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Trump Holds DC Event, Then Campaigns in NC; Tapes Capture Trump's Fierce Ambitions; New Clinton Ad: Trump "A Loose Cannon"; Clinton Stumps in All-Important Florida; Megyn Kelly, Gingrich Spar Over Trump Accusers; Poll: Clinton, Trump Neck-And-Neck in Utah; Pence Makes Stop in Utah Today; Obamacare Architect Responds; Defense Secretary Suspends Bonus Repayment Orders. Aired 10-10:30a ET
Aired October 26, 2016 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[10:00:00]
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.
Just 13 days before Americans choose their next president and the two campaigns are focused on key battleground states. Hillary Clinton beginning her day in the all-important state of Florida as a new poll shows the state in a statistical dead heat. According to Bloomberg Donald Trump holds a razor thin lead, two percentage points in a state that he must win. And yet the Republican nominee is off the campaign trail this morning. He's actually in Washington, D.C. For a ribbon cutting at his new hotel and then he will stump in North Carolina. All of this as new audio tape from a Trump biographer revealed candid conversations with him just before he launched his presidential bid, capturing his fierce ambition and his refusal to accept second place.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If you lose a lot, nobody's going to follow you because you are looked at as a loser. Winning is a very important thing, and the most important aspect of leadership is winning. If you have a record of winning, people are going to follow you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: So with Trump in a statistical dead heat in a state that's essential for him, he is raising some eyebrows by leaving the campaign trail to tout his brand new hotel in D.C. CNN's chief political correspondent Dana Bash is there with response from the Trump campaign. Good morning, Dana.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. This is definitely an official event done by and for the Trump organization, his business. This is not a campaign event. None of the campaign, sort of trappings are around here. And that is certainly as you said raising some eyebrows but his campaign manager defended it on CNN yesterday. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KELLYANNE CONWAY, TRUMP CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Well, he's made 12 stops in Florida in two and a half days. Nobody accuses Donald Trump of taking time off. Believe me, -- we don't even know when he sleeps or if he does. The guy is in deep fatigue of all. And he is - you know, nobody asks Hillary Clinton why do you have five days off before the debate but he's coming to open a hotel that's under budget and ahead of schedule. It's a great illustration to America of what he does. --
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: But he opened the hotel about a month and a half ago or so, that was the soft opening. But the hotel has been open now, for at least a month or six weeks.
CONWAY: This is the grand official opening and it's been scheduled this way for a long time and we are very excited to show America what this man actually does. He fixes things. He builds things.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: So, Carol, to me it seems that the issue is less about being off the campaign trail, because he is, as you've said, going to North Carolina for a couple of stops after this.
It's more about what he is doing, which is promoting his businesses. The spin from the Trump campaign is that this is one of his biggest assets to voters, that he knows how to run businesses. And you know, from his perspective these days, doing it well. But, you know, it's also free publicity. Let's just face it, for his property that he has as Wolf said to Kellyanne Conway yesterday, done openings for several times so one last time, one last chance to do it before the campaign is over while he's got the traveling press corps - presidential press corps with him is no accident.
COSTELLO: I know. I was just going to bring that up because supposedly he may take questions at some point from reporters and to me that seems to be a ploy to put that part of this event on national television.
BASH: Well, I'm not so sure. We should be so lucky that we get to ask questions of Mr. Trump. It's been a little while since the traveling press corps got to do that. At this point, that is not the plan. But we can certainly hope so. But other than that, yes, it is going to be a ribbon cutting and official discussion not about the things that he would do for America if he were president, but the things that he did to make this hotel here in Washington, D.C.
COSTELLO: All right. Dana Bash reporting live from D.C. this morning. Now, let's turn our attention to the Clinton campaign. CNN's Jeff Zeleny is in Palm Beach County, Florida, with that. Good morning.
JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORREPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Hillary Clinton is going to be opening her second day of a two-day campaign swing here in Palm Beach County, as you said. Yesterday, she was in Broward County. Now, these are Democratic-rich counties here. She is trying to encourage people to vote now, to vote, early, and some two million voters in Florida already have cast their ballots. She is moving beyond the persuasion time of the campaign to win over some undecided voters if there may be any left and she is trying to urge those Democrats to get out the vote. She needs to have the same level of turnout among African-American voters, Hispanic voters, women and others, as Barack Obama did in 2008 and 2012. But she's also delivering her closing argument here in Florida in person, and she has the help of Morgan Freeman doing it in a new television ad. Let's watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MORGAN FREEMAN, ACTOR: A steady hand or a loose cannon, common sense and unity or drama and division, a woman who spent her life helping children and families, or a man who spent his life helping himself. Our children are looking to us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[10:05:16] ZELENY: A steady hand or a loose cannon. That is basically, the bumper sticker message for what the Clinton campaign hopes to frame this race as. But Carol, so interesting that Morgan Freeman is making that argument. Hillary Clinton is seldom in her own ads. She seldom voices over her own ads here. Of course, her unfavorable are fairly high. That's one of the reasons why here. But Carol, she's also celebrating her 69th birthday today. She is one year younger than Donald Trump. She went to an Adele concert last night in Miami as a regular old guest watching Adele. At the end of that, Adele said vote Clinton, not Trump. Of course, Adele can't do either because she's not a U.S. citizen. Carol?
COSTELLO: Got you, Jeff Zeleny, reporting live from Lake Worth, Florida this morning. Thank you.
The final days of the 2016 campaign are not only lighting a fire under the candidates but also their top surrogates. Case in point, Newt Gingrich, who got into a very testy exchange with Fox News host Megyn Kelly.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: You want to go back to the tapes of your show recently? You are fascinated with sex and you don't care about public policy.
MEGYN KELLY, FOX NEWS HOST: Me? Really?
GINGRICH: That's what I get out of watching you tonight.
KELLY: You know what Mr. Speaker, I'm not fascinated by sex, but I am fascinated by the protection of women and understanding what we're getting in the Oval Office and I think the American voters would like to know --
GINGRICH: And then so, we are going to send Bill Clinton back to the east wing because after all, you are worried about sexual predators.
KELLY: Listen, it's not about me. It's about the women and men of America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: OK. So, let's talk about that and more. David Lauter is here, he is the Washington bureau chief for the "L.A. Times" and Larry Sabato is the director of the University of Virginia, Center for Politics. Welcome to both of you. Donald Trump is having a real problem with women in this election, Larry. Did Newt Gingrich help him on Fox News last night?
LARRY SABATO, DIRECTOR UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA CENTER FOR POLITICS: No. Obviously he just stoked the base for Donald Trump as if they need stoking, and that's classic Gingrich. Earlier you played that great clip from 2012 when Gingrich was running for president, when he lashed out at one of the panelists and screamed about media bias. And remember, it helped him win the South Carolina primary. Republicans love media bashing. And I think the Trump's core loves media bashing more than the average Republican. So, it's all of apiece. It's way too late for this to have any real impact on the election. Most of it's cooked.
COSTELLO: Well, I would like to play that clip once again, Larry, now that you mentioned it. This is Newt Gingrich when he was running for the Republican nomination for President of the United States. It was during a debate. Newt Gingrich himself has been married couple of times, right, and one of his ex-wives alleged that they had an open marriage. John King asked him about that onstage. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: She says that you came to her in 1999 at a time when you were having an affair. She says, you asked her, sir, to enter into an open marriage. Would you like to take some time to respond to that?
GINGRICH: No. But I will.
(APPLAUSE)
GINGRICH: I think -- I think the destructive, vicious, negative nature of much of the news media makes it harder to govern this country, harder to attract decent people to run for public office, and I am appalled that you would begin a presidential debate on a topic like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: So David, Newt Gingrich was trying to use that same tactic with Megyn Kelly but if it is not working so well in 2016, is it?
DAVID LAUTER, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF "THE LOS ANGELES TIMES": Well, no Carol, it's not. The problem, and this has been a problem for the Trump campaign all along, is they have never managed to change over from what might work in a Republican primary, where you're running against other Republican candidates and you want to build up your base, to what might work in a general election where you have to reach out to voters beyond the ones who are already with you. And they have consistently not managed to do that, which is why they are now stuck at around 40 percent or somewhat less of the vote and on track to have the biggest popular vote loss perhaps since Walter Mondale. They need to get out of that bubble if they are going to have any chance of turning this around. And you know, two weeks before the election, getting into a quarrel with Fox News really doesn't seem to be the way to do that.
COSTELLO: Well, and I bring up again that Mr. Trump is lagging with women. Our most recent polls show that Clinton has a 12-point lead among women. Not only that, 59 percent say the way Trump treats women is an indicator of both his character and his ability to be president. And Larry, interestingly enough, the "New York Times" published a set of interviews from
[10:10:16] 2014 between Mr. Trump and his biographer, and Trump's ex- wife Ivana talked a little bit about what their marriage was like. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
IVANA TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP'S EX-WIFE: She's a stupid girl. She doesn't have a brains. I have no idea what Donald was with her. But she broke us our marriage because immediately when I find out his affair, I file for divorce.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is it?
IVANA: I was the one, yeah. Because if you cannot trust your spouse, you know, it's over.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: OK. So Larry, we haven't heard from any of Trump's ex- wives but now this tape has surfaced and what message might that send to women?
SABATO: Well, I think they will pay attention to it, obviously, because any of those wives know Donald Trump very, very well, more than anyone else could, and you are absolutely correct, Carol, we are headed in all probability for the greatest gender gap in American presidential history, at least in the polling era. Trump is leading among men by a tiny percentage point, you know, 1, 2, 3 percent, something like that. He's losing women overwhelmingly, especially even in the category of whites who are college educated or graduate school educated. It's almost impossible for a Republican to win without winning whites overwhelmingly, men and women, blue collar and college educated. So this can't help him, but he's got far more serious problems at this very late date than that.
COSTELLO: So David, can Mr. Trump recover with women voters? Because it seems right now as if not just Donald Trump but his surrogates don't know how to talk about women in a way that makes women feel like, yes, they're on my side.
LAUTER: Well, you know, I felt the most telling point in that exchange that Newt Gingrich had with Megyn Kelly was when he said that she was fascinated by sex. This debate isn't about sex. It's about sexual assault which is a completely different thing, and the fact that he was trying to phrase it in terms of sex just tells you how huge the gap is between the way at least Newt Gingrich and quite likely Mr. Trump sees this, and the way most American women and probably a lot of American men as well, see this issue. If they can't get past that sort of lack of understanding of how people see the issue and what people are concerned about with this issue, then no, they're not going to be able to close the gap.
COSTELLO: I have to leave it there. David Lauer, Larry Sabato, thanks to both of you.
Still to come in the "Newsroom," 13 days to go, you would think the Trump campaign would be focused on battleground states but Mike Pence is in Utah?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:17:25] COSTELLO: Utah will be among the most fascinating states to watch on November 8th. The reddest of states is purple right now, and may just turn blue on Election Day. The Trump camp is worried. It is sending Mike Pence to Salt Lake City today. Keep in mind it is highly unusual for such a high-powered surrogate to campaign in Utah because Democrats usually concede that state. Not so this year. Clinton's camp has sent staffers to Utah to whip up support. So let's talk about that. With me now is Thomas Burr, Washington correspondent for "The Salt Lake Tribune." Welcome, Thomas.
THOMAS BURR, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT "THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE": Hey, good morning.
COSTELLO: Good morning. So, Mike Pence is very popular in Utah. Mr. Trump is not. So, how important is Pence's visit?
BURR: You know, the fact we are talking about the vice presidential candidate on the Republican side, visiting Utah 13 days for the election is very telling, I guess, of the campaign right now. Yes, Mike Pence has visited Utah a couple times before, actually, in this campaign and last time was with Governor Gary Herbert and other leaders in the state, this time, not so much.
COSTELLO: What do you mean? Because, you know, you mentioned Pence was there before. Senator Mike Lee -- welcomed him, a very popular Republican senator in the state of Utah. But things have changed. And tell us how they have changed, especially with Senator Lee.
BURR: Yes, absolutely. So, when Senator Lee has never supported Donald Trump actually in this campaign, has kept you know, silent on who actually he's going to vote for at the end of the day. But Mormons in general which make up about 60, 65 percent of the state, have not been very supportive of Donald Trump either and right now, all polling looks like Evan McMullin, independent candidate from Provo, born in Provo, Mormon is actually leading or around the same points as Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton, a few points behind. But right now, you look at the state and you say, well, this is actually -- it could go independent for the first time since 1960. Independent candidate could carry electoral votes.
COSTELLO: That would be kind of thrilling for Utah in a way. Because you know, -- we have never really talked about Utah, right, because we always assume it's going to go Republican.
BURR: I know, Carol. You can bet me $1,000 last year that Utah would be a swing state and I would have given you favorable odds.
COSTELLO: So, what is your prediction? Can Mr. Trump turn things around? Should Mr. Trump be in the state of Utah rather than Mike Pence? Would that help?
BURR: I don't think Mr. Trump visiting Utah is going to help his campaign. Mike Pence is probably the best surrogate he could send to try to whip up support there. At the end of the day, we will see. Again, Utah hasn't voted for a Democrat since 1964, since LBJ ran the table on all the states. And right now, if you say, will Evan McMullin, this independent
[10:20:16] candidate, be able to pull it out, I don't know. Hillary Clinton sent five new staffers there this week to try to whip up support. They're sending a lot more mailers. They're running TV, radio ads. They are really, you know, doing their best. But the fact that Donald Trump is actually having -- the Republican nominee, is having to defend Utah, is just fascinating.
COSTELLO: Oh, come on. We want your prediction. Who's going to win Utah? Come on, make a prediction.
BURR: I don't know. I'm not good at this betting game. I'm telling you.
COSTELLO: Thomas, you disappoint me. But thank you so much for being with me this morning. Thomas Burr thanks.
Coming up in the "Newsroom," Obamacare under fire as premiums soar and insurers back away. Will the program eventually flat-line or can it be fixed? We will talk to the man who built it next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:25:29] COSTELLO: Defense Secretary Ash Carter, now stepping in, promising to resolve the cases of thousands of Army National Guard's soldiers who are fighting to keep re-enlistment bonuses. The government wants them to pay back. CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr has more on the statement released moments ago by the Defense Secretary. Hi, Barbara.
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Carol. You could sort of see this one coming after, you know, days of political pressure from the veterans community, from the veterans impacted themselves and of course from the White House. The Pentagon did step in today. Defense Secretary Ash Carter, issuing a statement while he was traveling in Europe, just a short time ago, saying that the Pentagon for now will suspend this program to try and get these veterans, there's about 2,000 of them according to Pentagon calculations, to pay back enlistment bonuses that the U.S. Government says they improperly received. They were not due these re-enlistment bonuses. There has been a good deal of controversy about the Pentagon's effort to get them to pay it back.
What Carter has done is said he's going to suspend the program to get the reimbursements for the time being. He's going to have a team of senior leaders look at all of this, figure out how to have some equitable program here and get it moving and get these cases resolved rapidly. Here's what the Secretary had to say in part. Let me read it to you.
"We will provide for a process that puts as little burden as possible on any soldier who received an improper payment through no fault of his or her own. At the same time it will respect our important obligation to the taxpayer and that of course referencing that the technically, these re-enlistment bonuses never were supposed to be paid to the military personnel, but they signed the contract in good faith believing they would get them.
There are a lot of questions here still to be resolved. The people who have already paid the money back, what will happen to them? And to those veterans who say their credit has been absolutely ruined by what is an onerous financial burden on them, what can the government do to help them out? So, still, a lot of questions here to be answered. Carol?
COSTELLO: I'm sure you'll keep eye on it, Barbara Starr, reporting live for us from the Pentagon. Thank you.
And good morning, I'm Carol Costello, thank you so much for joining me. Republicans playing offense, continuing their assault on Obamacare as premium are set to skyrocket and insurers abandon the program. Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump acknowledging the system has its flaws but offering two very different plans to deal with it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: My first day in office, I'm going to ask Congress to put a bill on my desk getting rid of this disastrous law and replacing it with reforms that expand choice, freedom, affordability. You are going to have such great health care at a tiny fraction of the cost and it's going to be so easy.
HILLARY CLINTON, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We are going to make changes to fix problems like that. The President and I have talked about it. And look, this is a major step forward -- 20 million people and, actually, I'm sure you know this, predominantly working people, African-American, Latino people, now have access to insurance but the costs have gone up too much. So, we're going to really tackle that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: With me now, the man, known as the architect of Obamacare, economics professor at M.I.T., Jonathan Gruber. Welcome, sir.
JONATHAN GRUBER, ECONOMICS PROFESSOR MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY: Thank you. Good to be here.
COSTELLO: Nice to have you here. We have a lot of questions for you. Is Obamacare imploding?
GRUBER: No, Obamacare is not imploding. The main goal of Obamacare was two-fold. One was to cover the uninsured, of which we have covered 20 million, the largest expansion in American history. The other was to fix broken insurance markets where insurers could deny people insurance just because they were sick or had been sick. Those have been fixed and for the vast majority of Americans, costs in those markets have come down, thanks to the subsidies made available under Obamacare.
COSTELLO: But look at what's happening now. Premiums are going to raise 22 percent for some people -- who are enrolled in Obamacare. Not only that, but some people's deductibles are so extraordinarily high, it would be silly for them to go to the doctor because they can't afford paying their deductible.
GRUBER: First of all, the 22 percent increase, let's remember who that applies to. That applies to a very small fraction of people who have to buy insurance without the subsidies that are available. 85 percent of people buying insurance on the exchanges get subsidies. And for those people, this premium increase doesn't affect them. Now, for those remaining people, that is a problem. And that's something we need to address but it's not a --
