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Sanders Launches New Political Group Tonight; Clinton under New Scrutiny over Clinton Foundation; Trump to Speak in Tampa, Florida; Update on American University in Afghanistan Attack. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired August 24, 2016 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00] BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: And how is he going to take what he sort of started during the campaign and really move it in an effective way towards doing something? We are familiar with for example Obama for America. And this concept again, that you take something, that you created in a campaign, channel it into something else, we've never seen it really successfully take off.

JEFF WEAVER, BERNIE SANDERS PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN: I don't know that that is necessarily true. I think --

(CROSSTALK)

KEILAR: Not successfully. I just mean being if he wants to be real sort of power broker in a way or allow his supporters to be, and how do they really -- how do they do that?

WEAVER: Right. Well, look, what we will do is build up what happened in the campaign. This is an organization designed to carry on the legacy of Bernie Sander's presidential campaign. He will not be involved in the day-to-day operation. It's a nonprofit, obviously. As a U.S. Senator, he has a lot of things on his plate right now.

But we have across the country is millions and millions of people involved in the political process for the first time who want to stay involved and help realize the progressive vision that Bernie Sanders articulated. So we will work with groups that formed during the course of the campaign, but people didn't have a lot of experience in politics. We will help support those groups at grass roots level and help support candidates for office, including down-ballot candidates to create a progressive bench going forward. And we'll involve people in reaching out on ballot initiatives around the country as well.

KEILAR: So it is to people who did not really feel like they were part of the political process before. Are you essentially giving them like a primer on how to get involved, how to make a difference and promote candidates who might have been, for instance, more liberal than candidates that say the Democratic Party might be recruiting on a local level?

WEAVER: Right. What we find is that every year, every two years we elect Congress people, every two years we elect Senators, but we need a progressive bench. We have give people experience in local office and state office around the country so we have candidates who are prepared to run for Congress and the U.S. Senate who have experience, who have a relationship with voters in their communities. That's one of the things we will certainly be doing.

KEILAR: Let me preface this by saying this is not a judgment statement. I'm just asking if this is something that will happen.

WEAVER: Sure. Sure.

KEILAR: We have seen something happen, more to Republicans that we have seen happen to Democrats, which is they start to worry about getting primaried on the right. Do you think this will create a situation where Democrats now start to worry about essentially the same thing being primaried on the left?

WEAVER: I think what we found during the last election year is the rank-and-file of the Democratic Party moved in a much more progressive direction. Many people thought and is part of the success of Bernie Sanders presidential campaign. I think we saw it, even with Hillary Clinton supporters, and people are much more progressive than people thought they were. The party has to respond to that. So they have to run candidates that reflect the base of the party, which is moving in a much more progressive direction.

Donna Brazile, who was former here at CNN and moved over to the DNC, I think shares that vision of moving that party in a more Democratic direction and having a 50-state strategy to help up build up the ranks of progressive candidates.

KEILAR: Do you think there will be boisterousness? Is this going to create that, like we saw at the convention? Do you feel that is a good thing? Is that a new state of politics on the left that you would like to see?

WEAVER: I think it was a great example of what could be accomplished. There was obviously very boisterous in the beginning, at least the beginning of the convention, but everybody came together in the end. I think the result was the progressive platform that the Democratic Party created with the Sanders campaign and Clinton campaign. And it's the most progressive party platform in the history of Democratic Party. And our job is to make sure that that document becomes a reality. That's part of what our goal is.

KEILAR: Actually, I want to ask you something about Hillary Clinton because she is under fire over questions about her family's foundation, possible conflicts with her work. Obviously, you've had many opinions of Hillary Clinton over the course of the primary campaign and about some of the issues that she has faced they'd felt were serious weaknesses.

Here is what Senator Sanders said about this issue during the campaign back in June.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, (I), VERMONT & FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If you ask me about the Clinton Foundation, do I have a problem when a sitting secretary of state and foundation run by her husband collects many millions of dollars from foreign governments, governments which are dictatorships -- you don't have a lot of civil liberties of Democratic rights in Saudi Arabia. You don't have a lot of respect there for opposition points of view, for gay rights, for women's rights -- do I have a problem with that? Yeah, I do.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: You think it creates conflict of interest?

SANDERS: I do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Donald Trump agrees with Bernie Sanders on this issue. What do you make of the foundation becoming, again, a bit of a liability and criticism point for Hillary Clinton?

WEAVER: Well, I certainly think is a criticism point I think for many people. Let me say this. We have a choice in this election. The choice is between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. When you look at issues that affect real people out in the real world and this is really -- I mean, you had this one clip, and Bernie ran a campaign focused, as you know, and famous, "I don't care about you damn e- mails" line, he ran a campaign focused on issues that affect people's lives. Are you going to have a job? Are you going to have a job that pays well? Are your kids going to college? Are we going to save the planet from climate change? These issues were central to his campaign, and those are the issues that should be central to the general campaign. When you make that comparison between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, who wants to give tax breaks to the rich, hates immigrant, thinks climate change is a hoax, I think there, hands down, not a choice.

[13:35:27] KEILAR: You're not taking a whack at Hillary Clinton on this. I note that, Jeff Weaver.

Thank you so much.

WEAVER: Thank you.

KEILAR: We appreciate you're being here.

Moments ago, Donald Trump made an unexpected stop to tour a voter registration bus in Tampa. Reporters got in a question. Take a look here.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE & CEO, TRUMP ORGANIZATION: I had to come over here. Come on. Let's go inside.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Mr. Trump, will you talk about minority outreach? Mr. Trump, what are you doing to reach out to minority voters? What are you doing to reach out to minority voters? You have been talking a lot about Hispanics and African-Americans?

TRUMP: We're doing really great with minority voters.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Are you doing anything specifically to reach out to them?

TRUMP: Absolutely. Totally.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: And coming up, we are standing by for that Trump rally starting any minute now in Tampa. Will he make another pitch to woo African-American and Latino voters? Live pictures here. We will go here next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:40:54] KEILAR: Donald Trump is expected to take the stage in Tampa, Florida, any moment. These are live pictures from the Sunshine State. We will take you there when it gets going.

And Trump is expected to keep the heat on Hillary Clinton over an Associated Press report about access to Clinton when she was secretary of state from donors to the Clinton Foundation. The report paints a picture that donors had an easier time getting the secretary's attention and time.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: It is impossible to figure out where the Clinton Foundation ends and the State Department begins. It is now abundantly clear that the Clintons set up a business to profit from public office. They sold access and specific actions by, and really, for, I guess, the making of large amounts of money.

WEAVER: This is a woman who met with over 17,000 world leaders, countless other government officials, public officials in the United States. And they've looked at 185 meetings and tried to draw a conclusion to that. I think this is one of the most massive representations you can see from the data. They are trying to malign and implicate that there was something nefarious going on when, in fact, there wasn't.

GARY JOHNSON, (I), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: None of this is illegal. It is just that implication and the fact that it is being paid and that it is unstated. Look, if you don't pay for that access, you don't get the access.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Here with me now, we have Juana Summers, "CNN Politics" editor, and as of today, a new fellow at Georgetown University Institute of Politics and Public Service; and Molly Ball, political writer for "The Atlantic," and Ryan Lizza, a CNN political commentator and Washington correspondent for "The New Yorker."

So let's try to get to the bottom of this when it comes to the foundation. You listen to Donald Trump and he says the Clinton Foundation is the most corrupt charity of all time, basically. Then have you Hillary Clinton supporters, Ryan, saying this is a charity that helps combat HIV/AIDS and that, without it, people would die. Where is the truth in here?

RYAN LIZZA, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORKER: Yeah. Look, and that has gotten lost in this. No doubts. Look at the independent charity watch watchdogs and what they say about the Clinton Foundation, and it is generally prized for its work. It has done great work all off the world. And it is surprising that the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton campaign hasn't done much of a job explaining that.

On the other hand, when Hillary Clinton was first being looked at for secretary of the state, everyone that looked that new relationship between the Obama administration and the Clinton Foundation said, wait a second, there is a potential for the at least the appearance of a conflict of interest. And back then, in 2009, the decision was, OK, just make all of your donations, which were previously private, make them public. And the foundation and the Obama administration had a Memorandum of Understanding that laid that out. Other people at the time were saying, that's not enough, she should disassociate herself completely. Bill Clinton should not be a part of it. Because if you are a foreign entity, government or citizen, that want to influence in the Clinton State Department, of course, you will give money to the Clinton Foundation.

So it's these two things. It's a foundation that did great things but it was also used by people to buy access to her.

I think what is not proven yet is what Trump said after that, that not only did they get access, which all politicians grant to their donors, but they got favors.

KEILAR: And what it does is it highlights something, part of it is what happens on a daily basis, Molly. Like Ryan said, donors get access to candidates. It is not illegal. It might be a little stinky. But it is on such a grand scale when you talk about something the size of the Clinton Foundation and of the Clintons, right? Just creating this kind of like this doesn't smell quite right.

[13:45:01] MOLLY BALL, POLITICAL WRITER, THE ATLANTIC: Yeah. It's gross. No secret that Bill and Hillary Clinton both run in these circles of sort of the global financial and diplomatic elite. Even if she weren't secretary of state, that would be the case, with her husband being a former president and her being a former Senator. But it is a conflict of interest on its face when her interest ought to be advancing the United States diplomatic agenda and our foreign policy in the world, and donors off the interests are whatever their interests are, and they can advance their interest in their perception by going to, as Ryan said, the Clinton Foundation, which has its own interests, whether those interests are a very pure agenda of reducing poverty or whether there is something else going on as Donald Trump alleges. I don't think there is any evidence the Clintons were personally profiting in the way he alleges, off of the charity that they, but it is a conflict of interest on its face. The Obama administration knew that when Hillary took the job. And I don't think enough was done to separate those two, or if it was even possible.

KEILAR: How much is it, Juana, a losing issue at this point for Hillary Clinton? Sometimes, like Ryan said, it doesn't seem that there is as much of a response or maybe it hasn't been robust enough initially to for her supporters to say, look, this charity does good work. That is obviously the message they want out there. To what -- how much has this been damaging, do you think, even to the foundation in this legacy?

JUANA SUMMERS, CNN POLITICS EDITOR: Sure. One thing is, if I were to go outside on the street and ask the average voter, what is the Clinton Foundation and what does it do, I would guess the average person doesn't know about the works that we all do because we report on these issues on a day-to-day basis. From that standpoint, it's yet another thing for a candidate that has historically low unfavorables, as does Donald Trump, and has low historically low issues or whether people see her as honest and trustworthy, it is an unknown. That could make it particularly damaging for Donald Trump. On top of the issues of the e-mails, and whether there was any impropriety, whether she has done anything actually wrong is less of a question than what it looks like by the average voter, who doesn't know the ins and outs of this.

KEILAR: What about, for instance, some paid speeches. If Donald Trump is trying to make the case there is this tremendous personal gain and you don't see that in the foundation, is he looking in the wrong place? What do you think, Molly?

BALL: I think the speeches are a big issue. I'm surprised it has taken this long for the Clinton Foundation to become an issue. That was out there before this A.P. report. I think part of that is that the Trump campaign hasn't been particularly focused on prosecuting a case against Hillary Clinton in an organized and systematic way. The fact that this has become such an issue may be evidence that his new campaign team is doing a better job at driving messages about Hillary Clinton's untrustworthiness and about the various involvements that she and her husband have had in various financial things.

LIZZA: And politically, the Clinton campaign figures anything that is a sensitive subject will just go away in a couple of news cycles because Donald Trump won't be able to keep talking about something. He will say something outrageous and everyone will move on. If it sticks, she will have to give a speech, defend it, defend the foundation's work and what it did.

KEILAR: That's gamble. Donald Trump will steal the show, but maybe not in this case, right?

SUMMERS: Absolutely. We still have about 70-some-odd days until Election Day. Anything could happen. I think to the point that Ryan made earlier, the Clinton campaign would be not make a more forceful response, and let people know of the good things as opposed to allowing this narrative to continue.

KEILAR: We are inviting them on at any time.

Juana, Molly, Ryan, thank you so much.

LIZZA: Thank you. KEILAR: Coming up, we are standing by for Donald Trump, set to take the stage at a rally in Florida. You see there Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Live pictures ahead of Donald Trump. We will bring you this event once he begins to speak.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:52:48] KEILAR: Updating you now on our breaking news, an attack on American University in Kabul, Afghanistan. Multiple injuries have been reported with at least one explosion and gunfire heard on campus.

I want to bring in freelance journalist, Bilal Sarwari.

Sir, I want to let you and our viewers know we have about a four- second delay with you. We are up here against the ends of our show. This is such an important story and I want to get your update. But if I cut you off or it sounds like that, that is why. I'm not trying to be rude. We certainly want to get this information in.

What have you been learning about what's happening in Afghanistan?

BILAL SARWARI, FREELANCE JOURNALIST: Well, I've been able to speak to very close relative and many of my friends who are student there. They spoke of a very huge explosion when they were inside their classrooms followed by gunfire. In the last 20 minutes or so, one of my relatives confirmed the attackers were tossing hand grenades. They had Red Bulls. They had dates, eating them. So they are definitely trying to carry this attack for the long haul. And one of the attackers had maps of the university campus.

In the last hour or so, at least 132 students and some members of the faculty have managed to escape from the American University. Some of them jumping on the walls, going to people's home. This is still an ongoing situation. Members of the Afghan special forces from the Crisis Response Unit, a special forces unit that's trained to fight attacks like this, is on the ground, and as we speak, it's still an ongoing situation.

But this is an attack on Afghanistan's future. This is an attack on a symbol of American/Afghan relationship. Since the fall of Taliban, the United States of America have opened this university that is educating a future generation of Afghan leaders. We're really seeing senior government officials, young men and women, studying at the American University, but they're also running key government offices.

I can also confirm that you to at least two American citizens have managed to escape from that attack. And as you can imagine, most of the families are still worried. No one really believed that their sons and daughters could be at risk, especially when they are inside their classrooms. You can imagine how much panic there could be for the families of those who have traveled thousands of miles away to help the future generation of this country.

[13:55:30] KEILAR: Bilal Sarwari, there in Kabul, Afghanistan, describing to a terrifying scene, speaking to people inside there who say that the attackers have food, they have dates, they have Red Bulls. They appear to be in this for the long haul.

Bilal, thank you so much. That was a lot of information that we had not learned before.

That is it for me. I'll be back at 5:00 p.m. eastern on "The Situation Room" with more on that story.

For our international viewers, "Amanpour" is next.

For our North American viewers, NEWSROOM with Brooke Baldwin starts after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:00:08] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.