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Democratic Presidential Candidates Campaign in New Hampshire Ahead of Primary; Democratic Presidential Candidates Chances in Next Three State Primaries and Caucuses Reviewed. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired February 10, 2020 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

MAYOR PETE BUTTIGIEG, (D-IN) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We cannot risk dividing Americans future further, saying that you must either be for a revolution or you must be for the status quo.

JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Come on, man, you think? This guy is not a Barack Obama.

BUTTIGIEG: He's right, I'm not. And neither is he.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: A small taste of the campaign trail. We will be there tomorrow morning and have a lot to discuss on that this morning.

In Washington the president's retribution tour continues. The question now is who is next on his list. He's already fired two officials who testified under oath in the impeachment investigation, Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman and the ambassador to E.U. Gordon Sondland. He's also lashing out at U.S. senators over impeachment votes. One of those senators, Joe Manchin, who has worked with the president in the past, he will join us live in a few moments.

Joining us now, though, to talk about what's going on in New Hampshire, CNN senior Washington correspondent Jeff Zeleny, CNN political correspondent Abby Phillip is here as well, and CNN political commentator Karen Finney. She's a former senior spokesperson for the Hillary Clinton campaign.

Jeff, it was interesting yesterday, Klobuchar, Buttigieg had their biggest crowds to date on the trail. Biden in response to a question from you, his most pointed comments, I think, to date having to do with the other candidates, namely Pete Buttigieg. What are you seeing?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: There's no question that Joe Biden was trying to essentially shake voters and say, look, look at me. Look at my experience. How can we elect someone who has such little experience? And the Biden campaign essentially started this. They said they were responding to what Pete Buttigieg was talking about in the Obama administration, but that really wasn't the case. The Biden campaign was trying to shake things up. Joe Biden was trying to show that he has fight, he has fire, and he's trying to make the electability argument that fell somewhat flat in Iowa.

But the Biden's campaign's digital ad over the weekend, essentially belittling the mayoral experience, if you will, of Pete Buttigieg is what launched that conversation. So that's why I asked the former vice president about those comments 12 years ago. I still remember very well, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden himself, others saying, look, Barack Obama is not experienced enough to be president. So he said at that point he's not a Barack Obama. Of course, he's not Barack Obama.

But interestingly, the Buttigieg campaign has been waiting for this moment. They were hoping it was going to come during the debate on Friday evening so he could say that on the debate stage, "and you're not either." That didn't happen, of course. So that's one of the underlying things here.

But the bigger picture here, things I'm keeping my eye on, could Pete Buttigieg overtake Bernie Sanders in the final hours here in New Hampshire? Certainly possible if independents come out and support his candidacy, that is possible. And boy, would that be a big thunderclap here if Bernie Sanders was not to win. Not predicting that at all. Bernie Sanders has many advantages here. That is one of the things that could surprise here tomorrow.

CAMEROTA: We just don't know what's going to happen, of course. As we've been taught, New Hampshire voters like to deal surprises sometimes, Karen.

ZELENY: They do.

CAMEROTA: Karen, what do you think? What are you looking at most closely today and for the next 24 hours?

KAREN FINNEY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: So I'm not surprised to see the attacks getting a little sharper. I think that's only going to continue. And better to have the candidates to see how they handle those attacks now than in a general election. And you can tell Pete was totally prepared for that, as Jeff pointed out.

I think the key thing is going to be, I expect Senator Sanders is going to have a good night. He blew our campaign out of the water essentially in 2016. He has the near home state advantage. I think what will be interesting to see, what about the rest? Does Pete come in -- if he does beat him, that's incredible, but does he come in a close second? And then what does third, fourth, and fifth look like? How close is it? And what does it look like in terms of where the votes come from? And most importantly, are we going to see higher turnout?

Obviously, we've talked about this before, the turnout in Iowa was disappointing for Democrats overall. And we're all hoping to see increasing turnout as we continue through the primary to show the kind of enthusiasm that overall that we're going to need to win in November.

BERMAN: So we had Symone Sanders, the senior adviser to Joe Biden on last hour. And there were a few interesting things about that. Number one, she was in South Carolina, not New Hampshire. Where she was sitting actually tells you a lot about where they stand heading into the New Hampshire primary tomorrow. Number two, I asked her bluntly, does Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, have the experience to be president on day one, and Symone answered no. So it wasn't that they were hinting anymore. They are just flat-out saying that Pete Buttigieg isn't ready to be president.

And then Abby, she also volunteered to me, she says whatever happens tomorrow, Joe Biden will still be in this race. But to loosely quote Robert Redford from "All the President's Men," I never asked her that. I never asked her if Joe Biden would be in this race no matter what happened tomorrow. So it was interesting to me she was volunteering, leading with that phrase.

[08:05:15]

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. They have been saying that the reports of Joe Biden's demise are greatly exaggerated, and that's probably true. But it really does suggest they are kind of ready to be out of New Hampshire. They are ready to go on to these other states, to be where Symone was sitting this morning. And the problem, though, is you cannot throw your hands up and surrender this early in the process. New Hampshire voters are paying attention to what is being said by Joe Biden and by his surrogates about how this campaign is going. And I don't know that they are really going to like being written off this early in the process.

And there is a real risk for him in being so far behind in the pack that by the time he gets to South Carolina, there's already a narrative that has sunk into the electorate that he is a weak candidate, that he is going into this weaker than he ought to be.

So, yes. Joe Biden will be here. He has the money. He has the coalition, which, frankly, none of the other candidates do. But I do think that there is more work to be done on the Biden campaign's part to just show their seriousness about going after these votes and being really aggressive. One of the interesting things in the last couple of days is just seeing the frenetic pace of some of these other candidates who are trying to unseat Biden as the frontrunner in this race. They are doing five and six rallies a day, five and six retail stops a day, pulling in crowds of 1,000 people and more. They are putting in a lot of work on the ground here, and there's a sense that Biden needs to show that same kind of vigor in order to not just do well here but just to demonstrate to voters that he is going after the ball just like all the other candidates are.

CAMEROTA: Hey, jeff, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, it seems as though some of the reporting suggests, and maybe the polling, in fact, that Amy Klobuchar has stolen some of Elizabeth Warren's momentum. But, of course, Elizabeth Warren is also a senator from a neighboring state, so what's that about?

ZELENY: There's no question that Elizabeth Warren also is looking for a bit of a reset here. Look, she was so strong in New Hampshire for so long throughout the summer, throughout the fall. She has campaigned here almost endlessly. And now she's sort of in a box, because Bernie Sanders is consolidating a lot of the progressive spirit, and Amy Klobuchar is taking a lot of the oxygen as well.

We still expect the Warren campaign, when you talk to their advisers, they still expect to do fine here. The question is how long does fine go. A third-place finish is essentially the best that most advisers believe that they can get now. And if that couldn't happen, that would be certainly a problem.

So the question for the Warren campaign, it's not been about her organization. She had a good one. It's the candidate herself. Some people looked at her and liked her. She has many supporters. But others have simply moved on.

But we should point out, the voters I was speaking to yesterday at a Pete Buttigieg rally in the evening and Amy Klobuchar rally, they say, look, we are undecided. So there is not quite half, perhaps four in 10 voters who say, look, they could still change their mind. So the Warren campaign is counting on some of those to come back to her, but that's pretty unusual. New Hampshire primary voters often like the hot candidate at the end, and it doesn't feel like that hot candidate at the end is Elizabeth Warren.

BERMAN: I've got to say, if they say a third-place finish is fine, they are defining down fine from what they would have said a long time ago. Third place for Elizabeth Warren in New Hampshire, which is a state they invested in heavily, which neighbors Massachusetts, as you point out, again, maybe it's fine now, would not have been fine if you were looking at this two months ago.

Karen Finney, as you do look at this, and I know there's an incentive for Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren to wait because Iowa and New Hampshire are so different, radically different, offensively, in some ways, different from the rest of the Democratic primary calendar. The African-American population will make up one percent, one percent tomorrow of Democratic voters in New Hampshire, one percent. It will be 60 percent in the South Carolina primary in two-and-a-half weeks. That's the level of difference we're talking about.

But you've got to get to South Carolina. You've got to last two-and-a- half more weeks in this environment. And I'm not sure -- or you tell me, how do you do that?

FINNEY: It means you've got to make sure you've got the money to get there and you've put in the time and the infrastructure both in Nevada and South Carolina. Nevada, as you know, is up next, and it's another caucus state, although they promised us they are not using the same app that Iowa used.

[08:10:05]

And then South Carolina is really, like New Hampshire, it is a mobilization challenge, because it is about getting people to the polls.

The one thing I want to just point out, though, there has been increasingly a shift in the Democratic Party as we've had this conversation since about 2005 about Iowa and New Hampshire and the need for greater diversity where, yes, New Hampshire, they will look at the momentum coming out of Iowa. But they also, there are states that will say, do I think that state got it right? Do we want to make sure, are we going to vote a different way because we think that maybe in South Carolina we'll see this? Joe Biden is the one for us and the one that really understands our issues, particularly if you see a large African-American electorate, which I would expect, which should favor Joe Biden.

So I think there is really a desire to look at the four early states as a composite. And I certainly think New Hampshire is excited to be up next tomorrow, but they know there's sort of an air -- something in the air among the party -- and I think the chairman talked about this a little bit yesterday with Jake Tapper -- there are probably going to be some changes. And so there's also a recognition that this may be the last time New Hampshire goes second and that we have this kind of build up to the two states that are more diverse, and for people to want that diversity and to see how those candidates can do in those environments earlier in the process.

CAMEROTA: Really interesting to think about that as well as each state -- at least the four states being a correction to the state that came before them. That's an interesting dynamic as well.

Karen, Abby, Jeff, thank you. And we'll see some of you very soon in New Hampshire.

Former Vice President Joe Biden speaks to CNN's Don Lemon ahead of the New Hampshire primary, that's tonight at 10:00 p.m. eastern. Tomorrow morning, the Berman and I will be live from Manchester, New Hampshire.

BERMAN: Driving through Massachusetts to get there, which is the whole reason to do it.

CAMEROTA: Get some Funyuns.

BERMAN: A red-state senator firing back at President Trump after the president mocked him for his vote to convict. Senator Joe Manchin joins us live, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:15:43]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump this morning lashing out after his impeachment trial. This is what the President wrote about Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia who voted to convict the President, "They are really mad at Senator Joe Munchkin in West Virginia. He couldn't understand the transcripts. Romney could, but didn't want to."

Joining us now is the Democratic senator from the State of West Virginia, Joe Manchin.

Senator Manchin, thanks so much for being with us.

SEN. JOHN MANCHIN (D-WV): Hey, John, how are you? BERMAN: What does it tell you that the President has targeted you

with that? Not just actually -- I'm not going to put the other ones up. But I think there are three more which say basically the same thing.

MANCHIN: Sure. I don't worry about the Munchkin. I think I'm a little bit bigger than he is taller. But anyway, I guess, it is not surprising. I mean, I expected this.

John, I can only tell you that, you know, I listened for two weeks what the Articles of Impeachment that were sent from the House. It was very clear. It was laid out very well, very professional.

I thought for sure, the President said he wanted to make sure that he defended himself in the Senate. He thought he'd get a fair trial. He wanted witnesses and I thought well, that will help give us both sides.

But we never got that. No witnesses. They voted against even having John Roberts to negotiate any type of dispute that might happen if witnesses were both sides chosen -- equal amounts of witnesses and someone disputed, well, that's not relevant to the charges brought against the President.

All of these things could have been worked out and had a very good trial. It was very upfront and honest and had information that we needed.

Well, they took a position that the President can do no wrong, and the executive powers of the presidency puts them above the law, and I don't think that that's the framers of the Constitution -- it definitely wasn't Hamilton's when he wrote Federalist 65.

And I understood the transcript very well, and it was very clear that here is the most powerful person in the world calling the most inexperienced leader of a country that's being attacked by Russia, and everything that we stand for is to protect our allies, and then said, I need a favor. I need you to do something for me, and that's not who we are.

Democracy should not be conditioned, should definitely not be conditioned on political involvement in our country.

BERMAN: What does it tell you, Senator, and you are somewhat, a Democrat who's gone to great lengths to work with the President on some things. What does it tell you about him that he is calling you names this morning?

MANCHIN: Which I am here -- here is the thing. I'm his best chance of having anything in a bipartisan way. I think I voted 56 percent of the time with them, almost 50/50, a little bit more really.

I look at the -- I look at every vote that we have, I cast my vote based on a finding, go home and explain it. I've been chastised for votes for the Democratic Party. I've been chastised for votes for the Republican Party. But in West Virginia, you have to have some commonsense and go home

and explain, people expect that. I can explain this, but I assumed that when I made that decision, and I said, back home in West Virginia, if someone accuses you something, John, you can't wait if you know you're innocent -- you can't wait to defend yourself.

You can't wait to bring evidence forward and bring witnesses forward that shows that you're absolutely wronged. It was a wrong accusation, and I'm innocent.

I was hoping for that. We never got any of that, and I had to make my decision based on the evidence that was presented was overwhelming, and for the sake of my country, I mean, I like the President, I just love my country, and I'm going to do what's right for my country.

I can explain that all day long.

BERMAN: You still like him? He called you a Munchkin.

MANCHIN: Oh, that doesn't bother me; names never have. I understand that. I mean, I'm not going to call him names. I mean, I've heard the names that people respond back.

I have respect for the President. I want my President to do well. He's still my President. I want him to do well and succeed.

BERMAN: Do you respect with that behavior? Do you respect the behavior?

MANCHIN: I don't respect it. I was going to say this, John. But I expect every American and myself would like my President and our President, to act like a responsible adult, and he's not, and I hope he does.

For the sake of our country, I hope he does.

BERMAN: One of the things that you were asked over the last few days is some Democrats have suggested they're going to keep investigating him. They were asked about a possibility of a second go round. And you said no, no, you don't want a second go round on impeachment unless, the President continues using -- and this is where I'm quoting here -- "rogue proxies such as Rudy Giuliani running around playing with foreign policy."

Okay. So you said that. This is what Lindsey Graham said of Rudy Giuliani just yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Can you clarify? You said you talked to Attorney General Barr?

[08:20:06]

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): This morning.

QUESTION: This morning. Has the Department of Justice been ordered to investigate the Bidens?

GRAHAM: No, the Department of Justice is receiving information coming out of the Ukraine from Rudy.

QUESTION: Already?

GRAHAM: To see -- he told me that they have created a process that Rudy could give information, and they would see if it's verified.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So you said you had concerns about, "rouge proxies such as Rudy Giuliani running around playing with foreign policy." Isn't that what's happening? If Rudy Giuliani is handing stuff over to the Justice Department, as Lindsey Graham just said, doesn't that meet the standard you said as being of high concern?

MANCHIN: Absolutely, John. It should be -- it should be outlawed. It should be against the laws of the American -- the American people and against our Constitution and who are.

You shouldn't have -- the President -- the Executive Branch of government or the Legislative Branch or any branch of government shouldn't use rogue proxies that aren't beholding to the people, that don't answer to the people, that go out there and basically use the power of an office, whether it's a senator's office or whether it's the President's office, saying, I'm speaking on behalf of someone so and so.

Then that person or myself or the President calls and says, hey, if someone -- if Rudy shows up, I want you to work with him.

That's a lot of pressure on people. That is absolutely not who we are, and it should not be done. It should not be tolerated. And I'm going to see if we can get bipartisan legislation that would prevent any of us from ever abusing our powers at all. And that should not be --

What Rudy has done is absolutely horrible in our country who we are as a people.

BERMAN: I want to ask you about something else that was said by Matt Schlapp who is in charge of CPAC - Conservative Political Action Committee. This has to do with Mitt Romney, who was the one Republican who voted to convict the President.

CPAC is not inviting Mitt Romney to come speak, but Matt Schlapp actually went further than that. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MATT SCHLAPP, CHAIRMAN, CONSERVATIVE ACTION COMMITTEE: We won't credential him as a conservative. I suppose if he wants to come as a non-conservative and debate an issue with us, maybe in the future, we would have them come.

This year, I would actually be afraid for his physical safety. People are so mad at him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: His physical safety, Senator.

MANCHIN: It's awful.

BERMAN: What does that tell?

MANCHIN: Let me tell you one thing, there's not -- I have not met a more honorable person than Mitt Romney, and I mean that. I have known Mitt, we were both governors together. We just came -- I came in in 2004, he left in 2006. So we knew each other a little bit then.

We became very good friends here. There's not a more honorable human being that really has the best interest of his country -- and our country, and his State of Utah than the Mitt Romney.

I just -- I just -- it's hard to believe that we've stooped this low. You know, we've always come back. I believe in our country, I believe in my State of West Virginia, as Mitt believes in Utah, good people, and good people finally come basically, they are going to pull the wool over their eyes for so long.

I hope the President changes his ways. I hope he becomes a responsible adult, and I hope he succeeds. And I want to work with him if we can, but I'm going to be an honest broker.

And if I can go home and explain that I vote for it, and if I can't, I won't.

BERMAN: Senator Joe Manchin. Thanks for coming on. You're always a great sport explaining yourself and your votes here on NEW DAY. We look forward to speaking to you again real soon.

MANCHIN: Thank you, John. It's always good to be with you.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Really interesting to hear from him. He's clearly taking the high road and I don't mean the yellow brick road out of Munchkinville. There you go.

BERMAN: I see what you did there.

CAMEROTA: Yes. Thank you. All right there has been --

BERMAN: But he is taller. He is taller than the President, which he did not hesitate to point out right at the beginning.

CAMEROTA: He made that point. Yes, I got that. Meanwhile, there's been this alarming rise in the number of coronavirus cases on that quarantined cruise ship, so what does that mean for the rest of us? We have a live report for you next.

Plus this story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER: Wow. Oh my god.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is that you?

O'SULLIVAN: That photo is me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Okay, CNN tests a facial recognition app. It some say goes way too far.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:27:39]

BERMAN: Breaking news. The number of coronavirus cases on that quarantined cruise ship in Japan nearly doubled overnight.

An additional 65 cases have now been confirmed bringing the total number to 135; one dozen of them Americans.

CNN's Will Ripley is live in Tokyo with the breaking details. Doubled, Will. Tell us about this.

WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And, you know, John, we saw earlier in the week, the number tripled. At that point it was, you know, from 20 to 64. But now, yes, 64 to 135.

The Captain of the Diamond Princess cruise ship is trying to reassure passengers that this is not a result of a failure of the quarantine. In fact, he says the quarantine is working. And these are people who were exposed before the quarantine took effect.

Many of them, part of the reason why they weren't detected sooner, they weren't showing any symptoms. They didn't even have a fever, because they're not testing everybody on the ship. They're giving everybody a thermometer, they say put in your mouth and if you have an elevated temperature, you know, over a certain threshold, we will then -- you know, let us know and then we'll give you the throat swab and we'll test you.

The Japanese government says it's quite difficult to test, you know, the remaining 3,500 people or so who are on the ship. A lot of those people who haven't tested positive frankly, they want to be tested because they want to know and they want to get treatment if they have it.

Those who do have it actually seem a lot more relaxed in many cases from Rebecca Frasure, the American woman who I interviewed and you saw, you know, and heard from her at the six o'clock hour to, you know, some of her friends who have also tested positive and are simply showing no symptoms.

So this is something that we need to stress. The vast majority of these people are doing just fine and certainly will recover, even though obviously the situation in China is very grim, very difficult and to see the Chinese President Xi Jinping, you know, now wearing a face mask himself, that just for some people is quite alarming.

And you know, the images are alarming. The stories out of Wuhan are heartbreaking. But there are also a lot of people who are okay, and this is not a time to panic. That's one of the most interesting things that people who have tested positive have told me, yes, you have got to take this very seriously. Make sure you're washing your hands, make sure you're taking all the precautions you can, but don't panic -- guys.

CAMEROTA: Yes. It's just hard to know, Will, I mean, it's hard to know if symptoms will develop after they've tested positive or when.

But thank you very much for giving us the status report from the ground there. That's really valuable.

All right now to this, social media of course has completely changed the way we share photos with our family and friends. But now, a startup called Clear View AI is triggering fears about how far --

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