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New Day

Joe Biden Takes Big Lead Democratic Primary in Recent Poll; President Trump Attacks Joe Biden on Twitter; Venezuelan Opposition Leader Calls for Military Uprising. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired April 30, 2019 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Scary stuff. And --

JOHN "MITCH" BARNETT, BOEING WHISTLEBLOWER: And we have a -- and we have a serial number. I'm sorry, go ahead.

CAMEROTA: Only because we're running out of time, I want to cut to the chase, because this sounds like really scary stuff to my ears as just a member of the -- a passenger.

BARNETT: Absolutely.

CAMEROTA: OK, so just the flying public. Would you, knowing what you know and what you've seen with your own eyes, would you ever fly on the Boeing Dreamliner?

BARNETT: Absolutely not. No, ma'am.

CAMEROTA: John Barnett, you are a whistleblower. We really appreciate you bringing what you've seen to the public's attention. Thank you very much for being here on NEW DAY.

BARNETT: Thank you for having me.

CAMEROTA: All right, meanwhile, there is this new CNN poll. It shows Joe Biden's big bounce since he jumped into the race. NEW DAY continues right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning and welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, April 30th. It's 8:00 in the east. And this new CNN poll out just a couple hours ago which shows a bounce for former Vice President Joe Biden, a big bounce. Biden has broken away from the pack, 39 percent of potential Democratic voters say he is their top choice for the nomination. Senator Bernie Sanders is way, way back in second with 15 percent.

CAMEROTA: Today Biden begins campaigning in Iowa where he is doing much better this time around than during his previous runs. This morning Biden takes on President Trump's signature slogan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president has a motto, Make America Great Again. Do you have one? JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Make America moral again.

Make America return to the essence of who we are, the dignity of the country, the dignity of people -- treating our people with dignity. And this God awful deliberate division that's being taken in order to -- separating people to aggrandize his own power.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: CNN political director David Chalian joins us now with the numbers that are hot off the presses. David, give us the headlines.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: You said it, Alisyn. It's a Biden bounce from that announcement. This is the first national poll we've seen taken entirely after Joe Biden got into the race last Thursday, and here is that horse race -- 39 percent, way out in front for Joe Biden, 15 percent for Bernie Sanders. The next four, Warren, Buttigieg, O'Rourke, and Harris all in single digits.

Look at the movement from our poll last month. Joe Biden went way up by 11 points from 28 percent in March to 39 percent now. Again, that may just be a bounce that comes back down after the announcement, but that's a formidable position.

The only other person to make a move in the positive direction, Pete Buttigieg. He went from one percent to seven percent. But Sanders went down a bit, O'Rourke and Harris returned to single digits from double digits, all to Joe Biden and a little to Pete Buttigieg's benefit.

And take a look at this next number here, we broke it down to show you what is fueling the Biden commanding lead in this race. We broke it down by race. White voters versus non-white voters in the Democratic primary. Among white voters Joe Biden still has a lead, though not as big as his overall lead, 29 percent to 15 percent. But nonwhite voters, such a key part of the Democratic primary electorate, 50 percent go to Joe Biden, and then it's way down at 14 percent for Sanders. This is fueling that big lead.

One note of caution -- there's still a lot of time, right? Sixth-four percent of Democrats in this poll tell us they might change their mind. Only a third definitely will support the candidate they are with right now.

We also asked folks about the qualities that they are looking for in these candidates, and take a look at this -- 46 percent of Democrats in this poll say that beating Donald Trump is extremely important to their vote. This is the electability factor we are talking about. Then it's right experience, will work across party lines, the candidate has to look like the future of the party. This is all much lower. It is about beating Donald Trump right now for Democratic primary voters.

And on the issues, it is very clear there are a couple top issues animating this race. Climate change, 82 percent of Democrats say it's very important, 75 percent for Medicare for all, and then guns, you see free public college, impeaching the president, paying reparations, voting rights for felons, all topics that have been gated in the last several months lower down. Climate change and Medicare for all are animating this Democratic electorate. John, Alisyn?

BERMAN: David Chalian with these brand new CNN poll numbers. David, thank you very much.

Joining us now, Abby Phillip, CNN White House correspondent, Jonathan Martin, national political correspondent for "The New York Times," and John Avlon, CNN senior political analyst. John Avlon, these numbers for Joe Biden, 39 percent is a very big number just on its face for a 20 candidate field. And then when you go underneath, he's leading everywhere.

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: That's what's stunning in this poll. It's more than just a Biden bounce. The broad based support, areas where he's been considered weak looking at the primary, he's leading among voters under 45, young voters. He's leading among liberals over Bernie Sanders. The nonwhite voter number at 50 percent.

[08:05:11] That is really stunning in terms of how broad based this poll shows Joe Biden's support is. He's really lapping other candidates in a lot of categories. So this is very good news for Joe Biden as an out of the gate poll, and it shows other candidates got a lot of work to do.

CAMEROTA: J. Mart, that number, 64 percent still say they could change their minds. I should hope so. We are more than a year away. I'm glad to hear that voters are open to learning new information over the next year, but still, better than probably the Biden team expected.

JONATHAN MARTIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I think it's a little stronger nationally perhaps than he thought and perhaps some of his rivals thought. But you guys are key to emphasize how early it is and how often in past campaigns early numbers have not reflected the final outcome. And by the way, if you just talk to people on the street or in a coffee shop like I did yesterday in Pittsburgh, it's pretty revealing. Guys, they don't necessarily know who all the candidates are, they are not sure who is even running. And it's no knock on them. We're 10 months out from the first vote. They are normal Americans with lives, and they are not super engaged in this race yet.

So there is a lot of game to be played here, obviously these debates are going to be crucial. But it does look like now at the start Biden is something of a traditional frontrunner, and that can only mean one thing, guys, he's going to be facing a lot of incoming coming his way.

BERMAN: Absolutely. I will only note if you were in Pittsburgh yesterday and you are in Cedar Rapids today, there is no direct flight as far as I know. So you've had a very --

MARTIN: I have got three letters for you, O-R-D, O-R-D.

BERMAN: You have had a very eventually last 12 hours. So Abby, we know the president, you cover the White House every day,

Abby, the president is paying very close attention to this. He can't help himself to a certain extent. I'm not going to read these out loud, but he's tweeting all about Joe Biden yesterday, clearly watching the announcement. He seems fixated to an extent in elevating Joe Biden here.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, clearly the president has decided to his front runner is in this race, and you can see why some of his advisers are a little bit nervous that the president is going a little too far, that he's telegraphing too much that he's worried about Joe Biden. And the result that that might have in the democratic primary where there are 20 candidates is that you end up taking those 46 percent of people who say that beating Donald Trump is the most important thing to them and you're basically telling them that Trump thinks that Biden is his toughest competitor. He is telegraphing to the Democratic primary that he thinks that Joe Biden is the guy who will give him the toughest race.

And that actually helps Joe Biden, especially as the Trump campaign is trying to frame all of these Democrats as far left socialists, it really elevates Joe Biden as an almost kind of centrist character who will do the best in a general election, and that is counter to what the Trump campaign wants to accomplish here.

But the president can't help himself, he doesn't like to fall back when people are attacking him. And Joe Biden came right out of the gate and basically said that when the president talked about Charlottesville, he really let down the character of the nation. The president could not take that sitting down and basically took the bait and forced himself into a position where he's relitigating Charlottesville. So in a lot of ways you see Joe Biden kind of outmaneuvering Trump at a very early stage, and it's causing the president's advisers to kind of try to get him to take it down a notch, because it's too early for them to be engaged, I think, in their view at this level where there are so many other opportunities, easier opportunities, to take on these other candidates.

AVLON: Obviously --

MARTIN: John, real fast, I was going to say it's so Trumpian, too, because this is not strategy. The reason he's reacting yesterday to Biden is because he's watching cable TV all morning, and he's seeing the Biden coverage because it's the day of Biden's first speech. And he's just tweeting about what he's seeing on cable TV, which is covering the news that day. So much of this is just -- it's not strategic. It's just a president who responds to what he sees on TV. But that itself is what then drives the next day's news cycle, and here we are, guys, talking about it. It's very bad.

AVLON: Yes, it's very bad, but the larger playbook that Trump has been pursuing, also echoed by his favorite station, is basically a negative partisan playbook. It's to paint the Democrats as radical leftist socialists, as Abby said. And it's very hard to fit Joe Biden in that mold. Trump can't define him as he can many of the other folks. And that's why the team Trump is going to be nervous, because the candidates who flipped from Obama to Trump in those key 200 pivot counties, Biden is almost tailor-made to appeal to their concerns -- white working class, middle class folks where you can't paint Biden as a leftist radical in the same way he will try to do with Bernie Sanders and members of Congress.

[08:10:04] CAMEROTA: So Joe Biden was just asked what he thinks his chances are of winning the Democratic primary and of beating Donald Trump. Here is Joe Biden's answer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Donald Trump is very confident that should you win the nomination that he could beat you easily. Are you as confident that you can win the nomination and defeat him?

JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Whether I win the nomination or not is going to depend on the Democrats, and whether or not I beat Donald Trump is going to depend on the American people. But, as I said, everybody knows who Donald Trump is.

JILL BIDEN, JOE BIDEN'S WIFE: I'm confident.

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Maybe Jill Biden should be running. Jill Biden should be running his campaign. She's confident. He was giving the very, J. Mart, the very deliberate, very diplomatic answer there, and his wife, Jill, I don't know if you could hear it, jumped in, and was like I'm confident.

MARTIN: Let me clean that up one.

CAMEROTA: Yes, exactly.

MARTIN: He's trying to be modest and obviously not give out in this braggadocio way, which in fact would be very Trumpian. So I think he's trying to restrain himself. But look, I think if the Trump White House wanted to elevate somebody they would be focusing Trump's fire on Bernie Sanders or one of the other candidates that they are not as concerned about.

The fact that he's responding to Biden shows that it's not strategic because they are concerned about Biden as the nominee. It shows a lot of the Trump White House day to day tactics are just Trump watching TV and responding to what he sees on TV. It's not based on any kind of strategy that his campaign is giving him. It's him sitting in the residence until noon watching a DVR-ed morning news coverage and responding to it online. It's remarkable, but it's where we are. It does, guys, have the effect of creating this Trump versus Biden dynamic for the first five days of the campaign that Biden is in.

CAMEROTA: Everybody should DVR our show. That's one lesson that I can feel that we're getting.

MARTIN: I do every day, as you know.

BERMAN: Go ahead, Abby.

PHILLIP: It's also worth noting that the president is elevating Joe Biden, which seems like a good thing for Joe Biden. But I think Biden actually when he first came out of the gate benefited from some fairly low expectations in terms of how he would be able to raise money, how he would be able to compete on a sort of grassroots level. And there is a risk here that Joe Biden can become the sort of inevitable candidate, kind of like how Hillary was going into 2016. And that seems like it might be a good thing, but if you look at that poll that we just talked about, look at all the people who were in the double digits a few weeks ago who are now in the single digits. There is a lot of dynamism in this race right now, and there is a risk that you can start pretty high and drop precipitously.

And that's what Biden -- Biden wants to be in this sweet spot where he still is viewed as someone to be taken seriously but not flying too close to the sun. And I don't think there is a strategy for Trump, but the result for Biden could be something that he might want to temper just because it's so early in this race.

AVLON: Just one last thing, John Avlon, I will give you the last word here. There is one other place where Joe Biden wants to be, and that is in the shadow of President Obama. I just want to play you the campaign video that the Biden team put out a short time ago, just a little bit of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Joe talks to autoworkers whose livelihoods he helped save. We hear the son of a man who once knew the pain of having to tell his kids that he had lost his job. When Joe talks about hope and opportunity for our children, we hear the father who rode the rails home every night --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So what you can hear here is the sound of President Obama speaking when he was in office about Joe Biden. Our reporting, Jeff Zeleny is reporting that the Biden team did tell the Obama folks that this type of thing would happen.

CAMEROTA: Could, could.

AVLON: Look, to avoid the Heather Heyer mom mistake. Look, this is the kind of endorsement -- non-endorsement, but the halo effect of being part of the Obama/Biden ticket is enormously powerful in the Democratic primary. But I also think that this particular environment is suited to Joe Biden's strengths. Look at those top tier concerns that Democrats say they want -- ability to beat Trump, yes, experience, and then ability to work across the aisle is the third. That speaks to the stark difference between the two parties and the strength of some of Biden relationships in Washington and his reputation for personal decency. Again, we have a top tier that's moving. This is still early, but

Biden is very well positioned for where the party seems to be right now.

BERMAN: John Avlon, Abby Phillip, Jonathan Martin, we look forward to your dispatches from the Hawkeye state. Thank you very much

We do have breaking news out of Venezuela, the country's opposition leader Juan Guaido is now calling for a military uprising. The situation there is unfolding very quickly. These, I believe, are live pictures from the streets. Joining us now on the phone, CNN's Stefano Pozzebon. He is live in Caracas with all the breaking details. Stefano, bring us up to speed. What's happening?

[08:15:00]

STEFANO POZZEBON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John. It's (inaudible) and we are right next to those (inaudible) that there's been a (inaudible) military uprising here (in the heart of the Venezuelan capital, just meters from a key military airbase that is (inaudible) of Caracas. Right now, security forces inside the military base appear to be still loyal to embattled President Nicolas Maduro.

(Inaudible) I'm talking about (inaudible) here in the outskirts of these military bases. (Inaudible) members of the armed forces, military guardsman, whom appear to be wearing (inaudible) of a failed coup in 1992 (inaudible) Maduro has faced several military uprisings (ph) (inaudible) in the capital of Venezuela.

CAMEROTA: Yes, Stefano. These are obviously crucial hours, as you just said. And we should let our viewers know that you are wearing a gas mask out of necessity, which is why it makes some of your words hard to hear. But obviously, we're seeing what's happening when people are not wearing gas masks, how many people are in distress. They're trying to cover their face, as the situation there just continues to be such a hotbed of activity.

BERMAN: For people watching this very closely over the last few years, one key piece of information is Leopoldo Lopez, who was an opposition leader jailed in house arrest. He has been freed, and we saw pictures of him earlier this morning. This is a huge development. Lopez is someone with ties to the United States.

He's out now. We're trying to figure out exactly what this means and the impact of this. Also, given the call for a military uprising, what we need to figure out, over the next minutes and hours, is if there is a response, if the military is responding to this call for an uprising against the government. We can see obviously the violence on the streets.

CAMEROTA: And we're being told that President Trump has been briefed about this situation that is growing more heated. So we will wait for the White House's official response on what is happening in Caracas, and we'll bring that to you as soon as we have it. Meanwhile, President Trump is trying to prevent two of his banks from turning over his financial records to Congress. What does a member of one of the committees, who wants to see that information, think of this move? We ask her that and so much more, up next.

(BREAK)

[08:20:00]

CAMEROTA: New, this morning, the Trump team suing Deutsche Bank and Capital One in an attempt to block Congress from seeing his financial records. Let's bring in democratic Congresswoman Katie Porter. She serves on the House Financial Services Committee. That committee subpoenaed the banks to get info about President Trump's finances.

Congresswoman, thank you very much for being here. It sounds like the president and his adult children and businesses say that you want too much. You want too much. You're going back too far. You're looking into too many personal details. And they are suing to block you from being able to see that.

REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): Well, I support Chairwoman Waters doing her job on the Financial Services Committee. She's asking for these documents to fill in some of the gaps that are revealed in the Mueller report. And the president is not a private citizen. He has become a public figure by choosing to run for office

He gets public benefits like living in the White House and getting to fly on Air Force One, and with that comes disclosure of things that would otherwise be private. So I think those subpoenas are targeted, and I have great confidence in both of our court system and these financial institutions to disclose the documents.

Here's what the Trump legal team says. "The subpoenas issued to Deutsche Bank and Capitol One, Chairpersons Schiff and Waters, are unlawful and illegitimate. They seek information going back decades from anyone with even a tangential connection to the president including children, minors and spouses. He was a private citizen. His children were private citizens then. So how do you respond specifically to those complaints?

PORTER: When somebody runs for office and becomes elected, they have a duty to disclose and answer questions. The reason that we're asking for these documents is because they pertain to a pattern and practice of dealing with Deutsche Bank and Capitol One. We didn't subpoena every business dealing that the president has ever had. These subpoenas were narrowly targeted.

And I respect the president's desire to petition the courts for redress, but this is also a president who said he should enjoy special protection from the courts, and he should enjoy special protection from the president, for instance, from being - having to answer questions in person under oath during the Mueller report - Mueller investigation. And now he wants to have it the other way and be just a private citizen. So with public - with public duties come public responsibilities, and I think that's what we're trying to do here.

CAMERTOTA: I think the deadline, or the request, for the financial records is May 6th. That's very soon. And so, now that the president's team and his adult children, et cetera, have filed this lawsuit, are you going to be able to see these records?

PORTER: We're going to let the lawsuit, I'm sure, proceed forward. We have a duty as Congress to respect the rule of law and branches of government, but we may - the House may well choose to respond to that lawsuit and make its arguments. We have to respect what the court ultimately decides here. Like I said, the president has the ability to petition the courts, but we have our constitutional duty to do oversight here.

CAMEROTA: I want to move on to this Twitter spat, I guess you'd call it, that you got into yesterday with Chase. They backed down, is the upshot of this, and you went after them, basically for their tone deaf, I think is the word you would use, tweet, suggesting that people who can't necessarily pay their bills are kind of, you know, overspending or are spending on too many luxuries. Here's how it went, they said - they put out first this tweet.

[08:25:00]

You, "Why is my balance so low?" Bank account, "Make coffee at home." Bank account, "Eat the food that's already in the fridge." Bank account, "You don't need a cab. It's only three blocks. "You, "I guess we'll never know." Bank account, "Seriously?"

So that was sort of their cheeky way of suggesting that its people's fault for, you know, spending beyond their means. You then tweeted, "Hey, Chase, try paying your workers more. Families aren't spending frivolously. They're trying to pay rent." Were you gratified when you saw that they took that original tweet down and said basically, my bad?

PORTER: I was glad they took the tweet down. I think it's insulting to the hard working American people, many of whom are earning minimum wage or just above that who are struggling to pay rent, health insurance and other costs. So I think that it was important that they took the tweet down.

I think they should apologize to their customers. That's obviously their business decision. But we just had Mr. Dimon testify before the committee about the importance of everybody - you know, a financial system that works for everybody. He has taken on the mantel of leadership of the financial services industry.

And I think that means Chase should be leading the way in understanding why Americans are having trouble making ends meet, not making fun of them, not being sarcastic and not diminishing the real struggles American families face.

CAMEROTA: We have a moment of that exchange with Jamie Dimon, and I just want to play to play it, because your point was that a teller, who makes $37,000 a year, can't afford a lot of necessities. And so, I just want to watch this moment where you put Jamie Dimon in the hot seat.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PORTER: Mr. Dimon, she doesn't have the ability right now to spend your $31 million.

JAMIE DIMON, CEO, JPMORGAN CHASE: I am totally sympathetic.

PORTER: She's short 567. What would you suggest she do?

DIMON: I don't know. I'd have to think about that.

PORTER: Would you recommend that she take out a JPMorgan Chase credit card and run a deficit?

DIMON: I don't know. I'd have to think about it.

PORTER: Would you recommend that she overdraft at your bank and be charged overdraft fees?

DIMON: I don't know. I'd have to think about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: You gave him a lot of food for thought there. Did you hear back from him?

PORTER: I have not heard back from Mr. Dimon, and I think that's why I found this tweet particularly disheartening. I took Mr. Dimon at his word that he will think about what Americans should do and how we can improve the economy to ensure prosperity for every American family. There are a number of responses to that with increased wages being one of the possibilities.

We've asked Chase to consider raising their minimum wage to meet that of its competitor, Bank of America. But the other thing that Mr. Dimon could be reflecting on is the importance of lowering healthcare costs, prescription premiums, tackling the problem of housing affordability. He's one of our nation's most renowned business leaders, and I would welcome his help in trying to solve the problems that American families are facing, not belittle them.

CAMEROTA: Congresswoman Katie Porter, thank you very much for going over all of these topics with us.

PORTER: Thank you so much.

CAMEROTA: John?

BERMAN: A U.S. Army veteran charged with plotting terror attacks in the L.A. area. Find out why the FBI says he wanted to carry these attacks out in the first place. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:30:00]