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Trump is a Birther No More; Clinton Back on the Campaign Trail; Trump Unveils Revised Tax Plan; U.S. Responds to Growing Russian Cyber Threat. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired September 16, 2016 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[00:00:11] JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR: This is CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles. Ahead this hour --
ISHA SESAY, CNN ANCHOR: A birther no more. Donald Trump's campaign says the Republican nominee now believes President Obama was born in the U.S.A.
Hillary Clinton back on the campaign trail taking the stage to the James Brown song "I Feel Good".
SESAY: And rapper Jay-Z opens up on the war on drugs declaring it an epic fail.
VAUSE: Hello everybody. Great to have you with us. We'd like to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm John Vause.
SESAY: And I'm Isha Sesay. NEWSROOM L.A. starts right now.
VAUSE: Just hours after Donald Trump refused to answer if he thought that the President was a natural born citizen his campaign released a statement saying that yes, he now believes President Obama was born in the United States. All of this five years after Trump became a leading figure in the so-called birther movement.
SESAY: Trump rival, Hillary Clinton jumped on the controversy as she returned to the campaign trail after taking three days off to recover from pneumonia. But while she was out sick, Trump tightened the gap with Clinton in various polls that you see there. This one from Fox News shows him in a one-point race among likely voters. In Washington Thursday Clinton stays Trump was and remains divisive.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Everywhere I go people tell me how concerned they are by the extreme policies and divisive rhetoric they have heard from my opponent from the racist lie about Mexican immigrants that launched his presidential campaign to his racist attacks on a federal judge. And every time we think he's hit rock bottom, he sinks even lower.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: You better make sure I win on November 8th because I'm going to have wasted a hell of a lot of time, energy and money. You know, when they tell me, Mr. Trump, it doesn't matter, what you have accomplished. First of all I've accomplished nothing -- you've accomplished. I'm the messenger.
But what you've accomplished is so incredible I say unless we win we've accomplished nothing. Just remember. We have to win on November 8th. We have to get there, get everybody.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Joining us now, Democratic strategist Dave Jacobson and Republican consultant John Thomas.
Ok. Just when you thought Donald Trump was on a roll, everything was looking good, came this blast from the past. It was an interview with "The Washington Post". It was published just a few hours ago. This is where he was refusing to answer if President Obama was born in the United States.
This is one of the quotes. "I'll answer that question at the right time. I just don't want to answer it yet. I don't want to talk about it anyway. The reason I don't is because then everyone is going to be talking about it as opposed to jobs, the military, the vets, security." Ok. So that was the non-answer.
Then a short time after that we had the statement coming from the campaign which read in part, "Having successfully obtained President Obama's birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States."
The one thing, though is, John -- that's not actually coming from Donald Trump. And we're being told over and over again only Mr. Trump speaks for Mr. Trump. So when will Mr. Trump actually say those words?
JOHN THOMAS, REPUBLICAN CONSULTANT: You know, perhaps in a sit down interview later on he might. But I mean the campaign does speak for a candidate. It's a statement on behalf of the candidate. This is as close to an admission that Obama is a citizen and it's put to bed as we are ever going to get from him.
The fact is he doesn't this to be a big story. And his statement I think was right. You can see the last couple of days, Trump has been disciplined and on message. He's been giving speeches on the economy. He's been giving speeches on women and child care. He really wants to be focused on that. He gets it that this is a distraction.
SESAY: So, Dave, let me ask you this so your answer is in this context. Obviously they are trying to put it to bed but how much potency does this issue still have from a Democrat's point of view.
DAVE JACOBSON, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: I think it's fresh evidence of the fact that Donald Trump understands fundamentally that he has hit his ceiling, right. You're seeing these polls come out; he has definitely narrowed the gap. He's hovering around 42, 44 percent. But he has not broken that 44 percent ceiling. And I think he fundamentally understands look, if I'm going to win this thing. If I'm going to get closer to 50 percent I have to appeal to those persuadable voters, those moderate women suburban voters, who he's not really breaking through it.
And I think he fundamentally has to come off as not a racist, not a bigot. And one of the ways to do that perhaps is to say look, I believe the President was born in America. The problem is Donald Trump is not saying it, right. That's the issue. His campaign surrogates, his spokespeople are doing it. But he is not really doing it.
[00:05:03] THOMAS: I think the problem is Donald Trump has backed himself into a corner. Donald Trump does not apologize. That's just who -- he's not that person. And Donald Trump also thinks America needs a strong leader. So he's not going to -- he didn't do it before, he's not going to do it now. He doesn't apologize for anything.
(CROSSTALK)
VAUSE: I'm sorry -- go ahead.
SESAY: I was just going to say I guess that's him also saying that he doesn't care about the African-American vote because this issue is potent in that demographic.
THOMAS: I think he cares about it. He has been stumping at the different churches.
(CROSSTALK)
SESAY: I love your shrug.
THOMAS: No, no, no, no, no. He obviously cares about their vote. He has been going to their churches and spending time in Flint, Michigan -- talking to the African-American community. But on this issue he has made a statement and I think that's that.
VAUSE: Ok. Well, after three days home sick, Hillary Clinton back on the campaign trail. She jumped on this. Listen to what she said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: And again today, he did it again. He was asked one more time where was President Obama born? And he still wouldn't say Hawaii. He still wouldn't say America. This man wants to be our next president? When will he stop this ugliness, this bigotry?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: So, Dave, you know, for the last week or so, Trump has had the wind at his back, if you like. So even if you had the statement coming from the campaign saying he believes he was born in the United States. This was still a gift, a welcome back gift from Donald Trump to Hillary Clinton. JACOBSON: Precisely. I mean here's the problem with Donald Trump.
Like when you take the duct tape off diarrhea of the mouth comes out, right. Like when he is scripted and when he's got the teleprompters up there and he's reading and on message and disciplined, we see a narrowing of the race. We see a closing of the polling gap.
But the problem is now that he feels like he has the wind at his back he feels like he can shoot from the hip again and say whatever's on his mind. And I think that's his challenge.
SESAY: I mean Davie -- John, we have seen some slips in this message discipline in the last 24, 48 hours.
THOMAS: Yes. He's not a professional candidate. Look, Hillary Clinton has what -- 40 plus years of experience in the public arena. This is Donald Trump's first go at it. He's going to make mistakes.
But let's look at the polls. Dave, he hasn't just closed the gap, he is ahead in many of these important states. So whatever he's doing seems to be working a little bit better than Hillary Clinton.
SESAY: All right. Well, President Obama was also at an event with Hillary Clinton this evening at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus event and he talked about the tone of the election. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And look, throughout this political season, you know, the talk around these issues has cut deeper than in year's past. It's a little more personal. It's a little meaner, a little uglier.
And folks are betting that if they can drive us far enough apart and if they can put down enough of us because of where we come from or what we look like or what religion we practice then that may pay off at the polls. But I'm telling you that's a bet they're going to lose.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SESAY: And it was clearly a reference to Donald Trump there and his struggle with Hispanic and Latino voters.
THOMAS: Well, it also could reference Hillary Clinton calling 7.5 million Americans deplorables. That could potentially be it. Look, this has not been a positive tone. When President Obama ran in 2008 it was "yes we can". It was a change election.
But here's the truth, 70 percent of Americans think we are on the wrong track because of that guy, right. So we're not going to have an uplifting cycle. We're going to have a dose of reality that we need to get back on track to save this country.
We're not going to sit around here with hope and change. That didn't do it. So I think that's where Barack Obama is coming from.
JACOBSON: Well look, I think elections are obviously about choices and at a certainly it's incumbent upon a campaign or a candidate to sort of serve as a public service announcement to say hey listen, here are the differences, here are sort of the choices that you have in this election.
But I think the President is right. Like at a certain level you want to have some inspiration and some hope and some forward-looking optimistic view of the future. At the same time, you don't want to discount the importance of really defining your opponent and really laying out the stakes of this election.
But I do think that the President is right that we need more, sort of uplifting rhetoric in this campaign.
VAUSE: Ok. There is growing pressure on Trump to release his tax returns and you can add the Speaker of the House Paul Ryan to that. Listen to what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PAUL RYAN (R-WI), SPEKAER OF THE HOUSE: I'll defer to Donald Trump as to when he thinks the appropriate time to release his returns. I know he's under an audit and he's got an opinion about when to release those. I'll defer to him on that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think it's a good idea?
RYAN: I released mine. I think we should release his.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Ok. But according to Donald Jr. it's not about the audit. Here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP JR., DONALD TRUMP'S SON: He has a 12,000 page tax return that would create probably 300 million independent financial auditors out of every person in the country asking questions that are going to distract from his main message.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[00:10:01] VAUSE: So John -- basically, you know, the problem with releasing the tax returns, according to Donald, Jr. is that everyone gets to see them. And that's kind of the point, isn't it.
THOMAS: Well, I'm sure he's right. It would be a distraction. We also have to take Donald Trump at his word that he's under audit. I mean I --
SESAY: Why?
THOMAS: Because he says so.
SESAY: But I mean we're not in that business, you know.
VAUSE: Trust but verify.
SESAY: Trust but verify. We're not in that business. He has been asked to provide a letter from the IRS that refers to the audit. That has not been forthcoming.
THOMAS: Well, he should do that. If he is under audit he needs to prove that he's under audit, right. He needs to do that. I agree with you.
VAUSE: Ok.
SESAY: I'm always taken aback when you say, you know, why don't you just take him at his word because we're journalists and that's not what we do.
THOMAS: Sure.
SESAY: Dave -- that question of releasing your tax returns and, you know, it being a distraction or not. For Hillary Clinton as she has come back with what effectively is a reset should she continue down this road of attacking Trump or should she be providing that hope and change message that, you know, John himself referenced that Obama brought out in 2008? What should the strategy be for her now that she is back?
JACOBSON: I think it's a balancing act. I think look, you want to be hopeful and optimistic. And given her likability factor, I think she really has to have some sort of positive message. She's got a lot of policies. She put out a book earlier this week with all the different ideas that she has to how to move the country forward.
But I think at the same time, she still has to drive a wedge between some of these persuadable voters and Donald Trump. She can't give up on the negativity. I think frankly, some of the recent speeches that she has delivered whether it was in Reno, Nevada on the alt-right movement or some of the other speeches in the past, I think she really has to make him look like he is unhinged, he's thin-skinned, he's too radical and extreme. I think that's going to be a key part of her strategy. But that doesn't discount the fact that she has to have some sort of positive message to complement that.
VAUSE: Ok. And now for something completely different.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JIMMY FALLON, TV HOST: Is that yes?
TRUMP: Go ahead.
FALLON: Yes. Donald Trump, everybody.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Well, that's transparency I think. We found out a few things there. It really just shows he's a good sport.
THOMAS: And it's real.
VAUSE: Sort of.
(CROSSTALK)
THOMAS: I was wondering if there was a squirrel --
JACOBSON: -- like how much glue he put on before the show.
SESAY: It was a priceless moment there. I will give him there.
Gentlemen -- always a pleasure. Next hour we'll see you again.
VAUSE: We'll see you in an hour. Thanks -- guys.
SESAY: Thank you.
VAUSE: Ok now all of this controversy over President Obama was he born in the U.S., was he not? Did Donald Trump agree to that or not? That has been overshadowing Trump's policy speech on the economy which outlined some major changes to his original plan.
SESAY: He has scaled back some of his tax cuts and has promised more benefits for lower income families.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Over the next ten years our economic team estimates that under our plan the economy will average 3.5 percent growth and create a total of 25 million new jobs.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Let's talk Trumponomics now with Rana Foroohar, CNN's global economic analyst and an assistant managing editor at "Time".
Rana, we just heard Donald Trump there promising economic growth averaging 3.5 percent, 25 million new jobs -- that would be pretty impressive given that the U.S. economy has never really produced that many jobs in one decade. It's come close but never reached 25 million.
RANA FOROOHAR, CNN GLOBAL ECONOMIC ANALYST: Right. And, you know, 4 percent is basically double what the economy is growing right now. You know, to be honest, a lot of this is magical thinking, I got to say. These numbers, 3.5 to 4 percent growth are predicated on the idea that Trump's plan of tax cuts would actually create that kind of growth momentum.
And unfortunately for the last 20 years that has not been the case. It's not even a bipartisan thing, you know. You can look at the tax cuts under George Bush in 2001 and 2003 -- these were big sustained cuts. They did not create a big jump in growth. And then before the financial crisis, more Bush cuts in 2008 and then everything Obama did afterwards in terms of trimming taxes, post the financial crisis also did not create growth. So basically you have 20 years of evidence that this sort of trickle down theory is not working. So it makes these numbers just really hard to figure.
VAUSE: Ok. But did you say 3.5 percent economic growth. Because from Donald Trump -- wait, there's more. He is promising that the economy can grow even faster. Listen to the Republican nominee.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: It's time to start thinking big once again. That's why I believe it's time to establish a national goal of reaching 4 percent economic growth. And my great economists don't want me to say this but I think we can do better than that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[00:15:06] VAUSE: And again, so the question here is, you can put this out that you can say whatever you want but if you look at the economic policies which the Trump campaign is putting forward is there any explanation how the economy can actually grow better than 4 percent?
FOROOHAR: You know, there really isn't, John. And in fact, you've got a lot of economists very worried that some of these policies, protectionism around trade, tax cuts without spending cuts which, by the way, was the Reagan formula, you know, Reagan cut taxes but he actually never cut the budget. That's why at the end of his tenure you had national debt three times what it was before.
All of these economists are worried they're going to shave growth. In fact Oxford Economics, the U.K. based consulting firm believes that if all of Trump's plans are put into place including barriers to immigration which also demographics create growth. And that's one of America's great advantages. They believe that if all these plans are put into place it would actually shave $1 trillion off the U.S. economy.
VAUSE: That's an interesting point about the immigration policy too because this seems to be where the economic policy slams head on with his very popular immigration policy. We know Donald Trump has said he would like to deport millions of undocumented workers who are currently in the United States. But if he is to achieve that jobs growth which he outlined some experts say you have to double the immigration intake. How does that work?
FOROOHAR: Absolutely. Well, if you think about what is economic growth? Economic growth is basically the number of people working and how productive they are. And so as I said before, you know, one of our great advantages in the U.S. compared in particular to Europe, has always been that we have more immigrants, we have a slightly higher birthrate. If you start to cut those things you are cutting economic growth.
VAUSE: Ok. Look, Donald Trump did revise his tax plan. Before it was costing I think $10 trillion over 10 years, now it's $4.4 trillion and included in that tax plan is a big corporate bonus. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: One of our greatest job creation measures is going to be our 15 percent business tax rate down from the current 35 percent rate, a reduction of more than 40 percent. I know that's what you people have been waiting for.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Ok. So if you look at that tax cut we have the child care tax rebate he announced the other day. There is a big boost in spending on Defense and infrastructure -- all of this being paid for by stronger economic growth. Is there a provision within the Trump plan if the economic growth doesn't materialize?
FOROOHAR: Not that we've heard and, you know, again cutting taxes and not cutting spending is a recipe for more debt. It is not a recipe for growth. And by the way, we are also entering a new period in the global economy. It's a period when monetary policy is probably going to start slowly tightening. You're not going to have the same 40 years of easy money that you had in the past. This is not the time to be adding unproductive debt to the U.S. economy.
VAUSE: Also, finally here, it does seem that, you know, the world is in this model or this sort of formula of low economic growth anyway. It seems unlikely that, you know, the heady days of the 90s -- no one is returning to those days.
FOROOHAR: Well, that's right. If you think about what was happening in the 1990s that was the beginning of the tech boom. The Internet was coming online. There was a lot of connectivity. People were getting computers. That period is over. That is tapped out. In fact, a lot of economists think that really most of the benefits from that big computing boom are finished now.
We're not going the see that again unless there is something major on the horizon, some kind of new invention, some kind of major shift in global demographics. It's really hard to imagine 4 percent growth in the U.S. right now.
VAUSE: The 90s, they were the days.
Good to have you with us. Thanks so much.
FOROOHAR: Thank you.
SESAY: That's more than a little depressing.
VAUSE: I know.
SESAY: What do you think?
VAUSE: Well, you know, happy days ahead.
Ok. We'll take a short break. When we come back there are new allegations that Russia is behind a high-profile computer hack. We'll tell you how the United States is responding to this cyber threat coming from Moscow.
SESAY: Plus, rapper Jay Z spent years selling drugs on New York streets. Now he is railing against the U.S. war on drugs.
[00:19:31] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VAUSE: Just gone 23 minutes past 9:00 here on the West Coast. Welcome back everybody.
The World Anti-Doping Agency has joined the growing list of those blaming Russian hackers for a series of cyber attacks.
SESAY: That's right. And with increasing concern about cyber security, Washington is stepping up intelligence efforts against Moscow.
Chief U.S. security correspondent Jim Sciutto explains.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF U.S. SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Tonight U.S. intelligence focused on Vladimir Putin and Russia, viewed as increasingly assertive and ambitious in countering U.S. leadership and national security interests around the globe.
Russia's activity now includes what appears to be an unprecedented effort to undermine confidence in the upcoming U.S. presidential election as chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee Mike McCaul detailed on CNN.
REP. MIKE MCCAUL (R): The idea of a foreign power particularly one like Russia, a foreign adversary attempting to mess with our elections and Director Comey basically told us that that the motivation was to undermine the integrity of the American political electoral process. These facts and allegations are very disturbing.
SCIUTTO: Sources tell CNN that the intelligence community is expanding resources aimed at Moscow to match Moscow's evolving threat to the U.S. Those resources include human intelligence, electronic surveillance and cyber capability.
Ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Shift tells CNN quote, "Putin has taken Russia in a much more hostile, aggressive and adversarial direction and the U.S. is directing more resources and focus towards Russia and that's a necessity."
[00:25:04] Russia's cyber threat is of particular concern. The deputy director of the NSA has told us that Russia today has alarming capability not just to hack places like the Democratic National Committee but to harm the U.S. Homeland via cyber attack.
You are saying that today foreign actors already have the capability of shutting down key U.S. infrastructure. NSA DEPUTY DIRECTOR: Absolutely.
SCIUTTO: Via cyber attack.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
SCIUTTO: Russia?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
SCIUTTO: Some intelligence analysts say the renewed focus is late and has allowed Moscow to gain an advantage.
COL. CEDRIC LEWIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: The failure to properly resource our intelligence agencies vis-a-vis the Russian problem is really coming home to roost right now. And because of that failure on our part, we're playing catch-up in a very large way.
SCIUTTO: U.S. Intelligence officials tell me that they never took their eyes off of Russia but they grant it is very difficult to judge Russia's intentions in particular with President Putin. They say he has a very insular decision-making circle and that he can make, in their view and their description, make decisions in the foreign policy realm that they describe as impulsive.
Jim Sciutto -- CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Joining us now is Makan Delrahim. He's a former deputy assistant attorney general with the U.S. Justice Department. Makan thanks for coming in.
SESAY: Welcome. Nice to have you back.
MAKAN DELRAHIM, FORMER DEPUTY ASST. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Thanks for having me.
VAUSE: Why does it at least appear that the Obama administration is reluctant to directly respond to the cyber attacks coming from Russia especially if it's true what we're being told that they do believe it is being directed by the Kremlin?
DELRAHIM: You know, I think it's just multi factor here -- there's diplomatic reasons why they might be a little bit hesitant. And a second might be that they don't want to poke the bear, so to speak. So there are some concerns about that. They want to probably ascertain specifically exactly is it coming from state-sponsored hacking or are these just hobbyist hackers.
You have a lot of that, particularly in Russia. They have very talented coders who have specific financial motivations because, you know, not a whole lot of wages over there. And you can make more in one day of hacking somebody's credit cards, you can make more than that, than you would otherwise make in a month coding for a private company. So I think, you know, they need to ascertain are these state- sponsored, is it from the government and what is exactly the motivation behind it?
SESAY: And how do you see that? That very question -- if this is indeed state-directed hacking what is the end goal here?
DELRAHIM: There is multiple reasons. I mean nations engage in hacking for national security reasons. All nations probably do it.
SESAY: But the timing of it that it's happening now in this concerted way with a U.S. election on the horizon.
DELRAHIM: I don't know if there's a specific motivation. Certainly there have been innuendos particularly from Secretary Clinton today and in the past that they are trying to somehow influence the U.S. elections.
I don't think there is any evidence of that at the moment. And certainly, you know, everybody condemns that type of hacking but, you know, they have hacked -- folks have hacked the World Anti-Doping Association today perhaps to try to embarrass the U.S. athletes as retaliation for the agency's banning the Russian athletes.
VAUSE: You know, there does not though seem to be any kind of consistent framework here when it comes to dealing with state sponsored hacking. Years ago, North Korea hacked a movie studio and they got hit with sanctions. And now there are accusations that the Russians are hacking and all hands are off.
DELRAHIM: Well, I think, you know, I think the U.S. feels it's a lot easier diplomatically to attack a nation like North Korea and, you know, perhaps in the past a nation like Iran but Russia is a little bit more sensitive diplomatically. And until they have specific information I think they wouldn't feel comfortable attacking them.
SESAY: Just quickly, is there anything the U.S. can do to stop the hacking? Or are they stuck in a defensive position?
DELRAHIM: No. You know, first of all, there's a number of reasons why some of the hacking -- they are able to penetrate. One is we don't have a government-wide policy for cyber security. We -- you know, the DOD has very strong policies and technology to prevent that. But other agencies of the government and the DNC and certainly some private organizations just don't have those resources.
The U.S. Small Business Administration does not have in its budget the ability to block that as the DIA does or the Department of Defense. And I think the next president one of the things we should be doing is looking at policies to implement a government-wide program for procurement of those types of technologies and also updating native protection of the cyber security system.
[00:30:08] VAUSE: A big to-do list for a little win come November. And that's just one of -- one of the things on the list.
Thanks -- Makan.
SESAY: Makan -- thank you so much.
VAUSE: Appreciate you coming in.
ISHA SESAY, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you so much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.
VAUSE: We're going to take a short break. When we come back, the fragile ceasefire in Syria is holding, but the City of Aleppo is in ruins. We'll go there in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody.
Hillary Clinton back at work, back on the campaign trail trying to reassure voters about her health.
SESAY: In her first appearance since that now infamous near fainting spell, she walks out on stage earlier today to the James Brown song "I Feel Good". Have a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
"I FEEL GOOD" SONG PLAYING
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SESAY: Well, Clinton told the crowd that she tried to power through her pneumonia, but a few days of rest did her some good.
Then she launched into one of her so called "Stronger Together" speeches.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: I have this old-fashioned notion that if you are running for president, you should say what you plan to do, how you're going to get it done and how you're going to pay for it.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Donald Trump meantime at a campaign rally in New Hampshire repeatedly complained about the loss of manufacturing jobs to Mexico and China.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: My economic agenda can be summed up in three words: Jobs, jobs, jobs.
(APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP)
SESAY: Trump's daughter Ivanka is defending her dad's new maternity leave and childcare plan that was unveiled last week.
She's trying to deflect scrutiny and comments Donald Trump made years ago that pregnant women are inconvenience to business owners.
Here's Tom Foreman with details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
IVANKA TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP'S DAUGHTER: The cost of child care has become so onerous and so crushing. And there needs to be a solution to this.
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ivanka Trump is leading the charge for her father's new plan and taking heat. When "Cosmopolitan" magazine brought up this 2004 quote about pregnancy.
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: The fact is it is an inconvenience for a person that is running a business.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOREMAN: She shot back.
I think that you have a lot of negativity in these questions. I don't know how useful it is to spend too much time with you.
Shortly before she ended the interview, she called it an unfair characterization of his track record and his support of professional women.
Indeed the Trump team started the week insisting his company gives eight weeks of paid leave to new parents, but that turned tricky, too, after reports found otherwise. They admitted the policy can vary from one property to the next.
Nonetheless, the campaign keeps ripping away at Hillary Clinton's claim she is the lone champion for women in this race.
CLINTON: If fighting for affordable child care and paid family leave is playing the woman card, then deal me in.
FOREMAN: So how do their plans compare?
Among the main points, Clinton wants to give new parents 12 weeks of paid family or medical leave. Trump says paid maternity leave alone should be six weeks. Clinton wants no more than 10 percent of their income to go for child care. Trump would give them a tax break.
Clinton wants free pre-K for all four-years-old. Trump wants to give families deductions for child care savings accounts to spend as they like.
TRUMP: We need working mothers to be fairly compensated for their work and have access to affordable, quality child care for their kids.
CLINTON: Thank you.
FOREMAN: The Clinton campaign says Trump's tax breaks would help the well-off more than the working class, and he won't offer similar help for new dads leaving gay parents out. And Trump's own words from the past don't help much, describing childcare as his wife's work.
TRUMP: I mean, I won't do anything to take care of them. I'll supply funds and she'll take care of the kids. You know, it's not like I'm going to be walking the kids down Central Park.
FOREMAN (on-camera): Still, team Trump is taking all the criticism and pushing on. After that rocky interview with "Cosmopolitan," Ivanka took the magazine to task, tweeting, "Your readers do and should care about issues impacting women and children. Keep the focus where it belongs."
Tom Foreman, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SESAY: The Trump kids in the spotlight.
VAUSE: Channelling their father, it would seem at least a little.
SESAY: All right, turning now to Syria, where air strikes targeting ISIS have killed 23 civilians. Activists say the strikes hit a school in Deir ez-Zor housing families displaced by the war. At least nine of the victims were children.
VAUSE: And it's not clear who carried out the strikes. Since the area is controlled by ISIS, it falls outside the territory covered by the Syrian ceasefire.
And that ceasefire maybe holding for now, but mistrust is growing between Russia and the United States.
Russia is flying the drone over rebel-held eastern Aleppo to life the ceasefire violations.
Senior international correspondent Frederik Pleitgen has more now from government-controlled western Aleppo.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): More than five years of civil war have scarred large parts of Aleppo. Neighborhoods like this one controlled by the government in ruins.
Now finally with the ceasefire, some respite and seemingly little things become special. For the first time in months, 9-year-old Abdul Majid (ph) and his friends can go out and collect firewood for their families.
"We need this wood to cook dinner because we have nothing else," he says.
The Shihan neighborhood was right on the front line until recently. Rebels shelled this district from a nearby hill laying waste to many of the buildings. Meanwhile, government forces used air power to bomb the opposition areas.
Amid the destruction, families continue to live in the ruins. Ahmed Yazji (ph) has been here for three years and stayed even after the rebels fired makeshift rockets into the flat next door, blowing away the wall separating the two apartments.
"It was very dangerous," he says. "We were too afraid to go out because there was also a sniper covering the street, and we couldn't even go into this living room."
Now he stays here with his wife and eight children. The kids trying to rest in the badly damaged flat.
By all accounts the situation is even worse in the rebel held parts of Aleppo. Russia and the U.S. trying to ensure safe passage for U.N. aid into the besieged areas.
[00:40:10] (on-camera): If the agreement holds and Syrian Forces withdraw from this area, then this road, the Castello Road will be the main entrance way for aid into Eastern Aleppo. This is the road that the U.N. trucks are going to use.
(voice-over) : The ceasefire has brought much needed calm for the residents of this once so beautiful, now so battered city. While many of them cherish the calm, few are convinced that it can truly last.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Aleppo.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SESAY: Shocking pictures there.
Time for a quick break now.
And shocking allegations against the Philippine president including claims that his former death squad fed a body to a crocodile. We'll explain, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SESAY: The group Human Rights Watch is calling for the U.N. to investigate the Philippine president for his alleged involvement in extrajudicial killings. A self-described former hit man says Rodrigo Duterte ordered a death squad to kill criminal suspects and personal enemies when he was mayor of Davao City.
VAUSE: (INAUDIBLE) Philippine Senate Committee that Duterte himself killed a government official with an oozy sub-machine gun. He says the death squad even fed a body to a crocodile. The president's office denies the allegations.
SESAY: Well, Brad Adams is executive director of Human Rights Watch Asia division. He joins me now from Berkley, California, via Skype.
Brad, thank you so much for being with us.
Allies of President Duterte are dismissing the statements of the self confessed murderer. But on the basis of investigations Human Rights Watch has done in the past, do these allegations of President Duterte being involved with a death squad, being directly involved in killings himself, when he was mayor of Davao seem credible to you?
BRAD ADAMS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH ASIA: Unfortunately they do. We published a report in 2009 saying that there was a death squad in Davao that was responsible for a very large numbers of extrajudicial killings.
We had many people talk to us on the record and off the record. The level of fear in the city was enormous. So not that many people would go on the record.
But they described how the police and vigilantes working with the police were engaging in reign of terror in Davao City, killing people in the streets, glorying in it, and President Duterte encouraged this.
He made public statement after public statement saying that drug dealers deserve to die. That he wants them to die. The criminals should be killed. And this wasn't just, you know, ancient history in 2009. He said this over and over again during the election campaign that brought him to office on June 30th.
SESAY: Indeed. He did say this over and over again in the election campaign. And so bearing in mind that these allegations aren't entirely new, and Mr. Duterte was elected as president, I mean, do you expect there to be any backlash, any fallout for his presidency as a result of this testimony?
ADAMS: I do think this was a big day in the Philippines. This was a testimony in the Philippines Senate under oath by a man who said that he personally was involved in 50 killings. That he heard Duterte and saw Duterte give orders to kill people. He saw Duterte kill people with his own eyes. And he came across as credible.
Now, it has to be said these are just allegations, but they need to be investigated. And I think the Filipino people thought that, well, you know, he's like Trump. He just says things. He may not mean them. We don't know if he's serious. He's just a flamboyant, colorful guy. But, you know, people are laughing at Trump. But they are not laughing at Duterte anymore. Because there are dead bodies laying in the streets in many cities in the Philippines now.
Many of them have cardboard signs saying drug dealer, drug pusher. And there have been quite a number of cases now that have come to light where the person who was killed clearly was not involved in drug pushing, probably wasn't involve in drug use. And there have even been some children killed. And so public sentiment is turning.
SESAY: Yes. ADAMS: I think that Duterte is not going to be able to continue this campaign for very long. And we do think the United Nations should go in and investigate.
If this was a civil war, where 2000 people died in two month, there would be a clamour for the international community to investigate and get involved. And we think now is the time for that to happen.
SESAY: All right. Brad Adams, we appreciate you joining us and giving us some more insight into the situation in the Philippines. Very much appreciated. Thank you.
ADAMS: Thank you.
VAUSE: Well, still to come here, music mogul Jay Z taking on the U.S. war on drugs calling it racist and an epic failure.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[00:51:40] VAUSE: Rapper Jay Z is getting political, calling the U.S. war on drugs an epic fail. In a video op-ed published in "New York Times," he says the drug war unfairly targets African-Americans.
SESAY: Born Shawn Carter, Jay Z went from being a dealer in New York to one of the most successful people in music.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAY Z, RAPPER: Rates of drug use are as high as they were as when Nixon declared this so called war in 1971. 45 years later, it's time to rethink our policies and laws. The war on drugs is an epic fail.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Segun Oduolowu is an entertainment journalist and pop culture contributor to Access Hollywood Live, and joins us now with more on this.
Thanks for coming in, Segun. It's always good to have you here.
SEGUN ODUOLOWU, ENTERTAINMENT JOURNALIST, ACCESS HOLLYWOOD LIVE: It's good to see you back.
(CROSSTALK)
VAUSE: I need focus. This op-ed, it starts with the Reagan era war on drugs in 1986. This is the part of the op-ed, where Jay Z admits his past as a drug dealer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAY Z: Drug dealers were monster. The sole reason neighborhoods and major cities were failing. No one wanted to talk about Reaganomics in it and ending of social safety nets. The defunding of schools and then loss of jobs in cities across America. Young men like me who hustled became the sole villain and drug addicts like Moral42 (ph). (END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Young men like me who hustled became the villains.
So this is the guy who is part of the cracked cocaine epidemic. He speaks with some authority, maybe a moral authority, but some authority.
ODUOLOWU: No, it's a brilliant piece. And we must separate the messenger from the message. What he says about the safety nets and social programs that were stripped away, after school programs where poor, low-income people are going to fall into, no pun intended, cracks in the system and they're going to sell drugs when things have been taken away for them to go and get better jobs.
I do disagree with him at the depiction of drug dealers being monsters. I mean, they were selling drugs in their own community. Oftentimes, to their own family members.
And he has a song, where he talked about selling drugs to his own mother. So the monster that fits for the drug dealers. But, listen, Nino Brown said it best in New Jack City.
There are no poppy fields in Harlem. There are no cocaine trees being grown in wads or in inner cities. Where are the drugs coming from? Yes, there was a plight on the poor black and brown communities but where were the drugs coming from? The war on drugs is an epic fail.
SESAY: Yes. And there was no debate that the sentencing. There was inequity in sentencing when it came to the issue of drug dealing and drug usage.
What does it mean to the black communities to have Jay Z stepping up and wading into this conversation at time like this?
ODUOLOWU: I think it's necessary, because he's visible. I mean, your talk -- we, again, separating the messenger from the message, you are talking about a guy who has come up from the streets to sit next to the president of the United States at his inauguration, to be there with Hillary Clinton as she is campaigning.
We are talking about someone who is flexing his political muscles and his economic muscles. And since he has seen this first hand, had people who have been addicted to drugs, people who have sold drugs and people who have fallen victim to that punitive system where black and brown people were being given stronger sentences than their white counterparts. That, I think he speaks with authority and I think we learn.
VAUSE: Very quickly, because he does make the point, the hypocrisy in the current drug laws where some states can make billions of dollars from selling marijuana.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[00:55:00] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you're entrepreneur and you live in one of the many states that have passed and legalize laws, you may still face barriers participating in an above ground economy.
Venture capitalists migrate to these states to open multi-billion dollar operations. Former felons can open a dispensary. Lots of times, those felonies with drug charges, caught by poor people who sold drugs for a living. They are now prohibited from participating in one of the fastest growing economies. Got it?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ODUOLOWU: I mean, how cruel and ugly this is, where you are serving time for something that someone now is just getting rich off of. Drugs that are legalized in states where black and brown people were going to get sentences, where they would throw the key away. Now people are allowed to get rich off of, again, the same things that we were throwing people and locking them away for extended periods of time. It's ridiculous.
Again, the war on drugs, it's senseless. It really is. We've got prop 64 right here in California about legalizing it. A state that has been forward thinking in its marijuana laws. I mean, come on, people. If it's ok in Colorado and you can go and get a medicinal card, it's easy as you can cash it back, come on.
(CROSSTALK)
VAUSE: Thanks so much.
SESAY: We really appreciate it.
ODUOLOWU: There's so much more. Free Jay Z. You know my motto, free Jay Z.
SESAY: He's just fine.
You are watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles, I'm Isha Sesay.
VAUSE: I'm John Vause. Back in a moment.
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