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State of the Union
Worldwide Protests Against Trump; Interview With New York Senator Chuck Schumer; Interview With California Congressman Devin Nunes; Trump's Inaugural Crowd Size; Trump Force One Versus Air Force One. Aired 9-10a ET
Aired January 22, 2017 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[09:00:23]
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): President Trump.
Donald Trump is sworn in as the 45th president of the United States.
JOHN ROBERTS, CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE U.S. SUPREME COURT: Congratulations, Mr. President.
TAPPER: Promising to be the people's president.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This moment is your moment.
TAPPER: And putting his stamp on the pomp and circumstance.
What does this weekend reveal about how he will lead?
TRUMP: Should I keep the Twitter going or not?
TAPPER: Plus, new action against Obamacare, changes for homeowners and a meeting with the CIA.
TRUMP: I am with you 1000 percent.
TAPPER: Trump got to work this weekend, his first moves as president, and what they might mean for you.
And the women's march. Giant crowds gather across the world and descend on the National Mall on Washington to protest the new president.
SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D), MASSACHUSETTS: We can whimper, we can whine or we can fight back. Me, I'm here to fight back.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
TAPPER: Is this the beginning of a new opposition movement? Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer will be here in minutes.
Plus, the best political minds will be here with insights on an historic inauguration weekend.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TAPPER: Hello. I'm Jake Tapper in Washington, where the state of our union is getting to work.
The Trump era has begun after an eventful and unique weekend here in Washington, celebration as President Trump was sworn in.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: Hey, hey, ho, ho, Donald Trump has got to go!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: But also loud protests on the same streets where the Trump family had paraded just one day before.
As the women's march headed to the White House, President Trump made his way to Langley, Virginia, headquarters of the CIA, where, in addition to praising the intelligence officers and officials before him and assuring them that he was behind them 1000 percent, the president falsely claimed that the media had concocted his feuding with the intelligence community leaders, and he spent a, shall we say, trailblazing amount of time talking about his crowd size.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We had a massive field of people, you saw that, packed.
I get up this morning and I turn on one of the networks, and they show an empty field. I said, wait a minute, I made a speech. I looked out. The field was -- it looked like a million, million-and-a-half people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: We asked the Trump White House or a member of the new administration to join us this morning, but they declined.
I am joined now by the leader of the opposition, Senate Minority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York.
Senator, thanks for joining us. We appreciate it.
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY), MINORITY LEADER: Good morning, Jake.
TAPPER: So, let's start with President Trump's inaugural address.
He presented himself, I think it's fair to say, not so much as a Republican or a conservative, but as a populist. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: What truly matters is not which party controls our government, but whether our government is controlled by the people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: During the lunch that followed the inaugural address, you were deep in conversation with President Trump. What did you two discuss? And do you see any areas where you think you can work with him?
SCHUMER: Right.
Well, first, let me just say about his address, it was populist, but I'm worried he's using populist rhetoric to cover up a hard-right agenda. If you look at his Cabinet appointments, so many of them are not populist, but hard-right.
You know, Dr. Price, he wants to end Medicare as we know it. Mulvaney wants to cut even research into health care, DeVos, cut public education, Puzder, go against protections of labor.
So, his Cabinet is very troubling. And that's actually what I discussed with him. He said, "Can you move my Cabinet along?"
I said, "Look, with people who seem to be pretty mainstream, Mattis, Kelly, we are going to approve them quickly, but so many of your Cabinet appointees, Mr. President, are quite different than what you campaigned on and even what your speech was about."
So I am really troubled that this populist rhetoric is covering up a hard-right agenda, which is way, way out of touch with what the American people want and even what Trump campaigned on.
TAPPER: Let's talk about the Cabinet. At this point in the Obama administration, President Obama, then President Obama, had seven new Cabinet-level officials confirmed. Trump only, as of right now, has two.
[09:05:03]
Do you think that you're going to be able to stop some of his nominees, or are you just trying to slow down the process?
SCHUMER: Well, let me say this.
First, this Cabinet is unusually unique and a lot different than others. We call it the swamp Cabinet, billionaires and bankers. The number of wealthy people, the number of people rife with conflicts of interest, and the number of people who have disagreed with what Trump has campaigned on is so much more than just any other Cabinet we have seen.
And so that means they need thorough review, thorough review, so they don't have conflicts of interest, thorough review, so we know, for instance, is Dr. Price going to try to privatize or end Medicare, when Trump campaigned against it? And our Republican colleagues, I don't blame them with this Cabinet, have tried to rush it through. Advise and consent does not mean rush it through, ram it through. And
they are all going to get, many of them, the controversial ones -- and there are eight or nine of those -- are going to get very, very thorough discussions on the floor.
Whether we can beat any of them, that will be up to Republicans. If Republicans use the same standards they have used in the past, they will be beaten.
Mulvaney, for instance, didn't pay a household worker for four years. That was enough for Republicans to oppose Tom Daschle, and he never became secretary of HHS.
So, we will see, but we certainly feel that we have to bring to the American people how different this Cabinet is, how hard-right, how many conflicts of interest, billionaires.
And let me just give you one example. The one billionaire in President Obama's Cabinet, Penny Pritzker, took six months because of the complex conflicts of interest. DeVos and Mnuchin and Ross have far more complicated financial holdings than she did.
TAPPER: That may be true, sir, but it's also true that there are people who will obviously very easily be confirmed who have not yet been confirmed, one of them being Congressman Mike Pompeo, who has been nominated to be director of the CIA.
President Trump visited the CIA yesterday.
I want you to take a listen to White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: It's a shame that the CIA didn't have a CIA director to be with him today when he visited, because the Democrats have chosen -- Senate Democrats are stalling the nomination of Mike Pompeo and playing politics with national security.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: What's your response, sir?
SCHUMER: That's ridiculous.
Number one, we have never had a CIA director confirmed on the first day. Number two, there are very capable people watching over the CIA. And, in fact, I told vice president on Wednesday, I said: "Look, we need to have some debate on Pompeo. Why don't you ask Brennan to stay?"
He was willing to. They refused.
And, third, and most important, Pompeo is going to have huge, huge power. And there are issues that have been very vexing to the Congress, the old debate between security and liberty. So, to have a debate on him for a few days -- the vote is going to be Monday night -- is what should happen.
And I would say to all of my Republican colleagues that, instead of spending their time on this issue, why don't they talk about what the president did at the CIA? Standing on sacred ground in front of the names of many who had given their lives for this country, he talks how many people showed up at his inauguration?
President Trump is now president. He's not campaigning anymore. And instead of talking about how many people showed up at his inauguration, he ought to talk about how many people he's going to bring to the middle class.
Our Republican colleagues -- if a Democrat had said this, so much against the tradition of deep, hard-rock Republicanism that Ronald Reagan established, they would be all over him. If our Republican colleagues would start talking a little bit about some of the problems, when President Trump goes off in this direction, maybe he wouldn't do it anymore.
TAPPER: So far -- just sticking with the Cabinet for a second, so far, sir, you have voted for two of President Trump's nominees.
SCHUMER: I have.
TAPPER: You voted to confirm General Mattis for defense and General Kelly for the Department of Homeland Security.
Which other Trump nominees do you plan to support?
SCHUMER: Look, there are some that are not controversial. I'm going to wait and hear the debate.
But, this week, you will see a few more put into effect. But, again, advise and consent does not mean ram it through. Some of these nominees came before the committees before their conflict of interest papers were in, before it was clear that they wouldn't have conflicts of interest.
Many of them have controversial positions. And for eight or nine of them, there's going to be thorough, thorough debate, maybe even a few more.
TAPPER: Will you vote for your colleague Senator Sessions as attorney general?
SCHUMER: I have already said I will oppose Senator Sessions.
TAPPER: Will you...
SCHUMER: He has a record on immigration, on voting rights and on civil rights that is so against what America is all about.
[09:10:05]
TAPPER: Will you vote for Steven Mnuchin for treasury secretary?
SCHUMER: I'm studying his record. I haven't taken a position. I'm going to wait for the debate on the floor.
TAPPER: Are there Trump nominees that you already have made up your mind, besides Sessions, in addition to Sessions, whom -- whom you will oppose?
SCHUMER: Well, I certainly am really dubious of about eight of them, because so many of them have conflicts of interest and positions that are -- goes against the grain.
You know, I await the hearings, and I study the hearings, the floor debate. But there are eight or nine that I would have a very hard time voting for, maybe even a few more than that.
TAPPER: Can you tell us who they are? I imagine one of them would be Mr. Pruitt for EPA head?
SCHUMER: His positions against clean air and clean water would turn America back for decades. It's -- it's, again, against the American grain.
I haven't made final decisions on any of these people, but I would find it difficult to vote for him.
TAPPER: Let's turn to health care.
President Trump signed an executive order on Friday that he said would have the effect of easing the burden of Obamacare. What's your understanding of what this executive order will mean?
SCHUMER: Well, let me first say this.
They are in such -- they are in such a problem. They have so many problems with their repeal and replace. It's interesting. If you would have told me that, at this point in time, Democrats would be united and on offense, and Republicans would be divided on defense, when it comes to ACA, or the Cabinet, for that matter, I would have said, you know, you're wrong.
But it's true. And we have had a very strong two weeks, because they are in such a pickle. They don't know what to do. They can repeal, but they don't have any plan for replace. And the president's executive order just mirrored that. They said, do good things, not bad things, and do things that are -- that comply with the law.
That's meaningless. And it's because they promised everybody they were going to repeal. But now they have seen all the good things in ACA, the 20 million people covered, preexisting conditions covered, kids 21 to 26 get their parents' health -- health insurance, women treated equally as men.
And they know that to repeal these things, without finding a way to do them -- to undo them, would be catastrophic, substantively and politically. So they are in a total pickle. And this regulation does really nothing.
TAPPER: Let's turn to the Supreme Court. You recently said that you are absolutely willing to keep open that ninth seat, the Scalia seat, on the court. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCHUMER: It's hard for me to imagine a nominee that Donald Trump would choose that would get Republican support that we could support. So, you're right.
RACHEL MADDOW, HOST, "THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW": And so you would do your best to hold the seat open?
SCHUMER: Absolutely.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCHUMER: Yes, Jake.
(CROSSTALK)
TAPPER: You would do your best to hold the seat open?
SCHUMER: If the nominee...
TAPPER: Here's the question. Yes.
SCHUMER: Let me...
TAPPER: Go ahead. Go ahead.
SCHUMER: Let me just say this.
What I said on that show was,if the nominee is out of the mainstream, we will do our best to keep the seat open.
Let's remember that, of the last four Supreme Court nominees, two nominated by a Republican president, two by a Democrat, they had bipartisan support.
What I said -- you didn't show it on the air there -- is, if the nominee is not bipartisan and mainstream, we absolutely would keep the seat open. I'm hopeful that maybe President Trump would nominate someone who is mainstream and who could get bipartisan support. We shall see.
But, if they don't, yes, we will fight it tooth-and-nail, as long as we have to.
TAPPER: As you know, for the last four months, President Trump has had a list of 21 potential Supreme Court picks. He worked with the Federalist Society on the list. He says they are all conservative judges.
Are you saying that not one of the judges on that list of 21 is in the mainstream?
SCHUMER: I haven't studied the records of those 21. I'm not going to comment on a potential nominee. I'm going to wait to see who the president nominates.
My only plea to him, hope, nominate a mainstream person, not someone way out of the mainstream.
TAPPER: I want to ask you about your appearance at the presidential inaugural on Friday...
SCHUMER: Yes.
TAPPER: ... because you spoke. And I don't know what you could hear. I was farther away from President Trump than you were. But there was a lot of booing.
SCHUMER: Yes.
TAPPER: Let's run a little excerpt of your speech.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCHUMER: Whatever our race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, whether we are immigrant or native-born, whether we live with disabilities or do not, in wealth or in poverty, we are all exceptional in our commonly held, yet fierce devotion to our country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[09:15:02]
TAPPER: Could you hear the boos, and were you surprised by them?
SCHUMER: Well, I couldn't hear much. I was told about it afterwards.
But it was amazing. That speech given by -- to -- with any other president, with any other audience, would have been cheered. It's not controversial language to say we're all Americans. It's not controversial language to reach out to others who might not be exactly like you.
And so the fact that people didn't like it speaks poorly of them, not of what I said in the speech. They even, when I said we should have rule of law, I was heard, booed. When I talked about Sullivan Ballou, a great Civil War patriot who gave his life to his country and said there are some things greater than ourselves, there were catcalls.
Wow. What kind -- what kind of -- what kind of situation is that?
And, you know, I have to say something. The president-elect ought to lead. When his followers do things like that, he ought to speak positively about being inclusive and being American. The speech should have been aimed at bringing people together, as Ronald Reagan's speech was, as Franklin Roosevelt's speech was, Democrat and Republican. So, this is a -- the fact that saying these things, which are usually accepted by just about every American, met the displeasure of the crowd doesn't speak too kindly of that crowd.
TAPPER: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York...
SCHUMER: I should say -- I should say -- Jake, the one thing I say, just the people who booed. I'm sure it wasn't most of them.
TAPPER: Just the people who booed. Got it.
SCHUMER: Yes. Yes.
TAPPER: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, it's always a pleasure to have you on. Thank you, sir.
SCHUMER: Thank you.
TAPPER: Stay with us.
The fiery response from the former CIA director after Donald Trump's visit to the agency, why he says Trump should be ashamed of himself -- that story next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:20:16]
TAPPER: Welcome back.
President Trump traveled to CIA headquarters for his first official visit in office.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: As you know, I have a running war with the media. They are among the most dishonest human beings on Earth.
(LAUGHTER)
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: Right?
(APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: And they sort made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just want to let you know, the reason you're the number one stop is exactly the opposite.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: President Trump did, in fact, lash out at intelligence agencies in the wake of CNN's report that top officials had briefed him on Russian claims, uncorroborated, that, according to a reliable British intelligence source, the Kremlin claimed it has information to compromise him.
Quote: "Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to leak into the public, one last shot at me. Are we living in Nazi Germany?" Trump tweeted 11 days ago.
Now, CIA officials are a fairly smart lot. They know who compared them to Nazis, and it wasn't the media. But did President Trump's speech do enough to bury the hatchet? And do intelligence chiefs also bear some responsibility for this feud?
I'm joined here by the chairman of the House Committee on Intelligence, Congressman Devin Nunes of California.
Congressman, it's great to have you here. Thank you so much.
REP. DEVIN NUNES (R), CALIFORNIA: It's good to be here.
TAPPER: Usually, you're out in California, so it's nice to have you here in person.
Let's start with President Trump's visit to the CIA. That's an organization that you know very well.
An aide to John Brennan, who was the CIA director until Friday, put out an extraordinary statement. It said -- quote -- "Former CIA Director Brennan is deeply saddened and angered at Donald Trump's despicable display of self-aggrandizement in front of the CIA's Memorial Wall of Agency Heroes. Brennan says that Trump should be ashamed of himself."
You're the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. What did you make of the speech and Brennan's response to it?
NUNES: Well, I found out a few days ago that Donald Trump was planning on going to the agency to swear in Mike Pompeo, because there had been an agreement in the Senate that all the national security folks would be approved on the first day. And that didn't happen.
So, I think it's important to remember that Donald Trump had scheduled that in advance in order to swear in Mike Pompeo.
Well, his schedule was already planned. I don't think he wanted to change his schedule. So, he went out there, met with the CIA. I think he was briefed. And, you know, the agents that were there, the CIA employees, they were excited to be there.
And, in fact, I spoke to a few last night who I thought maybe were there, so I wanted to get their opinion on what they thought. And they said, we didn't get a chance to go because it sold out so quickly.
TAPPER: Yes. There was a lottery for seats there. Like, 400 people got seats.
NUNES: Yes.
TAPPER: A lot of people wanted...
(CROSSTALK)
NUNES: And he was received well.
So, I think that, you know, you're going to see the -- the -- at the highest level of the -- of the past administration, those level -- that -- at that level, I think Donald Trump had a lot of problems with. And I don't blame him for having a lot of problems. There were a lot of leaks.
TAPPER: So, you -- you think that John Brennan's response and also just how he's comported himself, you have an issue with it?
NUNES: Well, look, the former director is entitled to his own opinion.
But the fact remains that there were a lot of leaks that occurred over the course of the last 60 to 90 days, before this election, that most people can attribute back to somewhere within either the Obama administration directly or the intelligence community.
But what people are not talking about, which I thought Donald Trump said some things that were really important yesterday, he showed an understanding that the CIA is the tip of the spear. When the CIA gets things right, fewer people will die. He called radical Islamic terrorists, terrorists.
He said that they are going to go out and kill the jihadists around the world. They are going to be eliminated. Those were major statements that he made yesterday that nobody is covering.
TAPPER: And what do you make -- just to note, just for our viewers, we believe that Mike Pompeo will be voted on in the Senate to be CIA director tomorrow evening, Monday evening. And it looks as though he will clear, he will be confirmed.
What do you make of the criticism that standing in front of the Memorial Wall, talking about crowd sizes, that was inappropriate?
NUNES: You know, look, Donald Trump is a citizen politician. He's really enjoying what he's doing.
He's going to take the media on every single day. He's never been in politics. And I think you could -- you're going to see more of this. And I have seen him on the campaign trail. He was just having a good time.
As a matter of fact, this week, this past week, inauguration week, he was showing up to events that he wasn't even scheduled to be at. I was at a lunch. It was supposed to be a small lunch. And he stayed for 45 minutes and talked and had a good time.
And so, you know, it was -- I think he was just out there to show support for the agency. And, of course, like Donald Trump often does, he -- he's a very smart guy, and he starts to talk about a lot of different things and has fun.
[09:25:03]
TAPPER: Just to bring this up one more time, because I don't think this point of view has been adequately reflected in the public, especially by people like you who are part of the intelligence community, in a sense, being chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, there is this feud and has been this feud between leaders of the intelligence community in the Obama administration and President Trump.
And you think that President Trump in some ways has gotten a bad rap on it, that some of these leaders have been unfair to him.
NUNES: Well, we don't know where the leaks came from. And so...
TAPPER: Well, I broke the story, and I can tell you John Brennan had nothing to do with it.
NUNES: Well, but there were a lot of leaks that came that -- and it's not just on the last story. I mean, this goes back for -- for 90 days.
And so, look, we will -- as -- as, you know, we always do, we will look into the leaks. We will see if we something -- we find something. And, you know, who knows?
TAPPER: Let's talk about some of these intelligence issues with Mike Pompeo, because Senator Bernie Sanders is planning to oppose him and some Democrats have raised concerns.
In an op-ed, Pompeo wrote -- that he co-authored -- he wrote -- quote -- "Congress should pass a law reestablishing collection of all metadata and combing it with publicly available financial and lifestyle information into a comprehensive, searchable database."
That might sound alarming to some people.
NUNES: Yes.
I don't know when that statement was made. But, as you know, we passed legislation to fix the metadata program. It was largely bipartisan. Mike Pompeo was part of that, in that, voted for it. It passed overwhelmingly in the House and Senate.
So, I don't think we are going to go back and revisit the metadata issue. I think it's working well.
TAPPER: What about this lifestyle information thing? Is that something that gets discussed in intelligence circles?
NUNES: Well, if you look at lifestyle of terrorists, any foreign or abroad, absolutely, but on the American people, no.
TAPPER: I want to also ask about the fact that Obamacare -- you heard Chuck Schumer saying in the previous interview that he thinks the Democrats have had a good couple of weeks with Obamacare because Republicans, in his view, are in a pickle, in his words, because Republicans don't know what to replace Obamacare with because so many aspects of Obamacare are popular.
This is an issue that's important to you. What will replace Obamacare?
NUNES: Yes.
So, I look at it in three buckets. Health care is very difficult in this country to get right. So there's going to be what the administration can do with Obamacare first. That's going to -- kind of one bucket. You're going to have the bucket of what we can do with the reconciliation process, which requires 50 votes, plus one in the Senate.
And then you will have longer-term issues that have to be dealt with that need 60 votes in the Senate. So a lot of what we're dealing with here is the way the Senate is structured. And that's why you're -- you're -- there's not -- there are a lot of good plans out there.
I think the big difference between what the Republicans want to do and the Democrats is, the Democrats want your health care to be run right here in Washington. We want the individual to have health care. And we want every American to have access to health care, and we want that health care to be delivered locally, not by big government here in Washington, D.C., because then you end up with constituents like you see out in California, where we have no specialists who will see our Medi-Cal patients or our Obamacare patients.
And that's not good.
TAPPER: Let me ask you a question about this outstanding issue that there's still these -- FBI investigation into whether associates of President Trump had contacts with the Kremlin.
There's a "New York Times" story talking about Paul Manafort, the former campaign chairman, Roger Stone, a longtime Trump confidant, Carter Page, a former foreign policy adviser.
What can you tell us about this investigation, these intercepted communications?
NUNES: Well, look, they would have to -- they would have to notify me, or they should, if that was the case, at some point.
We have not heard that. And I would say that, you know, we -- we take our job of oversight very seriously on the Intelligence community -- Committee. We will work in a bipartisan manner. We have requested a lot of the intel.
We have requested all of the intelligence that went into the report that was -- that was issued here a couple weeks ago. We have yet to get that information. They made it available to us on Thursday, where we had to go out to the CIA in order to look at it. That's not what we asked for. We want the information at the
committee, so that we can come through it, so we can get to the bottom of this intelligence report, whether it was put together properly or not.
TAPPER: So, who is holding it up? Is it the CIA? Is it the director of national intelligence?
NUNES: Well, obviously, it was the Obama administration who hadn't given it to us. And they only made it available to us if we went out to the agency to see it in person.
So, that's not what we requested. We requested to have that delivered to the Congress, so that we could comb through the data to really understand what went into this report. And, clearly, we will -- we will look at anything and everything. And we will -- we will follow the facts where they lead.
TAPPER: Congressman Nunes, it's always a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you so much.
NUNES: Yes.
TAPPER: Congratulations. You were just sworn in -- it was a slightly smaller ceremony -- but with your family to -- to be a member of Congress.
NUNES: Right.
TAPPER: It's always good to have you on the show. Thanks for being here.
NUNES: Thanks, Jake.
TAPPER: Appreciate it.
NUNES: Thanks for having me in person.
TAPPER: Coming up: The new White House press secretary takes the podium for the first time to talk about an issue on the minds of every struggling American --
[09:30:00]
How big were the crowds on Friday?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SPICER: No one had numbers because the National Park Service which controls the National Mall does not put any out. This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe.
(END VIDEO CLIP) TAPPER: White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer berating reporters for the coverage of the crowd at Trump's inauguration arguing simultaneously that there are no official numbers while also falsely asserting it was the largest crowd in history. Lots to unpack here with me this morning. Let's talk about it all with David Axelrod, CNN senior political commentator; Congresswoman Mia Love, Republican of Utah; Tennessee Congressman Marsha Blackburn Republican of Tennessee as I said; and former Ohio State Senator Nina Turner, a Democrat.
Let's start with this debate about crowd sizes. It seems obvious that President Obama had bigger crowds, but so what?
REP. MIA LOVE (R), UTAH: I have to tell you. I was sitting -- I was sitting at the podium there, and I could see a ton of people.
TAPPER: Lots of people. Yes.
LOVE: Lots of people. It was a great day. Let's just move on. I mean, it was just -- there were a lot of people that showed up, and I was -- I was happy to see that.
TAPPER: There were lots of people that showed up, David, what's going on here? Why would Sean Spicer in his first press conference at that podium be talking about crowd size?
[09:35:04]
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, what you're really asking is, who cares? And the answer is one person cares and that person happens to be the president of the United States and he works for the president of the United States.
The real question is who can tell the president, do not do this? This is not worth our time when you -- who can tell him, when you go to the CIA don't get into politics when you're standing in front of the wall of honor? You know, when you speak to an armed services ball, don't get into politics. Thank and honor those people who are -- young people who are serving our country. Someone needs to be able to do that or he's going to be diverted from the points he wants to make.
TAPPER: Seems to me, Congressman Blackburn, that President Trump, whatever the size of the crowd, however big the ratings for the inaugural, he's the president and he -- a lot of people are rooting for him and going down this bunny hole doesn't serve his own interest.
REP. MARSHA BLACKBURN (R), TENNESSEE: He has an opportunity to bring people to him at this point in time and let's do the tote board on the number of regulations we can get on the books, the number of executive orders we can rescind, the number of -- the amount that we can reduce taxes. And let's bring --
TAPPER: Yes. The number of jobs you can bring back to this country.
BLACKBUR: Yes, jobs that we can create. And I'm going to leave counting numbers on that. Next four years from now I just want us to expand broadband enough in this country that we have more people than ever streaming the inaugural.
TAPPER: When this happens, though can I say do you ever -- I know you want him -- first of all, we all as Americans want him to succeed.
BLACKBURN: Sure. Absolutely.
TAPPER: But do you as a supporter of his ever just like put your hands in your head say, no, no, don't do that. Don't -- don't say things that aren't true. Don't focus -- you're standing in front of the wall of heroes at the CIA, don't talk about your crowds. Don't berate a pool reporter who messed up.
BLACKBURN: I'm cheering for the president and vice president to pull people to them and continue this movement of getting Washington, D.C. reformed, and pushing power and money out of this city and back to the states and local governments.
TAPPER: So head never in hand -- head never in hand? You don't? You never?
BLACKBURN: I am cheering.
(LAUGHTER)
BLACKBURN: I am cheering.
TAPPER: OK.
BLACKBURN: I am so for President Trump and he is good on building relationships.
TAPPER: We all want him to succeed.
BLACKBURN: He is going to build great relationships with Capitol Hill and he has built a great relationship with the American people and we are going to expand that.
TAPPER: Well, that's the question. The relationship he's building with the American people because as Congressman Blackburn points out there is an opportunity here and you were at the -- with the women's march yesterday, Nina Turner.
NINA TURNER (D), FORMER OHIO STATE SENATOR: Yes.
TAPPER: I don't know that he has taken advantage of that opportunity to unite people.
TURNER: Well, not yet, one would hope. I mean, good god, the numbers don't matter because he took the oath of office.
TAPPER: Right but that's OK.
TURNER: He is the president so he has to get over that. But yesterday I did talk to women and men from all walks of life and a lot of them were not necessarily there to protest the president himself as much as some of the policies and the things that they are concerned about. But he has to do more bridge-building and less talk about building a wall. There are walls up right now in this country and it is between -- it's not between him and folks who are trying to get into this country. It's really between him and some of the people who live in this country.
TAPPER: Let's talk about his inaugural address. He presented a very starkly populist vision of how he sees the country and what he wants to happen. Let's take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: From this day forward a new vision will govern our land. From this day forward it's going to be only America first.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: So he really took aim, Congressman Blackburn, at globalization and elites in both parties I think (INAUDIBLE) Democrats and Republicans -- it wasn't a particularly Republican speech. It wasn't a particularly conservative speech.
BLACKBURN: That's right.
TAPPER: Critics would say, you know, the ship has sailed on globalization. This is the world we're in. How do you do America first in the 21st century?
BLACKBURN: I think you do it by thinking in terms of the short term and the long term, as you look at policies. How is this going to affect us now? How will it affect us 10 years, 20 years, 30 years down the road? And that is the view that Donald Trump will bring to this administration.
Let's just not do something thinking of the next election. Let's think long term and what kind of legacy is this going to leave? What kind of path is it going to create? Goodness in trade. We need to think about this as we look at manufacturing, bringing jobs back. We have to be thinking in terms of the effects of these policies and what it's going to yield.
[09:40:00]
Tax policy and the changes that are going to be there, how is it going to affect families now and then affect their ability to build (INAUDIBLE) for retirement?
TAPPER: David, President Obama came to office with a lot of ties to labor unions. He ended up being one of these members of the global elite pushing forward trade deals although one could argue that were many more worker protection in the pacific trade deal than the NAFTA, for example. Is it going to be tough for President Trump to fight this tied of globalization?
AXELROD: Look, I don't think -- I don't think that -- as you said, I think that ship has sort of have -- has sort of sailed. The question is, is that really the battle of today and tomorrow that the congressman talks about the future?
You know, there's a greater threat to middle class jobs and wages from robots and computers than there is from China and Mexico today. What is the plan for dealing with that? Where are the people who, for example, are going to lose their jobs when driverless cars come online this decade? Millions and millions of people. Where are they going in the economy? Where are they going to find productive work? Where does that impact on wages and on family security? These are fundamental questions that people want the president to deal with.
TAPPER: In fact, I think the new labor secretary nominee Puzder is a big proponent of automation in the restaurants that he owns.
Everyone stay right here. Coming up, women across the world taking to the streets yesterday to protest Donald Trump and his agenda including a star-studded march in his own backyard. How is President Trump responding? That next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:45:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D), MASSACHUSETTS: We can whimper. We can whine or we can fight back. Me, I'm here to fight back.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TAPPER: Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren at the Boston women's march yesterday. Huge crowds gathered around the world to speak out against Donald Trump and his agenda, but is it the beginning of a new protest movement or just a day long affair?
The panel is back with me. Nina, you were at the march in D.C. Let me get -- put up these new tweets from President Trump on the subject of the march. Quote --"Watched protests yesterday but was under the impression that we just had an election. Why didn't these people vote? Celebs hurt cause badly."
And then just a few minutes ago, another tweet, "Peaceful protests are a hallmark of our democracy. Even if I don't always agree, I recognize the rights of people to express their views."
It is a legitimate question, I have to say. Why didn't these people vote? I'm sure a lot of them did, but I bet a bunch didn't.
TURNER: Good God, Jake. We don't know that all of the folks did not.
TAPPER: I didn't say that.
TURNER: I know, but, I mean, the president doesn't need to get into these little spats with folks. They are exercising their first amendment right which is a beautiful thing, and the president should look at it this way. He knows how to move a crowd -- bring a crowd out. He brought crowds of folks out all over the world, baby. He did that.
(LAUGHTER)
TAPPER: He should have added those numbers to his crowd size.
TURNER: President Trump did that. He brought out the crowds.
TAPPER: You assume we're not participating --
(CROSSTALK)
LOVE: I was not participating. I took a run with my husband and, you know, it was very difficult to get through, so we --
TAPPER: But you are somebody who has had concerns about President Trump during the campaign. I know you're rooting for him now as every American is.
LOVE: Yes.
TAPPER: But what did you make of the marches?
LOVE: Well, I can tell you one part of that tweet is true. A lot of the celebrities did not help. Madonna dropping the f-bomb over and over again. I would not have brought my child to that event. I think that Scarlett Johansson, for instance, there is a window there where she said, I didn't vote for you but I want to support you. And I think that that's where we need to start coming together at -- you know, together at this.
What can we do -- the next step is what can we do to help support women? And I'm not just talking about -- you know, I'm talking about the -- allowing women to become entrepreneurs, allowing -- my daughter wants to be a rocket scientist. What can we do to make sure that we empower our young women to become whoever they want to become, to have as many opportunities as possible to contribute to their communities, to their state and to their country?
TAPPER: And, David, there is an opportunity here for President Trump. There's already a lot of talk about Ivanka's child care tax credit bill...
AXELROD: Yes.
TAPPER: ... legislation that she's putting together. There's an opportunity to reach out to a lot of women and do a lot of good for a lot of women.
AXELROD: Yes. Look, I think Democrats and progressives will have to make had a choice. If the president actually advances a plan for paid parental leave and advances a plan for health care for everybody, if he truly wants to fight the pharmaceutical industry over these very high prices that Medicare pays, then I think Democrats are going to have to confront whether they want to fight or whether they want to make some progress if he does those things.
But, Jake, he also has an opportunity through the way he conducts himself to send a signal that he wants to be president of all the people, and the two tweets are illustrative of a problem. The first tweet was divisive. There is this sort of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Twitter quality to this guy, and the question is, how do you -- the second tweet was the one he should have sent yesterday, full stop, end of story.
TAPPER: Do you disagree?
AXELROD: And why he didn't, I don't know.
LOVE: I just think the reason why he is there is because people like that just boldness that he has, you know. People say, OK. Well, that's real. It's not scripted. I didn't have to think about it.
BLACKBURN: That's right.
AXELROD: That is true but...
LOVE: And there are people that like that.
AXELROD: ... congresswoman, that is absolutely true. But let's remember he -- first of all, 46 percent of Americans voted for him, 54 percent didn't. He goes in with the lowest approval ratings of any incoming president and now his job is to build on that and signal to the whole country that he wants to govern for all of America.
LOVE: I get it, but you know, I just want you to know that we as Americans also always look to Washington for all of the answers, right? I think that's time for us to become the leaders also and conduct ourselves in a way that is reflective of what we want a leader to do.
I think it's important for us to make sure that we're the ones that are sending positive messages out there. When I look at who is going to be the role models for my children I'm not looking to the president.
BLACKBURN: Right.
LOVE: I'm looking to myself.
BLACKBURN: Well, and what we're speaking to is the sense of decorum that is expected of the office of the president and the vice president and those of us in elective office, and there is a responsibility that is there. And my hope is that President Trump is going to continue to bring people in, just as he said in his inaugural address, join together.
[09:50:02]
Patriotism. When you're patriotic there isn't room for prejudice. Let's come together. David, you're right on the issues jobs, health care, fighting back on access, creating access whether it's health care or opportunity. This is something that should unite us. I do hope that there were lessons from the women's march that yes, pushing forward for incentives on child care and doing something on these issues important.
TAPPER: Thank you so much one and all for being here.
After the break President Trump ditches his private plane for Air Force One. How do the perks compare? Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TAPPER: On the campaign trail, President Trump's private plane was called Trump Force One. After flying in style for years, the question, is Air Force One now for Donald Trump really essentially public transportation?
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TAPPER (voice-over): Rest (ph) of 2016 campaign season Donald Trump traveled the country in style than most of us and even his fellow candidates could not imagine. (INAUDIBLE) to be modest Trump had a customized Boeing 757 with extravagant features. As a Trump employee showed off in this 2011 video.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You'll notice the seatbelts as well as everything else are 24-karat gold plated -- has yards of elegant gold silk adorning cabin walls. A custom headboard as well as comforter were created to compliment.
[09:55:01]
Mr. Trump also has a custom theater, custom designed pillows embroidered with the family crest.
TAPPER: And if the plane was too much hassle he could always take one of his personal helicopters. He even gave joyrides to a couple lucky kids and some members of the media at the Iowa State Fair.
UNIDENTIFIED BOY: Mr. Trump?
TRUMP: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED BOY: Are you Batman?
TRUMP: I am Batman.
TAPPER: But now that he's a commander-in-chief President Trump will have to say good-bye to his personal fleet. Don't feel too bad. He's getting an upgrade, Air Force One.
President and Mrs. Trump will now ride only on official aircraft leaving behind his prized possession that had become a symbol of his campaign from providing the background to some of his rallies to disrupting his rivals. SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: All right, that was pretty well orchestrated.
TAPPER: As with presidents before him President Trump's future trips will be aboard the iconic Air Force One, a plane he blasted once on Twitter as being too expensive. Boeing is building a brand new 747 Air Force One for future presidents, he tweeted, but costs are out of control, more than $4 billion. Cancel order.
Well, the order has not been cancelled yet and we expect President Trump to enjoy the high-tech amenities from his new presidential transport for the foreseeable future. He'll soon learn that Air Force One is more than just a cushy ride. It's a flying White House.
COL. MARK TILLMAN (RET), FORMER AIR FORCE ONE PILOT: The goal when the president goes onboard is to do the same things he does on ground in the White House to do 45,000 feet in the air. Other countries have not come close to what the United States has on their aircraft.
TAPPER: And while it might not have a private movie theater like Trump Force One it does have defensive capabilities like no other plane in the world including special shielding that protects it from a nuclear blast. It's even equipped to evade missiles.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 24-karat gold plated sink.
TAPPER: Even without the opulent gold features President Trump will still find himself...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Traveling Trump style.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TAPPER: Thanks for watching. I'm Jake Tapper in Washington.
"FAREED ZAKARIA GPS" is next. Have a great day.
