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Amanpour

The Impact in China of Clinton's Feminism; Republicans Prepare for a Contested Convention; A Radical Artist Drawing Out Injustice; Imagine a World. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired April 05, 2016 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00]

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CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN HOST (voice-over): Tonight: will Trump win Wisconsin or will the shine come off his unusual presidential campaign

after this latest primary?

I crunch the numbers with two top political experts.

Plus: acclaimed writer, illustrator and activist, Molly Crabapple on confronting Trump and the art of injustice.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MOLLY CRABAPPLE, WRITER, ARTIST AND ACTIVIST: I feel like, instead, I'm an artist who has politics. And I'm a journalist who has politics, only

insofar as we all have politics and we all should and show hard to make the world better.

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AMANPOUR: Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the program. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London.

Voters in the American state of Wisconsin go to the polls today in the presidential primary, as conventional wisdom maintains a contested

Republican convention this summer is increasingly likely.

Now if, indeed, Donald Trump's support is weakening, it may be in part because of his increasingly belligerent and controversial comments about

women, including his views on abortion.

On the Democrats' side, women have also been critical. Young women with the chance to vote for potentially the first female president are, nonetheless,

turning out in large numbers for Bernie Sanders. In a moment, we'll explore the female factor with Republican and Democratic strategists.

But first, a look at how Hillary Clinton's historic candidacy is reverberating around the world, as CNN's Alexandra Field discovers from

China.

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ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was certain to make history, even at the time.

HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Human rights are women's rights and women's rights are human rights, once and for

all.

FIELD (voice-over): That was Beijing more than 20 years ago. In China, the speech was censored by authorities.

Today, some young Chinese women are still discovering it.

LI TINGTING, WOMEN'S RIGHTS ACTIVIST: I (INAUDIBLE) her. And I start -- I think I like her. She do a lot of things, fighting for women's rights.

FIELD (voice-over): Last year, Li Tingting took a close look at what Clinton had to say back in '95, after the former secretary of state tweeted

this about her.

In April, the detention of women's activists in China must end, this is inexcusable. That's Clinton defending Li Tingting and four other Chinese

women dubbed the Feminist Five, detained before International Women's Day 2015 while demonstrating against sexual harassment.

The arrest sparked an international outcry. The women were released on bail 37 days later but placed under constant surveillance.

Clinton's comments outraged Chinese authorities, who said public figures in other countries should respect China's judicial sovereignty and

independence. Clinton fired back, aiming directly at China's president.

In September, Xi hosting a meeting on women's rights while persecuting feminists, shameless.

And from Clinton, another rebuke of Chinese authorities who shut down a women's legal aid center in January. True in Beijing in 1995, true today.

Women's rights are human rights. This center should remain. I stand with Guo.

Guo Jianmei, the Chinese activist who ran the clinic, was in the audience for Clinton's '95 speech. So was Feng Yuan, who says she devoted herself

full-time for advocating for women after the conference featuring Clinton.

FENG YUAN, WOMEN'S RIGHTS ACTIVIST: She is a really strong advocate for women's rights. As a president of America, I think that can -- she are a

very pleased example for women and for women's rights.

FIELD (voice-over): What matters most, she says, is what a Clinton presidency would symbolize for women, even in China -- Alexandra Field,

CNN, Beijing.

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AMANPOUR: So joining me now to discuss this issue and the latest campaign math, our veteran Republican pollster, Neil Newhouse, and Democratic

strategist, Margie Omero.

Thank you for joining me. I think you're both in Washington.

Can I just first start by asking you, Margie, about this particular issue?

Around the world, Hillary Clinton is a well-known from being secretary of state and former first lady. But as you saw in that report from Beijing,

she's also captured the imagination of those who --

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AMANPOUR: -- want to pursue women's rights around the world, helped by the first female American president.

But it's not resonating like that at home, is it?

MARGIE OMERO, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, I think you see a lot of women voters and a lot of Democratic women voters very excited about voting for

Clinton. She does well with women voters.

There is an age break, where younger voters are more likely to be -- younger women are more likely to be Sanders voters than Clinton voters.

Again, this is in the primary.

But I don't know if that means that they're rejecting Clinton because of gender, I think it may be more about embracing what the Sanders message is.

And I think when we look at Clinton and what is so appealing about her to a lot of women voters is maybe beyond simply her gender.

But her focus on women's issues that so many women -- and it's not just Democratic women, women across the board, swing voting women, who feel like

the issues that affect them as women frequently get left on the cutting room floor. They're just simply not priorities in our political dialogue

today.

AMANPOUR: Let me move over to you, Neil, because obviously, the women vote and the backlash has been quite intense now, about Donald Trump,

particularly after his sort of town hall with Chris Matthews, in which he misspoke and kind of made up a position on abortion and whether women

should be punished, if that were to become illegal.

And that adding to all the things he's said about women that have turned a lot of women off.

Could women make a difference tonight, for instance?

NEIL NEWHOUSE, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, women will definitely make a difference.

But back up for a second because neither one of these candidates is all that popular among the one key swing audience in presidential elections,

which is usually white women. So women by race.

A majority of white women have an unfavorable impression of Hillary Clinton. Now you think that would be an extraordinary number and it is,

except at two-thirds of these same white women have an unfavorable impression of Donald Trump.

We've never seen numbers like that before in a presidential election like this. I mean, he is extraordinarily unpopular among those voters. And it's

that same group of voters that Mitt Romney won by 12 points in the last election.

So he's under water significantly among a key group that he's going to have to win in order to be successful in November.

AMANPOUR: Well, let me ask you, I want to ask you both about the result after tonight's primary.

It looks like, Neil, polls are still showing Cruz to be ahead, although some are suggesting that gap is narrowing. You, yourself, have said

recently that in the modern political era, there hasn't been a more unpopular potential presidential nominee than Trump.

What is that going to mean for the electoral math that we've all been talking about, heading into the general election in November?

NEWHOUSE: Well, it makes the electoral map extraordinarily difficult. You look at that map -- and I did Mitt Romney's polling so I come at this with

knowing those eight or so key states that we need to win. And it's hard to pick out states that Mitt Romney lost, that Donald Trump's going to win.

And even some states that Mitt Romney did win, Donald Trump's going to have a tough time in. It makes the map extraordinarily more difficult for

Republicans come next fall.

AMANPOUR: Margie, let me ask you, because as unfavorable as Donald Trump is -- and we've got a poll out from CNN, which was taken about two weeks ago -

- 67 percent unfavorable view of Trump around the nation, 56 percent unfavorable view of Hillary Clinton around the nation.

And yet these two are front-runners. Personally, I don't understand.

Can you explain to me how they're front-runners with such high unfavorables?

OMERO: Well, I think, on the Democratic side, Clinton is popular with Democratic primary voters. So the overall favorables, the ratings that you

see, doesn't reflect her standing in the Democratic primary, even though Democratic primaries still, there's still a race there. There's still lots

of states up for grabs and you can certainly have Sanders has won a lot -- many of the last few states.

I think Clinton's favorability is very strong when she's not part of the political daily fight, when there is a daily campaign going on and she's

subject to a lot of attacks, her favorability rating goes down.

For Trump, he has really blossomed as an unpopular figure in a way that he was not before simply by opening up his phone and starting to tweet. And

he's not just unpopular overall.

Here's really the difference between Clinton and Trump. He's not just unpopular overall around the country or with women overall. With his own

party, 40 percent of Republican women are unfavorable toward Trump.

There is a gender gap in the Republican primary that is unprecedented. You didn't see with Romney and McCain. You didn't see a --

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OMARA: -- gender gap in their primaries. And if you did, women were actually more supportive of Romney and McCain. Trump is far less popular

and does less well in the primaries so far with Republicans in his party, Republican women.

So that means he's really got a tough road ahead, simply to consolidate his base. You're not going to find that on the Democratic side.

AMANPOUR: Neil actually alluded to that as well.

But can I just -- I know you want to jump in, Neil, but, first, regarding these tweets, we do have a sound bite from Melania Trump, his wife, his

third wife, talking about the tweets. So we want to play this and have you both comment on it.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have said you want Donald to be more presidential sometimes. Explain that.

MELANIA TRUMP, DONALD'S WIFE: Well, I -- sometimes I feel that, you know, the retweets sometimes get him in trouble. So just, I said, stay away from,

you know, stay away from retweets. And --

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DONALD TRUMP, REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: She does say that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: So I see you shaking your head, Neil.

First of all, the crowd seemed to really cheer when he was being asked to be more presidential.

NEWHOUSE: Well, I mean, we don't -- we haven't -- there's no precedence for this. You know, I can't think of another -- you know, Mitt Romney didn't

stay up late at night tweeting in the 2012 election.

And I think that the old adage, nothing good happens after midnight, I think goes for tweeting as well and should be, you know, a strict law in

the Trump campaign, because he's getting himself in trouble by doing that.

It's not, quote-unquote, "presidential." And I think he is closing the door to many potential voters, who would want to take another look at him,

simply because of those outrageous comments.

AMANPOUR: And, Margie, this must be, though, music to Democrats' ears, right?

Or eyes, when they see these tweets?

OMERO: It's not just not presidential, most people would be fired from their jobs if they did this, tweeted from their office account late at

night, the way he does, let alone someone running for president.

And I no longer wish for a Trump candidacy. Even if he is the most beatable, it's just too toxic to listen to him talk from now until

November, if we're having these conversations about what he says about Muslims, what he says about Latinos and women and basically everybody.

If we have to listen to that as part of our national political dialogue from now until November, I think it hurts everybody. It hurts our process,

it hurts the Republican Party. It hurts Democrats, it hurts voters. It just hurts all of us.

AMANPOUR: And, Neil, last question to you, then because clearly you and other members of the Republican establishment, the majority, really, are

saying that, yep, it does hurt our party. They're still talking about a contested convention.

I want to know whether you think that is the likeliest scenario and whether you think this Draft Paul Ryan movement that seems to be growing some

fervor has any legs to it whatsoever?

NEWHOUSE: Well, Christiane, I thought, as recently as probably a couple of weeks ago, that Donald Trump was probably on a kind of a glide path to the

nomination. And that's no longer the case.

I mean, it has gotten bumpy for him. He's hit some air pockets. And he's not going to end -- I doubt he'll end up with 1,237 delegates in order to

win the nomination.

If he doesn't come pretty close to it on the first -- going into the convention within, say, 75 to 100 delegates, I'm betting he doesn't win the

nomination. I'm betting that, you know, that it goes to a second ballot or maybe a third ballot.

And then it's wide open and in terms of whether voters, delegates turn to a Paul Ryan or a John Kasich or someone else. But, this -- we have gone

through -- it's been 64 days since the Iowa caucuses and we have another 63 days after today before California and the last primaries. There is a lot

to be played out here.

And I think both candidates are going to have some ups and downs. But I think when push comes to shove, I don't think Trump's going to go to the

convention with enough delegates. And I think that conventional wisdom that we're looking at a contested convention, I think that's right.

AMANPOUR: All right. Well, a lot to look forward to. And as you mentioned, another 63 days of this.

Neil Newhouse, Margie Omero, thank you very much indeed for joining us.

And after a break, the woman who paints portraits of injustice. I speak to the American artist and writer, Molly Crabapple, next.

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AMANPOUR: Welcome back to the program.

She has the eye of an artist and the spirit of a radical. That is the description of Molly Crabapple in her new book, "Drawing Blood," where she

chronicles her evolution as an artist all the way to activist, using her pen to draw out injustice, from Occupy Wall Street to Guantanamo to

everyday life in ISIS-controlled Raqqah, in Syria.

When she joined me here in the studio, I started by asking Molly about her unusual encounter with Donald Trump.

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AMANPOUR: Molly Crabapple, welcome to the program.

CRABAPPLE: It's my honor to be here.

AMANPOUR: Listen, we're going to go right into this election, because everybody in the world is looking on in a mixture of horror and shock about

what's going on. And you must have noticed that while you were abroad.

CRABAPPLE: Of course.

AMANPOUR: Tell me how this drawing of Trump came about because it's obviously not in the U.S. It's in --

CRABAPPLE: In Dubai.

AMANPOUR: -- Dubai.

CRABAPPLE: So in 2014, I was doing a piece on migrant working conditions in the Emirates and I found that Trump's workers were getting $200 a month to

slave, you know, in the hot sun all day to build these golf courses and these luxury buildings for him or that he was licensing his name for.

So I lied my way into a press conference and confronted him about the incredibly low wages that he was giving his workers.

AMANPOUR: What did he say?

CRABAPPLE: He said nothing. His mouth shriveled like a tiny little thing and the press people yelled at me.

They said, "That's not an appropriate question."

And I felt like I was going to get arrested right there, although I was lucky enough not to be. But it's interesting, because now Trump's hostility

to the press, his hatred of the media is something that is getting a lot of attention.

AMANPOUR: Yes, it's really manifesting itself in the rallies and the way he throws, you know, his people on reporters and camerapeople and it's pretty

bad.

But you identified that more than, you know, way before his campaign.

CRABAPPLE: I did, from experience. But it's amazing, because this is a man who doesn't want to be questioned.

The things that make Trump, I think, different from other extremely menacing candidates, like Ted Cruz, who very often share policies, is that

they're all people that want to enact violence legislatively. But Trump is the only one, I believe, that actually wants to whip up mobs, to beat

people right in front of him.

AMANPOUR: So how did you come into this activism?

I know you've done a lot on Occupy. I think Occupy, the movement, was happening right -- sort of under your nose, living in New York.

CRABAPPLE: Yes, Occupy happened across the street from me. And I turned my apartment into a sort of press room for wayward journalists and activists.

They could use my power outlets; they could drink my whisky and my coffee.

And I think sometimes journalism perhaps spread to me like some sort of communicable social disease. And I started writing three years ago, when I

was arrested at Occupy, I wrote about my arrest.

And I didn't write about it because I thought I had such a sad experience but because I feel that arrest and the lightness with which Americans take

arrest is one of the truly terrible things about our country.

AMANPOUR: After that, after the Occupy protests that you witnessed and after your arrest and all the things you started writing, you went to

Guantanamo Bay, right?

CRABAPPLE: I did.

AMANPOUR: Which is, again, very rare.

How on Earth did you get into Guantanamo Bay?

What was your pitch?

CRABAPPLE: Artists in America are not respected. And so I said, I wanted to draw pictures and they thought, oh, that'll be harmless. And I ended up

doing a major investigative piece for "Vice" about a young man named Nabil Hadjarab, who had been cleared for release maybe five years before I had

visited and was just --

[14:20:00]

CRABAPPLE: -- languishing there for no reason. I ended up visiting Guantanamo twice, once for the pretrial hearings of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed

and once for their sort of peremptory (ph) prisons.

AMANPOUR: Right. Well, we've got Khalid Sheikh Mohammed here and obviously this is the man who masterminded 9/11. I'm just wondering what it was like

to be in the same room as this person because he actually is there for a reason. I know lots of the others are not charged and have been

languishing, as you say, in this black hole, for so, so long.

What did you think when you saw somebody, you know, as evil as him?

CRABAPPLE: I'm a New Yorker. I was in New York for 9/11. I will never forget, not just the events of that day but the sight of the walls covered

with flyers of people, looking for their relatives who had been buried or burnt alive because of the actions of these people.

It was -- it was a horrifying thing. Now the court itself is quite a Kafkaesque place. You are separated from the proceedings by layers of

soundproof glass. The sound is all censored by the CIA and run on a 10- second delay. Anything that I drew there had to be approved by a censor. You can actually see the sticker.

AMANPOUR: Had you been to Syria?

CRABAPPLE: Once, only for a day.

AMANPOUR: But some of the drawings that you have are from Raqqah, which is the self-declared capital of the caliphate of ISIS.

How did you get the information to be able to make these drawings?

Where did you get these images in your head from?

CRABAPPLE: These are a collaboration with one of the most astounding people that I'm so lucky to work, a young Syrian writer, named Marwan Hisham (ph).

At that time, Marwan was living in Raqqah, it's his hometown. And me and him worked out a collaboration where he sent me surreptitious cell phone

pictures. And we wanted to do things that weren't the usual image that people got of Syria, of the gore, of the severed heads.

We wanted to do things that showed the more quotidian act of representation. These are bread lines of impoverished, impoverished people.

So while ISIS will do this propaganda, that is everything peachy keen and their cosplay caliphate, that they're taking care of the poor, they make up

all these lies, in reality, people are impoverished and starving there. And they're waiting on massive lines just to get a few slices of bread.

AMANPOUR: And there's another one that says "City Man."

What was that?

Is that Man City or is that really "City Man"?

CRABAPPLE: It was a store that was selling men's clothing.

AMANPOUR: Got it.

CRABAPPLE: And the thing about that, that's important, is you notice the faces are all censored, because ISIS censors photographs. The faces on

everything are blotted out.

AMANPOUR: Yes.

So what are you?

Are you a writer?

Beautiful and interesting book.

Are you a journalist?

Are you an artist?

Are you an activist?

CRABAPPLE: I usually consider myself an artist-writer.

AMANPOUR: But an activist.

I mean, you're out there to bring some of these real issues to the public and to sort of campaign through your work -- or not?

Am I putting words into your mouth?

CRABAPPLE: I'm always a little bit resistant to the label of activist for myself, and it's only because I know these brilliant activists, who

dedicate their lives to it. I know organizers, who get people out of prison, who organize rallies, who do so much. And I feel like I'm not that.

And I say that I'm not that, because I admire what they do so much. I feel like instead, I'm an artist who has politics and I'm a journalist who has

politics, only insofar as we all have politics and we all should and we should all try to make the world better.

AMANPOUR: And what brought you to this place?

CRABAPPLE: I suppose I'm just a fundamentally anti-authoritarian person. I don't like seeing authority misused.

AMANPOUR: Molly Crabapple, thank you very much indeed for joining me.

CRABAPPLE: Thank you so much for having me.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR: And coming up, we switch and we have a good day for a good dog. Imagine a world where man's best friend steps out of the shadows and steals

the spotlight, winning a major award. Lucca's incredible journey, next.

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AMANPOUR: And finally tonight, imagine a world where vets honor vets. Yep, a dog is involved but we're talking about military vets, not exactly the

kind you'd expect to see at a high-profile award ceremony though. The U.S. Marine dog who's actually called Lucca was honored in London today for her

bravery. And as we hear, it is not every day a dog gets this lucky.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And Jim will now present the medals.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The PDSA Dickin Medal is the highest accolade an animal can received. It's the equivalent of a Victoria Cross. And the

reason that Lucca has been -- is going to be presented with this is that it recognizes conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty.

And in Lucca's six years' serving with the U.S. Marine Corps as a military working dog, she went on over 400 combat tours, working alongside the

allied troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan. And during that time, there were no injuries sustained over her watch.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They were leaving a tree line to go search a compound and Lucca went up and indicated on an IED on the way to the compound, so

they started snooping for secondaries.

Lucca, left.

And unfortunately, a secondary device detonated and it took off her lower left leg.

She's got the same personality she had before. She's the same Lucca that she was before the injury, which is absolutely amazing, because I've seen

dogs go through a lot less and suffer a lot more.

The most important part of being a successful dog team is having a strong bond. When you stay with a dog seven days a week and you go through some of

the things you experienced in combat, you truly find out what the depths of a bond is between a dog and a handler.

And I absolutely -- I owe everything to her. I owe her my life. She saved me on numerous occasions and I'm very fortunate to have served with her.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: And who could argue for that?

That's it for our program tonight. Remember, you can listen to our podcasts, see us online at amanpour.com and follow me on Facebook and

Twitter. Thanks for watching and goodbye from London.

END