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Americans Cast Their Ballots Today In The Midterm Elections; Governor Seats Up For Grabs In 36 States; Prime Minister Trudeau Says Trump's Tariffs Had No Effect On NAFTA Negotiations; CNN Reality Check: The Facts Behind Trump's Claim On Immigration. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired November 06, 2018 - 07:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:32:13] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, live pictures. This is Raleigh, North Carolina. The polls are open there -- people voting.

In 26 states across the country, the polls are open and we've seen the lines. We've seen the people going in. We've seen the election workers. Our thank you to them and thank you for everyone getting out to exercise your democratic duty.

CNN has reporters tracking all the biggest races around the country. Let's begin with Rosa Flores, live in Florida. Two big races there -- governor and Senate, not to mention a number of House races as well -- Rosa.

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John, good morning.

Take a look behind me. The polls opened about 30 minutes ago and what we have seen are lines that are slow and steady. Here in Florida, what we've seen is a deeply-involved electorate.

Of the more than 13 million voters who are registered in this state, more than five million have already voted. That's 38 percent.

And if you look at the breakdown by party it is nail-biting. Take a look at these numbers.

Of those early voters, 40.1 percent are registered Republicans, 40.5 are registered Democrats. And then the rest -- the no-party- affiliation or other make up 19.3 percent.

Now, overall, there's this misconception here in Florida that most of the registered voters are seniors. Not the case this year.

Fifty-two percent of voters are millennials, Gen Xers, or Gen Zers, and this younger bloc of voters is more diverse. They are very much worried about the environment, jobs, and health care. And what we're seeing in this state we're also seeing in other states around the country.

And now I want to take you to Georgia where my colleague and friend Gary Tuchman is standing by. Gary, what are you seeing there?

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thank you, Rosa.

In the race here for governor, Stacey Abrams and Brian Kemp is bringing out the voters. This polling place in Cobb County, Georgia opened thirty minutes ago. More than 100 people were outside waiting to come in and it is raining outside so you can tell how enthusiastic the people are here. This is the line to go in the voting room.

Just a short time ago -- we'll give you an idea how eager people are who have come to vote and what happens when you do vote. This nice lady right here -- can I have you turn around for one second? What's your name?

ANN: Ann.

TUCHMAN: This is Ann. Ann suffered a voting-related injury. She walked in and she slipped on this very wet floor because it's raining. Is your knee doing OK?

ANN: Yes.

TUCHMAN: But it's --

ANN: I'm doing good.

TUCHMAN: But it's important to come and vote, right?

ANN: Yes, it is very important.

TUCHMAN: So you can see people suffer injuries to come out and vote.

But they're here because it's going to be a big day in the state of Georgia not only because the voting started today but this is kind of the end of the voting. Early voting began 2 1/2 weeks ago. More than 2.1 million people have already cast ballots.

Now we want to see what's happening in the great state of Texas. To my colleague, Athena Jones.

ATHENA JONES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Gary.

[07:35:00] That's right -- we're here in Texas where polls open in about half an hour. So no lines yet although we have seen a few early-rising Ted Cruz supporters out with signs.

And we're here in Tarrant County. This is the third-most populous county in the state. It's also the largest urban county that remains red.

And we're here in Tarrant because it is a bellwether county. President Trump beat Hillary Clinton here by nine points. That's the exact margin by which he carried the state of Texas.

And we know that when it comes to some of the big races we're watching here in the Lone Star State, like the Senate race between Democratic Congressman Beto O'Rourke and Sen. Ted Cruz, they're going to be closely watching what happens right here in Tarrant County.

O'Rourke, himself, has said as Tarrant County goes, so goes the state. We have to win in this county in order to be able to win the state of Texas.

Of course, it all comes to the size and shape of the electorate. And we know from the early voting numbers that enthusiasm is high. The very latest numbers as of the end of early voting on Friday -- early voting in this county tapped 465,000. That is far more than in past midterm elections and even more than the 2012 election, according to the election administrator.

Let's send it over to Brian Todd in Virginia.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thanks very much, Athena.

We're about 90 minutes into one of the most exciting days of voting here in northern Virginia that we've seen in a long time. Polls opened at 6:00 a.m. The people were trying to get in at about 5:30 a.m.

A steady stream of voters coming through this door here at Parkview High School. This is precinct 702 in the 10th voting district of Virginia. This is one of those suburban battlegrounds where the control of the House of Representatives is going to play out.

We're going to walk through the doors here into the voting area. A steady stream of people coming in here for the last 90 minutes. They register over here. They vote at six voting stations over here.

Now, Virginia has, at least in the last year, ordered all of its polling places to ditch the touchscreens -- the digital voting apparatus -- because they were just too concerned with tampering and possible hacking.

So they're doing it all on paper ballots now and here is where people put their paper ballots in. Once you vote over here, you put it in here, and then -- watch this gentleman here -- will give you a cardboard covering to cover your vote for privacy purposes.

This gentleman here has one of those. He's about to put it into the machine there and then it will scan his vote. He hands the cardboard cover back to the voting worker here.

And we can show you that it runs -- it has a running count of how many people have voted. So far -- there you see the number -- 212 have voted in this precinct just in the last hour and a half.

So, you know, it's a very charged voting electorate here in the 10th voting district where Republican Barbara Comstock is battling to keep her seat against the Democratic challenger Jennifer Wexton. She's in a tight race and it's really playing out in districts like this.

Alisyn, to you.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Brian, thank you very much. It's great to see everybody exercising their civic duty. We will check back with you.

Meanwhile, we have to tell you about this because severe storms have turned deadly overnight. One woman was killed and two others injured in Tennessee.

CNN meteorologist Chad Myers has our forecast. How's it looking, Chad?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: And still thousands are without power there. We don't know any polling stations yet without power but certainly a possibility. Four reports of wind damage in the past hour, Alisyn.

Now, things are calming down a little bit. It's the coolest part of the day. The storms won't be as severe as they were yesterday and overnight.

But the rain is moving into D.C., into Baltimore. In the next few hours, we will certainly see rain. A line of thunderstorms moving toward Atlanta, Georgia at this hour.

Now, let's go hour-by-hour. We're at 8:30 here moving through Atlanta. By 1:00, the weather is over all the way through all the counties around Atlanta, Georgia.

Farther to the north though, the rain is going to continue for much of the day. In fact, by New York City standards, around noon or so, that's when your heaviest will get there. Across a lot of the Poconos, earlier in the day.

Now, we move you to noon when the rain does get into New York, and Philadelphia, and D.C. By 3:00, it's into Boston, but moving away from New York City by 5:00 or 6:00, drying out for your evening rush, John.

BERMAN: All right, Chad Myers for us. Chad, thanks very much. We'll be watching that all day so you can pick your moments to get out and vote.

So, this could cause a major political shift in this country and has nothing to do with the House or Senate. We're going to speak to the head of the Democratic Governors Association to find out how changes in state houses could turn the national political picture.

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[07:43:07] BERMAN: The battle for who controls the House and Senate, that might be grabbing most of the attention today. But there are also 36 governor's races across the country. They are huge. Republicans currently control 26 of those states.

Here to discuss now is the governor of Washington State, Jay Inslee. He is the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association.

And, Governor, I don't want to reveal the secret from the break here but you came on practically singing James Brown, "I Feel Good." GOV. JAY INSLEE (D), WASHINGTON, CHAIRMAN, DEMOCRATIC GOVERNORS ASSOCIATION: Yes, James Brown. This is an "I Feel Good" moment.

I think tonight we are going to find that the majority of Americans have a Democratic governor working for them.

And I'm very happy about that effort, both as a check on the chaos out of Washington, D.C. but more importantly, this is the place we can make progress starting tomorrow morning because we can make progress and Donald Trump cannot stop these Democratic governors from making progress.

BERMAN: So, as we've been saying all morning, we don't know what's going to happen. It's early in the morning. The polls close tonight -- we'll count the votes.

INSLEE: Right.

BERMAN: But one of the things that you know as a Democratic governor and you know by looking at the calendar is that this race is so important for Democrats because redistricting will happen after the 2020 census --

INSLEE: Right.

BERMAN: -- and governors who were in office, they have a key seat at the table.

INSLEE: Yes, I think there's three things.

Look, gerrymandering is a pathology on the body politic. We have to stop this pernicious gerrymandering.

The best way to do that is elect a Democratic governor. In just eight states, if we get a Democratic governor, that could mean Americans have a chance to elect 26 new members of the U.S. Congress in a fair districting process.

So it's extremely important from a congressional standpoint, but I would say it's most important in our ability to move forward. And, President Trump cannot stop Stacey Abrams from getting a half million people to have insurance, Andrew Gillum fighting climate change, Gretchen Whitmer for fixing the roads in Michigan.

[07:45:00] This is a -- it's simply, with all his tweets, he can't stop that progress.

BERMAN: And that's interesting because you're positioning this as a national election for governors. These governors, you're suggesting, are --

INSLEE: Right.

BERMAN: -- running in opposition to the president?

INSLEE: Well, that is part of it. And I think if you were going to write the book of the rise and fall of Donald Trump, the rise ended this morning and the fall is starting tomorrow because these governors can lead the country both resisting some of this chaos and division, but also showing a way forward on health care, on education.

Or, Laura Kelly in Kansas can show the way forward on education, or Michelle Lujan Grisham can show a clean energy jobs program to fight climate change when we have a climate change denier in the White House.

So I really do think we're setting a plate for great progress, starting this morning.

BERMAN: You earn your keep as chair of the Democratic Governors Association by naming as many of the candidates as you can during this one television appearance.

INSLEE: They're friends.

BERMAN: I know. But I will note you've been successful in getting all the names in.

Stacey Abrams in Georgia --

INSLEE: Right.

BERMAN: Andrew Gillum, the mayor of Tallahassee in Florida. Those races have garnered a lot of attention --

INSLEE: Yes.

BERMAN: -- maybe historic in both cases. African-American candidates ascending to the state -- to the governor's mansion in those states.

When you look at those races what factor has race played?

INSLEE: Well, it's an unfortunate factor because in both of those races we have these hugely inspirational candidates with great personal stories.

I told a story of Stacey yesterday -- a story where she was valedictorian of her high school, but when she went to get to the governor's office to sort of be rewarded he wouldn't let her in.

Andrew Gillum tells a story of bringing it home. His parents always told him bring it home. When you got to school bring something home to the family. Now his theme is "Bringing it home to Florida."

So, inspirational candidates -- and every time a Republicans opens their mouths some dog whistle to division and hatred and latent racism comes out, and it's really unfortunate.

And I -- but here's the good news, not going to work. I really do believe we're going to do well there.

BERMAN: Georgia could go into overtime. What's the Governors Association -- the DGA going to do to help Stacey Abrams if it ends up in a run-off there?

INSLEE: I think -- I've won every overtime game I've ever been in so I hope that that will continue. We will be very active. We're excited about Georgia.

BERMAN: Let me ask you this. You have suggested you are thinking about or have been thinking about running for president, like roughly 673 other Democratic potentials.

INSLEE: Right.

BERMAN: When do you have to make your mind up if you're going to run in 2020?

INSLEE: Well, not today because today is for saying let's vote. And by the way, everybody who is listening to this show is going to vote. I know, because they care. That's why they're listening to your show.

But I hope people are heroes today, which gets all of their nephews and nieces to vote --

BERMAN: When do you have to decide whether you're going to run for president?

INSLEE: Sometime in the future. Today, I'm getting everybody on your show to become a hero to get everybody under the age of 40 to vote.

BERMAN: Before the first of the year?

INSLEE: We don't know.

BERMAN: All right.

Governor Inslee, thank you for being with us. Good luck today and thanks for being here.

INSLEE: Thank you. Don't forget to vote.

BERMAN: All right.

CAMEROTA: As Americans vote today, Canada's prime minister is talking about his complicated relationship with the president. Poppy Harlow's interview with Justin Trudeau, next.

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[07:51:39] CAMEROTA: OK, not to a CNN exclusive for you.

Americans heading to the polls at this hour, of course, for a -- some say, referendum on President Trump, including his economic policies.

But the leader of one of American's closest allies, Canada's Justin Trudeau, is also talking about his own tough negotiations with President Trump and his relationship with President Trump.

And, CNN's Poppy Harlow got the exclusive interview for us and she joins us now with more. Poppy, tells us about this.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR, "CNN NEWSROOM": Good morning.

It was a fascinating, wide-ranging conversation. We're going to get to the news here and then a bunch of it we'll play for you in a few days after the election on other things he's doing.

But look, I said to him point-blank, is it true when the president said we wouldn't have a deal without these tariffs? Is that true, Mr. Prime Minister? And he said, on the contrary. We were always willing to come to the table.

And here's more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: The new trade deal replacing NAFTA, USMCA, is agreed upon but not signed yet.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU, PRIME MINISTER, CANADA: Yes.

HARLOW: Are you considering, Mr. Prime Minister, not signing it unless President Trump lifts the tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum?

TRUDEAU: Obviously, the tariffs on steel and aluminum are a continued frustration. What a tariff is is a way of hiking prices on your own domestic consumers. So, consumers in the United States are paying more for Canadian steel, Canadian aluminum than they otherwise would.

And we've brought in retaliatory tariffs.

HARLOW: Yes.

TRUDEAU: That means Canadian consumers are paying more for bourbon, for Heinz ketchup, for a broad range of things because we had to retaliate.

But we would much rather have genuine free trade with the United States so we're going to continue to work as soon as we can to lift those tariffs. But we're not at the point of saying that we wouldn't sign if it wasn't -- if it wasn't lifted, although we're trying to make that case.

HARLOW: But, Mr. Prime Minister, some see this as the moment. The moment of leverage before that potential signing date -- potentially, November 30th right before there's a new Mexican government in power that this is your moment for leverage. This is your moment where you could say Mr. President, if you don't lift these steel and aluminum tariffs we're not going to sign it.

Any chance that happens?

TRUDEAU: One of the things that served me very, very well through the 13 months of negotiations over the new NAFTA was that I don't negotiate in public and we have strong conversations in private and we get to the right outcome for everyone.

HARLOW: One fascinating thing that you've spoken about is the greatest lesson you learned from your father, the former prime minister. And you said once that he taught you to trust people.

Do you fully trust President Trump that he will uphold his promises and not back out of deals, as we saw with the G7 closing communique?

TRUDEAU: What my father taught me was to trust Canadians. It was a way of looking at the electorate and say you don't have to dumb it down for them. You don't have to scare them into this or that.

You can actually treat people like intelligent, rational actors and they will rise to the occasion. And that has been my approach in campaigning and in politics from the very beginning.

HARLOW: So, President Trump is not a Canadian.

TRUDEAU: Yes, I recognize that --

HARLOW: Do you trust President Trump on this issue?

TRUDEAU: -- every leader has a job of sticking up for their own country and they will do it in their own ways. And I respect the fact that people have different approaches to it.

[07:55:05] My approach is to trust Canadians and deal in a way that is direct with other leaders.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Really interesting to see that, Poppy. And, hi --

HARLOW: Hi, it's good to be here with you guys.

BERMAN: -- it's great to see you.

CAMEROTA: John's here also.

BERMAN: It beats sitting next to a (INAUDIBLE).

You had a great discussion on trade. I'm just so fascinated by the timing of it.

HARLOW: Yes.

BERMAN: He's had such a complicated relationship with the president. Was he trying to send some kind of message to President Trump by sitting down with you?

HARLOW: The timing of this interview had been in the works for a long time. It was at the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit in Montreal and half of our conversation is about women and half his cabinet being women, et cetera. You'll see that on Monday, post-election.

But clearly, he was open to talking about everything on the table right now. You know, NAFTA 2.0, if you will -- the trade agreement.

And I talked to him also, guys, about this global tilt to the right and the U.S. and Brazil and Hungary (ph). I said, do you feel like you and leaders like you -- you're ilk are endangered species? And he talked about his concern about that -- the polarization that we're seeing.

And I said, so is all of this bad blood between you and the president water under the bridge now? And he sort of laughed it off and said, in politics, I'm called a lot of things by a lot of people and you just don't take it personally.

BERMAN: Yes, it's not a yes. It's all --

HARLOW: Right, right.

BERMAN: It's a -- it's a --

HARLOW: Yes.

BERMAN: It's a hump.

HARLOW: It was fascinating to hear from him.

CAMEROTA: Yes. Thanks so much for sharing it with us.

HARLOW: Thanks, guys.

CAMEROTA: Great to have you here.

BERMAN: A really great discussion. He's a politician though and he knows that it's airing on an election --

CAMEROTA: Sure.

BERMAN: -- here in the U.S.

President Trump rejected a closing argument on the economy to go hard on immigration, but what are the facts in his argument?

John Avlon has a "Reality Check" -- John.

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: That's right, John.

So, yesterday, the president's closing campaign ad, which CNN has described as racist, was pulled from NBC and Fox News, and it is a stunning moment -- a sign of the surreal times we live in.

But, President Trump is a believer in motivating voters through fear and anger and that's why he's chosen to close the campaign on the threat of what he's called an illegal immigrant invasion. And it's succeeded in raising the issues profile, at least among Republicans.

But here are some facts to keep in mind.

Illegal crossings across the southern border have been basically declining since 2000. This is a problem that has been politicized on the backs of a caravan of several hundred asylum seekers from Central America.

Now, thousands of U.S. troops are on their way to the border to logistically support the border patrol, doing things like setting up tents. That's all they can do because of an 1898 law called the "Posse Comitatus Act.

But it all comes at a cost that's been estimated to exceed $200 million if this plan is fully implemented.

Incidentally, Trump's suggestion that troops could fire on migrants throwing rocks was cited by the Nigerian Army to justify its fatal shooting of rock-throwing protesters just last week.

But closer to home let's look at some of the president's frequent claims about immigration.

He's claimed that America is building the wall he promised, but not one new brick has been laid to date.

At a rally in Indiana just last night, he repeated this red meat line.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: As we speak, Democrats are openly encouraging millions of illegal aliens to break our laws, violate our borders, and overrun our country. They want America to be a giant sanctuary city for drug dealers, gang members, and MS-13 killers.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AVLON: Almost, needless to say, this is false. Democrats don't want open borders and violent gang members don't have a constituency in either party.

He's also claimed that Democrats don't want to pass any bills to deal with illegal immigration. This is also false. Democrats have backed bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform in the past, with Trump allies like Lindsey Graham, and were willing to increase border security funding to secure a deal for the Dreamers during this administration.

The president doesn't seem interested in pushing comprehensive immigration reform. Instead, his administration has separated children from families at the border as a deterrent and cracked down on asylum seekers. And in recent days, he's suggested he could end constitutionally-protected birthright citizenship by executive order, which even Speaker Paul Ryan smacked down.

Look, America needs bipartisan immigration reform. What we don't need is to demonize groups of people for political gain.

And that's your "Reality Check."

BERMAN: All right, John. John Avlon, thank you very much.

And as we said, it is very interesting. CNN is reporting -- Jeff Zeleny is reporting that the president did not like the message on the economy and insisted on the immigration message. Facts be damned, in some cases.

A lot going on. Polls open in most states within minutes. NEW DAY's special election coverage continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This election is a referendum on the President of the United States.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's going to come down to turnout. Every last vote really does matter.

TRUMP: If the radical Democrats take power they will take a wrecking ball to our country.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I), VERMONT: This election is about whether we feel comfortable having a president who is a pathological liar.

MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I've got a feeling that blue wave is going to hit that red wall all across America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of people are going to the polls to say our leader is engaging in conduct unbecoming a president.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This White House, they're not writing off the House. I think we may have some surprises.

SEN. TED CRUZ (R), TEXAS: Security is on the ballot. It's the time for action.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

BERMAN: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY.