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Donald Trump Speaks Out; New York Stock Exchange Shuts Down; United Suspends Flights. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired July 08, 2015 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:25]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Here we go, hour two of CNN here. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

We have the breaking news. Any minute now, the New York Stock Exchange, we're hearing, could be reopening, so we just want to make sure we're there. We will take you there.

This has been a wild day of technical glitch after technical glitch after technical glitch. I'm talking three massive U.S. operations brought to their knees. You have the New York Stock Exchange suspending trading now for three to four hours now after experiencing an internal technical issue that started around 11:30 this morning.

Right around that same time, "The Wall Street Journal"'s home page went dark, and earlier this morning United Airlines grounded thousands of flights worldwide due to what is called network connectivity issue and not a cyber-breach.

Let me first bring in first Alison Kosik. She is at the New York Stock Exchange, as we're waiting to see all of this trading resume.

Well, what's the word that you have, Alison?

ALISON KOSIK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the official word initially was the exchange was going to open between 2:45 and 3:00. Now we're hearing 3:05, and that actually seems like more of a certainty and you can just sort of feel the anticipation in the air.

I actually see some of the traders getting ready for trading to resume. That's essentially what will happen. Trading will resume. The question was whether or not trading would resume or they would start kind of like a new trading day, but that trading will resume, and I just want to say that it's important, one trader told me, that the stock market reopen to close, and what that means is that these mutual funds that trade here, that these stocks that trade here, they need a closing price.

And they don't get the closing price if you don't have the closing bell, so this exchange has to reopen to close, and they are banking on it today, Brooke.

BALDWIN: OK, since 11:32 this morning Eastern time,

Alison Kosik, we will come back to you and see how the markets respond, so stand by, please, for that.

I have got more breaking news right now as I continue on. Tonight, Anderson Cooper sits down with Donald Trump. We were just talking to Carl Bernstein, who said Donald Trump was the biggest gift to the Democratic Party. Listen, you know he's really quintupled down on these comments about Mexicans and immigrants and those comments are costing the Republican presidential candidate dearly thus far, although when you look at polls, you know, it hasn't cost him that much.

Let me bring in Anderson, who just got miked up and sat down, to talk to me a little bit about your interview.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. I certainly asked him a lot about those comments, none of which he is backtracking on, I should say.

BALDWIN: He's not?

COOPER: No. And he also takes on other Republican challengers who now have come out against many of the comments that he made.

I also started the interview by asking him about a report now that "The Washington Post" -- they interviewed some 15 workers at a hotel that's being built in Washington, D.C., that Trump owns, being built by Trump, and they said that several of those -- they didn't give an exact number -- of those workers were illegal immigrants.

So, obviously, that raises questions of hypocrisy, as Donald Trump on the one hand saying that illegal immigration is killing this country, is hurting this country, taking jobs from Americans...

BALDWIN: And yet he's employing them.

COOPER: ... and at the same time employing them.

I talked to him about that. Let's show it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: "The Washington Post," as you know, say that some of the workers building this beautiful hotel that you're building down in Washington, D.C., are illegal. They talked to 15 workers. They said a number of those 15 came here legally.

Through asylum, they are now legal, but that a number of them did say they are illegal. Isn't it hypocritical for you, saying that illegal immigration is killing this country, to be employing illegal immigrants?

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I read the story, and we're building a great hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue and it's being done beautifully. And we're very, very -- I'm very cognizant of that, and, by the way, that story does not name any names. I would love for them if they could give us the names. But they said they spoke to one or two, and -- but they don't name them. They don't even know if it's true.

COOPER: Well, what they say is several of the men who hail mostly from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala have earned citizenship or legal status through immigration programs targeting Central Americans fleeing civil wars or natural disasters. Others quietly acknowledge that they remain in the country illegally.

(CROSSTALK)

[15:05:02]

TRUMP: They have to give us the names, because we have...

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: They are not going to give you names.

TRUMP: They have to give us the names.

And I have to say this. We believe so strongly -- I hired a very big contractor, one of the most prestigious, one of the best in the world, to build the building. It's their responsibility to make sure.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Doesn't the buck stop with you, though?

TRUMP: Yes, it does.

COOPER: You're paying their salary.

TRUMP: Oh, absolutely.

We have gone out of way to make sure that everybody in that building is legal, and we do have some that were -- that became legal. And wait a minute. We have some, many, I think, that became -- frankly, me, you, everybody, ultimately, we were all sort of in the group of immigrant, right?

COOPER: Right.

TRUMP: But we have done that to the absolute letter of the law. We're very, very careful.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: But if "The Washington Post" can go there and talk to 15 people and find some illegal immigrants...

TRUMP: They haven't shown us anything. I wish they would give us some names. We would get them out immediately.

COOPER: But you have got a guy -- you must have a guy on the job site.

TRUMP: We have more than one guy.

COOPER: Yes.

TRUMP: And we check it probably more carefully than ever job that was ever built.

Anderson, you have either 11 -- anywhere from 11 to 34 million illegal immigrants in this country. They are all over the place. Nobody knows even where they come from. They probably come some from the Middle East. You don't know where they are coming from.

We check on that building probably more carefully than anybody that's ever built a building before. And I think, from what I heard -- and I just checked it this morning because I asked the question because I read the article also -- we are absolutely in beautiful, perfect shape. Now, I wish they would give us the names. We would get rid of them immediately.

COOPER: This isn't the first time though this has been an issue. Daily Beast, today, there's an article -- I don't know if you have seen it. The headline says -- they are talking about the building we're sitting in right now. They are saying Trump Tower was built on undocumented immigrant backs.

TRUMP: How many years ago was that?

COOPER: This was, what...

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Thirty-five years ago.

COOPER: Thirty-five years ago.

TRUMP: Yes, they said 35 years ago.

COOPER: But this was a court case, 200 illegal immigrants, Polish workers, guys working for $5.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: I hired a contractor. Anderson, I hire a contractor. The contractor then hires a subcontractor. They have people. I don't know -- I don't remember. That was so many years ago; 35 years ago, they said we had some...

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: But this was a court case settled in 1999. You settled with them.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: That's all right. That's fine. I remember the case, frankly. I remember it very well.

We hire contractors. The contractor, very highly prestigious, very good contractor, they go out and hire subcontractors. Sometimes, the subcontractors will have people working, but, you know, it's pretty far down the line.

COOPER: This was 200 Polish workers working without hardhats, pretty noticeable on a union job.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: When you have to go back 35 years to tell me about something, I think that's pretty pathetic, to be honest with you.

COOPER: Do you think -- can you guarantee that you don't have illegal or undocumented workers working for you in hotel projects or various projects?

TRUMP: I can't guarantee it. How can I? How can anyone? We have 34 million in the country.

I used to hear 11. Now I hear 34 million. I can't guarantee anything. But I can say this. We work very hard to make sure that everybody is legal, as opposed to illegal.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: There you have it, Donald Trump saying he can't guarantee that there aren't other illegal immigrants working in some of his projects, but that he works very hard to try to make sure there aren't.

BALDWIN: Just quickly, while I have are for you another 60 seconds, before we go to the New York Stock Exchange, I want you to reiterate the point that you were making with him that was in that Daily Beast article, that the -- that, what, Trump Tower was built...

COOPER: Daily Beast has put out an article that there was a court case, a lawsuit brought against him years ago that the Trump Tower, the building that was there originally, which was Bonwit Teller...

BALDWIN: Which is where you were sitting?

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Right, was actually taken down and the land cleared by some 200 illegal immigrants, Polish workers, who were working for $5 a day -- $5 an hour, 12 hours a day seven days a week.

They ultimately sued and it went on for a long period of time. Trump said he did not -- in the lawsuit said that he didn't know that there were illegal immigrants working on that job site until later on.

BALDWIN: OK. Stay with me. We are going to pivot back to the New York Stock Exchange, but I have more with Anderson's interview as he presumably -- you asked him about some of these other candidates this race. We will have Anderson back in a second.

But let me go to the New York Stock Exchange to Alison Kosik, who has been watching very closely and been talking to some of those traders.

What is the latest guidance you have? Are we talking, what, 60 seconds from now?

KOSIK: Very well could be, Brooke. That is the word from the New York Stock Exchange, that the stock exchange will officially reopen in one minute.

Now, some stocks have already opened. That's why you see this crowd around me. I'm actually near a trading post where some stocks have reopened, but the broad range of stocks that are traded here on the floor, we hear from the New York Stock Exchange, will open in about 40 seconds.

You know, there was a lot of skepticism whether or not the exchange was going to be able to go ahead and get things up and running. And you talk to many traders and they will tell you that they think it's important for stocks to reopen, even if it was only for half-an-hour. It's important to open, so they can close, merely because it's important that you get the closing values on those stocks, for those mutual funds at the end of the day.

They say and also for confidence reasons, they are looking for the New York Stock Exchange to reopen, everybody anticipating it. You can see the commotion on the floor, everybody looking at their computers. We're waiting for them to start, a couple seconds away. Let's see if that's going to happen.

[15:10:10]

And I'm hearing some applause. I'm not seeing it yet. Are you guys open? Are you open?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, it looks like it's open.

KOSIK: OK. There's a little confusion, but it looks like it's open, but they are not getting orders at this moment, Brooke.

I'm going to walk out of the frame for a second.

Is it open?

It's open, but they are not getting orders. So the question is, is what kind of connectivity is going on between the brokers and the New York Stock Exchange as well? That was actually a question this morning, whether or not the exchange was even going to open, some traders were wondering if the exchange was even going to open today because of the connectivity issues between brokers and the New York Stock Exchange.

I'm going to step out once again and see if things are working. BALDWIN: Go for it. We are going to stay on this picture. We are

going to stay on this picture. You figure out -- Alison Kosik can officially figure out if the exchange is still open.

Keep in mind, listen, in a typical trading day, as it will today, will close in about 50 minutes from now. I can see Alison looking around, she's still asking. Live news, folks. We're doing this on the fly trying to figure out all the commotion around her.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Go ahead, Alison.

KOSIK: A lot of confusion, a lot of confusion, Brooke. Everybody is shaking their heads, yes, it's open, but their faces don't look happy, which means they are not getting orders, so it could be that the exchange is open and all is not perfect at this moment, but it is open for business.

BALDWIN: OK. I'm going to let you go. Let's make sure we confirm that.

I'm going to go back to Anderson, and as soon as you get that officially, we will go back.

We're just going to bounce around here at the top of the hour, back to Anderson.

COOPER: Live news.

BALDWIN: Live news, people, live news.

You just sat down with Donald Trump. We were hearing some of his comments really totally doubling down on all things.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Yes. What's also interesting, there was a tweet, a retweet that was sent out from Donald Trump's Twitter feed and that was then later on deleted, according to TheWrap.

And in it, it talked about Jeb Bush and Jeb Bush's wife and suggesting that perhaps that Jeb Bush's position on illegal immigration was influenced by his wife, by his relationship with his wife. I talked to Donald Trump about that. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: You have been very vocal in the media, very accessible. You're on Twitter. There was a tweet that caused you problems that was rescinded. It was a retweet about Jeb Bush's wife.

TRUMP: Yes.

COOPER: The original tweet said Jeb Bush has to like the Mexican illegals because of his wife. That was somebody else said that. You retweeted it. Did you authorize that? Do you regret that?

TRUMP: No, I didn't authorize it.

But I will say this. Look, I have millions of people on Twitter and Facebook. I think I have over five million people on both. That's a lot of people. It's sort of like...

COOPER: So, do you regret that going out?

TRUMP: It's sort of like owning a newspaper, a big one, without the lawsuits. It's good.

I don't regret anything. Look, some -- we -- it was a retweet. It wasn't me. And it was actually -- if you look at it carefully, it was a retweet of a Breitbart story that was a very good story, a very fair story, a very strong, a very good story.

But do I regret it? No, I don't regret it. Look, I would say that he would. If my wife were from Mexico, I think I would have a soft spot for people from Mexico. I can understand that.

COOPER: You think that influences his position on illegal immigration?

TRUMP: I think it could. Maybe it should, if he loves his wife -- and I know he does. I hear she's a lovely woman, by the way.

So if he loves his wife and she's from Mexico, I think it probably has an influence on him, yes. I can understand that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: No regrets.

COOPER: No regrets, and he continues on. It's a very wide-ranging interview. We talked for more than 40 minutes. It's really fascinating. He talks very specifically about what he would do against ISIS in Iraq.

I really tried to get him on specifics, because, in the past, sometimes he just sort of talks in general.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Were you successful?

COOPER: Actually, yes, in particular on the ISIS thing. It's quite interesting what he says his plan is and we will play more of that obviously throughout the day and tonight.

BALDWIN: OK, good deal.

Anderson Cooper, thank you so much, 8:00 tonight, "A.C. 360" for more on that.

And live TV once again. We will go back live to the New York Stock Exchange and figure out what the deal is there.

Alison Kosik, have they reopened?

KOSIK: You know what? This is sort of something that's happening at the moment. Really, it's never happened like this before, so there is a lot of confusion, but the short answer is that the New York Stock Exchange is back and open, although it's opening very slowly.

One trader telling me customers right now are a little timid, they are not necessarily sending in their buy orders or their sell orders. So they're waiting. The fact of the matter is, the exchange is open. It's important, though, that it stays open until the closing bell at 4:00, without any glitches. That's what everybody is sort of holding their breath for.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: A couple of questions for you. Stay with me, Alison. When we saw you a couple minutes ago, you were just sort of swarmed by, I don't know if it was traders, mostly media.

[15:15:03]

Can you just talk about the sense? Give me a little color from the floor.

KOSIK: Confusion, lots of confusion, mass confusion here. Is it open? Is it not open? Why are no orders coming in? Also the anticipation and the preparation for what will come, because a lot of these traders didn't know how the stock exchange was actually going to open to trade.

Was it going to resume trade, meaning -- stocks had been trading all day. Just because the New York Stock Exchange has been out of business essentially, stocks have been trading on other exchanges. So what the New York Stock Exchange essentially did is say, yes, we're going to go ahead and open for business, but we're not going to open with a clean slate, meaning starting -- sort of like starting over on a new day.

We're going to start with the train still rolling, with those trades still rolling, as they have been all day. So these traders here are having to jump on that train and resume trading like it hasn't stopped all day. So that does cause a little confusion, and that's why you are seeing sort of the pause and the deliberate movement of these traders at the moment. They are not as hurried as they normally would be.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Still seems pretty frenetic. I imagine, working there on the New York Stock Exchange floor, that is par for the course.

Alison Kosik, thank you so much for rolling with this.

Again, just reiterating what she's reported, the New York Stock Exchange is now officially open for really just about 40 more minutes of the trading day and we will watch some of the numbers. As she pointed out, some of the numbers had been ticking up and down. Some of the other exchanges had been still open today, Nasdaq, et cetera.

But keep in mind 82 percent of trading at the New York Stock Exchange is electronic. So when you have an internal technical issue, again, internal technical issue, not the result of a cyber-breach, what happens is what we have all witnessed the last couple of hours.

Quick break. We're back with more breaking news here on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:20:57]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: "The Washington Post," as you know, say that some of the workers building this beautiful hotel that you're building down in Washington, D.C., are illegal. They talked to 15 workers. They said a number of those 15 came here legally.

Through asylum, they are now legal, but that a number of them did say they are illegal. Isn't it hypocritical for you, saying that illegal immigration is killing this country, to be employing illegal immigrants?

TRUMP: I read the story, and we're building a great hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue and it's being done beautifully.

And we're very, very -- I'm very cognizant of that, and, by the way, that story does not name any names. I would love for them if they could give us the names. But they said they spoke to one or two, and -- but they don't name them. They don't even know if it's true.

COOPER: Well, what they say is several of the men who hail mostly from El Salvador...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: That was just a piece of Anderson Cooper's sit-down with Donald Trump. Just ran back from the sit-down, 40 minutes with him and talked about his doubling down on the remarks he's had with regard to illegal immigration.

Clearly, he's not backing down and talking about some of the other candidates in the race and talking about this hotel that's being built not too far from the White House. "Washington Post" story saying several undocumented immigrants working on that hotel, which would paint the picture of hypocrisy for Mr. Trump. Again, he says doubling down on that as well.

Let's talk about this. Let's chew on this with our chief congressional correspondent, Dana Bash. I have got Jeff Zeleny, our senior Washington correspondent, and CNN chief political analyst Gloria Borger. And if we can, all three of you, just I want your gut reactions out of the gate, round-robin style, of what you thought of just those few minutes of TV we got from Anderson.

Dana, to you first.

DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know what? When you're doing well in the polls, you have got to be prepared for scrutiny, and this is exactly what Donald Trump is getting, and there is a lot to scrutinize.

I mean, when you have, as he likes to talk about, a multi-billion- dollar company and you have so many sort of tentacles of it, there's a lot to drill down on, especially when he made the controversial remarks that he made and he's sticking to.

Of course, there are going to be stories and probably more like this about illegal or undocumented workers working for parts of his company and, of course, you're not going to get the names of them because anybody, you know, with even half of a brain who is undocumented won't give their name.

BALDWIN: Of course.

BASH: Because they will be deported, so that's a little bit of a red herring.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Of course, it seemed like he was pushing it off on the contractor.

(CROSSTALK)

BASH: Welcome to the big leagues.

BALDWIN: Right, right, welcome.

Jeff Zeleny, your turn.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Dana is right.

Look, running for president is harder than talking about running for president and that's what Donald Trump has always done. He's talked about running for president and now that he's actually running, he's sort of going through the gauntlet here and every word you say comes back at you.

So the reality is, though, Brooke, he's still talking about this. This isn't what voters necessarily want to hear about. It's certainly not what the party wants to hear about, so the biggest question is how quickly does he move beyond this? Does he stop doubling down on this and sort of change the subject?

It sounds like he is doing that in part of the interview on ISIS and other things, but this immigration thing is a loser for Donald Trump and maybe his party.

BALDWIN: But we keep asking him about it, Gloria Borger.

ZELENY: Fair enough.

BALDWIN: Because it's so sort of outrageous. We are. And he continues to, you know, come back with, you know, even louder, more vociferous retorts.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Right.

As I was listening to Donald Trump, my thought was first rule of holes, stop digging, OK, and he keeps digging himself in deeper and deeper. The other thing I thought about was Mitt Romney. Remember when Mitt Romney was talking about that issue of self-deportation, when he moved to the right during the Republican primaries last time?

And then a story came out and he was criticized because some landscapers who worked on his property were apparently illegal immigrants, and he had to deal with that whole controversy. So Anderson is right in asking the question. OK, you're against illegal immigration, you want to build some big wall. Isn't it hypocritical? And the answer, is of course, yes, which is why he kept digging himself a deeper hole.

[15:25:00]

BALDWIN: Poll numbers, ladies and gentlemen, in my hands, just to remind all of us, those of us who are keeping score. This is a CNN/ORC poll from June.

Republicans' choice for nominee in 2016, number one at the top here, you have Jeb Bush, number two, Donald Trump. He is second in the poll as well for who can best handle the economy and who can best handle illegal immigration? This is CNN/ORC.

My question -- I was just talking to Carl Bernstein, the legendary Carl Bernstein, and he says that he thinks Donald Trump is the biggest gift to the Dems in this election cycle. Gloria Borger, do you agree?

BORGER: Yes. I think he's a great gift and you saw Hillary Clinton in her interview with Brianna Keilar yesterday kind of swat them all along with Donald Trump. She said, well, you know, Donald Trump, they are not attacking him enough.

And, you know, it's very convenient for Hillary Clinton to be able to paint them all with the same broad stroke as Donald Trump because, of course, as you know, Republicans disagree about what to do about illegal immigration, so it's a total gift to Hillary Clinton, and I think Republicans ought to be using Trump as a foil more and they are starting to do that, but I guarantee you we're going to hear more and more of it.

BALDWIN: They're starting to do that, but at the same time, Dana Bash, you have the Rudy Giulianis and the Ted Cruzes of the world who are supporting him. Is that helping Trump? BASH: You know, no. I think for Trump it doesn't matter. I think

the Ted Cruzes of the world hope it helps Ted Cruz, which is why he's making a very strong case for being kind of on Donald Trump's side.

But, look, from the minute that Trump gave his now infamous announcement speech, where he made these remarks about Mexican illegal immigrants being rapists and criminals and so forth, I got -- and as -- I'm sure -- I know my colleagues also got, you know, calls from Republican candidates, from their campaigns, saying, are you kidding me? Why are you taking this guy seriously? He's not going to be president.

And you know what? I'm not getting those calls anymore, not because they think he's going to be president, but because they know he's a force to be reckoned with. They are not happy about it and more importantly the party in general is not happy about it for the reason that Gloria was just talking about. It just takes them down a road that they were hoping, you know, was cut off in 2012 when dealing with and talking about and the rhetoric about illegal immigrants for a party that is so desperately trying to reach out to the Hispanic and Latino community.

This is absolutely the last thing that they need and they are trying to figure out a way out of it.

BALDWIN: Dana Bash, Jeff Zeleny, Gloria Borger, thank you all very, very much.

Again, a reminder, we just saw a piece of it, but Anderson told me he sat down with Donald Trump for 40 minutes. Watch this interview tonight, "A.C. 360" 8:00 p.m. Eastern here on CNN.

Coming up, back to our breaking news, the New York Stock Exchange has now just mere minutes ago reopened. It was a computer glitch that brought it to a standstill for hours today. As I reported, trading has restarted just a couple of minutes ago. We will take you back there live.

Also, does this glitch here, though, reveal serious security concerns? We will explore coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)