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Major Winter Storm Hits Millions; Sanders Raises $4 million; Biden Offers No Clues; O'Rourke Decision by End of Month; Warren Unveils Child Care Proposal; Taiwan's Warning about China. Aired 6:30- 7a ET

Aired February 20, 2019 - 06:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:32:45] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: A major winter storm is sweeping across the U.S. and more than 100 million people, including John and me, are in its panel.

Let's get to meteorologist Chad Myers for the forecast.

Where is it, Chad?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, really the center is, I would say, Columbus, Ohio, right now, into Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. That's where the heaviest snow accumulations are going to be. It iced a little bit in Indianapolis overnight. But two to four inches of snow for New York and maybe even into D.C. We'll take a look at now almost into Williamsport, almost into DuBois, Pennsylvania.

And the snow is going to continue. It's going to be a changeover to sleet and then to rain, but it's going to be tricky. When does that changeover finally happen? When does this snow wash away? New York City, you could get a significant amount of snow and then sleet before the rain finally comes in. And then when the rain does come in, there will be three quarters of an inch of rain and it will wash away.

But today's evening commute could be very tricky. Boston, New York, Philadelphia, even into D.C. Now, the bulk of the snow will be in Pennsylvania in the Poconos and the Alleghenies, but still two to four inches of snow in New York City really slows down the afternoon commute for sure.

Down to the south there's an awful lot of rainfall. There's flooding potential here. Could be four to six more inches of rain in places that are already flooding, John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, watching it very, very closely. Going to be a tough ride home around here, Chad.

MYERS: Yes.

BERMAN: Thanks very much.

President Trump says Bernie Sanders, his chance to be president has passed. But there may be four million reasons to rethink that statement this morning, next.

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[06:38:10] CAMEROTA: President Trump welcoming Senator Bernie Sanders to the 2020 presidential race, but pouring a little cold water on his candidacy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Personally, I think he missed his time. But I like Bernie because he's the -- he is one person that, you know, on trade, he sort of would agree on trade.

But I wish Bernie well. It will be interesting to see how he does.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Sanders supporters clearly disagreeing with the president. Well, I'm not sure what they're disagreeing with in this case because he wished, you know, the president wished Bernie Sanders well.

CAMEROTA: I feel like that his aides, after that, got around him and said, like, Mr. President, Bernie Sanders said some not nice things about you.

BERMAN: Yes, he did.

CAMEROTA: I'm not sure that today he would still give that welcoming message.

BERMAN: All right. The important thing is, is that Bernie Sanders raised $4 million in the first 12 hours of his campaign. That is according to the Sanders campaign.

Joining us now, MJ Lee, CNN national political correspondent, Alex Burns, national political correspondent for "The New York Times," and John Avlon, CNN's senior political analyst.

And, John, we were all here yesterday the moment that Bernie announced.

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

BERMAN: And one of the questions was, will he be able to generate the same fervor that he did four years ago? Financially at least $4 million in 12 hours is good.

AVLON: Signs point to yes. That is an unbelievable haul. Probably unprecedented. Put it into perspective, in around four hours he raised more money than Kamala Harris did in her first day.

Now, look, it makes sense, he had a big presence in 2016, high name I.D., high enthusiasm and he specifically went out and called for low dollar donations and volunteers. But, boy, did people respond. And so it -- I think it's a -- it's a reasonable sign out of the gate that Bernie Sanders' momentum hasn't entirely dissipated since 2016. I think perhaps --

CAMEROTA: A few more details on that. The -- they -- the Bernie campaign says that the donations came from every state, about 150,000 individuals gave more than 4 million total and mirrored the 2016 campaign's average donation of $27. This says that there is still a lot of enthusiasm for Bernie then.

[06:40:05] MJ LEE, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. And I think the people who are going to be the Bernie loyalists are probably always going to be the Bernie loyalists and unclear if the $4 million that were raised actually constitute support from the hard core loyalists or if it also is money coming from people who are still undecided but looks at Bernie favorably and it is prone to giving probably small dollar donations to a number of the candidates.

But, again, as we talked about yesterday, this is Bernie Sanders, this time around entering a field with a number of other candidates in a way that he obviously did not last time around.

BERMAN: And, again, if the average donation is $27, it means that all those people can give a lot more to him or a lot more to anyone else too.

AVLON: Right.

BERMAN: It may be that some of these donors give to many different candidates at the same time.

We were watching Bernie Sanders get in the race yesterday and more and more candidates jump in and it does beg the question, Alex Burns, where's Joe Biden at that point? Where is Joe Biden? Yesterday the answer was Philadelphia lecturing people, but dropping sort of bread crumbs about what his intentions might be. Let's listen.

ALEX BURNS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: Most Americans think our house is out of order, maybe for different reasons, offering different solutions. But it's not the America that we thought.

So it's time to restore America's soul. Remind ourselves of who we are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: "Restore" was a word he used frequently there, which I think was intentional. You saw the note cards on his lap right there indicating to me he had a plan for something he wanted to achieve during that speech. What did you see and what are you hearing?

BURNS: Look, I think almost every time he speaks in public, we hear something that sounds like the intellectual architecture of a presidential campaign, right? A message about healing the country, about bringing together the parties, about, in some cases, kind of restoring the good old days, whatever exactly you imagine those could have been.

CAMEROTA: He means three years ago. Those good old days.

BERMAN: Right.

CAMEROTA: It's not that far back for the nostalgia.

BURNS: Well, and sometimes he invokes like really a truly different time of like cooperation in Washington, which was not three years ago, right?

CAMEROTA: Fair.

BURNS: It was at no point really in my lifetime, but it was -- it was, you know, longer ago than three years ago.

BERMAN: He just called us old is what just happened there, in case you're wondering.

BURNS: I don't -- I don't think it was in your lifetime either.

But, look, the bottom line here is, Joe Biden has been dropping these hints for months and months and months. He told folks over a month ago that his decision was eminent. His decision is still not made. He's telling people that he's planning to do it. We reported that very soon after New Year's. But there is still this sort of like continuing sense among people close to Biden, very supportive of Biden, that if you're going to do it, why aren't you doing it already? And within Biden's world, there is this kind of tug of war between people who feel like you've got to get off the sidelines because every day you wait is a missed opportunity. You're shedding resources, shedding opportunities to other candidates. And people who feel like he's maybe the one candidate in the race, or potential candidate, other than maybe Bernie Sanders, who can afford to wait because everybody knows who he is and because so much of the country already has a pretty strong and pretty positive view of him.

AVLON: Yes.

CAMEROTA: That brings to us Beto O'Rourke's decision making and where he is in that process, because people have also been wondering if he's going to stay on the sidelines or jump in. So here's Eric Bradner, our CNN reporter, put this out on Twitter yesterday. Beto O'Rourke acknowledged he's considering both runs for president and the Senate. He told reporters in El Paso he still plans to make a decision this month about what it is we do next. He also said in Spanish that the vice presidential nomination is off -- is not off the table.

Do you get to decide if you're going to be vice president -- if you're nominated for vice president?

AVLON: No, that's -- that's usually the opposite of the way it works.

Look, we've got a little bit of pin the tail on the Beto right now. He's going to go -- whatever title I might, you know, be inspired to do and that his decision making process seems, you know, seems a little loose, shall we say. He's been on sort of a long beat pilgrimage for a while and he's going to have to decide, is it John Cornyn, is it the White House, is it the Naval Observatory.

He's got a lot of goodwill. I think people recognize him as a rising star in the party. But it's still a big leap to go from losing to Ted Cruz to the presidency. And it's already a pretty crowded field. So he's going to have to make a decision at some point. But I think we haven't heard the last from Beto O'Rourke no matter what decision.

BERMAN: He has said his initial timeline was February and he may have just extended it a little bit. He said, I think I will decide by the end of February, but I don't have to decide by the end of February, which is interesting.

MJ, you've been doing some reporting on Elizabeth Warren. We're covering four candidates here in one bloc, but (INAUDIBLE) the size of the presidential field.

CAMEROTA: We are. We're getting a lot done in this segment.

BERMAN: She unveiled her universal child care proposal yesterday officially and you think she is presenting herself in a very specific way when she runs?

LEE: That's right. I had a piece yesterday about how so much of what we see on the stump with Elizabeth Warren goes back to her professor and her teaching ways. If you listen to her town halls, if you listen to her speeches on the stump, she really emphasizes the fact that she is walking out, that she is a nerd at heart. And I don't think this is just a stylistic thing, even though she does certainly play it up. This is about Elizabeth Warren going out there and sort of saying to the masses, what I want to talk about are really arcane issues, like net metering or net neutrality. But here I am on stage trying to explain this issue to you and sort of win you over on the point that these issues actually matter to you and that you should be paying attention.

[06:45:18] As far as the universal child care policy goes, I think a key part of that is that it is going to be paid for by her proposed wealth tax. Expect to hear that over and over again. She is going to be putting out other proposals that are also going to be paid for by this proposal and the revenue from the wealth tax, that that is going to continue to be central to her platform.

CAMEROTA: Yes, I mean, people bristle about the wealth tax, but 3 percent on billionaires. Is anybody going to cry a river for -- for that?

BURNS: It's not a controversial proposal with many, many voters. The mechanics of whether it's actually constitutional and whether it could pass Congress --

AVLON: Is practical.

BURNS: Is a totally -- is a totally different question.

AVLON: Yes.

BURNS: But the idea of taxing the wealthy is overwhelmingly popular.

I will say, I was with Warren in Iowa pretty recently. MJ was there as well. And one thing that really struck me was the crowd response to the specificity of her proposals, right? That not just her like expertise on the issues, but the idea that you have crowds getting on their feet for pretty wonky details about campaign finance, right?

CAMEROTA: Her net neutrality.

BURNS: That that's not something that I feel like we are accustomed to seeing in presidential politics. It's acute --

AVLON: You're saying it's unlike a Trump rally?

BURNS: Well, and it's unlike a lot of the rallies that we see on the Democratic side.

AVLON: Sure.

BURNS: I think it's a sign that voters want concrete solutions --

AVLON: Yes, it's great.

BURNS: And I think a view that you'll probably see other candidates taking.

CAMEROTA: Really interesting.

BERMAN: Alex, MJ, John, thank you.

CAMEROTA: A programing note. Monday night, live from Washington, D.C., CNN will hold a presidential town hall with Bernie Sanders. It will be moderated by Wolf Blitzer. That's at 8:00 Eastern only on CNN.

BERMAN: Hi. Hi.

CAMEROTA: I'm Bernie Sanders.

BERMAN: Hi, I'm Bernie Sanders.

All right, it is the bombshell report making headlines this morning. "The New York Times" reporting the president asked his acting attorney general to put a supporter of President Trump in charge of the Michael Cohen investigation. And one of the reporters breaking this news, Maggie Haberman. She will join us in a bit.

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[06:51:06] BERMAN: All right, this morning, we have a CNN exclusive. The president of Taiwan is delivering a warning to the world, saying she faces an aggressive threat from Beijing. She spoke exclusively to CNN's Matt Rivers. Matt joins us now live from Taipei.

Matt, what have you learned? MATT RIVERS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, it's

interesting what the president here in Taiwan told us is that while, of course, China is top of mind for her, it's a threat for her country, the context in which she described that relationship to us, she said, look, it's not just about that singular relationship, it's about what Beijing is doing. In her eyes, it's expansionist tendencies could have something do and could have an effect on other countries in this region and across the world like the United States.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: As the U.S. grapples with a more combative China, economically, politically, militarily, one small island says it's already fighting those battles on the front line. Taiwan, about 100 miles off China's coast.

RIVERS (on camera): Madame President. Good to see you.

TSAI ING-WEN, TAIWAN PRESIDENT: Yes.

RIVERS (voice over): Taiwan's president, Tsai Ing-wen, sat down with CNN for an exclusive interview. The threat from China was top of mind.

ING-WEN (through translator): China's ambitions and aggression are not just targeting Taiwan, but also other countries in the region or even worldwide.

RIVERS: Taiwan is a vibrant democracy of 23 million people and a close U.S. ally, self-governed for seven decades. But Beijing still considers it a part of its territory to be retaken by force if necessary. And since he took office, analysts say Chinese President Xi Jinping has increased military drills near the island.

ING-WEN: The military threats China poses on Taiwan grow every day.

RIVERS: The threats faced here could increasingly reflect what the U.S. might see from Beijing. Thai's government say China might have meddled in Taiwan's elections last year, not unlike what American officials say Russia did to the U.S. in 2016. Beijing denies that. The Trump administration believes China could do the same thing to the U.S. in 2020.

And then there's Huawei, the Chinese tech giant that critics allege has close links to the government. Huawei denies that. The U.S. now says the company is a national security threat. Tsai says Taiwan has already done something about it.

ING-WEN: We have placed restrictions on the use of Huawei equipment in government agencies and other highly sensitive institutions.

RIVERS: But Taiwan is most concerned about China's powerful army. A nationalist drum beat from Beijing means speculation about China invading Taiwan went from a far-off notion to a scenario real enough that we're talking logistics.

ING-WEN: After withstanding the first wave of Chinese attacks ourselves, the rest of the world would stand up to exert strong pressure on China.

RIVERS: Despite having no formal diplomatic ties since 1979, the U.S. has sold billions of dollars' worth of weapons to Taiwan. In a recent op-ed, Senator Marco Rubio said China is the, quote, geopolitical challenge of this century for the U.S.

For Taiwan, the future the senator talks about is right now. And Tsai's message is clear, what happens here, what happens to this democracy could happen to others.

ING-WEN: If it's Taiwan today, people should ask, who's next? Any country in the region, if it no longer wants to submit to the will of China, they will face similar military threats.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RIVERS: And we know that some lawmakers in the U.S. want to hear from Tsai Ing-wen in person in Washington. A group of Republican senators, led by Marco Rubio and Corey Gardner of Colorado, among others, have asked Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to formally invite Tsai Ing- wen to give an joint address -- or to give an address to a joint session of Congress. That invitation hasn't yet been formally extended, Alisyn, but if it is, you can expect Beijing will not be pleased.

CAMEROTA: OK, Matt Rivers, thank you very much from Taipei for us.

Up next, your "Late Night Laughs."

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[06:59:00] CAMEROTA: All right, comics using the new "New York Times" report and Bernie Sanders is not off the hook either. Here are your "Late Night Laughs."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHEN COLBERT, HOST, "THE LATE SHOW WITH STEPHEN COLBERT": Late last year Trump asked Whitaker whether Geoffrey S. Berman, a Trump ally, could be put in charge of the widening investigation of Michael Cohen by the Southern District of New York. Number one choice, Geoffrey S. Berman. If he's not available, let's go with Jared T. son-in-law. Third choice, U.S. attorney burger, cheese.

JIMMY FALLON, HOST, "THE TONIGHT SHOW STARRING JIMMY FALLON": Bernie Sanders has announced that he is running for president. Although, at age 77 years old, he isn't so much running as he's slowly wandering for president.

SETH MEYERS, HOST, "LATE NIGHT WITH SETH MEYERS": Bernie Sanders announced today that he's running for president. He was trying to just tell his family, but we all heard him. Between us, top secret, I'm running for president. That's why I'm whispering.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[07:00:05] BERMAN: Hi.

CAMEROTA: I'm Bernie Sanders.

BERMAN: All right, thank you to our