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At This Hour
Pence: Evidence Against Trump Accusers Soon; Trump Attacks as Clinton Surrogates Pounce; Beauty Pageant Contestants: Trump Acted Inappropriately; Former Miss Ohio Defends Trump; Obama Campaigns in Cleveland for Clinton. Aired 11-11:30a ET
Aired October 14, 2016 - 11:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[11:00:07] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm John Berman.
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everybody. I'm Kate Bolduan. Happy Friday.
Looking at live pictures right now of Cleveland, Ohio. Hello, Cleveland. John made me do it. A battleground state where early voting started just this week, where any minute now, President Obama will be campaigning for Hillary Clinton. We will bring you there as soon as it begins.
Donald also hitting a battleground today, North Carolina. Yesterday, he went to battle against the women accusing Trump of forcing himself on them in years past. Trump calls the claims outright lies and calls the accusers horrible liars.
One of those accusers, Jessica Leeds, says Donald Trump assaulted her on a plane more than 30 years ago. She talked to Anderson Cooper. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JESSICA LEEDS, ACCUSES TRUMP OF INAPPROPRIATE TOUCHING: He was grabbing my breast and trying to turn me towards him, and kissing me, and then after a bit, that's when his hands started going -- I was wearing a skirt, and his hands started going towards my knee and up my skirt. And that's when I said, I don't need this, and I got up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: Now, according to Donald Trump's running mate, Mike Pence, in just a matter of hours, that's what Mike Pence said, evidence will be revealed that will disprove Trump's accusers. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE PENCE, (R), INDIANA GOVERNOR & VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Frankly, I think before the day is out, there will be more evidence publicly that shows and calls into question these latest allegations.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What evidence is coming out? PENCE: Well, just stay tuned. I know that there's more information
that's going to be coming out that will back his claim that this is all categorically false.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: CNN's Brianna Keilar live for us.
Brianna, Mike Pence says stay tuned.
BRIANNE KEILAR, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. We are staying tuned. So far, we haven't seen anything to disprove these allegations. And it's really one of those situations where, how do you, right? There are just so many allegations. That's one of the issues for Donald Trump.
Hillary Clinton is seeing this -- her campaign is seeing this -- you'll notice she's not on the campaign trail. She's fundraising. She has her surrogates out. She's really trying to keep her powder dry. Her campaign sees Donald Trump in free-fall and they don't want to give him any sort of soft landing, so they are staying out of his way.
Hillary Clinton has been doing some rather safe forums. For instance, she appeared on the "Ellen" show and, in it, keeping in mind she's doing this, she is trying to target women and she talked about Donald Trump and his demeanor during the last debate. Here's what she said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON, (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He was really all wrought up and you could just sense how much anger he had, and so he was really trying to dominate and then literally stalk me around the stage. And I would just feel this presence behind me.
(LAUGHTER)
And you know, I thought, whoa, this is really weird.
ELLEN DEGENERES, HOST, ELLEN: Yeah.
CLINTON: So I was just trying to stay focused, trying to keep my composure.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: Some people thought there was sort of this hulking presence of Donald Trump at the debate. Some people looked and said that might not be the sort of image he wants to portray after this tape has come out, because it is one that is certainly a little bit threatening compared to the normal composure during a debate where a candidate is going to stand back and look respectful and give someone their space.
She is trying to, as she has, pull away some of those female voters, especially college educated white voters. Make no mistake about it, this is all part of the calculation in the campaign. BERMAN: Brianna Keilar for us. Thanks so much, Brianna.
Donald Trump also facing criticism from several former beauty pageant contestants who say he acted inappropriately when he owned the Miss USA Pageant.
This is what former Miss Arizona, Tasha Dixon, told CNN.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TASHA DIXON, FORMER MISS ARIZONA: He walked in and, you know, some women were half naked, others were in the process of changing.
It puts us in not only a physical vulnerable position but also an emotional state because it's physically humiliating to changing and have the owner come in.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: We should mention this is something Donald Trump himself admitted to doing with Howard Stern in 2005. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE (voice-over): I will go backstage before a show and everyone's getting dressed and ready and everything else, and you know, no men are anywhere. And I'm allowed to go in because I'm the owner of the pageant and therefore I'm inspecting it.
HOWARD STERN, RADIO SHOW HOST: Like a doctor.
TRUMP: You know, I'm inspecting. I want to make sure the dresses -- is everyone OK. They're standing there with no clothes. Is everybody OK. You see these incredible looking women. So I sort of get away with things like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: Sort of get away with things like that.
Joining us, someone who has competed in Miss USA Pageant when Donald Trump was the owner, Former Miss Ohio 2014, Madison Gesiotto, a Trump surrogate now.
Madison, thanks for joining us.
I should mention you are also a columnist with "The Washington Times."
So it's obviously clear you have been in pageants, you have been backstage of a Donald Trump-owned pageant. Was that your experience? Did Donald Trump come backstage when you all were getting ready and in various stages of undress as you are getting ready for the pageant?
[11:05:28] MADISON GESIOTTO, COLUMNIST, THE WASHINGTON TIMES & FORMER MISS OHIO & FORMER MISS USA PAGEANT CONTESTANT: As you know, I competed in Miss USA in 2014. However, this wasn't my experience at the pageant. Donald Trump had a separate dressing room and was nowhere near or in the dressing room at the 2014 Miss USA competition. He actually ended up arriving late. I think he was there maybe the night before the pageant started. He wasn't even there for preliminary competition, which was on Wednesday. He was out in the audience when we were rehearsing. Then, after that, we saw him very briefly after rehearsals in the audience section. That was about it. We did not see him ever in the dressing room in 2014.
BERMAN: Would it have been unusual to have a man, someone like Donald Trump, the owner of the pageant, backstage at a pageant?
GESIOTTO: Yes. I competed in Miss Ohio two years, the year before I won and the year I won. We never had any men near the dressing room. The security was female. Then at Miss USA, there was no men in the dressing room as well. In my experience, that would have been very unusual, at least in the 2014 competition.
BERMAN: So if these women who have come forward and said Donald Trump was backstage, and if Donald Trump, what he said with his own words to Howard Stern, if that's all true, then that would be odd, you say.
GESIOTTO: Yeah. I think it would be odd. As you mentioned before, I did compete and I didn't see anything like this happening. So I understand the girls saying maybe that would have made them uncomfortable but I have never experienced that and I can only speak to my own experiences on this.
BOLDUAN: Odd, then, that Donald Trump would be bragging about it to Howard Stern, all the same.
What are your feelings, Madison? The tape, the "Access Hollywood" tape came out on Friday. Have you the accusations now coming from women from years past this week. What are your feelings now of the back and forth over the last few days between the accusation and how Donald Trump has responded to them?
GESIOTTO: Well, you know, it's obviously not my job to independently investigate accusations of sexual assault. I know he's vehemently denied these and evidence should be coming out later today to discredit these claims. However, regarding the "Access Hollywood" tape from 2005, I expressed on multiple networks disgust with these comments. I think these comments are terrible, as he admitted himself. They are degrading to women.
But what I think here, he's not the only one saying them. We see young men on college campuses -- I have heard multiple young men over my time at Ohio State say horrible things, even worse than these comments. And what I think we need to see is a change in culture and what I hope is that this will actually spark that change in culture and make people realize, listen, a lot of men are saying these things, it's not OK, and we need to start standing up and saying this is not OK, and we need to make a change.
BERMAN: Let me ask, that sounds a lot like what the first lady, Michelle Obama, said yesterday in her speech in New Hampshire. Do you think she was on target then when she was voicing her concerns for the type of language you are talking about and the type of language we have heard at least on that tape from Donald Trump?
GESIOTTO: You know, I didn't hear her speech yesterday. However, like I said, I do feel we need a change in culture with young men today. We need to make sure they know it's not OK to speak this way. And that moving forward, people who do speak this way change. I think they need to realize this is not the way women want to be talked about. Yes, I understand the claims, and this is locker room talk, and he's right, talk like this does happen in locker rooms, but it shouldn't, and I hope we can change that.
BOLDUAN: You think Donald Trump is the one to change this culture that you're speaking out against right here?
GESIOTTO: You know, I think he coming forward as a leader and someone followed by millions across this country, saying I said these things, they were terrible, I was wrong. I think that could really make a difference, yes.
BOLDUAN: He didn't offer the tape up. This had to be presented to him and then --
(CROSSTALK)
GESIOTTO: Well, I don't think it matters how the tape came out. The fact of the matter is the tape is out now and he has taken responsibility for this. And he's saying he's sorry. He's saying this is not right. So I think young men are going to see that and hopefully realize that.
BERMAN: Madison, we should tell you we are waiting for President Obama to take the stage. We just took the picture down. Not sure if he's walking up right now.
BOLDUAN: We'll keep an eye on him.
BERMAN: We will keep an eye on him.
Let me ask you, if we have a second more, Donald Trump yesterday was talking about a "People" magazine reporter who wrote the piece suggesting that, in 2005, he made unwanted sexual advances to her. If we can play the sound, some sound people are remarking about today, I want to ask you about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Take a look. You take a look. Look at her. Look at her words. You tell me what you think. I don't think so. I don't think so.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: Can I have you respond to that quickly? He said take a look at her. I don't think so. What do you think he meant? [11:09:58] GESIOTTO: I think he's referring to the words as he
claimed. As he says, these are false allegations. He's saying there will be evidence coming out later today to discredit these allegations. If that is the case, those are ugly words to make allegations of someone of sexual assault. This is a serious problem. And by making false allegations, I think we take the attention away from real victims. And as Hillary Clinton said herself, these victims deserve to be heard and they deserve to be believed. I think we need to do a better job of making sure we do this.
It's innocent until proven guilty in this country. That's an important trait of the United States of America that so many other people in other countries are not lucky enough to have the benefit of a criminal justice system that operates in that way. So I think we can say, you know, that Donald Trump is innocent until proven guilty. I think that these -- the information that's going to come out later today will hopefully show that.
BOLDUAN: Madison, thanks so much for joining us. We really appreciate it.
We want to move over to Cleveland, Ohio. President Obama speaking to the crowd. Let's listen in.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: -- beautiful, still fired up.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: But the one thing I got to say, though, is since I've been in Cleveland this time, it seems like there's an extra pep in your step.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: I don't know what happened exactly. I don't know whether -- did something happen here in Cleveland? (CHEERING)
OBAMA: Did Lebron have anything to do with it?
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: All right. Well, congratulations, everybody.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Can everybody --
(LAUGHTER)
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Can everybody please give Jackie a big round of applause, not just for the introduction, but for service to our country? (CHEERING)
OBAMA: We've got some outstanding members of Congress who are here. Marcia Fudge (ph) is in the House. (CHEERING)
OBAMA: Marcy Kaptur is here.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Your outstanding mayor, Frank Jackson, is here.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And although he's campaigning elsewhere in the state, I want to make sure we give a shout-out to your former governor and the next United States Senator from Ohio, Ted Strickland.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Well, I know. I love you back.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: But thank you, guys. Thank you.
So this will probably be one of the last times that I visit Cleveland as your president.
(SHOUTING)
OBAMA: No, I'll come back to Cleveland. We'll just go to a game.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: But --
(SHOUTING)
OBAMA: No, understand Michelle and I, our lease was only eight years, so now we're making sure we didn't break any china, making sure Beau and Sonny haven't ruined too many carpets. We want to get our security deposit back.
(LAUGHTER)
But we are so grateful, so blessed to have had all your support over these years. It's been a great privilege.
I remember when we were campaigning here on that closing day and we were in the midst of two long wars, putting an enormous burden on our military families. We were in the early days of what would turn out to be the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes. You had all kinds of challenges from health care to climate change, where we weren't even pretending to do something about it. We were just kicking the can down the road. And I told you then, eight years ago, that I wasn't a perfect person, I wasn't going to be a perfect president, but what I guaranteed you was that I would work every single day as hard as I could to make sure that working families all across this country got a better deal.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And you gave me the honor of serving you, and eight years later, we have fought our way back from recession. We have helped our auto industry set new records. Our businesses have turned job losses into 15 million new jobs. We slashed our dependence on foreign oil.
Hold on a second, young man. Don't be interrupting everybody, come on. Come on, sir. Come on.
(SHOUTING)
OBAMA: Everybody just --
(SHOUTING)
[11:15:07] OBAMA: Come on, everybody. Let's do our little chant. Hillary! Hillary! Hillary! Hillary!
(CHANTING)
OBAMA: All right. I think we're OK now. I notice this has been happening everywhere. And I keep on telling folks, you got to organize your own rallies.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: You know, if you're confident about the other guy, just go to his rallies.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: I feel confident about my candidate. That's why I'm at this rally.
(CHEERING)
(LAUGHTER)
OBAMA: So you don't have to spend time over here. You know, go knock on some doors for your guy.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: That's a better way for you to spend our time, unless you're just being paid to be here.
(SHOUTING)
OBAMA: In which case, hey, you know, everybody got to make a living.
(LAUGHTER)
Where was I? So eight years ago, we were in tough situations. But because of your
resilience, because of your faith in each other, in this country, we have slashed our unemployment rate --
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: --- incomes are rising again. In fact, incomes went up last year by the largest amount that has ever been measured. Poverty is falling. In fact, last year, poverty went down faster than any time since 1968.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: 20 million people have health insurance who didn't have it before.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: The uninsured rate is now at an all-time low. We brought more of our brave troops home to their families.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: We delivered justice to Osama bin Laden.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Marriage equality's a reality in all 50 states.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: By almost every measure, our economy is better than it was when we came into office.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And that's not just true across the country. It's true right here in Ohio. You just look at the auto industry. That was flat on its back when we came into office. And now, it's selling the best cars in the world and is doing as well or better than ever before.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And that means there are hundreds of thousands of folks here in Ohio that have benefited. So we have been busy. But I'm here to tell you -- you want me to tell you?
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: I'm here to tell you that all that progress goes out the window if we don't make the right choice right now.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And it shouldn't be a complicated choice, because it's a choice between somebody who is as qualified as anybody who has ever run for this office --
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: -- and somebody who has proven himself unfit to lead or represent this country that we love.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And I've said this before. Democrats and Republicans have always had their differences, and that's a good thing. That's how democracy is supposed to work. When I was running against John McCain, when I was running against Mitt Romney, we had serious disagreements and debates about economic policy and foreign policy and social policy, and those elections were close. I thought I had the better argument and I would be the better president.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: But I could have seen either one of them serving honorably, not embarrassing us on the world stage. They would have engaged in legitimate debates and normal democratic processes. But that's not the case with today's Republican nominee. He doesn't have the temperament. He doesn't have the knowledge, he doesn't seem to have the interest in acquiring the knowledge, or the basic honesty that a president needs to have. And that was true before we heard him talking about how he treats women. And it was -- don't boo. What do I say?
(SHOUTING)
[11:20:12] OBAMA: Don't boo, vote.
And by the way, that was true when he talked about how Muslims are unpatriotic, or when he talked about how Mexicans were rapists, or when he made fun of somebody who was disabled, or he talked about our veterans and our troops and our Gold Star mom. You know, you don't have to be a husband or a father to know that that kind of language, those kinds of thoughts, those kinds of actions, are unacceptable. They're not right. You just have to be a decent human being.
(APPLAUSE)
And for those of you who didn't have a chance to hear Michelle yesterday --
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: -- talk about what it meant to her. I could not be prouder of her.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: I said yesterday that this is why I married her, to improve my gene pool --
(LAUGHTER) -- so my daughters would be smarter than me.
But she was sticking up, yes, she was sticking up for women, yes, she was thinking about the lessons we're teaching the next generation. She was also talking on behalf of men who know we're better than this.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Who don't want to teach our sons the kind of things that we have been hearing on television, that believe that one of the measures of any society is how does it treat its women, how does it treat its girls. Treating them with respect and dignity and equality. And if you believe that we are better than what we have been hearing, the good news is, as she pointed out yesterday, there's something we can do about it.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Right here in Ohio, a battleground state. Ohio's always close and so you can go vote. Vote early right now.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Early voting started on Wednesday.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And I know everybody here is early voting because, otherwise, you wouldn't be here. If you stood in line to get in this rally, then you got enough sense to go early vote.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: But for those of you who may not be here, and you don't even know if you're registered, you need to go to iwillvote.com/locate and you can find the early vote site nearest you. Or you can request a mail-in ballot. I'm going to repeat that website. Iwillvote.com/locate. That's not an infomercial.
(LAUGHTER)
This is an opportunity for you to exercise your right to vote, your civic responsibility, the essence of citizenship. And you don't need to wait until Election Day. You have a chance to reject a dark and pessimistic vision of a country where we turn against each other, where we turn away from our role in the world. You can reject a politics of fear and resentment and blame and anger and hate. You can choose the America we know ourselves to be, a country full of courage and generosity and ingenuity.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: You know, we have got real challenges still. When I ran eight years ago, I said we're not going to solve everything in one presidency. We've got real challenges. There are folks out there who are still struggling to pay the bills. There are students who are still trying to figure out how to pay off student loan debt.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: There are parents who are still concerned about caring for a sick child or worried about whether they're going to be able to keep their home. Everybody's worried about political gridlock. All across the country, people are concerned about the possibilities of increased racial division. There are pockets of Ohio and pockets of America, despite the progress we've made, that haven't recovered from factory closures. There are young people who are worried about whether they're going to have the same opportunities that we've had.
[11:24:59] But I will tell you this. I have traveled all 50 states. I have talked to hundreds of thousands of people. And what I've seen more than anything else is everything that's good about America, everything that's right about America. I see people working hard. I see people starting business. I see teachers teaching kids, taking money out of their own pockets to make sure they've got school supplies.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: I have seen doctors who are out there serving the indigent and the poor, making sure they have health care. I've seen our men and women in uniform serving to make sure we are safe. I have seen police officers and law enforcement and first responders who run into danger instead of run away from it. I have seen young activists who call on us to live up to our highest ideals.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: I see a young generation that is full of energy and ideas and is not going to be held back by what is right now, but is going to seize what ought to be.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And I see most of all, Americans of every party, background, every faith who believe that we are stronger together --
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: -- young, old, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, folks pledging allegiance to that same proud flag. That is the America that I know.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: And there's only one candidate in this race who has devoted her life to that vision of a better America and that is the next president of the United States, Hillary Clinton.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Now, her opponent has made it pretty clear he's just going to drag this election as low as it can possibly go. And he figures that if he makes our politics just toxic, then maybe you will just figure out you got no good choices and you just get discouraged and you just don't vote. But don't fall for it. Because I'm telling you right now, Hillary is one of the smartest, toughest, best prepared, most experienced persons ever to run for this job.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: You know, there's nothing that completely prepares you for what it's like to manage a global crisis or to send a young person to war, but Hillary's been in the room when those decisions were made. She's been a first lady, she has been a Senator, she has been my secretary of state, and in each and every job, she has worked diligently, and she's listened to the American people. She's done her homework. She has performed. She knows what the decisions mean concretely for a soldier or a veteran, for a kid who needs a great education, for a worker who's still looking for a good job or a raise or a decent retirement. Even in the middle of crisis, she keeps her cool and pays everybody the proper respect. And most important by, no matter how tough the odds, no matter how much people try to knock her down, she doesn't point fingers or whine. She doesn't talk about how everything's rigged. She just works harder and gets the job done, and never, ever quits.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: She doesn't quit and she doesn't make excuses.
And by the way, isn't that what you want from a president?
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: You know, I notice her opponent, he seems to be in the middle of the game making excuses all the time for why he might be losing.
(LAUGHER)
And it's always interesting to me to see folks who talk tough, but then don't act tough.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: Because if you're tough, you don't make excuses. You don't start complaining about the refs before the game's even done. You just play the game, right? That's what Hillary Clinton's doing. She's out there playing the game. She's just in the arena for you, fighting every single day to make sure that everybody gets a fair shake. That's what she's doing.
(CHEERING)
OBAMA: There is not a person out there who has been more qualified to serve as our president. That includes me and that includes Bill. And she's going to be great at it. She's got real plans to address the things she's heard from you, specific ideas to invest in new jobs, specific ideas to help workers share in their company's profits, specific ideas to make sure that fewer jobs move overseas, to make sure that jobs come back in places that have been abandoned, to invest --
