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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Interview With Former Department of Homeland Security Chief of Staff Miles Taylor; Bill Clinton Set to Speak at Democratic National Convention; Voter Confidence?. Aired 4-4:30p ET

Aired August 18, 2020 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:02]

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: So, let's start with, how confident are voters that votes will be counted fairly this November?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, a majority of voters, according to our new poll, Jake, are indeed somewhat or very confident; 56 percent, if you take a look at it, are somewhat are very confident, the 22 percent who are very competent, the 34 percent somewhat, that 56 percent majority.

But I will note, Jake, that is about 10 points lower than what we saw four years ago at this point in terms of confidence about the way votes would be cast and counted.

TAPPER: Do we have any idea in terms of partisan breakdown who -- how that changed, how so fewer people are confident about it? Is it Democrats? Is it Republicans?

CHALIAN: There's a little bit of both. There's no doubt the Republicans are driving that to some degree.

But I want to show you where you see a real partisan divide here. It's on the issue of, how do you want to vote? So take a look. We asked people, what is your preferred method of voting? Overall, 43 percent say on Election Day in person, 34 percent by mail, 22 percent early in person. Again, look at those bottom two numbers; 56 percent, a majority of Americans in this poll, Jake, say they don't want to vote in person on Election Day.

They want to do it early, or they want to do it by mail. But this is going to be the story of the election this fall. Take a look how this splits between Trump's supporters in the poll and Biden supporters.

For Trump's supporters -- for Biden supporters -- sorry -- only 22 percent want to vote in person on Election Day; 53 percent, a majority of Biden supporters, want to do so by mail. It is the complete opposite for Donald Trump supporters. The president's supporters, two- thirds of them want to vote in person on Election Day.

Now, obviously, that is also because the president is undermining vote-by-mail as a legitimate way to cast your ballot, but it just shows you there are going to be two totally different universe of voters depending on when they vote in the process.

TAPPER: Again, we should point out President Trump voted by mail or is going to vote by mail. He just requested his ballot.

CHALIAN: That's right.

TAPPER: Florida has vote by mail. You don't even need an excuse. It doesn't need to be an absentee reason.

CNN, David, also asked how concerned Americans are that, even with changes by some state, whether or not it will be too difficult to vote in the fall. What do people think about that?

CHALIAN: Yes, the concern is high. It's actually higher that it would be difficult to vote the fall than it is that there would be a fraudulent vote cast, 31 percent very concerned, somewhat concerned, 34 percent.

So you have 65 percent very or somewhat concerned that voting will be too hard for them to do with all of the rules changes.

But, again, I just want to stress, Jake, we see a massive divide here. Among Biden voters, it's 81 percent who feel that way, only 47 percent of Trump voters. Trump, voters 87 percent of them are concerned that votes would be cast fraudulently, even though, as you said, there's no evidence of widespread fraud with vote-by-mail.

TAPPER: No, none at all. Even the president had his own vote commission that disbanded. They couldn't find widespread voter fraud. There obviously are always incidents of voter fraud, but not widespread.

David Chalian, thank you so much.

The theme of tonight's Democratic Convention program is leadership. And headliners this evening include Jill Biden, the wife of the presumptive Democratic nominee, and former President Bill Clinton, who is expected to deliver his strongest rebuke yet of President Trump, as CNN's Jeff Zeleny reports for us now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Jill Biden stepping into the spotlight tonight at the Democratic National Convention, telling the nation about the Joe Biden she knows.

JILL BIDEN, WIFE OF JOE BIDEN: If the election were held today, who would you want to step in to clean up this mess?

ZELENY: She's set to deliver a prime-time testimonial from her old classroom at Brandywine High School, where she taught English during her husband's tenure in the Senate.

If they win in November, she's vowed to keep teaching as first lady.

BIDEN: I said, I know I can do both jobs. ZELENY: For the second night of the virtual convention, new faces like Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will join party elders like Bill Clinton in talking about the urgency of winning back the White House.

MICHELLE OBAMA, FORMER FIRST LADY: So, let me be as honest and clear as I possibly can. Donald Trump is the wrong president for our country.

ZELENY: Former first lady Michelle Obama delivering a powerful argument Monday night, imploring Americans to unite behind Biden and take a stand against President Trump.

OBAMA: He has had more than enough time to prove that he can do the job, but he is clearly in over his head. He cannot meet this moment. He simply cannot be who we need him to be for us. It is what it is.

[16:05:01]

ZELENY: At the White House today, the president made clear he was watching.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: She is over her head. I thought it was a very divisive speech, extremely divisive.

ZELENY: But Obama's message reverberated across the political spectrum, from progressives like Senator Bernie Sanders...

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): For everyone who supported other candidates in the primary, and to those who may have voted for Donald Trump in the last election, the future of our democracy is at stake.

ZELENY: ... to a handful of Republicans, like former Ohio Governor John Kasich.

FMR. GOV. JOHN KASICH (R-OH): Times that call for all of us to take off our partisan hats and put our nation first for ourselves and, of course, for our children.

ZELENY: Joe Biden and Kamala Harris intent on trying to make the election a referendum on Trump and, above all, his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, that point made clear in emotional appeals, like the one from Kristin Urquiza, who blames the president for her father dying of COVID-19.

KRISTIN URQUIZA, DAUGHTER OF CORONAVIRUS VICTIM: My dad was a healthy 65-year-old. His only preexisting condition was trusting Donald Trump. And, for that, he paid with his life.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ZELENY: Now, another focus of the convention tonight is America's standing in the world.

I'm told there are going to be a variety of national security officials who have served both Democratic and Republican administrations making the case against the president.

But, Jake, one thing we will not see is a keynote speaker from a rising Democrat. You will remember it was the 2004 convention that propelled Barack Obama, an Illinois state senator at the time, into the spotlight. Well, tonight, there will not be a keynote address.

There will be 17 individual young elected officials reading one speech. One of the reasons for that, I'm told, the divisions in the party. Do you choose a progressive or a moderate? The party decided to choose 17 of them. So, of course, that washes all of it out.

But it will be that speech from Jill Biden, in deeply personal terms, describing her husband and why she believes he should be the next president -- Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Jeff Zeleny in Wilmington, Delaware, thank you so much.

A number of staunch Republicans have come out in support of Vice President Biden's candidacy, among them, Miles Taylor, who served as chief of staff for the Department of Homeland Security during the Trump administration.

Taylor says that what he witnessed inside the White House was terrifying, and the U.S. is less secure because Trump is president.

And Miles Taylor joins us now.

Miles, thanks for joining us.

The president tweeted today that he doesn't know you. He called you a disgruntled employee. You responded by tweeting a photograph of you with the president at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office. You said you have stories to tell.

You have described what you saw as terrifying. What is the most important thing that the American public needs to know, you think?

MILES TAYLOR, FORMER DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY CHIEF OF STAFF: Well, Jake, thanks for having me, first of all.

I think the thing I would say is this. Any time Donald Trump finds out that someone doesn't share his views or opposes him, he really, really quickly finds a way to say, I don't know that person, and finds a way to disown that person.

So, this wasn't a surprise. It was expected. And, frankly, I think the best way for me to make that a little bit clearer is to spend the next few weeks, the next few months talking about my experiences in this administration.

But, look, I would leave the American people with this and a very simple picture. At the end of the day, the man with his finger on the nuclear trigger is a man whose mind is not on his job on a daily basis.

That is alarming. And that isn't something that just a handful of folks in the administration felt.

Now, I may be one person speaking out. You're going to see more people in the coming weeks, Jake. But what they're going to tell you is that this was a widespread sentiment in the administration.

And I can tell you, having talked to friends today in the administration, who messaged me to say, thank you for speaking out, that there are a lot of folks very close to the president who still feel this way about him, about his leadership, and about a desire that he not have a second term in office.

TAPPER: You have said that the president exploits the Department of Homeland Security for his own political purposes.

After you said that, I wondered what you maybe thought of the time that U.S. Park Police tear-gassed protesters at Lafayette Square before the Trump photo-op in front of the church. Is that the kind of exploiting that you're talking about?

TAYLOR: I want to get to that in just one second, Jake, but I will give you an even more recent example.

I just got word within the past hour that a White House liaison employee at the department has been directed to go around to dig up dirt on me.

Now, look, I'm fine with that. I can handle it. But here's the point. The administration, within hours of me speaking out about this, is already using taxpayer dollars for political purposes at the department. That just goes to show you that they can't break out of this cycle.

Now, when it comes to tear-gassing, that wasn't a surprise to me either. I mean, the fact that the president would allow that to happen, in order to advance a political photo-op, was not only sort of to be expected. It was similar to something else that we saw earlier in our time at the department.

In fact, I distinctly remember an incident at the Southwest border. We had a case where we had a number of migrants charging a border station. Now, what normally happens is, Border Patrol has to do crowd control measures to protect officers on the line. So, limited tear gas was used to make sure that facility wasn't charged.

[16:10:11]

When Donald Trump saw that on TV, he actually thought what we were doing was starting just to gas migrants across the border as a tactic. In fact, he immediately called the secretary of homeland security to say: This is great. I love what you're doing. Keep it going.

He thought gassing was a policy, when, really, it was a safety measure in that one moment for officers.

I think that tells you a lot about the president's character. And that's why I think this is a character election. It's not about the policies. It's not about the politics. It's about the man that we're voting for.

And in the time that I got to serve in that administration, I realized Donald Trump was not the man that we needed to be commander in chief.

TAPPER: You have also described President Trump as someone who has difficulty focusing on doing the job.

You worked at the Department of Homeland Security. Can you give us an example of that dealing with homeland security, a president unable to focus on American lives, the -- some sort of situation that you may have witnessed?

TAYLOR: Yes, Jake, we could probably go on all night with examples, but I will just tell you one.

I mean, one day, I walked into the Oval Office to give the president a brief. I think this was fall of 2018. We had Hurricane Florence bearing down on the United States. It was coming towards the Carolinas on the coast. We sat there, and we were briefing the president on the storm track.

We were briefing the president on the damage that we expected and also our concerns about significant loss of life if he didn't tell Americans to evacuate.

Now, at first, I thought the president was very focused. I thought he was really paying attention to the briefing. He was studying the foam board that had the picture of the storm track.

And then he turned to me and he said: "You know, I have got a question."

"Yes, Mr. President."

He said: "Do the hurricanes always spin this direction?"

He meant counterclockwise. Now, that's called the Coriolis effect, same thing that causes toilets to spin the other direction in Australia, a follow-up question he also had. But this is what the president was focused on.

Americans were in the path of a deadly hurricane. He needed to get out there and tell them to evacuate. And he was just marveled at the way that hurricanes spin, in a way a third grader might learning about earth science. This is the president that we're talking about to keep us safe.

TAPPER: The Senate Intelligence Committee issued its final report on Russian election interference earlier today.

I know the president doesn't like hearing about this issue. Is his reluctance to accept the fact of interference by the Russians, as ascertained by the intelligence community, does that put U.S. security at risk? And, if so, how?

TAYLOR: Look, we saw it firsthand. And we saw it firsthand because we were quite literally told, do not

bring up issues related to Russia with the president. It might be counterproductive. In fact, one of the former White House chiefs of staff told us that we should avoid bringing up the topic of Russia with the president.

Here's the problem with that, Jake. When we were in 2018, driving towards the midterm elections, it was very clear that our number one homeland security concern was the possibility that the Russians might do again what they did in 2016.

So, what does that mean? You want the president of the United States to be very vocal and to say publicly, Russia better not meddle in our elections, or there are going to be stiff consequences.

The president didn't want to do that. In fact, he was infuriated at the suggestion that anything was being done on the subject. We couldn't get him to focus on it. The secretary of homeland security would call him about it. We tried to schedule meetings about it.

And, in fact, in one meeting we scheduled on the topic, instead of actually focusing on the potential threat to the election, the president wanted to talk about how many counties he had won in 2016, rather than talk about the counties across the country that we were worried about the Russians targeting in our midterm elections.

That's how severe this problem is. He's not focused on the threat. He's not focused on the reality. And I think, frankly, it's time to move on.

And, Jake, if I can add one last thing, I'm speaking about this as a lifelong Republican, OK? I had hopes that this president would live up to expectations, or even those who didn't have high expectations for him, that he might be able to do his job effectively with support.

That didn't plan -- that didn't come out the way that we had planned. And I think, at this point, it's a time for us to put country over party. And I hope other Republicans will do the same.

TAPPER: I do want to give you one other opportunity to respond to something that Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law and a top adviser, said.

He basically said that you're a nice kid, but you weren't up to the job. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JARED KUSHNER, SENIOR PRESIDENTIAL ADVISER: It makes a lot of sense to me that he's endorsing Joe Biden. When he was working at the Department of Homeland Security, no wall was built and the border was wide open. That's why the president changed up the team there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: What's your take on that? TAYLOR: You know, first, Jake, I'm going to say this.

I'm born and raised in Indiana, so I hope Jared still thinks I'm a nice kid. And I'm not going to get into any commentary about Jared. I mean, my goal here isn't really to condone people by name in the administration, other than the man whose name is going to be on the ballot. Jared's name won't be on the ballot.

But I will say this. We did everything within our power when we were in the department to enforce the law and support the 250,000 men and women on the front lines that protect this country every day.

[16:15:01]

Sometimes that meant pushing back against the president. Sometimes that meant saying no.

And if what folks in the White House are upset about is that we said no, I actually take it as a badge of honor that he thinks it was time to change out that team.

I will make one other thing clear, I wasn't fired from the administration. I left months later on my own accord despite the fact that they wanted me to stay. But there came a point, Jake, where saying no was no longer enough and it was time to get out.

And I hope that good people who are there will stay in and try to keep things on the rails. But if the president's re-elected, the guardrails will be gone and he will try to implement a vision that I think is much more damaging to our nation's security than even what we've seen in the last four years.

TAPPER: Like what?

TAYLOR: I'll tell you this. There are people serving very close to the president that have told me verbatim we should expect, quote, shock and awe if the president wins a second term. You will see a flurry of executive orders. You will see the president pull out of foreign alliances. You will see the president align with dictators around the world.

And if right now we're less safe because we have fewer friends and stronger enemies than before, you can expect to see that on steroids in another four years of the Trump administration.

TAPPER: All right, former Department of Homeland Security Chief of Staff Miles Taylor, thank you so much for your time today.

TAYLOR: Thanks, Jake. I appreciate it.

TAPPER: Joe Biden's wife Jill Biden is tonight's headliner at the Democratic National Convention. You will also hear from President Clinton, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and more.

CNN's special live coverage starts tonight at 7:00 Eastern.

Coming up, President Trump making an appeal to what he calls the suburban housewife at an event celebrating women's suffrage.

Plus, first UNC shuts down in, person classes after more than a hundred students tested positive. And now, they're dealing with another problem in Chapel Hill.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:16:16]

TAPPER: In our politics lead today, President Trump attacked one of America's most admired women, former First Lady Michelle Obama, at an event earlier today that was highlighting the 100th anniversary of women securing the right to vote.

The president had been asked by CNN's Kaitlan Collins to respond to Michelle Obama's criticisms of him at the Democratic convention last evening. The president has spent weeks trying to court a key voting bloc of suburban women. He calls them housewives. And critics suggest he is doing so by appealing to racist fears, as CNN's Kaitlan Collins now reports for us.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Donald Trump is accusing former First Lady Michelle Obama of being, quote, divisive today after she said in her convention speech that he was in over his head.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: She is in over her head and frankly she should've made the speech live, which she didn't do. She taped it. And it was not only taped, it was taped a long time ago because she had the wrong deaths.

COLLINS: The death toll from COVID-19 is now 20,000 people higher than when Michelle Obama taped her speech.

But it was this stinging criticism that prompted the president's response.

MICHELLE OBAMA, FORMER FIRST LADY: He cannot meet this moment. He simply cannot be who we need him to be for us.

COLLINS: Trump says it was her husband's legacy that catapulted him into office.

TRUMP: Frankly, I wouldn't even be here if it weren't for Barack Obama. See? We're standing in the White House. I wouldn't be in the White House except for Barack Obama.

COLLINS: The event was meant to celebrate women's right to vote on the 100th anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment. Trump announced he was pardoning Susan B. Anthony who was jailed in 1872 for voting illegally.

TRUMP: She was never pardoned. Did you know that? She was never pardoned.

(APPLAUSE)

What took so long?

COLLINS: Moments later, he ramped up his attacks on vote by mail.

TRUMP: You can't have millions and millions of ballots sent all over the place sent to people that are dead, sent to dogs, cats, sent everywhere.

COLLINS: After losing ground with suburban women since taking office, Trump is also attempting to appeal to those voters now that he's facing a major gender gap with Joe Biden, touting a housing rule change he hopes will attract white suburbanites.

TRUMP: They don't want to have people coming in and forcing low- income housing down their throats.

COLLINS: His son-in-law Jared Kushner says the campaign is just getting started.

JARED KUSHNER, WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISER: So what you'll see is after Labor Day, I think the campaign really starts in earnest.

COLLINS: But it's the 2016 campaign still hanging over the 2020 effort. Today, the Senate Intelligence Committee released the final volume of its investigation into Russian interference which found that Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort had contact with Russian intelligence and therefore posed a, quote, grave counter intelligence threat.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Now, Jake, what would make Paul Manafort a grave counterintelligence threat? Well, this report identifies his longtime associate Konstantin Kilimnik as a Russian intelligence officer for the first time and says that Konstantin Kilimnik may have been involved in that Russian effort, that Russian intelligence effort to get the Democratic national emails to steal them and make them public.

TAPPER: All right, Kaitlan Collins at the White House, thank you so much.

Coming up next, the alternative today offered by Dr. Anthony Fauci for college campuses in coronavirus hot spots. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:29:16]

TAPPER: In our health lead today for the third straight week, more than 1,000 people a day are dying from COVID-19 in the United States. But the average number of cases across the country has trended down.

And as CNN's Nick Watt reports, the continued spread of the virus and the failure of the government to stop it is making for a very challenging situation for schools trying to reopen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (VOIC: The good news? This country just logged less than 40,000 new cases in a day, first time in nearly two months. Very high but falling.

The bad news? We're still averaging more than 1,000 lives lost every day to this virus. And here's the key metric. In nearly half of states, the number of tests coming back positive is still too high.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: When you look at New York City right now, it's less than 1 percent.

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