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Trump Team Splits on Romney as Possible Pick; Trump Revives Unfounded Claims of Voter Fraud; Future Of U.S.-Cuba Relations In Question; Market Set To Open As Cyber Monday Kicks Off. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired November 28, 2016 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:11] CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. That was good stuff. Thanks so much. You guys have a great day. NEWSROOM starts now.

And good morning, I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.

Donald Trump lashes out slamming the recount push in three states. And at the same time, falsely claims millions voted illegally in an election he won.

Confused? Well, here's his tweet, quote, "In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally." There's absolutely no evidence to support that. Right now, Hillary Clinton is leading the popular vote by nearly 2 million votes.

All of these as a major rift emerges in the Trump transition team. One its close advisers openly questioning why Mitt Romney is on Trump's short list to be Secretary of State.

We've got all the angles covered for you this morning with our team of political reporters. But let's begin with CNN's Senior Washington Correspondent Jeff Zeleny. Hi, Jeff.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Well, to bring you up to speed a little bit here in case you haven't been following all the recount back and forth over the weekend, A, the election is over but, B, there is some re-examination, if you will, of some of these votes, specifically starting in Wisconsin potentially later this week.

It's all because of the Green Party candidate Jill Stein who's been raising money to try and have that vote looked at again in Wisconsin. Now, Donald Trump won Wisconsin by some 27,000 or so votes. So the Wisconsin officials are going to be meeting later this morning to start discussing a recount here that she is paying for.

Well, the Clinton campaign over the weekend said that they had not planned to request a recount but they are going to participate and just oversee all of these. Well, that created a whole furor back and forth. Let's listen to Reince Priebus and Kellyanne Conway, two top Trump officials. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REINCE PRIEBUS, CHIEF OF STAFF TO PRESIDENT-ELECT DONALD TRUMP: This is a total and complete distraction and a fraud and something that they should drop. We will sit there and look through Scantron ballots, we will win again for the second time, and they will lose again for the second time.

KELLYANNE CONWAY, SENIOR ADVISER TO PRESIDENT-ELECT DONALD TRUMP: I was asked on CNN and elsewhere, goodness, a thousand times, will Donald Trump accept the election results? And now, you've got the Democrats and Jill Stein saying they do not accept the election results.

And the idea that we are going to drag this out now, where the President-elect has been incredibly magnanimous to the Clintons and to the Obamas is pretty incredible.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENY: So, of course, this has created a lot of discussion back and forth. The RNC, the Republican National Committee, now this morning is trying to raise money off all of this, but Donald Trump sending out a flurry of tweets over the weekend including this one specifically about the recount. Let's take a look at it if we can. He said, "The Green Party scam to fill up their coffers by asking for impossible recounts is now being joined by the badly defeated and demoralized Dems."

Well, this morning the chief counsel for the Clinton campaign, Marc Elias, also is responding on the favorite medium here of Twitter. He says this, "We're getting attacked for participating in a recount that we didn't ask for by the man who won the election but thinks there was massive fraud here."

So what is going to happen in Wisconsin later this week after the Election Board meets this morning? Most likely it's to go over all of the ballots again because it was requested here. Now, the Clinton campaign trying to make clear that they are not requesting this. They're just simply participating in overseeing this. But, Carol, Republicans having a field day on this because they say this election is over, fair and square.

One thing to keep an eye on, also, Michigan and Pennsylvania, states Donald Trump also was victorious in. There may be recount requests there as well. But all these is happening as Donald Trump, moving forward and filling up his administration -- Carol.

COSTELLO: And to think, poor Wisconsin is in the middle of it, 3 million votes were cast in the state of Wisconsin. The Stein people could ask for a paper recount.

ZELENY: Right.

COSTELLO: Do you know how long that would take, Jeff? ZELENY: Well, I'm told by Wisconsin law that they have to have this

done by the middle of December here. So this morning, in about an hour or so, all the county election officials from Wisconsin are going to be on a conference call with a State election official sort of going through how this works.

And recounts are not that uncommon. They happen in Senate races. They happen in Governor's races. In fact, one is going on in the North Carolina governor's race already as we speak here. The Republicans are requesting that one. So it can be done pretty efficiently, but state law says it must be done by the middle of the December here. So not too much longer for this drama. But certainly no one, even Democrats I've talked to, believes the outcome of this will change. Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. We're going to talk to someone from the Wisconsin Election's Commission to see how possible it is to recount 3 million votes, possibly by hand, by December 13th. Jeff Zeleny reporting live for us this morning. Thanks so much.

ZELENY: Thank you, Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. We're also hearing of this growing rift on Trump's transition team which a lot of people are puzzled over. CNN's Sara Murray has that. Good morning.

[09:05:03] SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Good morning, Carol. Well, look, Donald Trump still has a full plate of meetings today. He's still working on building out his Cabinet. And I want to just run you through a couple of the interesting folks he's going to be meeting with today before we get into that rift. That includes Pennsylvania Congressman Lou Barletta. He was an early endorser of Donald Trump, so we'll see if maybe there's a role in the administration waiting for him.

Also Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke. This is a man who has raised eyebrows with his sometimes inflammatory comments and tweets. At one point, he said it was pitch forks and torches time in America. That was earlier this year.

And last up is John Allison. He's a former banking CEO, and he's a good example of the kind of person that Trump said he wanted to see serving in his administration, someone who doesn't necessarily come from government.

So we'll see if these are just informational meetings or if these are potentially people we could see in a Trump administration.

But the big rift that you were talking about is this battle over who could fill the role of Secretary of State. And one of Donald Trump's top advisers, Kellyanne Conway, has been out there essentially publicly trashing this notion, even though Donald Trump himself has met with Romney. Take a listen to what Kellyanne Conway had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) CONWAY: The number of people who feel betrayed to think that Governor Romney would get the most prominent Cabinet post after he went so far out of his way to hurt Donald Trump. There was the "Never Trump" movement, and then there was Mitt Romney. He gave speeches against Donald Trump. He attacked his character. I'm all for Party unity, but I'm not sure that we have to pay for that with the Secretary of State position.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MURRAY: So certainly some harsh words from Kellyanne Conway, and sort of a bizarre feud at a time when we know Donald Trump is actively considering Mitt Romney, as well as others, for that potential slot. Now, if you think that Mitt Romney has spent his weekend fretting over it, he's certainly not showing any sign of that on social media.

Take a look at this photo of him with his wife, Anne Romney, and his grandchildren saying, "No greater joy than making discoveries together with grandchildren." Clearly, a little bit of a relaxing time for them on the beach as all of this drama plays out, Carol.

COSTELLO: So strange. All right. Sara Murray reporting live for us this morning. Thank you so much. So let's talk about all these. There's a lot to talk about again this morning. With me now, CNN political analyst and national political reporter for Real Clear Politics, Rebecca Berg; and Errol Lewis, CNN political commentator and political anchor for Spectrum News. Welcome to both of you.

ERROL LEWIS, POLITICAL ANCHOR, SPECTRUM NEWS NY1: Good morning.

COSTELLO: So we've got some hot news just in to CNN, Errol and Rebecca, so I'll run it by you right now. This is from CNN's Dana Bash. You just heard what Sara Murray said about Kellyanne Conway trashing Mitt Romney. Well, it appears that President-elect Donald Trump is, quote, "irritated" with Conway's public campaign against Mitt Romney's potential nomination as Secretary of State. What's going on here, Errol?

LEWIS: My sense of it, Carol, is or the place to look and to always keep in mind is that Kellyanne Conway is not just sort of an aide to Donald Trump. I mean, technically, as an adviser and so forth, yes, but she's a respected leader in her own right.

I talked with her over the years, and she is well-respected in conservative circles. She has been one of their thinkers. She has been one of their powerhouse consultants. She helped Mike Pence win the governorship of Indiana. She is not somebody who is just kind of speaking her own mind sort of loosely. She does represent a faction of the party.

And so this is more genteel fight than we expected, Carol, but we always knew there was going to be perhaps a bloodletting, maybe not so much but at least a vigorous discussion within the Republican Party. We thought it would be maybe a little bit more contentious if Donald Trump had not won, but he did win. But that doesn't mean that you don't have this fight between sort of the newly arrived Trump forces and the rock-ribbed conservatives. They've tried to make peace throughout the campaign, and that's what this fight represents.

COSTELLO: But here's the irony. Yes, it's irony time. Kellyanne Conway, you know, used to talk up Ted Cruz, right, before she was on Donald Trump's team. And she said some horrific things about Donald Trump herself. This is the reason supposedly that she's not for Romney because he said all these terrible, terrible things about Donald Trump. But Kellyanne Conway did too and the reason I know that is because she sat on this very set and she looked at me in the face and she said it. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONWAY: He says he's for the little guy, but he's actually built a lot of his businesses on the backs of the little guy. And he's -- a lot of little guys through eminent dominant or through not paying contractors after you've built something that little guys have, you know, suffered.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: So, Rebecca, she told me that Donald Trump, you know, made his living off the backs of the little guy, so, what?

[09:09:42] REBECCA BERG, POLITICAL REPORTER, REALCLEARPOLITICS.COM: You know, Carol, I mean, usually, it wouldn't be that unusual to go from, you know, a heated Republican primary to the general election to a Republican President and have this process where the Party comes together and buries their old hatchets and moves on to work together.

But with Donald Trump, his team in particular has very much, in this transition process, stressed loyalty. And it seems like, based on the remarks we've seen from Kellyanne Conway and from Congressman Chris Collins this morning on "NEW DAY" also attacking Mitt Romney, it seems that they are having trouble burying the hatchet and recognizing the need, at least among some of these advisers, to work together among Republicans to try to do the best they can in government.

And so it's really interesting. I mean, it's completely inconsistent for Kellyanne Conway, completely inconsistent for, you know, a number of people who are now in the Donald Trump fold. I mean, Rick Perry has also met with Donald Trump, former Governor Rick Perry of Texas, about a potential Cabinet position, and he gave a whole speech calling Trump a cancer on conservatism during the Republican primary. So to expect this complete loyalty from these potential Cabinet nominees is completely ridiculous.

And so it seems with Mitt Romney --

COSTELLO: I know but why are they doing it out in the open? That's the thing.

BERG: Exactly. It makes no sense. And, you know, my question is, if you're trying to attract the best and brightest talent from within the Republican Party, why would you be out there dissing your potential candidates for these positions? It would seem to maybe warn some other potential candidates off of going through this process because what is the incentive for these people to not only work for this administration but also to go through the process of being publicly humiliated? It doesn't really make a lot of sense.

COSTELLO: OK. So I want to pivot to this recount that's going to go on in Wisconsin starting today, Errol. So the Clinton team says they will in Wisconsin, quote, "To ensure the process is fair to all parties." So it kind of will, I don't know, be on the periphery of it all because it's being initiated by the Stein people. But what does that mean, "Ensure the process is fair to all parties," Errol?

LEWIS: What I assume it means and if you read the actual letter from Marc Elias, it's very lawyerly. It's very restrained. It's very responsible. And I think, as the attorney for the campaign, he would have to. It's probably in his contract, frankly, that he has to show up whenever there's a recount, all of the candidates and representatives, and they just keep an eye on things just to make sure that the other people aren't cheating, just to make sure that everybody knows that they're being watched.

It's a small but very important part of the responsibility of the attorneys, and so I don't think they're going to go much more beyond that. And I think, frankly, it's a little bit almost inaccurate to say that they're driving this. They're not paying for it. They didn't ask for it. No Democratic officials in Wisconsin have associated themselves with this. Nobody has accused anybody of cheating.

But, the campaign, if they're going to open up the ballots to do a recount, every campaign is going to send somebody to keep an eye on it.

COSTELLO: OK. But it apparently sent Trump off the rails because, of course, he tweeted out that millions of people voted illegally. He cited specifically California. And of course, that incensed California's Secretary of State, you know, the guy in charge of California elections, who tweeted in turn, quote, "Trump's reckless tweets are inappropriate of a President-elect and it undermines democracy."

So, Rebecca, is Trump tweeting this out because, A, he wants to force a recount nationwide? B, he's just really ticked off that Hillary Clinton is winning the popular vote? Or C, he's deflecting?

BERG: You know, it seems to me that it's more of the B choice, Carol. He really is, as we've seen throughout the campaign process and now into the transition, Donald Trump is just personally a little bit thin-skinned. And so when there's ever the suggestion that he didn't come out as the conclusive winner in any contest, there's a suggestion here that he didn't do as well as some people thought.

It's you know, kind of amazing that someone who is the President-elect would feel like his victory is undermined in any sense, but he does take these things very personally. And so I think that's really what's driving this conversation for him.

There might be an element of deflection as well. And certainly there is always strategy when it comes to campaign or government messaging that we need to consider, but this is the Donald Trump we have seen throughout this process. This is not inconsistent at all for him from a character perspective.

COSTELLO: All right. I have to leave it there. Rebecca Berg, Errol Lewis, thanks to you both.

LEWIS: Thank you.

BERG: Thanks.

COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, a symbol of President Obama's policies, the first regularly scheduled flight taking off for Havana today. Taking off from Miami, I should say. Is that all about to change though under a President Trump?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: A new era begins in Cuba.

(VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: All right. Just moments ago that happened in Havana. 21- gun salute that honored Fidel Castro. As tens of thousands of people crowd into the streets honoring their former leader.

On the other side of the city another sign of change, just a short time ago, an American Airlines jet left Miami International Airport, and landed in Cuba at the airport there. It marks the start of regularly scheduled flights into Havana from the United States. A one-hour flight from Miami ending a more than 50-year blockade into the city.

Nic Robertson live in Havana to talk about it all. Hi, Nic.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, hi, there, Carol. This could be the symbol of something new. That's certainly the hope of the younger generation here in Cuba. They're hoping that this flight, the first commercially scheduled flight, American Airlines flight landing here this morning, will herald in perhaps a better economic future for them.

While the country, however, heard that 21-gun salute here in Havana this morning, it was echoed at the other end of the country 700 miles away in Santiago there. The two 21-gun salutes timed to go off at the same time.

[09:20:04]And while that was happening the lines were forming at Revolution Square here in Havana for people to come to commemorate the passing of Fidel Castro. It's been a very quiet weekend. It's been a little bit of sorrow. You haven't seen joy on the streets. You haven't seen big outpouring of emotions.

But today begins essentially what the government has organized for the people to do, to come and gather and pass -- show their respects to Fidel Castro.

Here, today in Havana, in Revolution Square, again, tomorrow, throughout the day people will be able to do that. There will be a service to follow on Tuesday evening before Fidel Castro's ashes begin that 700 mile journey along the length of Cuba all the way to Santiago -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Nic Robertson reporting live from Cuba this morning. As Cuba prepares for a new era without Fidel Castro, it will also have to adjust to a relationship with the United States under a Trump administration.

The president-elect tweeting just moments ago, quote, "If Cuba is unwilling to make a better deal for the Cuban people, the Cuban- American people and the United States as a whole, I will terminate the deal."

And he can do that with the stroke of a pen, right, because President Obama lifted restrictions on Cuba through executive orders. So Trump could re-impose sanctions with the stroke of a pen.

So joining us to discuss this is Felice Gorordo. He is the co- founder of Roots Of Hope, and Alex Ferrer, a former Florida Circuit Court judge who was born in Havana. Welcome to both of you.

So, Alex there are still religious and political persecution on the island. Should Trump follow through with his threat and re-impose the blockade on Cuba?

ALEX FERRER, FORMER FLORIDA CIRCUIT COURT JUDGE: Well, the blockade still exists. The embargo was never lifted. What Obama did --

COSTELLO: Completely --

FERRER: What Obama did with his pen was basically he lifted the banking restrictions, allowed dollars to flow to Cuba and opened up for travel to and from Cuba, and the criticism has been that we got nothing for it. We got absolutely nothing for it.

You know, Cuba was on the ropes, you know, lost the Soviet Union's support, then it lost Venezuela's support. Argentina was floundering so it was the perfect opportunity for Obama to say you know what? We'll throw you a life line.

We'll open up the flow of dollars. We'll let Americans travel to Cuba, but in exchange we want something. We want freedom of the press. We want the public to be able to express their opinions about the way the country is being run without being beaten and dragged to jail which is what typically happens. But we actually didn't get anything.

Allen Gross (ph) was released as humanitarian release, nothing to do with the deal, 53 political prisoners were released and summarily rearrested so there was nothing that was gained.

So when Trump says I'm going to cut a better deal, I can't disagree with him. I don't have a problem with lifting some restrictions in Cuba and letting dollars flow there --

COSTELLO: Just so, so, so just so our viewers can understand what exactly you can do in Cuba that you couldn't do before. Right now, Americans can buy Cuban cigars, right? They can buy Cuban rum. They can take a cruise to Cuba because U.S. cruise ships can dock in the ports there.

You can fly in for a vacation as we just showed 139,000 Americans are visiting Cuba since restrictions were lifted. So, Felipe, there's a -- there's a huge interest in Cuba on many Americans' part. Is it too late to just go back to the way it was?

FELICE GORORDO, CO-FOUNDER, ROOTS OF HOPE: So I think that Cuba is on the cusp of change and I don't think it's necessarily because the government wants it. I think it's because the people demand it. And I think what we've seen over the course of the last several years is a greater hunger and desires especially from young people to be able to connect with the outside world. And I think what we need to do now, more than ever before, is help promote greater contact and connectivity with the Cuban people.

COSTELLO: And Alex, I think one of President Obama's hopes was if the restrictions were lifted on Cuba by the United States, that would mean that -- that the problems in the Cuban economy are flat-out the government's fault. Can no longer blame the United States for that because we're open with you. That was the hope.

FERRER: Well, I mean, yes, but, I don't really -- I guess, there's some people who -- who really think that if we eliminate his ability to point the finger at us it's going to make a difference. It doesn't.

The dollars that are flowing over there are being used by the Cuban government to basically prop up its security apparatus, which keeps the people repressed. You know it costs money to subjugate people. So that's what they use it for.

Cuba has been getting money from Europe. Cuba has been getting money from Canada. It's not like all of a sudden when Americans start traveling there capitalism is going to open their eyes and they're going to say oh, my God we want more.

They've had capitalism in their face. They just don't get to enjoy it because there are different systems where people who go to Cuba as tourists --

COSTELLO: But, but, let's -- Americans companies will make money too by trade with Cuba, right? American farmers for one thing because they can import wheat, soybeans, can import energy to Cuba. Also with pharmaceutical companies, they can buy and sell drugs in Cuba --

FERRER: Absolutely.

COSTELLO: -- so Alex, there are pluses too, right?

FERRER: Yes, there are pluses for America. The question is, do you want to send -- do you want basically to profit off of an oppressive regime that tortures, kills, I mean, you know the number of people that the Castro regime has absolutely murdered, including women and children that the Coast Guard cutters intentionally ram their boats and sink them at sea because they're having the audacity of fleeing Cuba, do we want to profit of off of that? Is that really the moral --

COSTELLO: I'm going to throw this to, Felice, because Donald Trump expressed admiration for Vladimir Putin, who is also a communist, guilty of many human rights violation, who also throws into jail journalists who write freely political opponents so what's the difference between Raul Castro now that Fidel Castro is dead and Vladimir Putin?

GORORDO: Well, I think that the president-elect has said that he wants to -- he wants to define a new relationship with Cuba. And I think he has an opportunity, especially right now after the death of Fidel Castro, to do just that. And I think he has a chance and a real opening to build on the momentum of the last several years.

I was listening to Alex's remarks and you know there's a long history here. And I think you know we have been pitted against each other falsely so, and I think that there are young people in Cuba, who are -- have a great desire to become authors of their own futures and define a new reality.

I don't think anyone really wants to leave their -- their homeland or be forced to do so. And I think now more than ever, we need to empower them to make a better life for themselves and their families on the island.

COSTELLO: All right. I have to leave it there. Felice Gorordo, Alex Ferrer, thanks to both of you.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, the election was over but the battle for Wisconsin is heating up as the recount of the votes just away. I'll talk to the man overseeing that process.

But first, we're just moments away from the opening bell on Wall Street. CNN Money chief business correspondent, Christine Romans is here for that. Hi, Christine.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN MONEY CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Hi. Good morning, Carol. You're likely to see the Dow Jones Industrial Average pull back a little bit. It's been a really good rally over the past couple of weeks. Futures are pulling into a small pullback here.

The big business story, of course, this morning, Cyber Monday it's that day for digital sales. After Black Friday weekend what kinds of sales should we see today? On Amazon 75,000 things for sale including the Echo, the Fire TV and the Kindle from 20% off on those.

Walmart is selling big TVs at a very big discount and Target 15 percent off everything. Here's what sold like hotcakes on Black Friday, Legos, electric scooters, Nerf guns, drones and of course, the Barbie Dreamhouse.

But people were so interested in very, very deep discounts and shopping so smartly, Carol. They actually spent about $10 less this year than they did last year on Black Friday and on that chart, mobile sales are a bigger portion than ever of how much money we're spending at the mall -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, Christine Romans, thank you.

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