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New Day
Clinton Draws Sharp Contrast To Trump's America; Two Police Officers Shot In San Diego; Charges Dropped In Chandra Levy Murder. Aired 5:30-6a ET
Aired July 29, 2016 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[05:31:00] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: One hundred and one days to go to the election and all eyes are on the contrast between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, and Johnson.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Did you just say 101?
CAMEROTA: Yes, 101.
CUOMO: I thought this was it. This wasn't it?
CAMEROTA: No, we actually have more. Trump says that he, alone, can fix things. Hillary Clinton says it takes a village.
CUOMO: One hundred and one, you sure?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I have joined the political arena so that the powerful can no longer beat up on people who cannot defend themselves. Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I, alone, can fix it.
HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: He's forgetting every last one of us. Americans don't say I, alone, can fix it. We say we'll fix it together.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAMEROTA: All right, let's discuss these differing viewpoints with CNN political commentator and the vice chair of the New York State Democratic Party, Christine Quinn, and CNN political commentator and KABC talk radio host, John Phillips. Christine supports Clinton, John supports Trump. Great to have both you here, good morning.
JOHN PHILLIPS, CNN, POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, TALK RADIO HOST, KABC: Good morning.
CHRISTINE QUINN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, VICE CHAIR, NY STATE DEMOCRATIC PARTY: Thank you.
CAMEROTA: So John, did Hillary Clinton saying we do this together -- did that somehow take some of the wind out of Donald Trump's "I, alone" plan? PHILLIPS: When you're the party that's in charge of government you talk about things in terms of "we". When you're the party that's outside of government you talk about things in terms of "I". He is presenting himself as the change agent. He's saying I'm going to go in there, I'm going to change things, I'm not going to -- to quote Arnold Schwarzenegger, I'm not going to move around the boxes, I'm going to blow them up.
And if you talk about that in terms of "we", it doesn't seem like it's as dynamic and as immediate enough as if you say "I" because that makes it seem like oh, I'm going to get a little group together, we're going to study things and we're going evaluate things. No, he's saying I'm going to go in there, I'm going to change things, and in a year when voters aren't happy with the direction of government that's a good image to have.
CUOMO: What do you see as the advantage in surrendering the "me" to the "we"?
QUINN: Look, I think he said "I, alone". This isn't about grammar or which pronouns we're using, in my opinion. I mean, I think Donald Trump very clearly made the statement that he believes he has all of the answers and that he can get whatever it is he sees that has to happen - he can get it done himself.
And I think the problem with that isn't the semantics, it isn't which party is in the White House, or any of that. It speaks to his world view. He sees everything through the eyes of Donald Trump -- everything as it relates to how he can do more, how he can make more money. He's not somebody who sees the United States as a community or the United States as the leading member of the community of the world, and I think we see that over and over again.
He used Brexit as an opportunity to make more money on his golf course. He views bankruptcy laws as things to be manipulated so he can leave contractors and small businesses in the lurch and never get paid. He does not see himself as a part of a greater whole and I think that is a huge problem for the person who wants to be president of this country.
[05:35:00] CAMEROTA: Let's look at our InstaPoll that is sort of the snap poll that we took right after Hillary Clinton spoke. We also did the same for Donald Trump with CNN. So in terms of who felt very positively, 71 percent of people watching her speech felt very positively about it. Fifteen percent somewhat positively, 12 percent negative.
And we should mention that this does skew Democratic because the people most likely to be watching her are Democrats. Donald Trump's very positive was, I believe, 57 after he spoke. And you know, John, doesn't this just raise the issue that Democrats are watching her and they like what she says.
PHILLIPS: Yes.
CAMEROTA: Donald Trump's Republican supporters are watching him and they like what he says, and never the twain shall meet. It's not like Donald Trump's supporters heard her message last and vice versa, so how are they going to sway people into their camp?
PHILLIPS: Sure, it's confirmation bias. People don't like both of these candidates right now, all the poll numbers show that, so the more they tear each other's throats out the more the people like. And the question is how nasty does this campaign go because we saw both conventions really go after one another very aggressively.
And these independent groups that the campaigns have no control over now get to have their say on what goes on. I think this could be one of the most negative elections in the history of the country.
CUOMO: Well, it certainly has been. You know, there is a tendency to say oh, it's so negative today and then you look back in history, it's always been. But this is different. Digital media makes it different, social media makes it different.
QUINN: Twenty-four hours.
PHILLIPS: And the independent groups.
CUOMO: And the independent groups, as well. That's true, although they have been stronger and more formative in the past than they are today in terms of an actual threat, but it's bad, let's just leave it at that. There's an interesting plus-minus balancing test that your candidate was trying to do last night.
The plus side is Donald Trump ain't me, he can't do the job, he's all talk. That's her plus. The minus is when you attack Trump he has become the face of a movement and there is a forgiveness of what he isn't by the people who want something different, so how do you balance those two things?
It's easy to punch him in the face as being unqualified, OK? This is his foray into politics. But how do you do that without offending the people who say he represents me?
QUINN: Well, two things. One, we have to remember that Donald Trump won the Republican primary, and primaries in and of themselves, but particularly this Republican primary, was a small portion of the far right wing of the Republican Party. And he won in a huge, by all accounts, field of candidates. So the supporters he has -- yes, he has them but they represent a really small part of the Republican --
CUOMO: He got more votes than any GOP primary runner ever.
QUINN: And she got significantly more votes --
CUOMO: But I'm saying you're making it sound like he just got a small piece of the pie but it enough because it was such a big pie. He got a lot of votes.
QUINN: My point is it's a part of a pie that is a certain very dug- in, very commitment ideological pie. I don't think on the Clinton campaign we are, right now, trying in a significant way, but we'll take any votes, to pull those hardcore Donald Trump people off. What we're looking to do is speak to our party, make sure they're energized, ready to go, ready to bring their friends, ready to register young voters and independent voters.
And those parts of the Republican Party, particularly like women, younger women, women in their thirties and forties who we could get. And they did nothing to reach out to that group of people in the Republican Convention.
CAMEROTA: Five seconds, John.
PHILLIPS: On that point, showing Bill Clinton next to Hillary Clinton last night at that convention you couldn't have two more different conventions. Bill Clinton was about triangulation, going after the middle. Hillary Clinton was about tearing the throat out of Donald Trump and pushing the party to the left.
CAMEROTA: John, Christine, thank you very much. We do have some breaking news that we want to get to right now because there have been two police officers shot in San Diego. Everyone in the area ordered to shelter in place. We have the breaking details for you ahead.
[05:39:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:43:00] CUOMO: We have breaking news out of California. One suspect in custody after two San Diego police officers were shot last night. We do not know the condition of the officers. We're staying on this story. Authorities are saying this, people, stay in your homes. This may be an active scene. They say they could be looking for other suspects. So, as they give us more information we will get it to you.
CAMEROTA: FBI director James Comey warning that battlefield losses for ISIS could actually increase chances of terror attacks in Europe and the U.S.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: At some point, there's going to be a terrorist diaspora out of Syria like we've never seen before. Not all of the Islamic States' killers are going to die on the battlefield. Through the fingers of that crush are going to come hundreds of really dangerous people and they're going to flow out, primarily, towards Western Europe, but we might as well be right next door to Western Europe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAMEROTA: Comey compares this to the formation of al Qaeda, which attracted radicalized fighters who battled the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.
CUOMO: Federal prosecutors dismissing murder charges against the man accused of killing Chandra Levy, a Washington, D.C. intern, in 2001. You remember this story. Levy's disappearance made national headlines. Why is this happening? Well, prosecutors say they can no longer prove
a case against the suspect here because of "recent unforeseen developments". That's their quote. They didn't offer any details yet. They'll probably come out in time. Levy's mother, Susan, says the announcement made her sick to her stomach.
I covered this case for a long time, very closely. It was always going to be a challenge. What they had on this suspect is that he was giving them confessional statements, but --
CAMEROTA: Yes, is that enough?
CUOMO: No, not in a homicide case because you'll have an attorney who comes up who immediately disqualifies him as being unstable, coerced. In other words, you need to make the case and they don't have the evidence and they don't have the testimony because of time.
CAMEROTA: Gosh, her mom has suffered so much heartbreak. Meanwhile, back to politics. The conventions are officially over, so which party put on the better show and who got better ratings? Our media expert's here next.
[05:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:49:25] CUOMO: Hillary Clinton going out with a bang, delivering one of the biggest speeches of her life. Probably the biggest one, right? And it was the big close of the Democratic National Convention. So what kind of show was it compared to the Republican Convention last week?
Joining us now is CNN senior media correspondent, host of "RELIABLE SOURCES", Brian Stelter. This is not a trivial calculation because Donald Trump had said I know how to produce a great show.
BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT, HOST, "RELIABLE SOURCES": Yes.
CUOMO: I know how to make things happen. So what do you see in the numbers?
STELTER: Well, clearly, the Democrats outrating the Republicans this week, at least for the first three nights. We don't quite have the numbers for night four yet -- Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump, the main event, you would say. But I suspect, given the trend all week long, that Clinton outrated Trump. And it's interesting to see --
[05:50:00] CAMEROTA: What have the ratings been? I mean, how much more?
STELTER: I would say 10 to 15 percent ahead of the Republicans during the Democratic Convention. Now, you could argue it should have been higher. You had so many Democratic stars on stage the first three nights, as well as celebrities.
CUOMO: And stars, period. Right, right, right. STELTER: Exactly. I think it's interesting to remember that only about one in 10 American adults actually tune in every night to these conventions. There's still a lot of people who are not choosing to watch these speeches. They're hearing about it, instead, through these shows, and on their smart phones, and on Twitter, and things like that.
But in terms of the ratings race, yes, I expected and most people expected Donald Trump to outrate the Democrats given his rating magnetism, given his history on "THE APPRENTICE". But the Democrats did put on, in many ways, a better show.
And Clinton, last night -- even the imagery. Think about the imagery in the white outfit versus the darker clothes Trump was wearing. The light versus the dark. I think all of that symbolism, all of those choices really do add up to something meaningful in these productions.
CAMEROTA: But when -- but when you say a better show, do you mean that it just wasn't riddled with production issues, as some of the nights at the GOP were. I mean --
STELTER: There was some of that.
CAMEROTA: Or do you just mean that they rolled out every single person with star power that they could find?
STELTER: Well, it's really -- both of those are true. The production of the Democratic Convention did seem to be more professional, did seem to be more organized. Both of these, though, had elements of drama and that probably helped in the ratings. The storylines -- I was talking to Sam Feist, our D.C. bureau chief, last night and he said he's covered 12 conventions. These were his favorite two because there was actual news at both of these conventions --
CAMEROTA: I'll say.
STELTER: -- which is --
CAMEROTA: Surprises -- lots of surprises.
STELTER: Which were, of course, reasons to tune in, yes. But at the end of the day the Democrats -- I think it was surprising to see the numbers be so strong because there's been this perception of Donald Trump being the higher ratings draw. It's actually not -- you know, it's changing a little bit, though. Donald Trump doesn't necessarily rate the way he did a year ago when you have him for an interview or for a speech.
CUOMO: Everything gets old. What did you think in terms of -- what moment stuck out to you in the DNC because we're just finishing it up?
STELTER: Well, I go back to Monday night and Michelle Obama because of the tone that she set for the entire week. I thought she signaled to the audience how different a convention this was going to be. There were some production issues during the RNC, but there were also fewer of these kind of political stars. And I thought, ultimately, it was better to go second, right? There's that issue in baseball it's better to go first than second.
CAMEROTA: Yes, because you can respond, also.
STELTER: In this case, the Democrats -- and the Democrats because they were the ones in power, they got to choose to go second. It ended up being better to go second, perhaps, because they've now framed the conversation. My takeaway last night was the only thing we have to fear is Donald Trump. That was my ultimate message -- my takeaway from hearing all these speeches on stage.
CAMEROTA: Of what they were saying. Donald Trump said two contradictory things about he felt about the star power of his own convention. First, before it, he said it's very important to put some showbiz into the convention --
STELTER: Right.
CAMEROTA: -- otherwise people will fall asleep. And then afterwards he said I wasn't looking for star power, I was looking for policy.
STELTER: Right, right. He made an interesting choice yesterday, as well. He put out a fundraising email yesterday morning that said unless you want to be lied to, don't tune in for Hillary Clinton's speech. And a lot of people interpret that to mean he was insecure or anxious about the ratings. Knowing that Democrats were beating the Republican Convention thus far, he was worried about how well he was going to stack up against Clinton.
Now, just so you know, later in the day -- he had about 30 million viewers last week. We'll see how high Hillary Clinton's rating are. But if he does end up losing to her in the numbers I think he is probably going to take that personally --
CUOMO: This was --
STELTER: -- because he's such a student of the ratings.
CUOMO: I'll tell you what, he's also known for his ability to take attention away from things.
STELTER: Right, right.
CUOMO: You think he's done a good job with that during the convention, whether it was the Russians should hack us or him saying yesterday, listening to these people speak against me, I want to hit them. Do you think that he was helping himself with this kind of --
STELTER: Well, it depends on what you mean by good job. I mean, he was effective in terms of getting people to talk about him, getting his name in the papers and on T.V., but whether it was positive attention or negative attention -- I guess to Donald Trump it always comes down to whether all press is good press. I would say most press is good press, but not quite all press is good press.
CAMEROTA: Brian, let us know when you get the new ratings in --
STELTER: We will.
CAMEROTA: -- and we'll report them. Thanks so much.
STELTER: Thanks.
CUOMO: All right, there is no question that last night had very high stakes for Hillary Clinton. This speech was going to be seen by tens of millions of people and this was it -- this was her moment. How would she do, especially in such a tight election? We have more coverage, next.
[05:54:40] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:58:50]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHELSEA CLINTON, DAUGHTER OF HILLARY CLINTON: My mother, my hero, our next president.
H. CLINTON: We've reached a milestone. I'm so happy this day has come.
DNC DELEGATES (Chanting): Hillary, Hillary.
H. CLINTON: We will not build a wall, we will build an economy. We will not ban a religion, we will work to fight terrorism.
KHIZR KHAN, FATHER OF HUMAYUN KAHN, KILLED BY CAR BOMB IN IRAQ: Donald Trump, you have sacrificed nothing.
DNC DELEGATES (Chanting): USA, USA.
JENNIFER GRANHOLM, FORMER GOVERNOR OF MICHIGAN: Donald, you're so vain you probably think this speech is about you.
H. CLINTON: America's destiny is ours to choose. Let's be stronger together.
DNC DELEGATES (Chanting): Hillary, Hillary, Hillary, Hillary.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo and Alisyn Camerota.
CAMEROTA: Welcome to our viewers in the U.S. and around the world. You're watching NEW DAY. It is Friday, July 29th, and it was an historic night. Clinton accepting the Democratic nomination for president, the first woman ever to lead a major party ticket. She shared more of personal history and she presented a sharp contrast with Donald Trump.
CUOMO: The speech was very important for her and she chose to fill it with attacks on Trump and, specifically, his temperament.
