here to Philadelphia. A few other advisors there. We are still told by Democrats familiar with the schedule tomorrow that she is indeed going to speak. Now, we can see her walking off slowly behind the stage there now completely going behind the stage. That she really has built. That she has organized, orchestrated, and she's been the chair here planning this convention all these years, and she has five more days left in the job tomorrow, maybe the last time we see her on this stage at all, Don.

LEMON: All right, Jeff Zeleny, stick around over there. Jeff is going to join our panel here, joining me now, Bakari Sellers, Kevin Madden, Angela Rye, David Chalian, Peter Beinart and Kayleigh McEnany. Again, Jeff Zeleny is inside the convention hall.

So, Jeff said the lights are on but is anybody home? I mean, seriously. I feel like I'm living in an alternate universe. David, what is going on here?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: I get it. I feel like Debbie Wasserman Schultz obviously is just having a terrible day and cannot think straight right now as to what she's doing.

As Jeff just noted, why when all the television cameras are there right now would you go and do your walkthrough of the stage right now? I don't understand this. This is not -- she's now giving the picture, she's resigned in disgrace today, basically, and now she's giving a picture of her fighting her way back for her last stand on the stage.

MADDEN: This has always been one of the criticisms that you've heard from Democrats which is that one of the big problems with Debbie Wasserman Schultz was that she was more interested in, you know, burnishing her own profile than she was of focusing on the job of party chair which is to worry about everybody else's.

LEMON: Does this help her profile? Does this help to burnish her profile, her own profile?

MADDEN: No, it doesn't but it's, obviously, it's some sort of damage control which is to still show that she's in control. It actually kind of reminds me of that movie the "Office Space" where the guy gets fired but he keeps showing up because there's a glitch in payroll.

LEMON: Wait, wait, let me ask you this question and then you can -- is this -- she's a smart woman. Clearly, she knows the optics of this. She's not unaware of what's happening here.

ANGELA RYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: She may have been yields back so I'm not sure. I heard she was a staff for the congressional office ...

LEMON: Is this on purpose?

RYE: ... was just featured prominently on that stage with her. I'm not sure. So the one clarifying question I had is I thought that she was still gaveling in and gaveling out, and she may speak, Marsha Fudge has been appointed as the convention chair but my understanding is she's still ... LEMON: She's gaveling.

RYE: ... gaveling. Gaveling in and gaveling.

LEMON: That's what I thought as well.

RYE: So, if she's gaveling in and gaveling out, maybe that's what that was. But if it's an actual speech, I have concerns.

The other thing is Jeff mentioned that she's planned this convention and worked hard on it. Just for clarification, the Rev. Leah Dougherty planned this convention. The DNCC is -- the CEO for the DNCC is Leah Dougherty. She has planned and worked very hard.

LEMON: Jeff Zeleny, give us some clarification. What do you know? Gaveling in, gaveling out and what of Angela Rye's questions here?

ZELENY: Well Don, as far as we know right now, Angela's right, she is intending to gavel in this convention tomorrow. That's what her statement said today. And then of course the gaveling out would be the final act of this on Thursday after Hillary Clinton accepts the nomination. So as far as we know, she is indeed gaveling in.

[23:05:07] The difference here in what we're talking about with Marsha Fudge, the congresswoman from Ohio, she will be in charge of the daily proceedings of this, effectively the convention chair if something has to go in of order, out of order, she'll be up there running. But it's basically a big business meeting. That's what this convention is, but we are also told that she is preparing for somewhat of a short speech tomorrow.

I was told earlier in the range of three to five minutes, no more than that. Perhaps, Monday afternoon in a 4:00 range. Now, we do not know if she will continue that but, boy, I cannot assume why she would be doing a walkthrough here tonight if she was not planning on speaking.

Now, she did not stand behind the podium, the podium was in front -- in fact not up, it was down. She was walking across the stage there but certainly, it looked like she was checking this out.

And again, she knows what time it is or presumably her aids do. We don't know if she knew that T.V. cameras were rolling. She'll soon find that out. But ...

LEMON: Yeah.

ZELENY: ... tomorrow afternoon, this could be an interesting afternoon. But, Don, the reason I said that it's -- we're so far away from her.

LEMON: Yeah.

ZELENY: We're at the very top of the hall here. There's no one visible to her right around here so, I don't know that. I mean, the convention hall is basically empty with the exception of a few correspondents up here so I'm not sure if she does know ... RYE: That's fair, the question is ...

(CROSSTALK)

MADDEN: Yeah, they know what's on.

LEMON: Yeah, she knows what time it is.

RYE: She knows the time now.

LEMON: There's a -- everybody, if there isn't a live camera from CNN or full camera somewhere else, there's always an iPhone or something so ...

PETER BEINART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: The question is how long did the Democratic Party want us to keep talking about this? They've now guaranteed that we're going to talk -- talking all night, these people are going to be talking about it tomorrow morning because of these pictures now.

They wanted the CNN to keep talking about it tomorrow afternoon. They wanted to keep talking about it tomorrow night. This should have been over by now. I'm really surprised, frankly ...

LEMON: You love this, don't you?

KAYLEIGH MCENANY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I mean, it's a sad moment for Democracy, honestly, because we depend on having free and fair elections and we depend on the DNC and the RNC to navigate those. And then, as you go into a general election, the FCC and then various election boards and how tragic would it be and how big this story would it be if monitoring this election, the Democrats and the Republicans, you had people stacking the deck against one of the parties ...

RYE: ... You know who stacks the deck, the party that pushes these voter I.D. bills and state legislatures all over the country speaking about bring their democracy.

MCENANY: I understand. I understand Democrats are desperate to deflect. You're bringing up depression. You're bringing up voter ...

RYE: Oh no. I didn't -- I talked about bad about these ...

LEMON: Kayleigh, you're supposed to say yes, this is good because it's a distraction for the Democrats.

MCENANY: But it is bad day for the democracy. It's a bad day ...

RYE: It's a ...

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: There she is. That was moments ago.

RYE: Is she speaking? LEMON: Which we'll know. Well, you're looking at Debbie Wasserman Schultz on the stage at the Democratic National Convention where it's going to be held at the Wells Fargo Center here in Philadelphia, getting a walkthrough, a brief run through, this just happen moments ago. You saw it live here on CNN.

And of course now with all the controversy surrounding her, people of course are going to question whether or not why this is happening and whether this is a good move or a bad move. My question was to optics, right, Kevin, you answered that question for me that I asked Kayleigh. The Republicans are loving this.

MADDEN: Yeah, the optics on this are bad. This is something that is going to go from a 24 -- all of us talking about it all day tomorrow, all day today to possibly all day tomorrow.

And also the optics when the convention is going on where you could potentially have a split screen with Debbie Wasserman Schultz sharing the television cameras with the nominee, which is a big problem if you're trying to drive a story that has more to do with the nominee and less to do with the DNC chair who will no longer be the DNC chair in four days.

CHALIAN: Can I just toss just a little cold water here for one second.

LEMON: Oh.

CHALIAN: I'm sorry.

LEMON: You'll be the skunk at the garden party here.

CHALIAN: Just for a second. Last week, we were consumed by Melania Trump's speech and plagiarizing and we were consumed by Ted Cruz and consumed by the floor fight that we saw. Nothing mattered last week as much as Donald Trump's speech because that's when tens of millions of Americans tune in. Some -- many of them for the first time and listened to the nominee for an hour and 15 minutes.

The same will be true this week. We will have lots of things to talk about and this is a distraction. I don't want to take anything away from that. And this is a distraction. But we also shouldn't lose sight that what this is all going to be about is Thursday night when Hillary Clinton speaks, and everyone tunes in and it's from those two speeches that the country goes forward into this general election.

MADDEN: I agree with you on that but real quick, what you need in these conventions, as you know, they're pageantry and what you need to really make them come off really well is momentum. And this is one day where you've lost a momentum but to your larger point, the person sitting at home in Columbus, Ohio, again, who is a swing voter, they have no idea who Debbie Wasserman Schultz is, and they don't care and their vote is not going to decide on it.

RYE: It's 4 p.m., it's going live. If this happens at 4 p.m. it's going live. BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I was going to get to that point. But this is also the blessing, I guess and the curse is that it's -- the curse is that it's going into so it's kind of hard to build a momentum. But the blessing is that it still is before the DNC has actually started any messaging

[23:10:07] The reason that Melania Trump's issues with plagiarism were so large is because she actually gave what everybody thought to be a very, very good speech. And so it trampled on that day's message. And then you had Ted Cruz which trampled on that day's message.

And so right now the Democrats are still in a position to have a day where they can get off a sound message. But I'm really, really interested now, and Jeff brought this up a minute ago in your reporting that she may speak three to five minutes. And I'm really interested in wondering who is crafting those words, how they're being crafted, what she can say, if anything, because if she opens up that speech and has some, you know, Kumbaya, I apologize moment, is that riveting? Or, I mean, what happens in the speech? I think that at 4:00 while people at happy hour, everybody's going to be tuned in. sitting here with Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

LEMON: Jeff, do we know that? Do we know who's crafting it? Do we know any of the things that Bakari just asked here and just his wonderings.

ZELENY: I do not know who's crafting that. Of course, she, you know, still has the full office of the DNC there. And of course she would have been planning on giving remarks anyway.

Now look, she was never going to give a prime time address, she is not going to be in the ranks of Mayor Bloomberg or Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders, but the chairperson of this committee always gives a notable speech. So, you know, she may give the same speech that she was always planning to give, although, you know, might need to alter that a touch, but no, I mean she -- I was in Miami with her yesterday and she introduced Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine, the same kind of ra, ra speech, why this election is important. And my guess is that's what her speech will be tomorrow, completely focussed on why this election is important to Democrats, don.

LEMON: This is mind boggling to me because if you ever, you know, most of us who work real jobs like if you, you know, quit your job or whatever, you have some issues, you would have never hear from again, right? If there's a T.V. personality was that you never see them again, what happened to that guy on issue, it's gone.

RYE: Well, she didn't resigned effective immediately, she resigned effective immediately after the convention.

MCENANY: And let's speak ...

LEMON: But can't they say like OK fine but you need to go now?

RYE: They could. You want to make a call?

LEMON: No, no, I'm just saying. I don't get it. I really don't get it.

MCENANY: Don, the reports indicated that they didn't want her to leave so I really think that this is a negotiation and a compromise. It was a compromise. It's saying, look, allow me to speak for three to five minutes, I'll leave after the convention, and this is kind of an act of defiance in my opinion.

LEMON: Why are you compromising, listen, here's the thing, this is -- hey, listen, you messed up, it's time for you to go. Take one for the team. This is about the highest office in the land. Thank you for your service. We will have a party for you after this convention.

BEINART: One thing we know about Debbie Wasserman Schultz, she's very good at not getting fired. Barack Obama tried to fire her, he had her in his office and he couldn't do it. This may be her genius, her ability to not get fired when she should have.

LEMON: Well, I'm going to need her to council me.

MCENANY: You can come on the apprentice, she'll be fired.

LEMON: All right, we'll continue to talk. Again just moments ago, Debbie Wasserman Schultz out on the stage of the Wells Fargo Center here in Philadelphia getting a run through when there's been so much controversy around her still being the chair, even though she has resigned, effective after the convention.

We'll be right back from Philadelphia.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:16:33] LEMON: All right. There we go. That is Debbie Wasserman Schultz taking a walkthrough on the convention stage. Just moments ago, you saw it happening live here on CNN and, of course, again the controversy surrounding her resignation today, but not until after this convention, whether she should even be there, she'd be allowed to speak, to gavel in, to gavel out. People are wondering what is going on here? Why is all of this still happening?

Back with me now, my political dream team. Here's my question for you and I want to make sure I get it right. When did Hillary Clinton know, what did she know and when did she know about this possible favoritism because it seems like she had to know something. If she's the one running, they're putting the finger on the scale, she and Debbie Wasserman Schultz are friendly, she's sort of a surrogate for Hillary Clinton. She's been ...

CHALIAN: Why do you believe Hillary Clinton had to know? Whatever ...

LEMON: Hillary Clinton is not a foolish woman. There are people who think that she ...

CHALIAN: Right, let me back up. The DNC was so obviously part of the very Clinton establishment thing that was the Clinton candidacy.

MADDEN: ... conspiracy.

CHALIAN: Yeah. Like there was no doubt that anybody thought that the DNC was somehow a surrogate operation for Bernie Sanders.

LEMON: So you don't think Clinton knew?

CHALIAN: I don't think -- I think there's no evidence that Hillary Clinton was aware of these e-mails going back and forth inside the DNC, among DNC staff members, about Bernie Sanders. I don't think there's any evidence that she ...

LEMON: It would be hard to think that what is it, Mook, Podesta, Hillary Clinton, those three people who all part of the DNC knew nothing.

CHALIAN: I don't think they knew the particulars. Do I think they believe that the DNC was an organization on their side that they could count on, that they could use in negotiations and know that they would -- yes, I ...

LEMON: What does that say about their campaign?

MADDEN: The DNC is the Democratic establishment, the establishment, the super delegates, all of the, you know, thousands of elected officials who are Democrats around the country wanted to see Hillary Clinton win and were supportive of Hillary.

RYE: And they wanted to see her win in 2008. We're acting like this is new. The same Democratic establishment that was on her side now ...

LEMON: That doesn't make it right.

RYE: No, I'm not saying it's right but I'm saying why are we surprised? Barack Obama happened to still end up winning the primaries, and he still ended up getting the super delegates after they left Hillary Clinton to switch to Barack Obama. But I think that we are crazy if we're not acknowledging that she actually was a part of the party ...

BEINART: And also worth remembering, when some of these decisions were made, Bernie Sanders was not Bernie Sanders yet, right? These -- Bernie Sanders was still an asterisk, right? He did not -- so, this was an in a contest in which people thought Hillary Clinton was basically facing almost minimal opposition.

And let me tell you, political parties are in the business of nominating the people who they think will win general election. No, I mean, that's the general way the party's trying to do things. So, to say that parties are not entirely internally Democratic, there is nothing new here. Parties try to nominate the people they think can win. And the people in the Democratic Party do not think Bernie Sanders was a strong general election candidate.

SELLERS: Can I chime in briefly because one, we just got 20 some thousand e-mails and I don't think there's any correlation to what you were eluding to, Don. But even more importantly, in the history of the United States of America, the person who got the most primary votes of any candidate is Barack Obama. The person who got the second most primary votes of any candidate was Hillary Clinton. The person who got the third most primary votes was Hillary Clinton.

So, let's not discount the fact that Hillary Clinton in this primary race did go out and get the most votes in this race and does have an over 300 delegate advantage without super delegates.

[23:20:07] I mean, you just -- we were acting as if the DNC went out and pressed everybody.

LEMON: All right, I want ...

SELLERS: With that being said, you have to hold the people accountable for what they were doing and what they were saying.

LEMON: OK, I want to get this in. So, Donna Brazile, our colleague here at CNN is now the interim chair at least until they select another chair. She spoke to Anderson Cooper tonight, listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: There was a lot of talk during the Republican convention about distractions that took away from the convention.

DONNA BRAZILE, DNC INTERIM CHAIR: Right.

COOPER: This is a big distraction.

BRAZILE: Look, Debbie has spent a lot of time, a lot of years, not just raising money, but also putting together the staff, working day in and day night to ensure we had a very successful convention.

COOPER: But can the Democratic Party just say thanks for doing all that but it's time to go and today's the day?

BRAZILE: You know, I am of the position that she made this decision. She decided that for the party, and for the country in many ways because she wants to elect the next president of the United States, Hillary Clinton, that she wanted to be a part of the activities this week ...

COOPER: But should it matter what Debbie Wasserman Schultz wants? I mean, isn't the idea for the Democratic Party to be unified behind Secretary Clinton?

BRAZILE: And we are. You probably are seeing a statement by not just, not only President Obama, Secretary Clinton, but also Senator Sanders. I took the position early on yesterday to walk into Philadelphia to apologize to the Sanders team about the distractions that the e-mails were causing.

I also apologized with the insensitivity, the tone, and really some of the harsh and very, what I believe to be toxic words that came from some of the staffers.

COOPER: Do you know what else in is in those e-mails that may be coming out?

BRAZILE: Well, all I know based on, you know, receiving e-mails on a daily basis from my friends at the DNC, yeah, I mean, there's probably information. If any e-mails are leaked, this is a cautionary tale to everybody, hello, good-bye, that's it, stop e-mailing people. I don't know the substance, but I do know there are lots of stuff that we might have to apologize for.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So, Donna has I think what many believed the right sentiment, the right tone there. She's saying all the right things but is the party doing the right thing actually now because you think there's more pressure for her to go sooner rather than later?

RYE: I don't think she's going any sooner than what's been decided and I ...

LEMON: Why is it her decision though?

RYE: I think that Kayleigh and Bakari have eloquently stated that it was a part of a compromise. I think that's exactly what you have. The great thing, Don, is all of your frustrations, you just sat back and everything, the great thing is Donna, our fantastic colleague as you already alluded to is going to make some great decisions ...

LEMON: Former colleague, as of now.

RYE: ... as the interim chair. Yes, the contract is suspended for right now, but while she's the interim chair, I think she's going to make great some decisions, and she's clearly already taking leadership and being accountable.

LEMON: But I had to say for the people at home who tune in, I mean, this is -- quite honestly for my mom, my mom said where she worked, my mom worked for Exxon Chemicals for a long time. She would have escorted out by security. And we hear that all the time about people, once you leave a job, even if you resign, security says, OK, see you later. We'll send you out.

MCENANY: She should have been escorted out by security because this is a massive scandal. When a party has become such a behemoth that from the beginning, instead of it being a level playing field between Bernie Sanders and between Hillary Clinton, the debates are varied on weekends, the stage, it's clearly crafted as such that it would elevate Hillary Clinton's chances and suppress Bernie Sanders. We saw it, the Bernie Sanders supporters were rightly disappointed by what happened in Nevada where they changed election results essentially ...

SELLERS: Who won the race?

MCENANY: But it could have been different potentially. If you enter a game and the ... SELLERS: That's not what happened though.

MCENANY: ... the playing field is not leveled ...

SELLERS: That's not ...

MCENANY: We don't know ...

SELLERS: That's not what happened. I mean, when the two candidates, well before they were even two candidates, there were rules set up. The playing field was already set. So, I mean, yes, we had debates on awkward nights as Jeff were saying, we had debates on Thanksgiving, on Christmas eve ...

LEMON: But, Bakari, for a party that really touts its, you know, inclusion and fairness and all that, to have this, this is -- she's right, this is a big scandal. We should not down play this especially for a party who touts that, who says that's, you know, that's their reason for being a party. Democratic. Democratic.

SELLERS: I think they're -- like I keep saying, I keep going back to, there are operational things that need to be changed. But these were the rules going into the game. Now, what came out of these e-mails, again, that is something I believe to be separate, but also, I'm going to get crucified for this, but let me say it, like Debbie Wasserman Schultz has done some good things for the Democratic Party. That's something that nobody has said on air, I don't believe outside, maybe Donna Brazile. And so, I'm going to take the heat and the wrath for everything and I 'm going to say right now, but she has actually done some good things for the Democratic Party.

There are a lot of people in the United States' congress and down ballot officials who owe a great deal of gratitude for Debbie Wasserman Schultz traveling the country and raising money. With that being said, when your time is up, it's time to go home. And right now, I think we understand that the time is up and it's time for her to go home.

[23:25:12] LEMON: You said -- you brought up a good point, you said the party is supposed to be fair, right, Hillary Clinton, impartial.

CHALIAN: You asked me what did Hillary know and I just think the burden here is on the DNC. The DNC is the organization that has to remain impartial according to their rules. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders for that matter have every right to try to curry favor with the DNC, but, you know, I don't think ...

BEINART: Political parties are not designed to be internal democracies. They are signed to be vehicles for nominated people who win. That is the ...

(CROSSTALK)

BEINART: ... up until the 19th, up until the -- I mean, up until the 1970s, party nominees were not chosen even remotely as a matter of fact. The point is, the reason ... RYE: I want -- I cannot wait for RNC e-mails to get released. Kayleigh, tonight, it feels like you have amnesia. The RNC was not on the side of Donald Trump.

MCENANY: Well, I think you have amnesia because at the very beginning of this segment, I even said, last hour, I said there were problems with the Republican establishment who canceled the presidential preference poll in Colorado. This is a kindred spirit battle that we're fighting here.

LEMON: All right, we're going to continue this on the other side of the break. Like you said, the party's over. It's time to go home. But yet and still, Debbie Wasserman Schultz is still up on the stage getting a walkthrough tonight in Philadelphia, happening just moments ago.

Again, some of it playing out live here on CNN. What is going on here? Is she going to speak tomorrow? Is she gong gavel in, gavel out? The drama is on.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:30:28] LEMON: We're back now live from Philadelphia, just hours before the opening of the Democratic National Convention. Will the scandal about Debbie Wasserman Schultz and the leaked e-mails overshadow the attempt by Democrats to unify around Hillary Clinton and against Donald Trump? And there it is, a picture is worth a thousand words. Video tells more than that. It's worth -- yeah, look at that. What'd you say?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah. The other woman left the stage.

LEMON: The other one, she's like I'm getting out of there.

There's Debbie Wasserman Schultz just moments ago on the stage at the Democratic convention getting a walkthrough. Many were wondering if she was even going to take the stage. Apparently she is planning to whether it's a gavel in gavel out or to give a short, we have heard three to five minute speech here.

David Chalian with some new news for us. Here is what I have to say, I feel like this is so -- I mean this is an out of body experience, last week it was Ted Cruz who came in and as my colleague Ana Navarro said, you know, you know what on the carpet ate the food and drink the liquor and then went home. And, but, instead it's the party chair this time because she has a brunch or breakfast tomorrow, much like Ted Cruz. Everyone was wondering about his speech, now her speech, I mean it's crazy.

CHALIAN: Right. It's not so much that she's attending a delegation breakfast as you know with these conventions. Every state delegation has a breakfast in the morning. The delegates gather in their hotel. Some Democratic Party official or campaign official comes and speaks to them. So tomorrow, she's scheduled to speak at the Florida delegation breakfast, her own delegation breakfast. This, she was on the list of the initial speakers. Whether or not she will remain a confirm speaker for tomorrow, we do not yet know but she is ...

LEMON: This is becoming a pattern.

CHALIAN: She was on the other list ...

LEMON: We don't know if she's going to speak.

CHALIAN: ... 8:30 tomorrow morning. Now, the big question you wanted -- use your Ted Cruz comparison is, does she take the path that he took?

Because remember, when he was confronted with delegates who was sort of antagonistic to him ...

LEMON: He is defiant.

CHALIAN: ... he quadrupled down.

LEMON: Yeah. Double that, yeah.

CHALIAN: He was really defiant and supported his position. If she is confronted by some Florida delegates tomorrow at this breakfast who feel that she has handled herself terribly this weekend, how does she respond to that?

SELLERS: I think you have two different things. I think, one is she's up for reelection right now. So her being at the Florida breakfast is not really a far cry from where she probably needs to be in order to win reelection. And I cannot see, I know Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and I cannot see her coming out and doubling down and running from this. I think that she, when she opens her mouth from the first time we ever hear from her, we'll own this. I don't think you can disown it. I mean, I don't think you can sit here and say, and I've been wrong before many times in front of the world. And I may be wrong again. But I can't see how you would not own this. And I just think that she will.

BEINART: And I think, if you step back, I think this is all a gift to the Bernie Sanders forces. It's a gift because it discredits the DNC now. It creates a situation in which what they want to do is they want to blow up this party establishment. They want to change the rules. They want to make it easier for insurgent candidates. All of this makes it easier because the establishment looks -- it makes the establishment look corrupt ...

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: I remember, before we get to that, when you said, one of the swing voters home doesn't know who Debbie Wasserman Schultz is. It's really the domino affect when you have the protesters on the Bernie Sanders side as you were saying. When you have Bernie Sanders who has said this all along. It's about those people she's going to need those Bernie Sanders supporters to help her get into the White House. It's not just at the swing voter may not know who she is, it's the domino -- it's a cumulative effect of ...

BEINART: Right. And she also chose Tim Kaine who was not the person they wanted. Now, she, Hillary Clinton has important allies. She has Elizabeth Warren who has -- who's a very, very important figure and being able to speak to that part of the movement.

I think the thing we don't know is, among the Bernie Sanders supporters out there, how much is this going to resonate? How much is this going to prevent the kind of -- I agree, with ...

(CROSSTALK)

BEINART: ... in general what we know is probably they come home. We're in a very partisan era. But does this delay that?

LEMON: What was your question again?

MADDEN: Well, mine was, is this enough of a scalp for a lot of those Bernie Sanders supporters that wanted to see somebody at the DNC pay a price? I don't know if it is. But I think the one thing that will satisfy those supporters so that you can have some of those Democratic tribal instincts come -- so folks come home to support their own party, I think it will be Bernie Sanders' speech alone at the convention. That is going to be the moment that they're waiting for. Those are going to be the signals, the words, the indicators that they need to sort of rally some support behind Hillary Clinton.

LEMON: And how then does he respond? Because he responded, he put out a statement and he said, basically saying this prove I was right all along.

SELLERS: But on our show once -- I believe it was "State of the Union" and Chuck Todd went and asked does this change anything?

[23:35:05] He, his response was no, no, no, I still support Hillary Clinton. And the Bernie Sanders campaign, they have been trying to reform the system, the system. And unlike Donald Trump, I would think on the Republican side ...

LEMON: There's a statement right here. "Debbie Wasserman Schultz made the right decision for the future of the Democratic Party while she deserves thanks for her years of service, the party. The party now needs new leadership." And then he again went on to say sort of -- this is -- there it is. "It's supposed to be -- you're supposed to main -- always remain impartial in a presidential contest." So he's using this and saying hey, look, I was right about this all along and you guys have every ...

SELLER: Well, I think there have been concessions made, and that's how you bring a party together. Whether or not you're talking about the platform where they went through this laborious process on the platform committee or even last night in the rules committee where we had this knock down drag out. But everybody at the end of the day came together on super delegates and what we're going to do to move forward. And now you have what we call the last scalp which is really, this is the prize that Jeff Weaver and Bernie Sanders wanted which is Debbie Wasserman Schultz going forward. And then Ben Jealous (ph) who was an arted supporter of Bernie Sanders who was just sometimes very, very difficult on Hillary Clinton to say the least came out and said that this departure of Debbie Wasserman Schultz actually gives the party time to heal.

MCENANY: Right. But I think one thing we need to consider is the fact that Bernie Sanders voters aren't necessarily Democratic Party loyalists. When you look at the breakdown of the 40 percent who say that they won't vote for Hillary Clinton, 5 percent went to Trump but the other went to the Libertarian candidate and the Green Party candidate. These are voters who aren't afraid to vote for the party.

LEMON: Kevin you said that ...

MADDEN: No. I, I think that that's -- I understand the optimism that a lot of Trump -- folks in the Trump camp believe that they can win Bernie Sanders voters but I think ultimately these are still folks that are going to go again by their party instincts and they're going to return to the full on the Democratic Party. The same way I think many folks who are Republicans who are not exactly happy about Donald Trump are also going to return to the fold there. That's why ultimately this is coming down to that 8 percent of voters right now that haven't made up their mind. Who those folks are yet that haven't made up their mind, you know, we know where they are. They're living in places like Columbus, Ohio and that we love Columbus, Ohio. It's a swing area of the swing state.

LEMON: So, you know, we went to convention in a telenovela (ph) and things and I would say are soap opera broke out. When I got all of this this morning. I was like, you cannot write this.

MCENANY: No.

BEINART: Yeah.

LEMON: Just before the convention this happens.

MCENANY: I'm so sorry.

LEMON: It's crazy, right? And we're not done yet. We're just getting started. We'll be right back after this break, don't go anywhere.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:41:16] LEMON: Live now in Philadelphia where the Democratic Convention is just hours away. Just hours away, the presumptive nominee is Hillary Clinton. Our talking to "60 Minutes" about what she calls the Hillary standard. Back with me now, my political dream team and speaking of that interview. Let's look at some of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SCOTT PELLEY, CBS NEWS: I was speaking to a young African-American man just the other day, in a Democratic state, and he said, and I'll quote, you know, I guess I would vote for Hillary, except for that corruption problem. End quote. As I talked to him further, he didn't quite know what he meant by that but that was his impression and concern. Why do you think people say that about you?

HILLARY CLINTON, (D) PRESUMPTIVE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Well, first, I will take responsibility for any impression or anything I've ever done that people have legitimate questions about, but I think that it's fair to say there's been a concerted effort to convince people like that young man of something. Nobody's quite sure what, but of something. I often feel like there's the Hillary standard and then there's the standard for everybody else.

PELLEY: What's the Hillary standard?

CLINTON: Well, it is, you know, a lot of, as you saw at the Republican convention, unfounded, inaccurate, mean-spirited attacks with no basis in truth, reality, which take on a life of their own. And for whatever reason, I don't want to analyze the reasons. I see it, I understand it. People are very willing to say things about me to make accusations about me that are -- I don't get upset about them anymore. But they are very regrettable.

PELLEY: Why do you put yourself through it?

CLINTON: Because I really believe in this country and boy do I believe in it now more than ever after seeing what was presented last week. I believe that we are better than what we are hearing in the political discourse. I believe we can work together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Angela, was she right about the "Hillary standard?" What do you make about that?

RYE: Several things. I think that often times in this life, women are held to different standards. I also think that's not a foreign concept to African-Americans.

One of my favorite mainstream quote was when Daddy Pope talks to Olivia Pope and he said, what did I tell, you have to be twice as good. And I think that it's a similar concept. However, I think that Hillary Clinton could do herself a favor by not coming across so guarded. It took her a minute on the e-mail issue to really own it in a way that was palatable for the American people. And I think she just had some work to do there. She's been through a lot in her role both as first lady. I think even as a senator and now as secretary of state and/or when she was secretary of state, as well, she had some real challenges. But I don't think that she can call this out. She needs somebody else to say it.

LEMON: And it was a very long sort of answer.

RYE: Mine was longer. LEMON: Yeah, it was good, go ahead.

CHALIAN: But 18 and a half years after she sat with Matt Lauer on the day show blamed ...

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: ... conspiracy.

CHALIAN: ... conspiracy, she still feels burned by her opponents in some way that she thinks is unfair. And, you know, she'll make that case to the voters and see if they think it's unfair or not. But it just seems to me yes, she's accepted responsibility and yes, she did so there again but she still pivots immediately to this notion of people out to get her. I don't know that that's the best thing.

MADDEN: You have to ...

LEMON: I want to get. I want to get --

MADDEN: I'm sorry.

LEMON: No go ahead.

MADDEN: I'd say you had to cringe when she used the term, Hillary standard because that is the central charge that all of her opponents have which is that Hillary Clinton thinks that she's above the law.

[23:45:06] That laws that apply to everybody else don't apply to her. And she brings all of this on herself.

LEMON: And they're going to use that.

MADDEN: And she brings this all on herself. I mean she stood there and said three things at the U.N. press conference that were demonstrably false. Which is that A, that the server was allowed using private e-mail was allowed, that national security was not compromised and that she never sent or received anything classified. Three things that she knew that we all knew were demonstrably false.

MCENANY: And the FBI Director categorically said those things were false. So this young voter that was referenced, you know, he didn't come up with this idea of corruption just because of, you know, attack ads that are out there. He came out with this idea because you had a sitting FBI Director contradict the three points she just mentioned.

SELLERS: And that's not -- Hillary Clinton wasn't talking about a Hillary Clinton standard when it comes to criminality. I just think that that's beyond to fail. And that's just put into the saying but that's not what she was talking about. It's actually draw that -- switch in to draw that parallel is just -- I think that's unfair to her point but for anybody to sit on this panel like sexism doesn't exist. Act like the fact that Hillary Clinton's been taking these barbs in his attacks since she was the first lady of Arkansas and then first lady of United States in 1992. And you're living in a parallel universe or in alter universe to quote Kayleigh earlier. I mean I did say a lot of that ...

CHALIAN: Have nothing to do with her own actions? Having nothing to do with her own actions?

SELLERS: No, I think that many times the Clintons have caused a lot of the drama that they have on themselves. However, yell Benghazi, yell it one time. I mean that is the -- that was the central charge last week because she had a group of people in a room last week yelling lock her up, being led by a sitting governor. It felt like the Salem witch trials. That is what the Hillary standard is.

BEINART: I thought I -- go ahead.

MCENANY: No, I just want to say, two of you have referenced sexism which is just a bit strange to hear because Donald Trump is a male and he has received more scrutiny, more attacks than any candidate I've seen in modern history just exactly because of her gender she's having ...

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: Let's balance this out with just -- lets it's, it's free air time. He's received so much -- it was 2.1 billion since they polled the numbers. I'm sure it's way more than that now. She doesn't -- she hasn't received that same amount free air time.

SELLERS: I don't think that's what we're talking here.

BEINART: There's a lot of social science data which suggests that people hold female politicians and women in power in general that were different and much tougher standard. There's no -- I don't think it's there's a serious question about that.

MCENANY: No, that's actually ...

(CROSSTALK)

BEINART: The question is -- no, no, you get -- there it is again, even there's tremendous amount of data about this but this has nothing to do with Hillary Clinton. It has to do with studies in the workplace, studies across into our -- to cross countries. The question is how does she respond to it? I don't think she responded to it well there. I think she said what she really believes.

LEMON: Yeah.

BEINART: I think she genuinely believes that.

LEMON: Wait Kevin, why did you make that face when she said, you know, Donald Trump has received more scrutiny then? Why don't you relay?

MADDEN: I don't think that's the best argument.

MCENANY: OK. Have we ever had a glowing panel where we praise Donald Trump for one something good, he said, no. I think the viewers either watch out ...

(CROSSTALK)

MADDEN: I don't think sexism is the best terrain to fight something that's for Donald Trump.

MCENANY: I think viewers ...

MADDEN: I think you chose your flights wisely and that's not ...

MCENANY: I think we're -- let's be honest, viewers have watch the scrutiny Donald Trump has got. It is not been a cake walk for anyone.

LEMON: So I had any after David ...

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: David Chalian question.

CHALIAN: Has Donald Trump caused any of that on himself?

MCENANY: No, he's said some things, sure, that we should scrutinize but ...

CHALIAN: That's my point.

MCENANY: ... Hillary Clinton's ...

(CROSSTALK)

MCENANY: Hillary Clinton's e-mails situation existed, we ignored it. Clinton foundation, ignore it. There are many things she has done that she's gotten a pass on. And just to go back to that gender path real quick ...

RYE: Where did she get a pass on? Look at this pass having there an inspector general's report through the FBI?

MCENANY: Right and only then did it get scrutiny.

LEMON: I got to go. I got to. I got to go. On the other side, we'll continue, we'll continue. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:52:23] LEMON: Look at that. There's a CNN girl here in Philadelphia. I cannot wait Philadelphia. Remember this is three, Philadelphia. That's four. There's no sound a it's Philadelphia. Soon, we were back at the site of the Democratic convention. It doesn't get under way in full until tomorrow until, you know, the gavel. But then who's going to do the gavel? That's the big question.

RYE: I thought ...

LEMON: We'll be covering it live though. RYE: That said she will still gavel with ...

LEMON: Maybe.

CHALIAN: According to the Washington ...

LEMON: According to the -- yes, she's gaveling. Right, you know.

MADDEN: And we had something, those people in Columbus, Ohio.

LEMON: Back to what we were talking about fairness, what was it?

MCENANY: Media coverage.

LEMON: About media coverage.

MCENANY: That is being biased. The media research center actually looked into this and found that ABC, NBC and CBS, the three networks covered over four-day period. The Trump publicists situation whether impersonated publicists. They covered it for 38 minutes.

Meanwhile, the Clinton foundation, they covered for four minutes since the beginning of the year. So these are facts. There is a bias against Right-Wing folks. And certainly in ABC and ...

RYE: How do people ...

LEMON: But you have to admit that somebody is pretending to be their own publicists. It's pretty good.

RYE: Gone there.

LEMON: I mean that's good.

MADDEN: I think that's a bad example to make your point because in that sense it's biased towards what's the easier story to cover ...

LEMON: Right.

MADDEN: ... and then to show. And I think when you have somebody -- as maybe -- we have a presidential candidate literally serving as his own spoke men and then lying about it. That's a very easily depicted story on television where as ...

MCENANY: Far better than having corruption in the Clinton foundation ...

MADDEN: You are absolutely right. That that is a very foul story that are going to be pursued. I just think -- I think more oftentimes they're biased in the favor of the easier story rather than more complex story.

RYE: Because it's a ...

LEMON: And it's also bias in the favor also -- it can be biased in the favor -- what is the most interesting story to cover for the viewers, sometime?

RYE: Who's the CEO of the Clinton's foundation? Is it Hillary?

MCENANY: Bill.

RYE: So, the other thing that I don't understand is why we continue to place the Clinton foundation at her feet? Do we want to talk about Donald Trump's foundation? Do we want to talk about Eric Trump's foundation issues or the black woman ...

MADDEN: I think the answer to all of those is yes.

RYE: But that -- but my point is that Hillary Clinton does not run the Clinton foundation.

MADDEN: She is directly tied to and benefits on that foundation.

RYE: By her last name.

CHALIAN: And her name is on it.

RYE: By her last name.

(CROSSTALK)

BEINART: I think there's two things going on. The first is that as a person as much of a cultural phenomenon as Hillary Clinton was for in the run of being the first first lady who was not a traditional, you know, kind of housewife and now the first years does a campaign is producing -- a massive cultural backlash and that's part of what we're seeing in this corruption.

On the other hand, it's also true that all for decade after decade, you can see this in the contrast of in the Clinton and the Obama.

[23:55:05] That Obama is much more careful in terms of the way he conducts himself than the Clintons have.

RYE: Exactly.

BEINART: These are the two phenomenon that have together to lead to this massive perception of Hillary Clinton as someone who's corrupt.

SELLERS: Let me just comment real quick to Kayleigh's point. And I get your point but there's one looming issue out there. And I don't understand why every interview regardless on what network it starts. With Donald Trump doesn't start with the question where are your taxes? Why don't you release your taxes, you know why? Because that is a standard for presidential candidates of the United States that he is disrespected.

And further, to go to, oh my god, I don't have my tax because they're being audited is just a bone face lie because we actually know that Richard Nixon was also being audited and gave his taxes. So while we're talking about the scrutiny ...

MCENANY: You're not going to ...

SELLERS: ... while we're talking about scrutiny. I just think it's ironic that the two heads of the major parties resigning is Debbie Wasserman Schultz got ...

LEMON: I got to go. Do you think she'll speak?

MCENANY: Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

BEINART: I think so.

LEMON: I think so. Do you think she'll speak? You? Yes?

RYE: It looks like it. And she walked out there.

LEMON: Do you think she's going to speak?

MADDEN: I think she will.

LEMON: You?

SELLERS: Ask me in the morning.

LEMON: All right everyone, thank you very much. I enjoyed it.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: That should be crazy.

Right back here with our live special coverage as Democratic Convention here, everyday beginning at 1:00 a.m. We will be here.

Our CNN original series "RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE" begin in just a moment. Good night.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)