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New Trump Tweet: "I Will Never Drop Out"; Trump Appears Outside Trump Tower; Trump Cheered by Supporters; McCain Says He Will Not Vote for Trump. Aired 5-6p ET
Aired October 08, 2016 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[17:00:13] POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour, 5:00 p.m. Eastern. Welcome to this special edition of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Poppy Harlow coming to you live from the campus of Washington University here in St. Louis. This is the site of the second presidential debate airing tomorrow night right here on CNN. And what a debate it will be? These people behind me certainly excited for the debate.
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
Some of them will be in the debate hall, our very own Anderson Cooper is moderating. But right now, it is the breaking news, Donald Trump refusing to step down, tweeting, quote, "The media and establishment want me out of this race so badly. I will never drop out of the race. I will never let my supporters down. #MAGA, Make America Great Again." Trump vowing to stay in the race, despite a newly surface video in which he uses stunningly vulgar, offensive, lewd language that is sexually aggressive about grabbing women's genitals.
He described trying to kiss, grope and have sex with married women saying, quote, "When you are a star, they let you do it. You can do anything." You will hear him in his own words in a moment.
But first, House Speaker Paul Ryan addressing voters in person for the first time since this video drop, he spoke just moments ago in a live event in Elkhorn, Wisconsin. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PAUL RYAN (R), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Look, let me just start off by saying, there is a bit of an elephant in the room. And it is a troubling situation. I'm serious, it is, I put out a statement about this last night. I meant what I said and it's still how I feel. But that is not what we are here to talk about today.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: I got it. Here's part of the statement that Paul Ryan released last night.
"I am sickened by what I heard. Women are to be championed and revered, not objectified. I hope Mr. Trump treats this situation with" --
All right, Donald Trump is walking out. You are looking at Donald Trump walking out of Trump Tower live right now. Amid some cheers and quite a bit of noise there surrounded by police officers. This is the first time we've seen Donald Trump emerge in public since he released that taped statement last night. Let's listen in for a moment.
(CROWD CHANTING)
TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP!
(CROWD CHEERING)
HARLOW: All right. You are looking at live pictures of Donald Trump emerging from Trump Tower, obviously our cameras are trying to get a good shot there, but there are a lot of people around.
(CROWD CHANTING)
USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!
HARLOW: All right. What are you looking at are live images of Donald Trump just emerging for the first time the public has seen him since this video tape dropped and the scandal erupted. I believe guys, we have MJ Lee there?
All right. We are trying to get our reporter. All right. MJ Lee, our reporter outside Trump Tower is with us. MJ, what are you hearing? What are the people saying? I hear some of them cheering, chanting USA! What else?
MJ LEE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Poppy, that was certainly unexpected. We were not expecting to see Donald Trump come out of Trump Tower. But I don't know if you can see, but he came out and stood on the sidewalk outside of Trump Tower and waved to his supporters, gave them a big smile. Clearly a candidate that wanted to sort of level in the fact that there are dozens and dozens of supporters that are outside, showing their support. And right now, we are hearing the supporters chanting, Mr. Trump, Mr. Trump, over and over again.
The supporters have been out here for several hours now, really trying to show their support for Donald Trump and also expressing their displeasure at the media as well. A lot of these supporters have been yelling at the reporters that have been out here for many hours today, saying that we should really not be focused on that Access Hollywood video that came out yesterday and that we are really doing a disservice and that we should be covering some of the corrupt things that Hillary Clinton had been involved in. Those are some of the words that we have been hearing from the Trump supporters out here today.
[17:05:05] HARLOW: OK. MJ, stay with me. I also have some breaking news. I have this statement in from John McCain, obviously John McCain, someone who Donald Trump has criticized, said was not a war hero. John McCain withdrawing his support of Donald Trump. I am going to read you this statement in full. Bear with me.
"In addition to my well-known differences with Donald Trump on public policy issues, I have raised questions about his character after his comments of prisoners of war. The Khan Gold Star family, Judge Curiel, and earlier inappropriate comments about women. Just this week, he made outrageous statements about the innocent men in the Central Park 5 case. As I said yesterday, there are no excuses for Donald Trump's defensive and demeaning comments in the just released video, no woman should ever be victimize by this kind of inappropriate behavior."
This again is a statement from John McCain just now he goes on to say, "He, Trump alone, bears the burden of his conduct and alone should suffer the consequences." That's a part of the statement from John McCain as you are also looking at these images of Donald Trump coming outside of Trump Tower for the first time.
Let me bring in my panel with me again, David Gergen, Sunlen Serfaty and Mark Preston. And guys, I was just in the middle of reading that John McCain statement will get to more of that in a moment. But David Gergen, your reaction to Donald Trump walking out publicly for the first time there after huddling for hours on end with his team deciding what he is going to do. Will he address the public tonight? Still an unknown.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Fascinating. This is an absolutely fascinating saga, drama.
HARLOW: And he didn't have to walk at the front doors?
GERGEN: He didn't. He didn't. But he clearly wanted to. And they certainly set that up. It's a very smart move. And what we're seeing shaping up is a battle between the people versus the elite, people versus the establishment.
HARLOW: But frankly, the story of this election?
GERGEN: The story of this election but he brought it to a head in there. And, you know, he has shown not only here but at a Paul Ryan rally. Unexpectedly I thought, he had a lot of people there (INAUDIBLE) with Ryan.
HARLOW: Yes.
GERGEN: Saying, where's Trump? You know?
HARLOW: Yes.
GERGEN: So you know, we're watching, you know, one of the political dramas of our time.
HARLOW: Have you ever seen --
GERGEN: No, I don't think any of us have ever seen this before. And frankly, I hope we never see it again, but nonetheless here we are.
HARLOW: Sunlen?
SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I was just really struck in this moment, the kind of willy-nilliness of this all if you will, you know, a presidential candidate, the GOP nominee really up against the wall, you know, revolt support for many of his party, within his party, feeling the need to come out of Trump Tower where he has been holed up all day to kind of give a thumb up. And you think I was really struck with his kind of like fist in the air. Like we can do this. We can do that. He wants that image in the middle of this awful news day for him. This awful 24 hours. He wants that image, showing he has supporters, out there chanting his name saying, go, go, go, USA, USA! This is a part of the aggression, this is part of the damaged.
HARLOW: You know, what a symbolic move, right, just the body language that he conveyed there, obviously, he could go out the back, he could go out the garage, he went out the front doors on Fifth Avenue in the middle of Manhattan on a Saturday afternoon.
Mark Preston, this is not only David Gergen, sort of like the establishment politics versus Trump or, you know, the people versus the establishment. This is also Trump versus his own team in a sense. Because not sure they would have advised him to walk out the front door. And by the way, his advisers told him, don't bring, according to Maggie Haberman, the "New York Times." Don't bring up Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton in your apology last night and he did it anyway.
MARK PRESTON, CNN EXECUTIVE POLITICAL EDITOR: And we know from our reporter with Hillary Clinton that Bill Clinton is going to be here tomorrow night. Whether or not he's actually in the hall or decides to watch it in a hold room, we'll wait and see. You know, that image was striking. It seemed like it was the end, right? It's a time when like a dictator down in Central America comes out and raises his hand, like I'm in it, and I'm not getting out, right, and guess what, like, it's over.
It is over for him. And you know we talk about how this is a bad news day, this is a terrible news day, couple of news day, it's a bad time for America. This is an awful chapter in the history of America. This is an awful chapter in the history of the Republican Party. This is by far the worst chapter in Donald Trump's life. I just think that when we take a step back and look where we are and where are we going, it really is symbolic of this divided America and the anger towards Washington and it's all --
HARLOW: You've got -- it's such an important point, because you've got the two candidates, the most famous candidates arguably ever with the highest unfavorables ever, you've got like 70 percent of people who want to see a third party, you know, candidate be able to vote for them and showing some sort of support. David Gergen, to you, at the same time, I just wonder, if that's where Trump is headed on? Mark Preston says this is the end. Trump is tweeting, I will never get out. I will never get out. I mean this until the end.
[17:10:03] GERGEN: I think in his head, that he can rally. He can turn this around. He reminds me very much of Nixon in the closing months. Because he loved these kinds of hard hat kind of responses and he could get that still. Even as things were closing in on him. But the difference here is that the Republican National Committee doesn't have the power to remove Trump at the top of the ticket. And so he can take it all the way through the election.
PRESTON: I say it's end of his candidacy in the sense that there is no possible way that he can win the presidency. I think David is right. He, he's got so much ego at stake in himself that he doesn't want to step aside.
HARLOW: What is also interesting is that Hillary Clinton supporter just said to me earlier today, if, indeed, he does not win and if indeed she does win, she said, is this really how you want to win, Sunlen?
SERFATY: Yes. I mean, no one would have guessed we would have been here right now. I mean, I think for Hillary Clinton, you know, a win is a win. If she does go on to win, but nothing that Donald Trump has shown in his character, leading up to now, nor nothing he has said in the last 24 hours, indicate that he is going to try to give an inch. And I do think he does potentially operate well when he feels a little bit like the underdog, a delegate, up against the law, I think that's a good position for him to be in essentially --
HARLOW: I think this could be a windfall for Hillary. I mean, she was going to -- I think she was going to win, it would be a close election. She can win big now. And that would really help her with the governor.
MJ Lee with us back outside of Trump Tower. MJ, you know, I can hear from this. And you could hear a lot better being there, a lot of supporters there.
LEE: A ton of supporters. And actually behind me, you can see an entire block on Fifth Avenue really cordoned off by fences to make room for these supporters. Again, they have been here all day. They are holding up banners, they are chanting, and really here to show their support. And thought that was very characteristic of Donald Trump to in the middle of a day like this, when the entire campaign is in full crises mode, Donald Trump decided to make an appearance and show his supporters that he knows that they are here and that they have been camped out all day. We saw him come out with a big smile on his face and wave. And my colleague Jeremy Diamond yelled out a question, rather, to him, asking if he is going to stay in the race? And Donald Trump essentially said, yes, he is not getting out.
HARLOW: Okay. MJ Lee, great reporting from Trump Tower. We're going to get a quick break in. I want to thank my panel, Sunlen, David, MJ and Mark. And before we go to break, just to button this up as well, you guys will stay with me. But just to button this up, I was reading John McCain's statement earlier. This is a statement from the 2008 Republican presidential candidate. Let me read the end of it for you.
"Cindy and I will not vote for Donald Trump. I have never voted for a Democratic presidential candidate and we will not vote for Hillary Clinton. We will write in the name of some good conservative Republican who is qualified to be president." John McCain, pulling his support from Donald Trump. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [17:16:28] HARLOW: All right, I'm Poppy Harlow back live here in Washington University, the site of the second presidential debate tomorrow night. You are looking on the side of your screen, moments ago, an extraordinary moment, a moment likely frankly never seen in a modern American presidential race. Donald Trump emerging from Trump Tower. Sunlen Serfaty described as sort of putting his fist up and greeting supporters there, clearly defiant and still in this race, amidst the controversy surrounding that lewd tape released just leaked from 2005 yesterday.
You are looking at supporters. Look at that, this is in the middle of Fifth Avenue right outside Trump Towers. Supporters chanting Donald Trump, Donald Trump, USA! USA! As Donald Trump decides what his next move is.
Let me go to our Dana Bash, she is working her sources. She is on the phone with me. And this comes amid a number of leading Republicans calling for Trump's running mate Mike Pence to take the top of this ticket, if even possible. Dana has been doing reporting on that and more. Dana, what are you hearing?
DANA BASH, CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (on the phone): Hey, Poppy, and one of the most-interesting things I have been told in the past few hours is about a phone call that Mike Pence had with Donald Trump himself when he explained that he did not feel that he could go to Wisconsin to represent Donald Trump at the big Republican unity event that Trump was initially supposed to go to before he was disinvited by the House Speaker. And I am told that what Pence told Trump in this call earlier today was that the only effective person to speak on this is Trump, himself.
And that Pence said, he told Trump, if he went to Wisconsin, it would interfere with that. So that's kind of a diplomatic way of saying, you're on your own, dude. This is your problem. This is about you. This is about your character. This is about your action. Never mind words and, you know, it's pretty clear from that conversation, from the fact that he issued a very tough statement and from the fact that he has not wanted to be out there on behalf of Trump, while this kind of shakes out, it's quite telling. This is a guy who was put on the ticket by Donald Trump.
HARLOW: Yes. Dana, this is also the guy that Donald Trump this week bragged about, look at him. Look at him, this is my first hire, did I make a great decision? And now he is not only not going to stand in the place of him next to Paul Ryan, he, you know, issued statement saying, you know, he can't stand by or defend any of those words. Dana, the question now becomes, what does Mike Pence do?
BASH: Yes. And I don't think Mike Pence knows the answer to what Mike Pence does, if he is going to, you know, watch and see what happens with Donald Trump? Whether he goes further and trying to redeem himself? Presumably at the next opportunity for that is going to be in front of tens of millions of people on the debate stage tomorrow night.
HARLOW: Yes. BASH: But just to give a little bit of contact, you know, Mike Pence is the ultimate running mate and has been. He has been a beautiful soldier, has been out campaigning, you know, relentlessly for Donald Trump. And more importantly, he is been, I even said this to him, Poppy in an interview recently, he's kind of been the Trump whisperer among conservatives. Many in the establishment, many skeptics of Donald Trump trying to go out and reach out to Governor Kasich, for example, others on Capitol Hill, trying to say, well, this is not really -- I know it's a different side of Donald Trump.
You know, he is said to me privately and publicly, you know, this is a guy who have gotten to know and he's really wonderful. And he's out there, you know, on a limb. And the fact that he is breaking so publicly is really telling. He is also very inherently and has been for years and he talked about him on the debate stage very religious. He is a Christian and conscious and a political thing. He's a true Christian conservative.
HARLOW: Dana, you also spoke with John Kasich, Governor John Kasich of Ohio who was one of the last ones standing in this Republican primary and he has never come out and backed or endorsed Donald Trump. He got a lot of grief from some of his own party saying, why aren't you getting behind our candidate? What did Kasich say?
[17:21:03] BASH: I just spoke with him on the phone, Poppy, right before I called him to speak with you. And look, he reinforced what he said earlier today in a formal statement that it's not just about this particular incident, which is what he calls, you know, obviously, horrible. It's an accumulation of one thing after another and, you know, I don't want to say that he didn't explicitly say he feels vindicated, but it's certainly the bye-bye God from him that he does. And that, you know, in fact, I said to him, do you believe that Donald Trump should get out of the race, that he should be off the ticket, like so many of your fellow Republicans have been saying all day today?
And his answer was, you know, that's not my job. I'm not on the Republican National Committee. And he actually said some people saying that are late for the party on that. He said, they'd come late to the party. He said, I appreciate that, but you know, this is why he said he has been adamant that Donald Trump is not the right person for the Republican Party or the country. So he said explicitly that he is not going to vote for Hillary Clinton, that's something that he made earlier in the statement, probably just leave the top of the ballot blank. And he's out actually campaigning in Washington State right now and will continue to do so. You know, Poppy, you spent time talking to voters in his state of Ohio, Governor Kasich's state of Ohio.
HARLOW: Right.
BASH: Where Donald Trump is doing pretty well. And I asked Kasich, do you think that he could win there? Yes. And I said, do you think that this is going to change the trajectory for Trump in your state of Ohio? And he said, he doesn't think anybody who is this much of a divider could win Ohio. But he said, you know what, maybe people are going to justify this. We'll see.
HARLOW: Yes. Hey, Dana, before I let you go, I was just thinking about how this is going to play out tomorrow night on the debate stage, because you have been on the debate stage. You have been one of the questioners in a number of the debates in the primary. What does Hillary Clinton do when she walks out, is it a scene like we saw play out two weeks ago in the first debate, does she walk across the stage, and they smile at one another and shake hands or does she not do that in the wake of this tape?
BASH: My understanding is they're working on trying to answer that question right now as they're hunkered down doing debate prep, you know, inside team Clinton, trying to figure out how to address it. You know, last ten days ago whenever the first debate was, as you said, you know, they did smile, even though they were probably gritting their teeth. And --
HARLOW: Right. Right.
BASH: And as the issue was out there, but not as much as you know, it was mostly the whole question of Trump and women was a result of his ad-libbing and reviving as a result at the end of that debate. This is, I mean, if you think about this, what this case has said and what he said on this tape compared to what he said about Alicia Machado, which is inexcusable. It's like, you know, those are words. And these are actions. And that's completely different.
HARLOW: Yes. Yes. Dana Bash, great reporting as always, thank you for bringing us that.
BASH: Thanks, Poppy.
HARLOW: We will be going to get a quick break in here on the other side. You will going to hear from the man who ran against President Barack Obama in 2008, John McCain no longer standing by Donald Trump. John McCain in his own words, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:28:18] HARLOW: All right. We are back with our breaking news, I'm Poppy Harlow, we are following these developments, moment by moment. You're looking at live pictures right now outside of Trump Tower in New York City where a large crowd of supporters have gathered as Trump just emerged from Trump Towers just moments ago, you see him there walking out after being hunkered down with his team trying to strategize what they can possibly do in the wake of this fallout from that lewd, vulgar and sexually aggressive remark that he made in that 2005 video.
Donald Trump coming out, vowing to stay in this race. His supporters cheering him on. This comes on a day that many prominent Republicans have withdrawn their support of the Republican candidate for president 31 days before the election. Among them, Arizona Senator John McCain, a 2008 Republican presidential candidate, saying in a statement in part, quote, "Cindy and I will not vote for Donald Trump. I have never voted for a Democratic presidential candidate and we will not vote for Hillary Clinton. We will write in the name of some good conservative Republican who is qualified to be president."
My panel is back with me. Sunlen Serfaty, Mark Preston, David Gergen. Mark Preston, to you. John McCain pulls out, John Kasich who never got behind Trump. I mean, the list goes on and on. I think we have an image we can pull up just to show our viewers the magnitude of what we're talking about, the fallout of Republican support 31 days before the election, where does Donald Trump go from here?
PRESTON: Well, you know, take it one step further. It's not just those who are withdrawing support.
[17:29:55] It's those who are calling for him to leave the race entirely, which is essentially saying, we are ceding the presidential race to Hillary Clinton.
HARLOW: Yes.
PRESTON: I mean, just the impossibility of putting somebody else into that slot to run against Hillary Clinton in 30 days or so is insane. It just doesn't happen. At this point Donald Trump, he does have support. And then we saw certainly some of that out there.
HARLOW: Yes.
PRESTON: He has grassroots support. But he is bleeding support almost every 10 minutes. It seems like somebody else comes out and has to put a statement out. I'm surprised we haven't seen more. We will over the next 24 hours. There will be pressure on Republicans to do so.
HARLOW: David Gergen, you made an interesting point last hour. You are saying we are seeing something we haven't seen in a modern presidential race, a division between the people and the party.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Absolutely. Think about it this way. I think there are five people that arrived today, five former nominees of the Republican Party for president, and four have come out against president. Four of them now have come out basically against Trump. That's just --
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: The only one still behind him is Bob Dole.
GERGEN: Bob Dole and -- I think, Mark, right, we may be waiting for Dole. I'm sure he's appalled. And I'm sure Elizabeth Dole is very appalled. So, it is -- I don't think we've ever seen anything quite this clear cut in which the people are so angry at the establishment that they're going to rally around Trump. There are a lot of guys out there, but a lot of women. What we don't know -- my working sense is, this is going to cost Trump in the polls, especially with women. But you know --
HARLOW: He already doesn't has a ton of female support.
GERGEN: He was 20 points already among women. What may happen is if Trump comes out as a fighter and takes on the establishment, takes on us in the media and all the rest, he may find that people like the underdog.
HARLOW: That's what, Sunlen, they loved through the primary about Donald Trump, his tweets, exactly like what he said out here, it's the media's fault. It's the establishment's fault. And I will never leave you, the people.
SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There is no doubt this helps him with his supporters. But that's the point here for Donald Trump. He needs to expand his base. It's not about will his supporters show up or not. It's about reaching out to the very people that can defend him right now, women. And so him coming out and him doing these three print interviews this morning, he was really defiant in saying, look, you know, my supporters, they get it. That really struck me. My supporters get it.
That, to me, makes believe that Donald Trump doesn't get it. This election is about more than attracting your tried-and-true supporters who have been there. And the general election is about expanding your base, reaching out and bringing new people into the fold. We'll see between now and then if he --
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: He cannot win with just his base. He cannot mathematically do it. This electorate is more diverse than it was under Romney. Romney couldn't do it with just the base.
I have to get a quick break in.
Guys, stay with me.
A quick break. Much more of our breaking news from the site of the next presidential debate tomorrow night. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:36:00] HARLOW: We are back like at Washington University, the site of the next presidential debate. You are looking outside Trump Tower. A big group of supporters rallying around, gathering to show their support for him after that videotape from 2005 emerged and the scandal all broke in the last 24 hours. The comments Donald Trump made, talking about his actions, sending tremors to through the presidential election. Moments ago, Trump surprised the crowd. He walked out of Trump Tower to those huge cheers.
Let's bring in senior media correspondent, host of "Reliable Sources," Brian Stelter.
We are all stunned when we saw him walk out like that. He could have gone out the back or the garage. He issued a clear statement to his people, to his supporters.
BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT & CNN HOST, RELIABLE SOURCES: Yes. HARLOW: The question being debated within Trump world this afternoon
was would he come out and hold a press conference, a speech, address the public tonight before the debate. What have you learned?
STELTER: There was talk of a rally, a full-blown rally. The Trump campaign says there will be no rally tonight. The indication is there will be public event tonight with Trump. What we saw here, Poppy, was an alternative. This was a moment for Trump to bask in the glory of the crowd there, a chance for him to get that attention, to soak it up, because it must feel pretty lonely in Trump Tower, hearing about all these GOP standard bearers all lining up against him, knowing he has 28 hours to prepare for the most important debate of his life?
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: The most important moment of his life.
STELTER: It was two weeks ago, and now the stakes are each higher.
HARLOW: We are learning Hillary Clinton will not say a word about this until she takes the debate stage with at least 80 million more eyes will be on this.
STELTER: That's true.
HARLOW: Talk to me of the strategy of the Clinton camp right now.
STELTER: Normally, second debates aren't watched as much as first debates. 84 million viewers watched first debate. Now, with the wake of this story, with this firestorm, it could be an even bigger audience on Sunday night. The Clinton campaign has a lot of preparation to do. And the Trump campaign having to figure out how to respond to this. Clinton also has to figure out what to say, what not to say. What to do when Trump provokes her, brings up Bill Clinton, brings up Bill Clinton's alleged abuse. Trump was clear in his late night video statement that he's going to go there, he's going to bring these issues up on the debate stage. It would make sense that, Clinton has a lot of thinking to do about what exactly to say. Maybe that's why he she is holding back until tomorrow night.
HARLOW: He is blaming the establishment and the media. Tweeting that this is the media's fault, the media wants me out of this race.
STELTER: He has benefitted enormously from getting the attention, now he's referring from the other side of the story. The reality is this event today is actually being driven by the Republican establishment figures, by the John McCain-type statements you are reading on air.
HARLOW: You now have the standard bearers of the Republican Party that are out. John McCain out, Bush out, George Bush out, Romney out. What will we hear from Bob Dole?
Brian, thank you.
STELTER: I was speaking on the phone, because a second source says no event tonight at all. That means Trump will be secluded in Trump Tower tonight, presumably working on debate prep.
HARLOW: Brian Stelter, thank you very much.
STELTER: Thank you.
HARLOW: Of course, Brian will have a lot more tomorrow morning, "Reliable Sources," 11:00 a.m. eastern live.
Tomorrow night is when it all goes down. These two candidates head- to-head. You will hear from Hillary Clinton for the first time. How will she react? Our own Anderson Cooper moderates.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:43:00] (CHANTING)
HARLOW: Welcome back to our breaking new. These are images from moments ago. This was Donald Trump moments ago, coming out of Trump Tower getting high fived and cheers as her emerged. This is the first we have seen since the videotape dropped 24 hours ago. You wouldn't know from this scene his campaign is in crisis mode after the lewd, vulgar and sexually aggressive remarks were revealed that he made a decade ago.
People close to the Hillary Clinton told us you will not hear a word from her about all of this until she takes the debate stage tomorrow night in St. Louis. That is when and where she will address what Donald Trump said. She will do it, according to campaign, we are hearing early on in the debate tomorrow night.
Two CNN political commentators with me, Patti Solis Doyle, Hillary Clinton's former campaign manager from 2008, somebody who knows what's inside Clinton's head and what she's probably thinking right now; and Andy Dean, former president of Trump Productions and a Donald Trump supporter.
Thank you for being here.
Patti, take me into the mind of Secretary Clinton. We know she will address this tomorrow night on stage. She will do it early remember what will she say?
PATTI SOLIS DOYLE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think the pressure was on Donald Trump before this happened for him to really perform and knock the debate out of the park. It's even more so now. For Hillary Clinton, she has to condemn Donald Trump in the strongest words possible. This is a woman who has devoted her adult life to fighting for women and families. She's done it on the international stage. She's done it domestically. She's fought for equality for women, economically, politically, socially, and so she's almost an icon for women in this country, so she needs to condemn him. That's her one and only priority tomorrow night.
ANDY DEAN, FORMER PRESIDENT, TRUMP PRODUCTIONS & TRUMP SUPPORTER: I think -- (INAUDIBLE) -- you would say, well, if you are this paragon of virtue for women, why does the Clinton Foundation accept $10 million from Saudi Arabia where women aren't even allowed to drive. I mean the Clinton Foundation takes tens of millions of dollars from many Middle Eastern countries where women are horribly abused.
[17:45:16] HARLOW: Well, are -- are you making an equivalency between what the Clinton Foundation takes for donations to in some way excusing what Donald Trump said?
DEAN: No. There is no equivalency.
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: What itself the point you are making? I'm confused.
DEAN: OK, there's a lot to unpack here.
HARLOW: You think she's supporting human rights abuses --
DEAN: Well, she's taking money from countries that do.
HARLOW: -- against women in Saudi Arabia?
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: What I'm saying is, if I ran a news network, you can have breaking news, fancy music, say, hey, the Clinton Foundation is up to this but I don't. CNN runs a network. And so there's breaking news that Trump --
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: I'm not going down the rabbit hole of the Clinton Foundation, because CNN has covered that extensively, Andy, as you well know.
DEAN: No, we see the difference.
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: We beg to differ. There is something very important going on.
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: OK, go ahead.
HARLOW: For you, someone who knows Donald Trump so well, worked with him for more than five years, how does Donald Trump address this?
DEAN: He already has. He apologized. But I think --
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: He apologized in taped remarks. Many people didn't see it.
DEAN: They were horrible comments. He's going to apologize again. He has to do it again. (CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: -- Clinton. What do you want to see from your candidate? I know you don't agree with the comments.
DEAN: No, I don't. Trump doesn't agree with the comments. They were very rough over comments. But at the same time, while they were made 11 years ago, he was on a mic, a hot mic. That doesn't excuse it. I'm explaining he didn't realize he was being recorded. That doesn't excuse it. That's awful. But these were 11 years ago. What I'm saying is --
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: He was 59 years old.
DEAN: You can make it seem --
HARLOW: He was 59-years-old.
DEAN: You can replace clips on Howard Stern and say it's breaking news every day for the next 31 days. To voters -- this is the key piece. The voters know that Trump can sometime speak in a way that is vulgar. They knew that a year-and-a-half ago. But this is a part of the primary process.
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: What I'm saying is happening here --
HARLOW: Here's what's different, right, it's not just vulgar.
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: We get it. It's insulting. We get it.
HARLOW: No, no, no. It's not just vulgar and insulting. It's sexually aggressive and predatory.
DEAN: And it's wrong.
HARLOW: Talking about using a position of power to grab a female's genitals. There's a difference.
DEAN: But nobody -- OK, we all agree that it's horrible.
HARLOW: That's something we haven't heard before.
DEAN: But the part that you are ignoring here, is when you cover every eight minutes that people say tat Donald Trump should step down, is this is a lot bigger than Donald Trump.
HARLOW: His own party members.
DEAN: These are people that have hated Donald Trump in the establishment to begin with. But let me finish my point. This is much bigger than Donald Trump. He is only a man. If this was the primary process, I could argue you have a point that he's just a man. But now, this is a part of our democratic system, which 14 million people over a year-long process went to the polls and he won 38 states. So when you're saying we should forego the Democratic process --
HARLOW: I'm not saying that at all.
DEAN: No, but that's what is being reported today is that Trump voters are these troglodyte cave dwellers, who --
HARLOW: Who is saying that?
DEAN: I think CNN is insinuating that when you are calling for what is amounting to -- you're asking him to step down.
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: You are asking him to step down. That's outrageous.
HARLOW: No one is asking him to step down.
DEAN: You can watch CNN coverage --
HARLOW: All right. His own party members, Andy, his own party members are the ones.
DEAN: The elite establishment who have never liked him. You quoted Jason Chaffetz, a Marco Rubio supporter. Kelly Ayotte never supported Donald Trump. These are people that are part of the establishment --
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: Trump is running against --
(CROSSTALK)
SOLIS DOYLE: It's news. It's news.
DEAN: It may be news but also there's a whole other side of Hillary Clinton that isn't being covered.
HARLOW: What do you think is not being covered about Hillary Clinton?
DEAN: Numerous.
HARLOW: Name one thing.
DEAN: OK, this whole week on CNN, it's Trump taxes, Trump taxes. Also, why was it 1995 released? There was a reason why it was 1995. We can get into that later. But it's Trump's taxes. Now it's this controversy of he says inappropriate things. We knew that a year and a half ago. The first question that was asked in the Cleveland debate on August 6th was, Mr. Trump, you ay inappropriate thing. Voters understood that. They said, hey, we don't agree with it, we want a stronger economy, we want it to beat ISIS -- (CROSSTALK)
DEAN: So we're taking an imperfect person with very --
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: You will be with me on the other side of this break.
Patti will get in here.
We're going to take a break. Much more from Washington University, the site of tomorrow night's debate, coming up.
But first, we have to jump to this, this week's "CNN Hero." We want you to mete Jeff Payne.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEFF PAYNE, CNN HERO: A lot of parents would not toss their kids a gun and tell them to have fun. Many of them don't think twice of throwing them the car keys. And we just throw the kids out there on the road and expect them to be prepared to handle every situation. That's just not the case. We're just doing our job so we can make a difference and make the roads safer for all of us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: All right. We have to get a break in.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:53:37] HARLOW: Back with my panel now, Patti Solis Doyle, Hillary Clinton's former campaign manager from 2008 is with us; Andy Dean, former president of Trump Productions and a Donald Trump supporter.
Patti, to you. We saw just moments ago, Donald Trump moving in a defiant clear move to his supporters, getting high fives and cheers from his supporters. Not just men, women in the crowd, too. We see him defy the odds time and time again in this presidential race. What tells you it is different this time?
DOYLE: I think it remains to be seen whether his steadfast supporters will abandon him at this point but Donald Trump's problem is he needs to expand that support. He needs to reach out to women, minorities, African-Americans, Hispanics. The only way he can win the presidency is to win white, educated women, and right now, with what's happened in the last 36 hours, there's no way he can do that.
HARLOW: Andy Dean, there have been indications from him that he would bring up Bill Clinton, the former president's indiscretions in the debate. Does he do that tomorrow night and should he given the developments of the last 24 hours?
DEAN: He might do it. I wouldn't recommend it. The American public are well aware of what Bill and Hillary did in the 1990s. I mean, that is out there.
What I would bring up are things like the Clinton Foundation's connections to the Middle East and the treatment of women there. I would bring Huma Abedin, who is going to be essentially running the White House, and her connections.
HARLOW: Wait. Why would you bring her up?
DEAN: This is something that may not get reported, but she did write for a magazine that was anti-American, that espoused radical views.
[17:55:14] HARLOW: Actually that -- actually, Andy --
DEAN: Against women.
HARLOW: -- she's listed on the masthead there --
DEAN: Correct, that her mom wrote.
HARLOW: as a contributor, as something she rarely, rarely did. Also wasn't paid by that publication. And you're also mischaracterizing.
DEAN: I'm not. She was part of a magazine that said very anti- American things.
HARLOW: Part of a magazine in what capacity, Andy?
DEAN: She was on the masthead and it was her mom and -
HARLOW: Never paid by the magazine. What did she write that was so offensive?
DEAN: I'll send you the e-mails.
HARLOW: What did she write?
(CROSSTALK)
HARLOW: You're bringing up Huma Abedin. Make your argument.
DEAN: OK, in the magazine, if you want to read it --
HARLOW: Make your argument.
DEAN: I will make the argument if you want. In this magazine, it's said very crazy things, like blaming America for 9/11. If women dress provocatively, they can invite violence upon themselves. That's what was in the magazine. It's worthy of exploration.
SOLIS DOYLE: It's not true.
DEAN: It is true.
SOLIS DOYLE: It's not true.
DEAN: These are facts. I'm saying -- (CROSSTALK)
DEAN: 99 percent of the time is devoted to Trump's taxes, Trump's horrible this, Trump said this bad thing. Can't we devote a little bit time to figuring out who Hillary Clinton's main chief of staff might be and her links to this crazy magazine?
HARLOW: 10 second rebuttal, Patti.
SOLIS DOYLE: It's just not true. It's just not true.
(CROSSTALK)
SOLIS DOYLE: It's untrue.
DEAN: Read it.
HARLOW: We have to leave it there. We're out of time.
Andy, Patti, thank you very much.
Thank you for watching. I'm Poppy Harlow. I'll see you back at the top of the hour.
"Smerconish" is now.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
