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Vice Presidential Candidates Argue over Campaign Insults; Syria's Civil War; Iraq Ready to Free Mosul from ISIS. Aired 2-3a ET

Aired October 05, 2016 - 02:00   ET

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


[02:00:00]

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ISHA SESAY, CNN HOST: You're watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles.

JOHN VAUSE, CNN HOST: Ahead this hour, an avalanche of insults. The B team on the presidential ticket face off in their only debate.

SESAY: Just hours after pounding Haiti, Hurricane Matthew strikes its next target.

VAUSE: More airstrikes on civilians in Syria one day after the U.S. officially suspends cease-fire talks with Russia.

SESAY: Hello and thank you for joining us. I'm Isha Sesay.

VAUSE: Great to have you with us. Another hour of NEWSROOM L.A. starts right now.

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VAUSE: I'm John Vause, by the way.

(LAUGHTER)

It's been a busy night.

SESAY: Yes. We'll move on from you.

VAUSE: OK.

SESAY: Though the vice presidential candidates were on the stage, their running mates were the focus of Tuesday night's debate.

VAUSE: It quickly turned combative, with Democrat Tim Kaine repeatedly challenging Republican Mike Pence to defend Donald Trump's controversial positions. Pence, in turn, called the Democrats' campaign insult-driven.

Joining us now, Democratic strategist Dave Jacobson and Republican consultant John Thomas. You know, the big thing about this debate tonight was just how combative Tim Kaine was. He was on the front foot from the get-go; at every answer, it was loaded with an attack on Donald Trump time and time and time again. This was one example of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TIM KAINE (D), VA: Donald Trump during his campaign has called Mexicans rapists and criminals. He's called women slobs, pigs, dogs, disgusting.

I don't like saying that in front of my wife and my mother.

He attacked an Indiana-born federal judge and said he was unqualified to hear a federal lawsuit because his parents were Mexican.

He went after John McCain, a POW, and said he wasn't a hero because he'd been captured. He said African Americans are living in hell.

And he perpetrated this outrageous and bigoted lie that President Obama is not a U.S. citizen.

GOV. MIKE PENCE (R), IND.: He says ours is an insult-driven campaign.

Did you all just hear that?

Ours is an insult-driven campaign?

I mean, to be honest with you, if Donald Trump had said all of the things that you've said he said in the way you said he said them, he still wouldn't have a fraction of the insults that Hillary Clinton leveled when she said that half of our supporters were a basket of deplorables.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: So was Robby Mook sitting back there with Hillary Clinton, going tick, tick, tick, tick, you missed one?

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: The problem was there were just so many he just couldn't focus on exactly what he was trying to do.

DAVE JACOBSON, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Yes, oftentimes with these debates, you've got to be laser focused and surgical when it comes to those attacks. And he threw the kitchen sink. I think part of that was a function of him wanting to fan the flames and continue the dialogue with some of these outrageous things that Donald Trump has said.

But I think the challenge was, from a performance standpoint, a lot of it got lost because it was too much at once and I think he should have been a little bit more surgical in those attacks.

SESAY: John, before you answer I want to say Donald Trump was looking at Tim Kaine going, now that's what happens when you overprepare.

(LAUGHTER)

(CROSSTALK)

JOHN THOMAS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: But look, it wasn't a good night for the -- for Tim Kaine. But what happened was he laid out too much information. I think what he was trying to do was try to set a trap for Governor Pence.

He wanted to put Governor Pence back on his heels, thinking I have to defend all of those accusations when Pence so smartly did what Donald Trump should have done last week, put it aside and went back to message.

And it was the basic message that is the winning message for Donald Trump, which is if you like the direction of the country, we're not your guys. But if you want change, we're your only hope.

VAUSE: It kind of felt like these guys were sort of ranting, they weren't listening to each other. They were sort of talking over the top of each other.

JACOBSON: Right. It was a lot of cross-talk. And I think the question is did voters tune out?

You're already going to have like historically low numbers of people viewing this because you had so many people tuning in to the blockbuster event with Trump and Clinton.

But did people tune out because there was too much cross-talk?

And that's something we'll see obviously with the data.

SESAY: But do people tune in to the vice presidential debate looking for substance?

How much do these debates, the vice presidential debates, move the needle?

THOMAS: Not tremendously. I don't think historically they have.

But tonight may be interesting because there were a lot of Never Trumpers on the Republican side that were worried and going, oh, my gosh, this Trump guy, does he have the temperament?

And then after watching Mike Pence they go, oh, my gosh, at least his number two is in control.

VAUSE: OK. Well, you talked about the fact that Pence took control of the debate. He obviously has a good communication style; he's a former radio talkback host so he's got the style down pat. And to that point --

[02:05:00]

VAUSE: -- it took him about 27 minutes I think to basically flip a question, whatever it was, I can't remember, but to Hillary's e-mail controversy. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PENCE: Hillary Clinton had a private server in her home that had classified information on it --

ELAINE QUIJANO, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: All right, Governor, 30 seconds.

PENCE: -- about drone strikes, e-mails from the President of the United States of America were on there, her private server was subject --

QUIJANO: Governor, I'd like to ask you about Syria, Governor.

PENCE: We can put cyber security --

QUIJANO: You've had a minute --

(CROSSTALK)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: So does Mike Pence then become the debating coach for Donald Trump?

But Donald Trump doesn't really like people who do things better than him.

Does Donald Trump now hate Mike Pence?

(LAUGHTER)

THOMAS: Donald Trump will probably say, see, I hire good people, I surround myself with good people. But Donald Trump can learn something from tonight. And I think he will, whether he admits it or not. I think he will. Your own CNN poll showed that skewed Democratic showed that --

(CROSSTALK)

SESAY: -- to 30 percent.

THOMAS: -- right, showed that Mike Pence was the winner tonight. I think even Chris Matthews on MSNBC said that Pence was the winner. And it's because he drove the conversation. He didn't take the traps that Kaine was laying out. So look, I think Trump is going to learn a thing or two but we'll see on Sunday.

SESAY: Dave, is there anything that the Clinton campaign can point to tonight, from tonight, and say, that was a win, that's a point in our corner?

JACOBSON: Well, I think on the facts. The reality is we won on the substance, we won on the issues and we won on the facts. The reality is Mike Pence didn't -- he wasn't the defender in chief tonight of backing up everything that Donald Trump has said on the campaign trail. In fact, he continued to pivot away from everything Donald Trump said

and to change the subject frankly because I don't think he wants to back himself into a corner four years from now if Donald Trump loses when he runs. He doesn't want to have to answer those questions about why he defended those outlandish remarks that Donald Trump --

THOMAS: That's not also the secret sauce of this election if you're Donald Trump. It's not talking about Donald Trump. It's saying if you want change, Donald Trump is the answer, that is the message. So they shouldn't spend their time defending what Donald Trump said. It should be all about wanting change.

VAUSE: OK. We talked about Tim Kaine, his role as attack dog, as a rabid pit bull. And he tried. Boy, did he try.

(CROSSTALK)

JACOBSON: -- 70 times.

VAUSE: -- yes, he dropped it 70 times. And there were some pretty scathing attacks like this one.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAINE: Ronald Reagan said something really interesting about nuclear proliferation back in the 1980s. He said, the problem with nuclear proliferation is that some fool or maniac could trigger a catastrophic event. And I think that's who Governor Pence's running mate is, exactly who --

PENCE: Oh, come on.

KAINE: -- President Reagan warned us about.

PENCE: Senator, that was even beneath and you Hillary Clinton. And that's pretty low.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: I mean, let's just be clear here that the Democrat vice presidential nominee just called the Republican presidential nominee either a fool or a maniac. And Pence, at that point he almost bit but then he pulled back. It showed the discipline that he had going --

THOMAS: And it's also a hard attack for Kaine to make because Pence is so under control. He's so calm. So to say you're a maniac, your --

VAUSE: You're with a maniac.

(CROSSTALK)

THOMAS: -- it's a hard argument to make on that stage when you've got a skilled tactician on the other side.

SESAY: That begs the question as we talk about preparation as to the way he was prepared, the strategy they laid out for Kaine.

This comes back to your strategists, Dave, did they get it wrong?

JACOBSON: I think it's emblematic of the fact that Tim Kaine is no Hillary Clinton when it comes to debates. She killed it last week and I think she's going to kill it again this Sunday.

But I think perhaps he had too much caffeine, he was too energetic, he was too excited. I think he should have been more surgical and more methodical in his attacks rather than doing the kitchen sink.

But look, there is some value in what he said when it came to the nukes. Donald Trump is a guy who has called for more nukes around the world, whether it's Korea, Japan, South Korea. I mean, that's pretty like unbelievable --

THOMAS: But that never broke through because he was doing an oppo dump the whole debate.

VAUSE: Every time there was a question he was like, oh, by the way, did I mention that Donald Trump called a woman a fat pig?

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: National security what?

THOMAS: Team Clinton overprepared their vice presidential nominee. And I think the Clinton team came in cocky. They knew they had a good performance. And Kaine probably thought, I'm going to come in and seal this deal.

JACOBSON: And they probably also thought he was going to go and defend point by point all of the attacks against Donald Trump, which he just pivoted away from.

SESAY: But then doesn't that come down to know thy opponent?

THOMAS: It does.

JACOBSON: Right.

SESAY: So something went wrong.

JACOBSON: Right, right. Look, and I think at the end of the day, though, we still got our points across and we're still talking about the substance and the issues that were raised this season.

THOMAS: The Clinton campaign is very lucky the V.P. debates don't matter.

(LAUGHTER)

VAUSE: One (INAUDIBLE) at a time.

On the issue of Russia and Vladimir Putin, this came up time and time again. And Pence -- this is one area where Pence differed from Trump. He called Putin --

[02:10:00]

VAUSE: -- a small, bullying leader. And then in Syria he actually suggested that the U.S. should use direct military force.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PENCE: The provocations by Russia need to be met with American strength. And if Russia chooses to be involved and continue, I should say, to be involved in these barbaric attacks on civilians in Aleppo, the United States of America should be prepared to use military force to strike military targets of the Assad regime, to prevent them from this humanitarian crisis that is taking place in Aleppo.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: And again, this was an important point because it does seem to suggest that he is conflating Russia and Syria in the same conflict and suggesting maybe some kind of conflict with the Russians.

THOMAS: That was a big statement tonight.

VAUSE: It was.

THOMAS: I think it's going to come up again on Sunday and Trump better be prepared to go into a little more depth on that.

VAUSE: Oh, that should be fine, then.

No problem, right?

JACOBSON: He's a policy expert. He knows more than the generals.

VAUSE: (INAUDIBLE) foreign policy. That's his forte.

SESAY: You're going to wonder, though, whether Speaker Ryan's looking at this performance from Mike Pence, thinking, mmm, got the wrong one.

THOMAS: Yes, is there a rule switch?

Can we change it?

SESAY: Because he was calm and fluent, right?

(CROSSTALK)

THOMAS: He did an excellent job. And, honestly, if he were at the top of the ticket, Republicans would be up right now.

SESAY: I can see you dreaming now.

(LAUGHTER)

VAUSE: But he was just like all those 16 other guys that Trump saw off during the -- THOMAS: Sure. Yes. It was an anti-establishment election. He

couldn't have gotten through the primary. That is a good point.

VAUSE: OK, thanks, guys.

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: Good to have you with us. Thank you.

OK. We'll move on now. The cleanup begins in Haiti after one of the strongest storms there in 50 years. Hurricane Matthew smashed into the island nation early on Tuesday with extreme winds and torrential rain.

SESAY: Officials say mudslides and flash floods are likely. Haiti is still struggling to recover from a deadly earthquake that struck in 2010.

VAUSE: Cuba is getting the brunt of the storm right now. The hurricane made its second landfall there just a few hours ago.

SESAY: Forecasters say the island could get up to 50 centimeters of rain. The storm is also threatening the U.S. East Coast.

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[02:15:00]

SESAY: Matthew is still very much a problem for many people.

Pedram, appreciate it.

VAUSE: Thank you.

SESAY: Now time for a quick break.

A day after breaking off talks with Russia, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry says Washington is not giving up on peace in Syria. That story just ahead.

VAUSE: And while their running mates debated, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump were out on the campaign trail. What they had to say a little later.

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SESAY: Activists in Syria say airstrikes have killed at least 20 people in rebel-held Eastern Aleppo over the last 24 hours. Syrian and Russian warplanes have been bombing the city relentlessly since a cease-fire fell apart two weeks ago.

VAUSE: The U.S. announced Monday it was suspending talks with Russia over the crisis but U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry says peace efforts must go on.

JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: But I want to be very, very clear to everybody, we are not giving up on the Syrian people. We are not abandoning the pursuit of peace. We are not going to leave the multilateral field. We are going to continue to try to find a way forward in order to end this war.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[02:20:00]

SESAY: CNN international diplomatic editor Nic Robertson is following this story for us from Turkey. He joins us live from Istanbul.

Nic, good to have you with us. There appears to be a stepped-up effort on the part of the Russian-backed Syrian military to retake control of Eastern Aleppo.

If that happens, what does it mean for this conflict?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: It's very clear that what President Assad and his Russian sponsors want to do is take more territory on the ground and that includes controlling Aleppo.

They lack the number of troops there that will be required to essentially move out 275,000 people in that rebel-held area. It's a large area and there are a lot of rebel fighters in there and they're still armed.

And Assad doesn't have the wherewithal to do it. And the Russian and Syrian tactics so far have been to bomb this besieged population to try to break their will, break their spirit and make them give up.

I think likely we're going to see more efforts from the Syrians and the Russians to try to create sort of humanitarian corridors, if you will, to let the people leave that part of the city. So I don't think we're going to see an advance through that rebel-held area.

Rather, what we are seeing, which is an escalation -- and we're hearing that in the past few days the escalation of bombing on Aleppo has been more intense than it has been over the past many weeks.

So an increased intensity to besiege that population and essentially bomb them, as the United States has said, try to bomb them into submission.

Now if the Syrian government does that or when it does that and if it has enough troops to secure that area afterwards, it will try to lock in, very likely on the back of this at least, to lock in control of more key cities. Damascus they pretty much have already. There's Aleppo; Latakia they have pretty much already. Homs they have. Hama they have, to a degree. It's the countrysides and areas around that they're going to find very tough. But this is the agenda we're likely to see them follow in the near and mid-future.

SESAY: John Kerry on Tuesday vowing to continue his push for peace. We just played some of that sound for our viewers.

But in the absence of any real leverage over Russia, can the U.S. achieve peace without making some major compromises here?

ROBERTSON: Well, of course, it's not just the U.S. here. The U.S. were the sponsors to try to bring the Syrian -- an umbrella of Syrian opposition groups, which didn't include ISIS and didn't include Al Qaeda, to a negotiating table.

So Al Qaeda, their affiliates and ISIS are still going to be fighting on the ground. You're still going to have a rebel opposition moderate to not-so-moderate fighting on the ground.

There are others within the region, Saudi Arabia, others in the region, that have been allowing -- Turkey, for another one -- that have allowed support to get to rebel factions that they support, along with the United States, along with others, who've been training some of those rebel fighters.

So there's no indication that any of that is going to be abated. At the diplomatic level, you have a low-level meeting in Berlin today, a foreign ministry officials meeting -- France, Germany, Italy, Britain and the United States will be represented. I don't think we'll see any major headlines coming out of that.

But the fact that the United States has broken off its relations with Russia over the Syria issue -- Secretary Kerry says they're not out of it. But what it does essentially allow the situation to do is to spiral in a more unpredictable way. Kerry, with Lavrov, was trying to corral this toward peace talks. Now it could go in a multitude of directions.

SESAY: Nic Robertson, our international diplomatic editor, joining us there from Istanbul, appreciate it. Thank you.

VAUSE: For the first time, Iraq's prime minister has broadcast a radio message directly to the city of Mosul, saying liberation is coming.

SESAY: Mosul has been under ISIS control for more than two years. A military offensive to retake it could be just weeks away. Details now from CNN's Ben Wedeman in Baghdad.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: "God willing," Iraqi prime minister Haidar al Abadi announced Tuesday afternoon, "victory is at hand."

He was directly addressing the population of Mosul, Iraq's second largest city, which has been under ISIS occupation since June 2014, at a time when Iraqi and Kurdish forces are preparing to retake the city.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HAIDER AL-ABADI, PRIME MINISTER OF IRAQ (through translator): We will raise the Iraqi flag in the center of the city of Mosul, as we have raised in Qayyara and Shafqat and, before it, in Baiji, Tikrit, Ramadi and Fallujah. And many other towns and villages have been returned to the people of Iraq.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WEDEMAN: Abadi was addressing the people of Mosul on a new radio station, FM 103.3, which broadcasts directly into Mosul. During ISIS' almost 2.5-year --

[02:25:00]

WEDEMAN: -- reign of terror, it destroyed religious shrines, sold women into slavery, drove minorities out of the city and generally imposed its dystopian order.

AL-ABADI (through translator): We decided and we are determined to liberate all of the Iraqi land of ISIS. In this decision, an victory has been achieved. Today you are closer than anytime in the past to getting rid of ISIS' injustice and tyranny.

WEDEMAN: Abadi called upon the local population to cooperate with Iraqi security forces as they enter the city in what is expected to be a long and bloody battle. A date for the start of that battle has yet to be announced but it's expected to begin within the coming weeks -- Ben Wedeman, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: The president of the Philippines says U.S. President Barack Obama can go to hell. Rodrigo Duterte is upset over American criticism of his deadly anti-drug campaign. He says he's willing to cut ties with the U.S. in favor of Russia and China.

SESAY: U.S. officials say Mr. Duterte's tirade contradicts the warm relationship between the two countries. But Mr. Duterte did not have a warm message for Washington.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RODRIGO DUTERTE, PRESIDENT, THE PHILIPPINES: Instead of helping us (INAUDIBLE). So you can go to hell. Mr. Obama, you can go to hell. You better choose purgatory (INAUDIBLE).

SESAY (voice-over): Mr. Duterte's remarks came just as the U.S. and the Philippines started joint military exercises.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Coming up next for our viewers in Asia, "STATE OF THE RACE" with Kate Bolduan.

SESAY: And for everyone else, much more on the vice presidential debate, including a fact check about Mike Pence's claims about Vladimir Putin.

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JOHN VAUSE, CNN HOST: Welcome back, everybody. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles. I'm John Vause.

ISHA SESAY, CNN HOST: And I'm Isha Sesay. The headlines this hour.

(HEADLINES)

SESAY: The U.S. vice presidential candidates faced off Tuesday night in their first and only debate. Democrat Tim Kaine and Republican Mike Pence spent much of their time defending their presidential candidates. A CNN snap poll shows 48 percent of viewers think Pence won to Kaine's 42 percent.

VAUSE: And joining us now for more on this, CNN's senior reporter for media and politics, Dylan Byers.

Thanks for being with us. It's late. But it was debate night. So it was a good reason to stay up.

How many people do you think watched?

DYLAN BYERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's a really good question. The most that ever watched a vice presidential debate was almost 70 million. Of course, that was --

(CROSSTALK)

BYERS: -- Sarah Palin and Joe Biden. And so that -- there's no way that the numbers -- at least, in my guess, there's no way the numbers tonight are going to match those numbers.

I do think that generally, because there has been increased interest in Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, we will get more. I'm going to put it -- my guess would be somewhere around high 50s, 60.

VAUSE: Really?

I would have thought 40.

SESAY: When people come to the vice presidential debate, what are they looking for?

Are they looking for the substance?

Is it more the optics?

What is it?

BYERS: You have to -- it's funny because vice presidential debates so rarely move the needle. They so rarely matter. I think you have to be invested in the election generally. I don't think you necessarily think that somehow Mike Pence is going

to tell you something that Donald Trump couldn't tell you or Tim Kaine's going to tell you something Hillary Clinton couldn't tell you.

At this point, you've been engaged in the process for maybe 15 months, 16 months. You are just in it now and you just want to watch. And I think the way that Donald Trump has sort of elevated the ratings, I think that even passes on to the vice presidential debate.

VAUSE: OK. One thing which was interesting about this debate was how Pence sort of refused to defend Donald Trump or refused to take the bait, depending on which way you want to look at it. But when he did, he kind of just outright denied that Trump had said something. Like this moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TIM KAINE (D), VA: Donald Trump believes that the world will be safer if more nations have nuclear weapons. He's said Saudi Arabia should get them, Japan should get them, Korea should get them. And when he was confronted with this and told, wait a minute, terrorists could get those, proliferation could lead to nuclear war, here's what Donald Trump said and I quote: "Go ahead, folks, enjoy yourselves."

I'd love to hear Governor Pence tell me what's so enjoyable or comical about nuclear war.

ELAINE QUIJANO, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Governor Pence?

GOV. MIKE PENCE (R), IND.: Did you work on that one a long time? Because that had a lot of really creative lines in it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: And this gets to the question of what are people looking for?

Because clearly Trump has said that and people will fact check it. But it just doesn't seem to matter.

BYERS: Right.

Will the fact checking matter?

There are sort two of layers to every debate, even though we might not like to admit it. Underneath, there's the substantive layer about what the actual facts are, what these people actually said, who -- where they actually stand on the policies and then there's this sort of topical layer, which is demeanor, tone, attitude.

In terms of that top layer, there's no question that Mike Pence, in my mind at least, there's no question Mike Pence won the debate tonight.

The question is, how many things can he sort of fail to address?

How many things can he fail to acknowledge? How many things can Tim Kaine attack him on before it becomes clear that there's a more substantive layer there that Mike Pence can't really account for?

So in my mind -- you know, our colleague, Jake Tapper, put it really well earlier tonight; Mike Pence may have won the night but it's not clear that he'll win the week.

I do think as the fact checkers turn out, as the pundits turn out, the analysts turn out, certainly as the Clinton campaign gets a chance to put their own spin on this, Mike Pence's ability to sort of shrug off what he'd said in the past and what Donald Trump has said in the past, that will wear thin over the course of the week.

SESAY: Let's share with our viewers a moment of that shrugging off and not willing to maybe acknowledge the fact. And this really comes down to the fascination with who said what about Putin. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAINE: This is one where we can just kind of go to the tape on it. But Governor Pence said, inarguably, Vladimir Putin is a better leader than President Obama.

PENCE: That is absolutely inaccurate.

KAINE: And I just think --

PENCE: I said he's --

[02:35:00]

PENCE: -- a stronger -- he's been stronger on the world stage.

KAINE: No, he said leader.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SESAY: He said you're absolutely inaccurate.

Let's play the tape of what Governor Pence said to our own Dana Bash.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PENCE: I think -- I think it's inarguable that Vladimir Putin has been a stronger leader in his country than Barack Obama has been in this country. And that's going to change the day that Donald Trump becomes President of the United States of America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SESAY: How do you see that moment in the debate on the whole Putin thing?

BYERS: Well, first of all, what I will say to this question, do the fact checkers matter, in a way what matters is the onus is on us, is on the media, to play that tape, like you just did and like our colleagues will throughout the day tomorrow.

I think for me, in terms of the debate, the whole focus on Russia and the whole question about how Donald Trump views Vladimir Putin -- and again, Pence's sort of unwillingness to really address those inconsistencies and those differences that he has with his own running mate, this is something that's going to come back to haunt them.

We've got a little more than 30 days left to focus on various aspects of this campaign. All of those things that Donald Trump says that Mike Pence then has to do this sort of cleanup on aisle 5 on, those will be big issues.

And while he may have gotten away with shrugging it off during the debate, he won't be able to get away with it during the 24-hour news cycle.

VAUSE: What was interesting about this debate is that Trump was live tweeting throughout the debate. He seemed fairly interested early. There was lots of capital tweets going out, lots of retweets like this one.

So we know that Trump was actually tweeting. This was the retweet.

"Kaine looks like an evil crook out of the Batman movies."

It does seem an odd thing to do, though, for Trump to take away some of the limelight, if you like, or just to give a night to his number two.

BYERS: It's an odd thing for two reasons. The first reason is because Tim Kaine is up there, saying that Donald Trump insults people all the time and Mike Pence is saying no, he doesn't, you guys are the people who do all of the name calling.

And as this debate is happening, there's name calling going on from the guy at the top of the ticket.

And then, two, for the reason you talked about, the limelight, you actually have, after Donald Trump's rather disastrous debate performance in the first debate, you actually have his running mate putting on a relatively speaking strong debate performance, certainly more composed than Tim Kaine was.

Why do you want to distract from that?

But, of course, some of our reporting from our colleague, John King, showed that there's word that Trump actually isn't happy about the positive reviews of Pence --

VAUSE: Really?

That's a shock.

(CROSSTALK) BYERS: -- because it makes him look worse -- yes.

SESAY: I do want to pivot for a second and talk to you about the moderator in all of this because that will be a big talking point in the hours ahead, considering how contentious this was.

How did Elaine Quiano, who's a colleague, a former colleague of ours here at CNN, how did she fare in this debate?

She had a tough job. But maybe put it in context of Lester Holt and the first debate.

BYERS: She had an extremely tough job. She had a tougher job than Lester Holt, arguably, because the vice presidential candidates only get one debate. It's 90 minutes long. It's a third as much of the time if you take all three debates that the presidential candidates get. She had to fit nine topics into 90 minutes. So that's 10 minutes a topic.

She had two candidates who really didn't want to talk about the questions she was asked. They would rather talk about -- you know, attack the people at the top of their respective tickets.

So it was a hard job. Where she failed and failed rather in a sort of -- in a way that really affected how the debate took place, she stuck so much to her script. She said, OK, here's my question now; 10 minutes later, here's my question; 10 minutes later, here's my question.

You need to be able to adapt with the candidates as they shape the debate.

So if they're talking about Russia now, let them talk about Russia. Don't tell them they can't talk about Russia now then come back to Russia 10 minutes later. It doesn't make a lot of difference.

VAUSE: She also had two guys who knew a lot of stuff, too. (INAUDIBLE) lot to say.

There are a history of one-liners out of these vice presidential debates. Back in 1988, Bentsen to Dan Quayle, saying, Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy. And in this debate, we had this moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAINE: When Donald Trump says women should be punished or Mexicans are rapists and criminals --

PENCE: I'm telling you --

KAINE: -- or John McCain is not a hero, he is showing you who he is.

PENCE: Senator, you've whipped out that Mexican thing again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(LAUGHTER)

VAUSE: Whipping out that Mexican thing again.

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: The Clinton campaign have registered www.thatmexicanthing.com. It redirects to their website. Pretty quick.

BYERS: Pretty quick. They're doing two things. One, they are taking advantage of something that's funny. You have to acknowledge that we live in a sort of social media age. Things become memes, they catch on. They go viral. This was obviously funny. It was sort of a ridiculous thing to say.

They're also trying to tap into a more serious aspect of this, which is --

[02:40:00]

BYERS: -- that they're pushing for that narrative that Trump and his campaign dismiss the concerns of minorities.

And, you know, for Clinton supporters, the issue of what Trump has said about Mexicans is actually a really thing. It is not just "that Mexican thing." It's not just a talking point.

It reflects how Trump World views minorities. So by turning that into a website they're, A, taking advantage of that humor but, B, they're also highlighting a serious issue on the campaign.

SESAY: What do you want to bet it appears on "Saturday Night Live"?

BYERS: There's no question in my mind. I mean, literally, there will be -- the only question is how --

(CROSSTALK)

BYERS: -- what is the Mexican thing according to "Saturday Night Live"?

VAUSE: Dylan, we didn't get to what the candidates were -- the presidential candidates are doing today but a good discussion on the debate. Thanks so much.

BYERS: Thanks for having me.

SESAY: Thank you. Now you can go to bed.

BYERS: OK. I'm going to bed.

VAUSE: We're staying here.

SESAY: And you love it.

VAUSE: Oh, let's do another hour.

After the break, the British currency hitting a three-decade low. We'll tell you why the pound has taken such a huge plunge.

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VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody. The British pound has taken a huge hit, falling to a 31-year low against the dollar on Tuesday as more details emerge on how Britain will actually leave the E.U. It's now around $1.27, lower than it was right after the referendum.

SESAY: The concerns are growing now that Britain's prime minister has laid out exactly when the Brexit will happen. CNNMoney's Nina dos Santos has the latest.

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NINA DOS SANTOS, CNNMONEY EUROPE EDITOR (voice-over): 2019, it's official: that is the year that the U.K. will be leaving the E.U.

[02:45:00]

DOS SANTOS: British prime minister Theresa May has announced she will trigger Article 50, the legal process by which Brexit happens, by March 2017 at the latest.

Well, that sets the clock ticking. Barring any last-minute surprises, that means the U.K. will be leaving the E.U. two years later. We also have more details from what the U.K. government's priorities will be in those talks.

Theresa May wants control over immigration and she'd be willing to give up some of the benefits of the E.U.'s single market in order to achieve that. That's raised fresh fears that British exporters could suffer and that British banks may find it harder to do business in the E.U.

That's pushed the pound to a new 31-year low against the dollar. But it's not all bad news.

Why?

The FTSE 100 is having a strong year. That's largely because it's full of companies, like the oil giants, BP and Shell, that earn their money in dollars. So for them a weak pound boosts their bottom line.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Adding to the gloom, the IMF on Tuesday predicted a significant slowdown in the U.K. economy next year with a best-case scenario for economic growth of 1.1 percent, down from an expected 2.2 percent forecast before the Brexit vote.

Nicholas Economides is a professor at the Stern School of Business at NYU. He joins us from New York.

Nicholas, thank you for being with us.

Is the hour now upon us that Britain is paying the piper for the Brexit vote?

NICHOLAS ECONOMIDES, NYU: I'm afraid it's the beginning of starting to pay. I hope that the British prime minister will not do what she says she's going to do. And I hope that they start thinking more seriously about how the world is going to be after a Brexit before invoking Article 50.

VAUSE: Well, there is growing concern and expectations that Prime Minister Theresa May is looking at a hard Brexit as opposed to a soft Brexit or a Goldilocks Brexit.

Why is a hard Brexit such a concern?

ECONOMIDES: Well, it depends on what position Britain ends up with towards the European Union.

Is it going to be pretty close, like Norway or Switzerland, with most of the trade agreements remaining almost the same?

Or is it going to go far away like, let's say, Turkey, where a whole bunch of stuff needs to be negotiated from scratch?

That's the point.

If it's going to be a hard Brexit and a distant Britain from the European Union in the future, that is going to mean very serious costs for Britain, at least in the transition, to be able to renegotiate hundreds of different treaties that the European Union has with other countries around the world.

VAUSE: There is this report out in Bloomberg that, unlike her predecessor, David Cameron, Theresa May won't prioritize the financial services industry during these negotiations, instead putting immigration control ahead of the financial service industry.

What would the fallout from that be for Britain especially?

ECONOMIDES: Well, I don't think that's a very smart thing to do. The European Union doesn't have the possibility of going soft on the immigration issue. It's one of the basic freedoms of the European Union, the freedom of movement, of labor and people. So they cannot really go back on that.

So on the financial services, maybe they could negotiate the solution. On immigration, I don't think the Europeans can. And, therefore, as I said before, it's not very smart to make this a priority.

VAUSE: If we look at all the economic implications of the next couple of months, how will that impact the average British voter, particularly the ones who live outside of London, those who predominantly voted for the Leave campaign? ECONOMIDES: Well, I think many voters voted for the Leave campaign aspiring to old dreams of an empire and a very strong Britain. I don't think those dreams are going to be realized. They will end up as two islands isolated from their neighbors. They will end up with significant growth and recession problems.

I don't think the aspirations of the voters who voted for Brexit are going to be realized.

VAUSE: Over the last 24 hours, the big headline has been the fall in the value of the pound. That's good news, at least in the short term, for the British stock market.

But what about in the mid- to long term?

What will --

[02:50:00]

VAUSE: -- that mean for the U.K. economy?

ECONOMIDES: Well, don't forget that the fall in the pound happened because the Chancellor of the Exchequer had to cut the interest rate because of -- for the fallout of the Brexit. So it's a direct effect of Brexit that the pound is so low.

It means that the people who live in England and get paid in pounds are going to have more expensive vacations, more expensive cars imported from abroad, more expensive TVs imported from China and so on and so on. That's not good for the average person.

So it has been a difficult road for Britain in the European Union. But in this particular case, through Brexit, they are really shooting themselves in the foot. This is the wrong thing to do and definitely the wrong decision.

VAUSE: With that, we shall leave it there, Professor. Thank you so much for being with us. We appreciate it.

ECONOMIDES: Thank you. Thank you very much.

SESAY: And we're going to take a short break. More news right after this.

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VAUSE: Well, out there in social media world, the stars don't get much bigger than Kim Kardashian, with her millions of followers on Twitter and Instagram.

SESAY: But police say her fame has also made her a target. CNN's Jim Bittermann has new details on Monday's reported armed robbery in Paris.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM BITTERMANN, CNN SR. INTL. CORRESPONDENT: A police spokeswoman said again today the robbers who broke through this door early Monday morning and robbed Kim Kardashian, in fact, were an organized team and they had planned their action very well.

The fact is that they've known that from the very beginning. And so they're pursuing two leads in terms of the investigation. One is that this was an inside job, that somebody gave the robbers information about where and when Kim Kardashian was going to be here and also perhaps about the security situation.

The idea that her bodyguard was gone for just a few hours with her two sisters, going to a nightclub, and that she was all alone here, that idea might have come from someone inside the entourage. So that's one of the areas of attack that the police are looking at.

The other possibility is that Kim Kardashian herself, on social media perhaps, tipped the robbers off. So they're going through all of her social media communications just to see if there was anything that she said that might have been a tipoff for the robbers -- Jim Bittermann, CNN, Paris.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: My Spidey sense tells me it was an inside job.

SESAY: Yes. Mine does, too.

All right.

VAUSE: Problem solved.

(LAUGHTER)

SESAY: You're watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles. I'm Isha Sesay.

VAUSE: I'm John Vause. Rosemary Church has more after this.