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Cory Booker Announces His Bid for the Presidency; Time is Running Out for Negotiation. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired February 01, 2019 - 07:00   ET

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST: A big new entry as of this second, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker is making it official. He is running for president.

ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: We want to go straight to CNN's Rebecca Buck is live near Booker's home in Newark, New Jersey, with more on these breaking details. Rebecca.

REBECCA BUCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. We're here in Newark, the city that launched Cory Booker's career as mayor some years ago. Today as he takes that next big step to run for president, and he picked a symbolic day to do it. This is the first day of Black History Month. Booker is the second African-American candidate to jump into this democratic primary after Senator Kamala Harris and is he putting that heritage front and center in this race not only because he will be targeting African-American voters but it's a key part of his own personal story.

In the announcement today, Booker nods to that history. His parents struggled to buy a home in a white, affluent neighborhood and a white lawyer who helped them to do so because he was inspired by Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights Movement. Booker says in his announcement that courage is contagious, it's part of the optimistic message he's hoping to bring to this presidential primary. I want you to look at his announcement video.

(BEGIN VIDEO)

CORY BOOKER, SENATOR FROM NEW JERSEY AND 2020 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I believe that we can build a country where no one is forgotten; no one is left behind. Where parents can put food on the table, where there are good-paying jobs with good benefits in every neighborhood. Where our criminal justice system keeps us safe instead of shuffling children into cages and coffins. Where we see the faces of our leaders on television and feel pride, not shame. It is not a matter of can we, it's a matter of do we have the collective will, the American will? I believe we do. Together we will channel our common pain back into our common purpose. Together, America, we will rise. I'm Cory Booker and I'm running for president of the United States of America.

(END VIDEO)

BUCK: So today Cory Booker answering one question, will he run for president? And the next question, how will he fair in this crowded democratic primary? One of the most diverse in history if not the most diverse in history. One advantage he could have is that he has a raw political talent the democrats point to. One of the challenges, this is a year of the woman. Woman candidates running. He's going to go on "The View" today for his first interview after he rolls out his campaign and then off to Iowa, South Carolina, and New Hampshire in the weeks to come.

BERMAN: Rebecca Buck for us in New Jersey. Cory Booker announces he's running for president; certainly one of the more anticipated announcements in this 2020 race. Let's bring in CNN Senior Political Reporter Nia-Malika Henderson, Van Jones, host of the "Van Jones Show;" Jackie Kucinich, Washing Bureau Chief for "The Daily Beast;" and John Avlon here as well.

Van, I want to start with you here. where does Cory Booker fit in this new crowded field, and I don't think it's any coincidence at all that Senator Booker is announcing on February 1st, the beginning of Black History Month and some of his first radio interviews will be with the likes of Tom Joiner and extremely, maybe the most popular, African- American radio host.

VAN JONES, HOST OF THE "VAN JONES SHOW": Well, Tom Joiner is certainly that. First of all, I have to say I've known Cory Booker for almost 25 years. I graduated from Yale Law School in spring of '93. He showed up in the fall of '93 and took the entire law school over. I'm so glad I got out about the Cory Booker phenomenon took over the Yale Law School. You have Bill Clinton and you have Cory Booker - the two people that had the biggest impact on that law school, just his raw political talent.

He's a force to be reckoned with. Cory Booker is a force of nature. He has -- no one is surprised he's running because in some ways people have been telling him to run. He's a very small, small guy. Don't forget, he left Yale Law School, could have gone anywhere in the world, went to Newark, New Jersey, moved basically into the poorest neighborhood and began the most improbable climb from working with folks in housing projects to living in a housing project to now running for President of the United States. He is - he is not a normal person, not a normal candidate. He's somebody who brings an extra gear when it comes to energy and empathy and you'll see this throughout the rest of his campaign.

HILL: Nia, I heard you in the background there as we heard he's not a normal candidate, being described as well by Van there as a force of nature. What's your take? Where does he fit in now in this increasingly crowded field?

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON: Yes I think Van hits on great points there. The energy, the enthusiasm, you can see it in the introductory video. He's got the marching band there. It feels very young; it feels very now. It feels very fresh. Cory Booker is somebody who people have known about for years.

If you go back to 2002 there was a "New York Times" magazine article that said he would likely be the first black president.

[07:05:00] That was in 2002. Of course now he's trying to be the second black president. I think his path looks a lot like Obama's. In many ways kamala Harris's does too. This idea that you can do well with not only African-American voters, but Latino voters as well, young voters, as well as women. These are people who occupying the same lane in many ways and it's not just because they're African-American, it's because they're fresh faces and they've already sort of zeroed in on key constituencies and already have some sway with those constituents.

The interesting thing about Booker is he was doing a lot of things that we see Beto O'Rourke doing now, the things that we see AOC doing, heavy on Twitter, heavy on Instagram, heavy on social media and really energizing young folks. We'll see if he can keep that kind of spirit alive in this campaign because he has been around so long, if he can keep that freshness going forward in this race.

HILL: He's been around. His social media game too we should point out, has been around for a long time. He was early on in that.

BERMAN: Earlier than that. Yes, it was actually practically before social media, right?

HILL: Right.

BERMAN: I mean Cory Booker predates the social media game and actually helped usher it in. Jackie, Rebecca Buck noted this is easily the most diverse candidate field we've ever seen.

JACKIE KUCINICH, WASHING BUREAU CHIEF FOR "THE DAILY BEAST: Right.

BERMAN: We can put up the pictures so people can see of the people who have already announced and/or are exploring. You have five women. You have a Latino in Julian Castro. You have Mayor Pete Buttigieg who is gay. This is a very, very diverse field already

KUCINICH: Well absolutely. And that's why - that's why we're talking a lot about lanes, right? Because we're going to have a lot of these candidates competing for the same people. You talk about Kamala Harris and Cory Booker, there are already - there's been reporting - they have already been reporting various members of the black caucus in the House. One of the things though, Cory Booker has made criminal justice reform a part of his being. Right?

He just helped push it through the Senate. Kamala Harris is going - that's going to be a bit point of contention between the two of them because of her role as a prosecutor, as the A.G. when she was in California. I think we're going to hear a lot of exchanges between the two of them as we get a little further into this about this issue in particular because that's going to one of the ways they try to really separate themselves from - in the lane they're both in.

HILL: There's been a lot of talk about taking certain voting blocks, certain demographics for granted as we know over the last number of years. And John Avalon, one of the things that stood out to me, we were talking to Michael Smerconish just a short time ago and asking what his listeners were saying about this growing field. He was saying that people were calling in saying, "I'm a minority caller and I want you to know Kamala Harris should not be taking my vote for granted just because of who I am." And that's an important reminder too is we're seeing that courting is important, but let's not forget people are people and they don't more; they don't want just a one dimensional candidate.

JOHN AVALON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Of course and I think it's time as a country we have this incredibly diverse field of the folks already running, the straight white guys - I think there there's one candidate right now. That speaks to the evolution of American politics and the Democratic Party. But it speaks about the need to transcend our tribalism and the racial and ethnic algebra of putting together coalitions doesn't work so much as being a compelling candidate with a great message and a great record.

And with Cory Booker, as you heard Van say, this is someone who has been leading with great expectations from early, early on. People running for city council in Newark don't typically get "New York Times" profiles. They don't get an award-winning documentary street fight about their first mayoral race.

BERMAN: Nonsuccessful.

AVALON: Yes, nonsuccessful. It's a great time. And so you get a sense of that trajectory and his record - he has executive experience. That's an important differentiator. It's actually, we've got more mayors in the race right now - current and ex mayors than governors. And he has a strong record; brought a lot of attention and investment into Newark. Lowered unemployment, lowered crime, but there was the criticism from his successor then a city councilman, that you see the mayor more on "Meet the Press" than in the streets toward the end of his term.

That's one of the things, he's been a media figurehead for so long, and can he keep that freshness and energy? But is he a raw talent that really stands out in any political field.

BERMAN: I actually think he backed off a lot of the media over the last four or five years in anticipation, I think, of getting in this race. And Van, you've been talking about - we were just having this discussion about taking no one's votes for granted. I've heard you say that many, many times here. No one should assume that any one voter or voting block is going to follow any one candidate for any one reason.

Cory Booker, complicated, interesting, as you said. He also, if he's been criticized for something it's for being too close to Wall Street, right? He is a Senator from New Jersey. This is an interesting year to be running with Elizabeth Warren and others very critical of Wall Street. Cory Booker is someone who has seen to be close to financial interests.

JONES: I think one of the reasons why in addition to his personal passion for the issue that he's leaned so hard on criminal justice reform is because it is, you know, a very, very strong progressive value that rounds out the picture of Cory Booker. Cory Booker really was that guy who would -- in the morning he might be in the community center in Newark talking to the poorest kids in New Jersey and then that afternoon he might be on Wall Street talking to some of the richest people in the world and then back in Newark and basically with the same message to both constituents.

But if you just grab him on the Wall Street side you can do some damage to him with this Democratic Party that does not like Wall Street, it really was born with "Occupy Wall Street" seeing 99 percent versus 1 percent. Cory Booker can sometimes be characterized as being too close to that so-called 1 percent. This may not be the year for that. So you're going to see him go very hard with the black community, he's going to go very hard on criminal justice reform, he's going to go very hard on his common touch which he does have with ordinary people. But is he going to catch fire. He's going to catch some flak from the left of our party.

AVALON: Can I just say one thing, though? When you're mayor of Newark, he brought major investment into downtown Newark. That was part of his job and it is hard to do. Big companies weren't coming into Newark and he helped turn that around and that involves reaching out to Wall Street and big corporations. So I think that hit on him from the activist class, I get it. But he did he his job in mayor in doing that outreach.

HENDERSON: Yes, he's going to -- there's an interview I think he gave in 2012, might have been on "Meet the Press", where he criticizes the approach that the Obama campaign is making to Mitt Romney and sort of beating up on venture capitalists. And that's going to come back to him. He called it nauseating the way that the Obama allies and Obama was attacking Mitt Romney.

That's certainly going to come back and haunt him. We'll see how that plays. But all mixed up, he is somebody that's electrifying. Between him and Elizabeth Warren, those are the folks who really send a buzz through the crowd. People want to touch them. People want to be around them. That's something that I think will serve him really well, particularly in a state like Iowa, particularly in a state like New Hampshire where you are in those living rooms talking to people, telling your story and trying to connect with them. We'll see what happens obviously on South Carolina, with African-American women being a really important voting block there as well as African-American men and white women as well.

He has to prove he can do well with white voters. That's the way that Obama was able to persuade black voters that he could win a general election. So that trip to Iowa for Cory Booker is going to be incredibly important as well as the work that he's doing in South Carolina. He's already trying to amass a talented team down there, talk to folks down there. He's going to have a real blockbuster team in South Carolina as well as the others.

HILL: Jackie, interesting, too, Iowa, obviously, we know Iowa is going to be on the stop, but Sherrod Brown in Iowa just talking about trying to be the more populous candidate here if he decides to jump in. How much of that is a focus for these other candidates who are already in? I mean, this is really straddling a line between being that progressive part of the party, right, and not losing the appeal to a more mainstream voter, being a more populous candidate?

KUCINICH: Yes, it seems like Sherrod Brown is more in the Joe Biden category...

HILL: Right.

KUCINICH: ... of a candidate. And because of that he's reaching out to a lot of people who have walked away from the Democratic Party, which is kind of the old model, especially when you talk to some of the more progressive candidates. They want to build the base; they want to grow the base. They want to get more African-Americans out. They want more young people out. Where Sherrod Brown seems to be appealing, not that he's not trying to appeal to those people, but he's a democrat from Northeastern Ohio who opposed NAFTA on the front end.

It's those workers that their factories have closed that Donald Trump won. He's trying to bring them back home to the Democratic Party. Whether he'll be able to do that is an open question.

HILL: But could a Cory Booker too? I'm looking more could Cory Booker bring those people back into the fold? What does he have that could win them over to his side?

KUCINICH: That's an open question, it really is. That's going to be one of his challenges.

AVALON: It's interesting, one of the open questions is democrats try to decide -- just one second, Van, on what happened in 2016. You know, what do you say more? Was it it white working class in the upper Midwest who didn't vote for Hillary Clinton or was it the fact that turnout was dramatically down in Milwaukee and Philadelphia? And those were two different analysis of what went wrong in '16 and how the candidates can try to bridge that gap and address those deficits.

BERMAN: It could be both, right? And that's what Sherrod Brown is trying to argue. Sorry Van, go ahead.

JONE: I was going to say one thing. One thing about Sherrod Brown is that he is an unusual candidate in that he's for the white working class, but he's never allowed himself to be defined by that in that when he talks about workers he talks about African Americans, he talks about all kinds of, you know, different folks. And he's also -- he was, you know, as we said, had the right position on everything from the war to the right position for a liberal democrat from the war to women's issues, et cetera.

I think Cory Booker, he's not been tested yet in those waters, sort of industrial heartland water, you know. Can you see Cory Booker with a hard hat on and pull that off? I don't know. You haven't seen him try those kinds of things yet. That's going to be the big test for him. The other big test for him is going into South Carolina, you're going to see a heavyweight battle between Kamala Harris and Cory Booker for the black vote. HENDERSON: And Biden -- if Biden gets in too. I mean Biden's got

some real strong ties in South Carolina as well. He hasn't been as active down there already in terms of telling people what he's going to do and telling people to wait on the sidelines. I do think one of the things about Obama is he did have that ability to go into those working-class, white-working-class communities partly because he was in Illinois, he was a Midwesterner. But yes, I mean we covered it. He would go on factory floors and be very comfortable there. He did very well with those workers. It doesn't take a white man to be able to go in and talk to those Midwestern white working class folks in the Midwest.

BERMAN: It's a good point and the last thing I will say on 2020, it does seem to me and Elizabeth Warren has indicated she has a big announcement to make. It seems to me that these candidates or perspective candidates are beginning to think they have to get in soon if they're going to get - the federal work doesn't open next week(ph). I think every day, every few days we're going to be hearing from more and more of them. All right, guys, stick around. We've got a lot more to discuss.

HILL: President Trump talking to "The New York Times," taking on the Russia probe. His definitive answer about his discussions with Roger Stone next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:20:00]

HILL: In a new wide-ranging interview with "The New York Times," President Trump talks about the Russia investigation that continues to loom over his presidency.

(BEGIN VIDEO)

TRUMP: Well, he told -- he told the attorneys that I'm not a subject -- I'm not a target -- yes. Oh, yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did he saying anything about the SDNY investigation too?

TRUMP: About which?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: SDNY investigation, because there's two. There's Mueller's and there's Cohen's.

TRUMP: I don't know - I don't know about that. That I don't know about.

(END VIDEO)

HILL: Let's bring back John Avlon, Van Jones, Nia-Malika Henerson, Jackie Kucinich. He was - it was interesting the word choice that we can't ignore. Van, let's call on those law school credentials here. He's saying I was told, Rosenstein he said actually told my attorneys I was not a target. I am not a subject. Those two words very important, just remind us, what's the difference?

JONES: Well, I mean, he's trying to say that he is not the target of a criminal investigation. He's not himself personally under -- under threat of being indicted for crimes even though of course he's president there's no -- the Department of Justice has said it doesn't have the authority do that.

But first of all, back up for a second. You got too give Trump some credit to have Maggie Haberman come into the office and talk to him. She has been one of the toughest critics of the administration. She's somehow, I don't know what she's got, she's got 27 sources inside the building. I don't know how she does it. She gets stuff out of that building almost nobody else does. The last person you'd expect him to sit down and talk to he brings her in and you know she's tough on him and she grills him. But I just want to point out when I heard that Maggie Haberman was going to the White House, I wasn't sure they were going to let her back out; she's been that tough on the president. Congratulations for her to get that face-to-face interview on the record and on tape.

But he's trying to squiggle and wiggle his way out and try to suggest he's not in any harm and everything is fine, when in fact even if you are not the direct target of a criminal investigation, you can still find all of your associates can be in a ton of trouble and ultimately you can get drug into trouble because what ultimately people say when they crack under -- when the actual targets crack under pressure, you can then find yourself in real trouble anyway.

BERMAN: And it was also interesting, I don't know whether he meant to say he was told he was not a subject of this investigation. He slipped that in there and the difference there is, you know, target means they are investigating you and your criminal activity and, you know, expecting to press charges. Subject means you may be involved in activity that they are investigating but they don't have yet enough evidence to press charges against you and then there's a discussion about whether a president could ever be the target of a criminal investigation because a president can't be indicted.

All of that is open here. The most interesting thing he might have said there, Nia, was that I don't know if I'm the target or the subject of the investigation from the Southern District of New York, a federal investigation which is sending Michael Cohen to jail and which has already indicated in writing they think the president may have been involved in breaking campaign finance laws.

HENDERSON: Yes, and that's an investigation that not only involves Michael Cohen, it also involves the CFO from Donald Trump's organization. I think his name is Alan Weisselberg as well as David Pecker who's over the "National Enquirer." It's hard to know what you can believe from this president because he tends to make things up. He obviously wants to make himself look good in this interview in front of Maggie Haberman, an interview that I think he requested, right, with the publisher. It was supposed to be off the record and the publisher insisted it wasn't going to be off the record.

It's hard to know. Every once in a while, maybe every six months or so he does these kinds of interviews with the "Washington Post," with the "The New York Times." But, again, anything that comes out of his mouth you have to weigh against his enormous history of just making misstatements. I think the "Washington Post" has something like 8,000 at this point. So you kind of have to take what he says with a grain of salt. I mean, he talked about the national intelligence chiefs and seemingly made up a story that said they came to him and said that they were misquoted. I mean, that doesn't sound like something that actually happened, but, again, it's Donald Trump's spin and his, again, odd relationship with the truth.

HILL: You know what's interesting that there was not a lot of -- I think as Maggie pointed out last night, she characterized it as not a lot of wiggle room when he was talking about specific events involving Roger Stone. He was very clear I never spoke to Roger Stone about WikiLeaks; I didn't direct anyone to. That didn't leave Jackie a lot of wiggle room there, which normally we would see from the president, sort of pedaling around things.

KUCINICH: Probably because he doesn't have a lot of wiggle room. That's the only explanation. I mean, you've seen them both try to separate himself from Roger Stone and say he likes Roger Stone and Roger Stone's been with him for a while but he wasn't a campaign adviser which we know isn't true. So it seems like Roger Stone is someone he's really having trouble figuring out where to position himself from as, you know, Roger Stone is, again, there today.

BERMAN: Let's just play the sound. I think we have the change about WikiLeaks. The reason this is an issue because the indictment that came out against Roger Stone last week, there was a sentence which said that there was a senior Trump campaign official that was directed to make contact with Roger Stone about WikiLeaks. The question was directed by whom, and here the president's basically saying not me. Listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you ever talk to him about WikiLeaks...

TRUMP: No.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... because that seems to be (inaudible).

TRUMP: No, I didn't. I never did.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you ever tell him or other people to get in touch with him?

TRUMP: Never did.

(END AUDIO)

AVALON: I'm so glad we played the audio because the tone is un- Trumpian. It's calm, almost - in very innocent, choir boy style as opposed to usually the president has to flourish. He exaggerates. He goes P.T. Barnum and carnival barker. So this is different. The question is... HILL: ... no collusion.

AVALON: Exactly. Is this sincerity or is this trying to slip one by ala Stormy Daniels denials? And of course it raises the question, if we take the president at his word, if you look at the Stone indictment who could hand down that directive to a senior, either Trump or Manafort. If we take the president's word it's not him. But again, we never hear blanket denials that simply and never in that tone.

KUCINICH: He also doesn't think Stone is going to flip on him.

AVALON: Exactly.

KUCINICH: Stone has said over and over again. You also saw in that interview he talked about how Roger Stone isn't going to be coerced into lying about me or something like that. He has that confidence of that Stone's on his side, which perhaps also informs that.

BERMAN: I will note this. As powerful as Maggie is, lying to Maggie Haberman is not a crime.

AVALON: No.

BERMAN: Lying upped oath is a crime, so it's a different standard there doing an interview although that was a flat denial. A lot of other news made here including in terms of this negotiation going on to prevent another shutdown.

The president made clear to Maggie and Peter Baker that he doesn't hold out much hope that this bipartisan group of Congress people are going to reach an agreement and I don't necessarily thinks he wants them to reach an agreement. Listen to what he says.

(BEGIN VIDEO)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is your first experience dealing with Nancy Pelosi having the gavel as the speaker. Do you feel that you properly estimated her strengths? Do you feel like you underestimated them?

TRUMP: Yes, I do. I've actually always gotten along with her but now I don't think I will anymore. I think that she's hurting the country very badly.

I think Nancy Pelosi's hurting our country very badly by doing what she's doing and ultimately I think I've set the table very nicely.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Set the table for...

TRUMP: I've set the table, I've set the stage for doing what I'm going to do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And you're going to wait it out for 21 days before you take...

TRUMP: Yes, I'm going to wait until the 15th. I think it's a waste of time.

(END VIDEO)

BERMAN: I think it's a waste of time, Van. I set the table. It sounds like he's saying I set the table to just do this myself.

JONES: Yes, you know, one of the things that we're seeing is that the inability of the political class to resolve this question of immigration reform is actually having this background effect of more and more executive authority being gobbled up. The way that Obama chose, and he was doing this to help the Dreamers, he grabbed a little bit more executive authority than he had before. Now you're going to see Trump out to build the wall going the other direction, grab a little bit more executive authority than he had before and say I'm going to declare a national emergency. when he says I've been setting the table, he's been saying it's an emergency, it's an emergency and having enough of his people say it that he thinks can he go into court and say we've established a record that it's an emergency because we call it an emergency and then have the courts have to decide, you know, do we want to get involved in this or do we want to let the President of the United States use his, quote unquote, "emergency powers" to do something that Congress has expressly decided they don't want to do yet? So this is going to cause a constitutional crisis of some kind. What I want to point out in this is notice when you have a big, big problem like this and you cannot get it solved normally, then you begin to see extraordinary actions on the part of the executive branch which ultimately hurts the country.

KUCINICH: But one of the reasons this can't be solved in a conventional manner is because of the president. Because no one feels like that anything negotiated inside the House and the Senate is going to be accepted by this president. So that in and of itself creates a really -- a tough mission for these Congress folks that no one really thinks that they're going to get anything done by the end.