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Trump Vows To Appoint "Pro-Life" Justices; Trump; If Roe V. Wade Overturned, Would Go To States; Trump "Fine" With Same-Sex Marriage Ruling;; Bannon Hire Prompts Furious Backlash; Dave Chappelle's Powerful Message To Trump On "SNL";

Aired November 14, 2016 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:02] BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: CNN Senior Legal Analyst Jeffrey Toobin, joining me now. That was pretty fascinating. Where instead of saying it should be -- he's saying, well, they could go to another state. He's not -- although, of course, Democrats would say that's unacceptable. There should be a right, but he's not talking like a Republican on this issue at all of abortion.

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I think in practical terms he is supporting the Republican position ...

KEILAR: Sure.

TOOBIN: ... and he is in a unique position to do it because he's going to be appoint at least one Supreme Court Justice. Now, it's funny. This as, you know, same-sex marriage is settled but abortion is not. They are both settled. I mean they both have Supreme Court majorities that support abortion rights that support same-sex marriage. The difference is political, is that the Republican Party.

KEILAR: Public opinion, right?

TOOBIN: Has -- and public opinion is sort of, given up on same-sex marriage. Abortion rights remains the central social issue fight. It's been that my entire life, your entire life. And it shows every sign of continuing.

KEILAR: He's discerning between that. For him settled -- he's not talking like a lawyer, right?

TOOBIN: Right.

KEILAR: He's not talking about, when you say this is settled, normally a lawyer or someone with the legal knowledge ...

TOOBIN: Exactly.

KEILAR: ...would say settled law, right? OK, so what is the likelihood then? That Roe V. Wade could be overturned, because of Donald Trump having appointments?

TOOBIN: Well, there are currently five justices on the Supreme Court, who ruled justice past tune that Roe V. Wade is good law and in fact states cannot burden the -- a woman's right to choose. They see it on the screen there, Anthony Kennedy a Nixon appointee, joins with the four Democratic appointees. Kagan, Sotomayor, Ginsburg, and Breyer. So there are five justices in favor of protecting a woman's right to choose abortion. The replacing of Justice Scalia which that President Trump will announce shortly, that is not going to affect the overall balance. The question is who leaves next? Ruth Ginsburg is 83, Stephen Breyer is 78.

KEILAR: Talked that she'd wanted to retire. Obviously she's reconsidering that at this point. I don't expect ...

TOOBIN: I don't think she wanted to retire. I think she wanted to stay. I think there are a lot of Liberals who were very angry at her for not leaving when President Obama had a Democratic Majority in the senate same with Stephen Breyer. Anthony Kennedy, who was sort of a wild car on certain issues, he's 80 years old, too. But those three of the five justices in the pro-choice majority in the Supreme Court are all elderly.

KEILAR: So would -- so when you think of the issues that could -- we've talked about abortion, we've talked about same-sex marriage. What other issues do you think could come before the court, or the clock is really ticking on them?

TOOBIN: Well, I think there will be a lot of issues related to immigration, you know, they're obviously will be a big increase in deportation. Maybe not all 11 million, maybe 3 million but a lot of those cases are going to wind before the courts. What are their -- what's the resolution there? You know, church and state issues.

You know, whether you as a religious person can excuse yourself from government obligations that came up in the hobby-lobby case. Certainly there are going to be more opportunities for religious people to get out of government obligations. Those are important cases. And, you know, the death penalty. The death penalty is hanging by a thread in many respects in the United States. I mean, the executions are way down but it still exists. Will the Supreme Court get rid of it altogether?

KEILAR: There's going to be a lot of pressure on Donald Trump to pick justices who are very clearly conservative, I mean -- but even the Chief Justice, John Roberts. I think of the Obamacare case were in the end that was upheld as a tax, which was ...

TOOBIN: Right

KEILAR: ... you know, felt almost like to dig to President Obama, but that was something where Republicans were almost aghast that Roberts had helped deliver that.

TOOBIN: Right. I think that gives you a somewhat misleading impression of Robert's overall record.

KEILAR: Yeah. TOOBIN: He has been very conservative on same-sex marriage, on abortion rights. But it is true that he did save Obamacare. Now, the question is what will remain of Obamacare in a year or two? So that may not be as significant in retrospect as it looks like, but, you know, I think you are absolutely right that he has made a commitment to the conservative wing of the Republican Party to pick conservative Supreme Court Justices. And I have every expectation that he will succeed in that.

KEILAR: All right.

TOOBIN: Nomination, again though, confirmation will be a separate issue.

KEILAR: That's right and sure will be. Jeffrey Toobin and you were looking forward to that. It's got to be an amazing story.

TOOBIN: You know, Supreme Court is always a good story. Better than ever now.

KEILAR: Yup, but sure is. All right, Jeffrey. Thank you so much.

[12:34:32] Up next, his promise to build a wall among other things is added to the political divisiveness in the U.S? So how does Donald Trump bridge this divide, and govern with so many people insisting that he's not their president?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: It has ban stunning six days since America elected Donald Trump as its 45th president. Those who fear what it might mean have taken to the streets in some cities. The president-elect himself was asked about those protesters during an interview that aired on "60 Minutes" on Sunday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT-ELECT: Don't be afraid. We are going to bring our country back. But certainly don't be afraid. You know, we just had an election, and sort of like you have to be given a little time. I mean people are protesting. If Hillary had won and if my people went out and protested, everybody would say, oh, that's a terrible thing. And it would have been a much different attitude. There is a different attitude, you know, there's a double standard here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Just one sound bite from a wide-ranging interview that touched on gay marriage, the wall that Trump has said he wants to build along the U.S.-Mexico border, a number of other issues. And I want to talk now with two of our CNN Political Commentators, Donald Trump supporter Jeffrey Lord and Democratic Strategist Paul Begala.

[12:40:05] Jeffrey, I want to ask you about this first, because something Donald Trump said they really sticks out to me. He said if my people were to protest. He means his supporters. But he is not the president-elect. Aren't they all his people?

JEFFREY LORD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, sure, they're all his people, but Brianna, I mean I have been around, my gray hair betrays me. I remember when the American Left, was doing this to Lyndon Johnson and for Hubert Humphrey in 1968. This is what they do. In our day it's occupy Wall Street or Black Lives Matter. They go out on the street and they protest, and they break windows sometimes or get violent. This is what they do if Donald Trump is just merely their latest opportunity to do this.

KEILAR: I mean I've seen this on both sides. Look, I certainly hear what you're saying about the violence, but I've covered tea party protests on Capitol Hill, where people spit on members of Congress, where African-American members of Congress were called slang terms, racist slang terms. So I want to know what you think, Paul when you ...

LORD: There's no place for this, Brianna, period.

KEILAR: No, there is ...

LORD: I mean there's no place for racism of American life, period.

KEILAR: There certainly is no place for it. And I wonder, Paul, what you think about what Donald Trump needs to do in talking about this?

PAUL BEGALA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, actually, before I get to that, good manners compels me to point out that if it were reversed to see Jeffrey sitting there, the solid sedate stable silver. You know what I have been doing if I was Jeffrey Lord, I'm in Houston. And the great Elmo Wright, played for University of Houston when I was a kid. He's a white receiver. When he's going to touch down, he invented the end zone dance. OK. If I was Lord, I'd still be doing the end zone dance.

So, first congratulations to Jeffrey for conducting himself such thing ...

LORD: Thank you sir.

BEGALA: Now, about President-elect Trump which I choke on saying but it's my duty and an obligation as American. John Mitchell, you know old guys like Lord Nikon. Remember John Mitchell was the Attorney General for Richard Nixon. Mitchell said one of the enduring laws of Washington.

He said, watch what we do not what we say. And I think people are getting all excited because Trump is saying some things that kind of appear to be moderate. I'm not interested. I'm interested in what he does. And what he's doing is so far staffing the government. The transition is two things. You unite the country and you staff the government.

It's very early. It's only six days. But I don't know that he's made the kind of progress on those two things that he needs to make to be a successful President. The country is bitterly divided and he hasn't seemed to be able to find the actions that can unite it. And as far as staffing the government, your earlier panel with Jackie Kucinich, Alex Burns, you're talking about the controversy surrounding at least Steve Bannon who apparently will be the most powerful person in the White House and comes out of a pretty eccentric movement, not a traditional conservative.

KEILAR: All right. What do you think Jeffrey? You can respond to that as well, but...

LORD: Sure.

KEILAR: ... what do you think Democratic leaders made to do when we're looking at what's happening? And I will tell you. I watched the protest march through Washington, D.C. I did not see violence. I saw people actually joining.

LORD: Right.

KEILAR: And it is a Democratic town. I saw people ...

LORD: I was thinking of Portland, Oregon.

KEILAR: ... enjoy walking, you know, joining as it went. It certainly didn't seem like -- it was a professional situation as Donald Trump described. But I wonder what you want to hear from Democrats when it comes to these protests?

LORD: Well, when I mentioned violence. I was thinking of Portland, Oregon where apparently there has been some violence.

Well, I -- you know, look, I protested when I was in college myself. So I'm not against protest. That's part of democracy. I guess skeptical here that this is all because of Donald Trump. I think Donald Trump is just sort of the latest deal here and as far as the reference to Steve Bannon, I just want to say -- you know, I know Steve Bannon and he's being very, very unfairly characterized here, among other things, as anti-Semitic. I mean, a bigger Zionist you will not find. And he's a huge fan of Bibi Netanyahu, a major supporter of Israel. So that means its gross mischaracterization.

KEILAR: Well, has it -- isn't it also true, though, that through Breitbart under sort of him overseeing that. I mean you also had headlines that called out people for being Jewish. So it's sort of -- I see what you're saying but I'm also seeing that.

LORD: The headline you're referring to which referred to Bill Kristol as a quote and quote renegade through was a Jew was written by David Horowitz who is Jewish. And what you had here and I certainly know Bill Kristol and love him to death but I just disagree with him here.

And I know David. And David's point in this was that that Bill Kristol and the never Trumpers were in an essence of abandoning Israel by voting for Hillary Clinton or not supporting Donald Trump. That's hardly anti-Semitic. I mean David Horowitz, again he's Jewish. So -- and there are Jewish who are appoint in senior positions at Breitbart. So I just -- I mean, it's a bad knock. [12:45:09] KEILAR: OK. So you reject that and I want to get in something that we've heard from Dave Chappelle, who I thought said something pretty interesting and a lot of people have paid attention to this during his opening monologue for "SNL" over the weekend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVE CHAPPELLE, COMEDIAN: These people who had been historically disenfranchised. And it made me feel hopeful. And it made me feel proud to be an American. And it made me very happy about the prospects of our country. So, in that spirit, I'm wishing Donald Trump luck. And I'm going to give him a chance. And we, the historically disenfranchised, demand that he give us one, too. Thank you very much.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Jeffrey, I know many in your camp most of them surprised when they heard that. He's talking about African Americans being historically disenfranchised and now being so included in the White House, a house that was built by slaves, where black folks used to not even be allowed to go, and he said something that, it seemed as if he was sort of bridging the divide, but also standing up for his position. What did you think?

LORD: Well, I'll take him up on it. You know, The White House was in fact built by slaves, but so as the Democratic Party and the American Left. I mean, Slavery was the backbone of their political strength when they launch so then they kept at, it was segregation and lynching and all the rest.

And my objection here is that the historically disenfranchised had been disenfranchised by the Democratic Party and they still are at it with race, with racial quotas and support for illegal immigration by skin color. I mean this is all about racial obsession. It's wrong. This is the party of Lincoln that's going to be back in the White House here and Jack Kemp, my old Boss, Jack Kemp, and I look forward to taking the Dave Chappelle up on

that. I think that's terrific.

KEILAR: Paul, your reaction?

BEGALA: History is important, but so are current events. The current events are these -- Donald Trump won and he won in part by saying very racist things, the very textbook definition of a Racist statement. That's not my opinion. That's Paul Ryan, the Republican Speaker.

When Mr. Trump attacked Judge Gonzalo Curiel for being a Mexican- American, Paul Ryan said it was the very textbook of a racist statement. Most American, I know Jeffrey disagrees but I certainly believe the whole birth of thing that Trump pushed was racist attacking our president as if he weren't legitimately our President. So he enters this office, not with a historical legacy of racism going back to Thomas Jefferson, he doesn't bear that burden, but he bears the burden of his own very divisive and racist comments.

He should also keep in mind, there's one thing I would tell those guys, Jeffrey, I know you will. They lost the election by 2.3 million votes by the time they count them all. A solid defeat of the popular will. Now, the Electoral College is how we do these things? He's absolutely legitimate when he signs the law, I'll obey it, when he enters the room I will stand. But he lost more people wanted Hillary Clinton than Donald Trump. He also lost seats in the house and lost seats in the Senate. This calls for an attitude of great humility in entering that office. Can Donald Trump do humility? Not a chance.

LORD: Yes.

BEGALA: We'll see. I'll keep an open mind. I'm with Chappelle.

KEILAR: But we will see which ...

BEGALA: But he lost seats in the house, lost seats in the Senate and lost the presidential popular vote so that's a pretty strong repudiation, actually of Trump and Trumpism.

LORD: We have a Republican in the White House Senate.

KEILAR: We will see which of you is correct on that. Jeffrey Lord, Paul Begala, thank you so much to both of you.

And up next, when Donald Trump is sworn in his president in January, he's going to have a Republican House, he's going to have a Republican Senate to help him carry out his policies and agenda, but that necessarily mean smooth sailing for him. How is congress transitioning to a Trump administration?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:52:51] KEILAR: It is back to work for lawmakers on Capitol Hill. Soon the U.S. House will begin their first session since the election of Donald Trump. And people on both sides of the aisle are trying to figure what to make of the results. Business congressional leadership elections get underway this week.

CNN's Manu Raju joining us now live inside of the Capitol there or the near the Capitol I should say, inside one of the office buildings. One of the biggest elections that we are going to see Manu involves the House Speaker. They must be feeling good, bad, what are you thinking? There was a lot of talk about what his future would hold, but now you have Reince Priebus as his Chief of Staff. May be a sign that there's going to be some camaraderie between the White House and the Hill?

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: Yeah, actually Paul Ryan's feeling really good right now in no small part because of Donald Trump, Brianna. And that's something that we wouldn't have expected during this campaign season when Trump and Ryan had an extended back and forth that lasted for a long time and last month, or looked like Trump was probably going to lose, a lot of the conservatives we're looking for a scalp in there are warning that they'll go after Paul Ryan. Well, not so much anymore. One reason why that Donald Trump came in -- comes into office with helping down ticket Republicans, particularly in the House, pad there majority. House Republicans are looking at having at least 238 seats in the new Congress. That means when Paul Ryan is voted on by the full house to be re-elected as speaker, he can lose upwards of 20 votes and still be elected speaker. No one expects him to lose that many votes. Also that outside group of agitators if you will, the house freedom caucus, they're not mounting a challenge to Paul Ryan right now, in fact they're looking for ways to help a Trump administration and Paul Ryan himself trying to align himself with Donald Trump, working very closely with the incoming president. So a lot of talk about unity and that is helping Paul Ryan at the end of the day here, Brianna.

KEILAR: The Democrats have choices to make as well. What do we expect on the other side of the aisle?

[12:54:46] RAJU: Well Nancy Pelosi, the House Democratic leader is likely to be re-elected as the Democratic leader, but there is some movement that possibly see if there's a challenge against her. Congressman Tim Ryan of Ohio, a newer Democrat elected within the last few election cycles is making phone calls this morning, Brianna, to see whether or not he can have any support to challenge Nancy Pelosi on Thursday, leadership elections within the house Democratic caucus. But I can tell you, that's going to be a very stiff challenge. Pelosi has raised millions and millions of dollars for her colleagues, has a lot of support internally. So even if this does happens, she's unlikely to be unseated.

And also some Democrats are pushing to delay that Thursday leadership contest to see if there's need for some new blood within the leadership. It's unlikely that that will be delayed. And that's on the House side. In the Senate side, Senate Democratic leader, the new Democratic leader is going to be New York Senator Chuck Schumer. He's expected to be re-elected -- elected to that position to succeed Harry Reid this week, Brianna.

KEILAR: Big surprises at the White House, maybe, not so much when it comes to Congress. Manu Raju, thank you so much. And thank you so much for watching "Newsroom." "Wolf" starts right after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:00:15] WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer. It's 1:00 ...