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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Soon, Biden, Harris Greet Freed Americans At Joint Base Andrews; Soon, Freed Americans To Reunite With Families U.S.; Trump Escalates Race Attacks, Including Birth Certificate; "NewsNight Tackles State Of 2024 Presidential Race; Members Of The Panel Give Their "NewsNightcaps". Aired 10-11p ET
Aired August 01, 2024 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00]
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: Tonight, the long wait, as Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL WHELAN, FREED AMERICAN FROM RUSSIAN PRISON: These people in the government are working towards my freedom.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: -- have their faith rewarded --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: We work relentlessly to free Americans.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: -- in the largest prisoner swap since the Cold War.
Plus, the campaign collides with the world stage as Kamala Harris heads to welcome freed Americans home and Donald Trump denounces the deal.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: They allowed some really rough people out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: And Joe Biden --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: Why didn't he do it when he was president?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: -- tries to have the last word. Also, Trump digs in and makes clear that his racist attacks against Kamala Harris are now part of his message to American voters.
And is the Democratic nominee playing hide and seek --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. J.D. VANCE (R-OH), VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: It's not reasonable to run and hide from the media.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: -- from tough questions?
Live at the table, Jason Osborne, Aisha Mills, S.E. Cupp, and Bomani Jones.
Welcome to a special edition of NewsNight, State of the Race.
Good evening, everyone. I'm Kate Bolduan in New York. Abby Phillip is off tonight. So, you are stuck with me.
Let's get right to what America's talking about. You can go home again. Evan Gershkovich, Paul Whelan, Alsu Krumasheva, tonight, their destination is American soil. And the simple thing that you and I take for granted every day, every single second of our existence, they are about to walk free.
Already, the how this happened and the why it happened now and the price it took to make it happen is causing campaign complications for Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAMALA HARRIS, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT, PRESUMPTIVE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Over many years, President Biden and I and our team have engaged in complex, diplomatic negotiations to bring these wrongfully detained Americans home. We never stopped fighting for their release. And today, in spite of all of their suffering, it gives me great comfort to know that their horrible ordeal is finally over.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: I'd like to introduce my friends who have roped in forcibly being here with us tonight, and also the fifth in the hot seat with us tonight is Jonathan Franks. He has been involved in many a prisoner swap most recently, and most maybe high-profile in recent years, Trevor Reed, who was released in 2022. It's great to have you here, Jonathan.
Okay, the politics of a prisoner swap, I mean, this is historic and unprecedented in all the things in any year. The fact that is happening in 2024, it's like one of those things that yet again was not on my bingo card and it just landed on it. But what are the politics of prisoner swap in the middle of an election year? You add it up and it becomes what kind of a suit? S.E. CUPP, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think if you had a normal nominee, and I just mean conventional nominee, there wouldn't be politics around a prisoner swap. This was an incredible day for these people. It was a great day. Very sad for some others who were left behind, but it was a great day. And Donald Trump had to inject himself and his politics and his ego into, saying I would have gotten a better deal, as if you were talking about one of his buildings and not people.
So, I think there shouldn't be election politics around what happened today and I don't know that there would be unless Donald Trump decided to make this about him and not that.
JASON OSBORNE, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN ADVISER: I do think if you go back to 1980, where Ronald Reagan and the Iranian hostages, I mean, I think that politicians are always chasing that dream or that ideal of an impactful election year gambit, right? And I think in Donald Trump's case, I'm not defending at all what he said in his tweet except for the fact that it does raise questions of the last swap, which was the Iranian swap, with there was money given.
Now, that was their money. It wasn't taxpayer money given back to him. So, I think for him to legitimately raise that as an issue is like we don't know all the details of the swap, I think that was legitimate.
[22:05:03]
In terms of what your point was, I agree with you on that part, but I do think on the money aspect, that was a legitimate concern.
BOLDUAN: There was no money exchange, though.
OSBORNE: But we didn't know, right? I don't think that all the details and I think even Sullivan even said that some of the details are --
BOLDUAN: No money exchange. Let me play -- okay. Let me play. Let me play the Donald Trump bit where he's talking about this moment, because his take on it, his -- like Donald Trump's hot take, their prisoners are swapped and here's what he says.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I heard that I heard he said this, why didn't Trump get him out, and he was taken during that time. I got out 59 different people, 59, and I didn't pay money. I didn't pay money.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: They didn't pay money. One Google search, though, shows that the throwback machine of 2019 tells us that Donald Trump did approve a payment of $2 million to North Korea to pay for the medical bills of Otto Warmbier. So, there is money that is exchanged with nations that we do not like all the time.
BOMANI JONES, ESPN PODCAST HOST, THE RIGHT TIME WITH BOMANI JONES: Yes, maybe. Look, I don't think most people observing this know enough about this to have a comparative of like, oh, this deal is way better than the last time (INAUDIBLE). I don't know.
BOLDUAN: But the one I cut you know with my girlfriend back in Indiana, I was way better.
JONES: Yes, no, but, I mean, but if you're the president you do get a boost off of look what this is that I can do And if you're Trump, you define yourself by the idea of being the deal maker. So, no matter what you're going to say that these other people don't do this, but nobody really knows.
This isn't going to -- like the way this lands on people after three, maybe four days is probably nonexistent. It fills up the day right now with something for us to talk about, but I can't -- like I talk about trades all the time. I work in sports. I can tell you if those trades are good ones, right, no matter who that happens to me. I don't know what the hell to tell you about who -- like who they -- this is like, what, seven countries, everything else? I didn't realize there were this many people in jail getting traded all the time until this happened. People don't know, man.
OSBORNE: I agree with you.
BOLDUAN: But they should know, though. Why is it a non-story after 24 hours?
AISHA MILLS, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: The fact that we're talking about this as if it's like a real political bellwether is completely nonexistent. I mean, most of us were watching the Olympics today, and they're like, oh my goodness, diplomacy. This is what's supposed to happen. People's lives are being saved, and back to our regularly scheduled programming.
Thank God these people are coming home to their families. This is amazing. Let's have compassion, right? But thinking about it as a political football of who wins or who loses I don't think is where the populace is going to be.
JONES: it would be a story if I was the one that's in jail, I would be perfectly honest with you. That would be the biggest story in the world if I was a person that came home. Yes, but you can't compare it to 1980. I think the word, hostage, lands a lot different than the word prisoner. Like the idea that people were taken hostage and then removed, you come in and you're like a hero.
OSBORNE: No. The only reason I brought up 1980 was the fact that during that cycle that it came out that Reagan had prolonged the ability of those hostages from coming back to help him once --
JONES: Yes, but I don't think you can get that kind of win now what often is.
OSBORNE: No, absolutely.
BOLDUAN: You have to wade through this concept all the time to get politicians to and to get the world to pay attention when you're trying to advocate for someone. What do you see in the historic nature of what we watch play out today together on my show and then the reaction coming in from Donald Trump and others?
JONATHAN FRANKS, SPOKESPERSON, BRING OUT OUR FAMILIES HOME CAMPAIGN: Well, part of me is surprised that they did this in an election year. I'll be honest is that in traditional wisdom is you don't do these during election years. So, I'm proud of them for doing that. I mean, quite frankly, I'm very proud of the president, of Jake and the others who were involved in this because this is a big deal.
And I was a little confused by the former president and I have a pretty nuanced view of his work on hostages. I think he brought a lot of good to the enterprise, but it was kind of confusing to see him criticizing prisoner trades because I represent a client whom he traded for in 2020.
BOLDUAN: So, that's what we call it.
CUPP: There you go.
BOLDUAN: A prisoner swap mic drop. And then J.D. Vance enters the fray doing what is J.D. Vance's job being a running mate, which is backing up Donald Trump. I will say that is J.D. Vance's job today, and this is how he did it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VANCE: We have to ask ourselves, why are they coming home? And I think it's because bad guys all over the world recognize Donald Trump's about to be back in office, so they're cleaning house. That's a good thing, and I think it's a testament to Donald Trump's strength.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUPP: It's all for the W, right?
BOLDUAN: I applaud his approach. I applaud -- your job as a running mate is you got to back him up. You don't get to have a different opinion, and he worked it today.
MILLS: Well, in a land of sound bites, where all that their community is going to see, all that their folks are going to see are the constant replay of that clip, of course, there's going to be a population of folks who think that Donald Trump just saved the day, right?
Fortunately, we have the rest of media that tells full-hearted stories, but I think this also goes to show that they do what they can to just put one liners that are mistruths and incomplete out into the sphere so that we click them, which we need to be really mindful about and have a little bit more responsibility in the way that we tell our stories, like we're doing here where we can have a full-throated conversation.
[22:10:19]
BOLDUAN: Give me a gut check on what Vance said, or was Vladimir Putin shaking in his boots? FRANKS: No, of course not. And I think what Vladimir Putin was motivated by was getting -- I can't say his first name, Krasikov back. And he has been obsessed with that for years. So, as soon as that, of the pieces came together on that, he made the move, because that was the goal.
CUPP: But there also -- I mean, there is a relationship, an important relationship that Biden has with Germany that made this possible now, and maybe not in another administration. So, there is technically a reason that this happens now in an election year with Biden, not with Trump, but this wasn't Trump's success or his victory.
BOLDUAN: And important in what you just said is with Biden, not with Trump. So, is it wrong for Kamala Harris to, I don't know, to try to claim that I'm part of the -- I was part of this too?
CUPP: She is part of it. This administration did it. She is part of it. That cuts both ways. She's going to find it cuts both ways on the border and everything else, but she is a part, of course. But she is a part of this. This is her administration as much as it is Joe Biden's.
JONES: Anything good that they do, she's going to have to jump on, right, like that becomes the record that you have to hold on to. It would be silly to do anything --
BOLDUAN: Otherwise, you don't have right.
CUPP: She'll be blamed for the bad too.
BOLDUAN: Right.
FRANKS: I'm aware of contributions of hers over the course of the administration that are substantive that haven't been reported. So, I don't think it's -- I certainly didn't think it was bandwagoning. And I was really glad to hear her effectively proclaimed that if she wins the election, we're going to continue down this path of bringing Americans home.
BOLDUAN: Yes. I want to have like a Jonathan Franks just pop-up video, like I'm going to post a question. He's like, I actually got the answer already. So, let's don't worry.
Can I end just really quickly? I'm going to read one line from this great inside piece that The Wall Street Journal did on all the inside details. The very last bit is about Evan Gershkovich had to sign a request for a pardon, blah, blah, blah, thank you, Vladimir Putin. And on the form, he writes, after his release, the last line submitted, a proposal of his own. After his release, would Putin be willing to sit down for an interview?
CUPP: That's a journalist.
BOLDUAN: All I thought was like, that is such a baller move.
CUPP: It's so badass. And that's a full-throated journalist, a journalist who knows this is my job. And not just my job, this is my life. This is in every fiber of my being. I respect, freedom of speech, and I will hold powerful people accountable. And if I have a chance at a get, even with my captor, I'm taking it. I mean, just badass.
OSBORNE: I mean, can we also ask Jake Tapper what he's going to start tweeting out every morning, because I know for the last, however long, the guy was over in jail --
CUPP: He tweeted today. He is free today.
OSBORNE: But now what does he do tomorrow?
FRANKS: I have clients to nominate --
(CROSSTALKS)
BOLDUAN: I am constantly worried what is happening with Jake, what he's going to tweet in the morning. We will -- you know what?
FRANKS: I have ideas. I have clients.
BOLDUAN: Jonathan Franks, again, pop-up video. Thank you so much for joining us, Jonathan. You guys don't get to leave. Bomani, I know, is trying to escape, but he's not allowed to.
Again, the president and Vice President Harris, they are expected to be arriving right there at that shot you see right there, Joint Base Andrews, any moment for the anticipated arrival when these now free Americans will be landing on free American soil once again. And we'll bring that to you live.
Plus, Donald Trump tonight digging in instead of trying to dig out of his race and identity attacks on Kamala Harris, including now a birth certificate.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:18:19]
BOLDUAN: Tonight, Donald Trump is tripling down, if that's a thing, on his personal racist attacks on Vice President Kamala Harris. He reposted a picture of her birth certificate, trying to continue baselessly saying that she is not black, and shared, we'll show you, this picture of Harris in traditional Indian sari, sarcastically praising her love of Indian heritage.
Now, we are told, also, at the very same time, his campaign is deploying their top black surrogates to try and mitigate some of the damage that they seem to sense from his comments at the Conference of Black Journalists that we have talked so much about, and that damage includes 48 hours worth of this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And they tell me that Harris' husband, Doug Emhoff, Mr. President, is Jewish. He's Jewish like Bernie Sanders is Jewish. Are you kidding me? He's a crappy Jew. He's a horrible Jew.
TRUMP: I didn't know she was black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn black. And now she wants to be known as black. So I don't know, is she Indian or is she black?
And today, it's almost like -- I mean, Schumer has become a Palestinian. Chuck Schumer is officially now a Palestinian.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: So, what is a campaign surrogate to do? Advice? I mean, how do you -- really, if you're going to, quote/unquote, mitigate some disaster?
OSBORNE: Well --
JONES: You really think one of us can fix this?
BOLDUAN: I would love you to play the role.
JONES: That's the most flattering thing anybody has ever done, to think that I can look at this and be like, oh, okay, no, I'm not. Here's how we're going to fix this.
BOLDUAN: I got the one liner.
OSBORNE: Yes. Well, I mean, I worked for one of those surrogates, Dr. Ben Carson, who I think is an amazing man.
[22:20:00]
And I actually haven't seen any of the comments that he's made on this. But, clearly, this was a mistake. I mean, there's no if ins or buts about it. I think Scott Jennings had a great line about it the other night where, you know, he basically shit the bed. And now the question is he going to roll around in it?
I think there is a --
JONES: That's exactly what he's doing.
CUPP: Yes.
OSBORNE: Well, it appears so. Now, we're in the 48-hour window. I mean, you want these stories to go away and I just don't know how it goes away.
BOLDUAN: He doesn't -- Donald Trump can control himself if he would like to.
JONES: Right. But --
BOLDUAN: He doesn't want it to go away.
JONES: But the thing I find confusing about this attack is if the idea is that she is pretending to be black when she's not really black, the people that would be most offended by that would be black people. We're not falling for that one, right? Like we're pretty good on knowing this one, so we do all right. Like you might fool us every now and then, but we're pretty good at figuring this out, and we have roundly decided that this is, in fact, a black person. I can't see this as being something that's swaggering anybody that they need to swagger.
BOLDUAN: Like there's a list of things that I didn't think we would ever be saying on television is like the wildest thing.
JONES: Yes. Well, he's basically saying he's never heard of the idea of somebody being biracial. Like there are a lot of things that come together in this that just seemed like this is the best you guys could come up with. And that's the thing that seems most worrisome about them and what they're doing is you really couldn't come up with anything better than this.
CUPP: They really don't know how to handle her. That's obvious. And it's been obvious from the jump.
BOLDUAN: Do you think that's it? Do you think this is like a sign of Donald Trump, like politically fidgeting, like he can't figure out what to do with her, and so this is kind of giving, like throwing spaghetti on the wall?
CUPP: Yes. And the thing is that's wild about it, among many things, one of the things that Donald Trump has been very good at, impressively and infuriatingly good at, historically, is identifying what his people want to hear. And those things might be impolitic and things that like we would never say, and we couldn't imagine that appealing to anyone. But he's very good at identifying these undercurrents and speaking to them.
I don't know who this is for. I don't know what -- it seems like he's off his game because I don't know who childless cat ladies is for. I know these voters, the voters that J.D. Vance has meant to woo. These people go to church and bible study every week and pray for their childless friends who are going through IVF and adoption. This doesn't make sense to his own voters. You could -- it'd be one thing if you thought, well, this is appealing to them. It's awful and cringy, but it's appealing. I don't think it's even appealing to his voters. So, I don't really know what the point of it is.
BOLDUAN: I can feel you rolling your eyes right now. Tell me.
MILLS: I just think we're wasting time. Like I could care less about what he's saying about whoever, right? Let's talk about Kamala Harris and why she's amazing. And the fact that black people, the Indian aunties, all the Latino folks, even the white dudes have been raising a ton of money for her. Because when you look at her, you see America. And that's why they're mad, and that's why they're scared.
We've got someone who is running for president right now that is a reflection of the majority of us in being biracial, in being someone who has compassion and kindness, and certainly somebody who is also tough on all the things. And I think that, you know, for me, that's what I want to give airtime to. When someone is flailing about, with despair, saying ridiculous things, you know, we ignore them.
CUPP: But if someone who's a former president and a candidate for president ignore it --
BOLDUAN: But what about the track record of just this, that Donald Trump is a master of labeling, targeting, and even though you would say it's -- even if it's completely misinformed, he has found a way in the past to make something stick with enough people that it sticks?
MILLS: Well, I would disagree, and I would say that Donald Trump is a bully and a jerk. And if my child in middle school --
(CROSSTALKS)
MILLS: If my child in middle school was going around saying things that were ridiculous, badgering people, calling people names, and then using racist tropes, we wouldn't be sitting around having a lovely conversation about how masterful she is.
So, when I say that I don't want to give credence to bad behavior by suggesting that it is somehow strategic --
CUPP: No, I'm saying it's not strategic.
MILLS: It's not strategic at all.
CUPP: That's what I just said.
MILLS: No, I agree with you. It is not at all strategic.
CUPP: It's totally not strategic. And he's been great at labeling. This time, it's backfiring because they're owning the labels. They're taking and co-opting all the stupid labels that J.D. Vance and Donald Trump are giving everyone, and they're using them, turning them around to their advantage.
So, there doesn't seem to be a lot of strategery going on in what was once a pretty strategical campaign.
[22:25:05]
The wheels are off. It feels like the wheels are off this (INAUDIBLE).
MILLS: We are a dying breed and we are not going backwards. This is not 1950. This is not 1960, okay? We are not going backwards to a time where people can be divided based on like race.
You know, I'll tell you a funny story. Literally like two weeks ago, somebody called me a mulatto online, this whole big nasty fight I'm having in my community with the school board. And somebody called me mulatto. And I just kind of laughed at that because it was designed to be a really nasty racist insult. And I said, where did you get that from, right? You got it from Donald Trump. It's the most antiquated terminology. The kids don't even know what this means to even be insulted by it, right? We're not going backwards to that time.
And there might be -- I don't know who's listening, S.E., but there might be, you know, a dozen people that are still cheering him on with this kind of rhetoric, right? But I do think it's missing most people. I don't think that it's landing. I don't think it's strategic. I don't even think that his base is buying it anymore.
BOLDUAN: It also does feed to the -- I remember speaking to a lot of voters in '20 who had voted for Trump in '16, and then ended up voting for Biden, in the suburban moms, like go to all the labels of like the people who were like decide -- some of the people that helped decide that election, and it was, I'm exhausted by the nonsense. And that was in -- you know, this goes beyond nonsense, but it was kind of that like exhale of like I don't want to go back to that anymore.
JONES: Well, I think there are a lot of people in these four years, particularly with the social media deplatforming of Trump, we really kind of got a break. Like you had to go find him if you wanted to go --
BOMANI: Bomani, that helped him.
JONES: Yes, it helped him. But I guess what I'm saying is now that he has come back, I think that people remember what it was like, like that was a stressful four years. No matter what side of it you were on, that was the stress of four years. We got a reprieve from it. And now he's back. Like, to me, it has felt like the last month. It was like, man, this feels like this eerie deja vu. Oh, that's right, we did this for four years. And I don't think that people are going to feel good about this coming back. And particularly if the tactics that he's using are much more -- even more explicit than they were before.
Xenophobia was a play, but explicit like anti-black racism was not really the play. That has not been the play that's worked well for a very long time. And so I don't think that they're scared as much as they just kind of stew (ph).
MILLS: And it all just feels so regressive. I mean, it's not even like TikTok era, sexy, fun insult, right? Like it feels so rigidly old school that I don't know who the market is for this, right? Because throwing out like these old -- I mean, you're talking about birth certificates, really? You're going to put up a birth certificate. Been there, done that 2007, '08, right? Like I'm --
BOLDUAN: When I saw that. I was like, oh my God.
MILLS: Blast from the past. So, the playbook is stale. It's old as much as it is ignorant.
BOLDUAN: Stand by to stand by, folks. We've got much more to come.
Next, Democrats have been calling Trump weird and he is feeling apparently weird about it. I have a bone to pick about this being one word, though. I will get to this. I'm going to go on a thing. We'll discuss.
Plus, any moment to remind you of this big news, we're watching this live event that we'll be playing out, and families, people, everyone is waiting to see. Three Americans released from Russian custody about to return to U.S. soil. We're going to have that live for you when it happens
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:32:41]
BOLDUAN: You should hear the commercial break talk. Democrats have called Donald Trump evil, a dictator, a con man, but apparently it is being called weird that seems to actually really be getting under his skin. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: If you've ever seen her with the laugh and everything else, that's a weird deal going on there. They're the weird ones. Nobody's ever called me weird. I'm a lot of things, but weird I'm --"
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: Okay, let's get into this. I actually have thoughts on this, and this isn't just like, this is the one thing Kate's gloved on to. I have an issue with Democrats on this one. Weird is a word that I have now realized I use all the time, and now it feels like I've become like a democratic surrogate every time I'm talking to my kids because I've always said like, no, no, we're into weird. We like being weird. We're into being weirdos. And now I'm like, thanks a lot, Kamala. No, I'm just kidding.
MILLS: Wow, weirdo, different than that's weird, right?
UNKNOWN: Oh, now we're cursing.
MILLS: A little bit because the kids will tell you, right? Like the young people will be like, oh yeah, the weirdos are cool, right? It's a whole thing. Very different than, dude, it's kind of weird. Like I don't know what's going on with you.
BOLDUAN: What is it about, honestly, what is it about the word that is effective?
JONES: Because everything is high school. That's why. Like it taps into a very visceral place that people relate to.
BOLDUAN: I feel like I'm having anxiety.
JONES: We are going --
OSBORNE: I think it's high school and being a dad.
JONES: Yeah, too.
OSBORNE: My kids call me weird all the time and they're in their 20s.
BOLDUAN: Well, it's because you wear jackets like that. I'm just kidding.
OSBORNE: My wife picked this jacket out. Now you're calling my wife weird. All right, I get it.
JONES: We are slowly kind of realizing that the defining thing of the year 2024 is going to be not like us, right? And if you look at the approach that everybody's taking and running this on every side, no matter who they are, the campaign slogan over everybody basically is they not like us, right? And so, you flip this back around on Trump and all of them is why are these guys some weirdos?
Because that's what Walz is saying. The dude in Minnesota is just saying, you know, it's like, don't they seem kind of weird to you? And like, yeah, they're not like us. They're weird. Everybody's putting that in that sort of position.
And so, now Trump, who's been the high school bully for so long in all of this, they just hit him back with some more high school stuff like, dude, he's weird. And then how do you and how do you prove?
BOLDUAN: And so true. That is so true.
[22:35:00]
This is so --you have really hit it.
JONES: Yeah.
MILLS: You know, the thing about the weird moniker, too, is that all these other words we can use, you're racist, you're bigot, you're all these things that is more so defining him around ideology, just saying weird is actually kind of just making fun of him because he's kind of weird, right?
And I think that that's the rub there, right? He will own whatever label you give him. And you know, he'll own a label. But when you're just kind of making fun of him, like on the schoolyard, oh, hey, weirdo, we don't want to be your friend, I think that's the thing is getting under his skin.
OSBORNE: But they not see, like, I get your point on it. And I understand why they're trying to go and do that. But then on -- on our side of the aisle, we look at, you know, the wheels on the bus go round and round. Those kind of clips of Kamala Harris and some of her word salad things. And we're like, that's weird for a vice president to be talking like that.
JONES: Yeah.
OSBORNE: And, you know, the White House Easter egg roll and some of the festivities that occurred over there. I mean, Jesus, we're sitting here looking at that as weird. I mean, okay, so they claim weird first.
JONES: We could even call it a bit broadly hypocritical that the left and its openness and the desire that everybody is just tolerant like the way they are. And now we're going to call somebody else the weirdo. It's all there.
But that's not the point now, is it, right? Because I tell you, if I want to if I want to put together the clip package and I've seen them about why these people are weird, it's a really easy sell, right? It's not -- it's not hard to pull off. But it's -- it's childish and it's going to work.
BOLDUAN: But is there an expiration date on this? I -- every time, you know, on my show, I will have a Democratic governor after Democratic lawmaker come on and they will -- they will be standing there and they will be talking. All of a sudden, you just you actually can see them the physicality change and it becomes like, yes. And the policies, this and immigration, that and isn't just kind of weird. Like - like --
OSBORNE: I mean, Chuck Schumer saying that after showing him grilling a raw burger with cheese on it, I mean, it -- him saying weird is weird in and of itself.
BOLDUAN: I can't handle.
CUPP: Democrats and Kamala surrogates can't just run on "weird and I'm a prosecutor, he's a criminal". She has that for no interview. She's going to have to answer some questions. She's going to have to have some policies and an agenda.
But it is an interesting trick. And it's about otherizing, something Trump has historically been very, very good at. You should know this very well because he tried to otherize Ben Carson around his Seventh Day Adventism. He tried to otherize Ted Cruz. He tried to otherize Marco Rubio. He's tried to otherize people that he disagreed with.
He usually does it around race, ethnicity, religion. What the Dems are now trying to do is otherize people like J.D. Vance for just sounding like they don't represent real people.
BOLDUAN: What I'm hearing is we're getting nowhere. What I'm hearing is we've gotten nowhere.
CUPP: It is weird to be as obsessed about childless people as J.D. Vance seems to be. That is weird. And it is an attempt at saying these people are kooky. They're not like you. They're not like us.
BOLDUAN: Kooky sounds way cooler than weird. Kooky sounds way cooler than weird. Okay, I want to give you guys your take because the governor of Illinois, he says some great things. He's got some good lines. So, veepstakes is on in full force. We now have some of the top contenders canceling their weekend plans. Exactly. A triple eyebrow- raise. What could this mean? Here's what J.D. Pritzker said about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. J.B. PRITZKER (D-ILLINOIS): Lollapalooza is happening this weekend here in Chicago and my kids and I mean, tens of thousands of others are -- are going to be there. You know, I've heard other governors talk about how they've canceled their weekend plans. I was going to perform, of course, with Blink 182 on Sunday --
ARI MELBER, "THE BEAT" HOST: Oh, great.
PRITZKER: But I've canceled in order to clear my schedule.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OSBORNE: I'm going to go out on a limb and say him being at Lollapalooza is weird.
BOLDUAN: No, Lollapalooza is for everyone.
MILLS: Let me just talk about the fact that at the end of the day, Democrats at least have a sense of humor, a little bit of levity. Right now, life is kind of fun.
CUPP: They are having fun. That is true. They are having fun.
MILLS: Needed a surge and a boost of just joy and fun and happiness and camaraderie.
CUPP: Oh, they got it for sure.
MILLS: And that is a great thing. Remember, we are still coming out of, I don't know how you all feel, but I still feel some of the weight of like COVID on top of us, just kind of climbing back out. The world is crazy. Now, Donald Trump is back.
People are talking about him. He's saying foolish things. Just to have an opportunity to have some fun and lightness and laughs, I think people are really going to appreciate and respect it. I think we're seeing a lot of that happen right now.
JONES: It isn't really joy, though.
MILLS: It has to be joy all the time. Everybody has to be a jerk all the time.
UNKNOWN: I don't think so.
JONES: This isn't joy. This is picking on people. That's not the same thing. And it can often be very enjoyable.
[22:40:00]
But I would say that it is eye level messaging from a party that is really bad at that, right? They're like these. Like, if you're just going to reduce it down to being weird, take it away from everything else. It's right there. You know exactly what's going on. It doesn't have a lot of prefixes and suffixes. This does not have a
lot of syllables. This is right there where people can hear you and people can listen, which they have not been good at for a very, very, very long time.
BOLDUAN: I still would be. If the expiration date has been hit, Democrats, next month you got to choose a new one because I need to get back to being comfortable using the word weird with feeling like I'm following someone's lead, all right?
All right. Stick with me. We are moments away from President Biden and Vice President Harris breeding three American hostages freed from Russian custody. Plus, what does this situation mean about a potential Harris or second Trump presidency on the world stage? We'll discuss.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:45:11]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J.D. VANCE (R) VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: It's not reasonable to run and hide from the media and not answer the American people's questions.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: J.D. Vance, that is what he has to say about that. Any moment now, President Biden and Vice President Harris will be greeting the freed Americans from Russia as they touch down on U.S. soil. You can expect shouted questions maybe from reporters, but actual questions in formal settings like a taped interview.
Kamala Harris seems somewhat allergic to that, so far, as the presumptive nominee. She has yet to hold a press conference or sit down for an interview since she became the presumptive nominee. And you can hear J.D. Vance is ready to talk all about that.
Joining the table this time, we hooked CNN's presidential historian, Tim Naftali, to join us. What do you think about -- the rub for a long time was, you know, Joe Biden isn't taking questions and he's not taking press conferences.
Donald Trump is doing interviews. Donald Trump is taking questions. J.D. Vance is running the cameras. Kamala Harris is not. Kamala Harris is not. She is making -- she is out there. She is campaigning. Yes, it is a compressed timeline. She's not set for interviews yet.
TIM NAFTALI, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: All right. And if Donald Trump were a disciplined campaigner and if J.D. Vance were actually thinking about advancing the cause of their ticket, there would be even more pressure on Kamala Harris to define herself.
But at the moment, the Trump-Vance team is defining itself through its, I would say, really amateurish approach to this campaign. It's amazing to me that they didn't anticipate a change at the top of the ticket. It's amazing. You'd think --
BOLDUAN: It was projected for a long time.
NAFTALI: Not only projected.
BOLDUAN: They had a long lead time.
NAFTALI: But anybody who'd studied politics knew that once Nancy Pelosi started to send signals, that was the tip of the iceberg. I'm not saying she's an iceberg. I'm just saying that's it. And for the for Trump not to have started to think through what his attack lines would be should Harris become the top of the ticket is amazing to me.
CUPP: It's worse than that because Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were running as a ticket. You would have come up with some attack lines against the vice president. You were going to debate her. J.D. Vance was going to have to debate her at some point. So, those attacks should be ready off the printer. They should be ready in a folder.
NAFTALI: So, Kate, I think, yes, Vice President Harris should engage in those press conferences. But she's been given a bye because the Trump-Vance team has been so awkward in dealing with her candidacy.
BOLDUAN: Because, the thing is, you know, the phrase is always that you need to define yourself. You need to find your campaign, your candidacy before your opponent does. And they do seem to be flailing, as we've discussed tonight and trying and trying to do that.
I don't -- I am -- I am somewhat surprised that Kamala Harris isn't sitting for interviews. It's not like she's not capable of doing it. She does have some things that do need to be discussed. I myself am interested in finding out how she has-- changing a position and evolving, that's the facts of life.
But how did she get -- how do you get from I will ban? I do want to ban fracking to -- I don't want to ban fracking. How do you and why?
NAFTALI: Am I the only person that's surprised, though, that part of the plan of the switchover wasn't and there's going to be this interview right here. Like normally when somebody is launching something,
UNKNOWN: Right.
JONES: You have the interview plan set up to go with it. This has been such a disheartening race because we're alternating between two sides who decided the most effective strategy was to let their opponent crash out. But let Biden crash out and then once Biden was out of there is let Trump crash out. Like the best strategy is to let other people talk.
MILLS: I don't know --
OSBORNE: Like the Republicans are surprised or caught off guard. I mean, let's not forget that a month after the debate, I mean, for an entire month, we -- on these shows and others, you had Democrats through consistently saying that Joe Biden is not getting out. Joe Biden is not getting out. He is the man. He's in it to win it.
The campaign was saying that up until the minute that Joe Biden decided that he was getting out. So, all of a sudden, everybody's like excited about Kamala Harris when I mean, I was on shows. I know she was. I know you -- you were anchoring shows and you had Democrats that were like, why are we even talking about this because Joe Biden's going to be in it? So, now everybody's --
JONES: And people believe that?
BOLDUAN: -- believed and saying out loud. It's a very distinctive.
OSBORNE: Way to say it's about probability. It's not about being sure. I mean, nobody has a clear crystal ball. The point was you had to prepare for the possibility and to say that it wouldn't happen at all.
MILLS: So, I'm not saying I disagree with your point, but here -- here is how I'm seeing all of this. I do think that absolutely Vice President Harris should sit down for the interviews and will absolutely sit down and be asked the tough questions and account for changes of view, et cetera. But I don't know what you've been looking at the last two weeks.
[22:50:01]
But I have been following the cultural zeitgeist that is Kamala Harris. And I do think that there is a bit of arrogance on the part of the media who feels entitled to the first look of the thing, when in fact she went to the people first.
If you look at the money, that's unprecedented -- unprecedented, the momentum that the announcement had for her, the constituencies that gather immediately in an organic way to come together on calls with 50,000 people raising millions of dollars at a time, the big rally that just happened down in Atlanta.
If you go on TikTok, for example, it's all Kamala Harris memes. So, I do think, again, we are not going backwards. The idea that campaigning is based upon a very narrow set of principles around how you roll out your conversations at home.
BOLDUAN: No, that's not what I'm saying. It's a thing of the past.
JONES: I don't think anybody is saying that.
MILLS: I don't know which election but you can see the poll numbers --
JONES: I don't think that's what anybody is saying.
CUPP: She sat down for interviews. She could have touted those poll numbers. Had she sat down for interviews, she could have laid out her agenda. Had she sat down for interviews, she could have bragged about all of the cultural zeitgeist. But we do deserve to ask her questions. You know why?
MILLS: And you will get to. CUPP: It's not because we're the media. It's because we ask the
questions the public doesn't get a chance to.
MILLS: You'll get to. I mean, I think that we're talking about less than two weeks right now, right?
JONES: Yeah, but two weeks is a long time.
MILLS: If the summer ends and you haven't, then we'll be having a really different conversation.
BOLDUAN: Historically, what is the honeymoon period?
NAFTALI: Well, we've never had this kind of shotgun marriage.
BOLDUAN: Well-played, well-played.
NAFTALI: No, here's one of the things that vice presidents who are running right after or actually during the administration for which they're vice president, one of their problems is always to define themselves vis-a-vis the president.
But because of President Biden's physical challenges, leave it at that, Kamala Harris has actually had the spotlight and has had an opportunity to define herself. It's very sad that the president had COVID, but that gave her a few days to be the only voice that we heard. President announces this not by a speech to the nation, which is what you would have expected, but through a statement.
So, look, the rules are being written as we go along. What is very clear is that whatever Kamala Harris has said publicly behind the scenes, she's been a marvel at pulling together the party. There is a story there, and look, she's gotten help, no doubt, that Hakeem, no doubt that Nancy Pelosi, to some extent Barack Obama and Biden have all worked.
But in the end, she's the one making the calls. It's astounding that all of her potential rivals just melted away.
BOLDUAN: Yeah.
NAFTALI: So, though she didn't go public and didn't talk to the media, she's done the work behind the scenes. Now is the time to explain, now that she's united the party, what does the party stand for and now to do it.
BOLDUAN: We're not in the past tense. We are in the present tense. And so, we are in a standby to standby because --
NAFTALI: We are unburdened by what has been.
BOLDUAN: We are unprecedented. I'm really sick of being unprecedented. I'm looking for some more precedented people. Hang tight. All eyes on this place, Joint Base Andrews, as the plane carrying those freed Americans just crossed into U.S. airspace. We're going to go there live soon. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:58:09]
BOLDUAN: And we're back, and it's time for the "NewsNightcap". You each get 30 seconds, apparently, because now I'm wearing this because normally I'm just going to break this down. Everybody, I'm normally asleep at this time because I have to get up so early. So, this is new and fresh for me.
CUPP: Okay.
BOLDUAN: So, you get 30 seconds and you are going to just give me your piece. Jason, you can begin.
OSBORNE: All right. Well, I'm going to take the subject I originally said, which is the Olympics, which was -- has been amazing to watch the stories. My daughter swims at LSU. So, seeing some of her old teammates swimming and the gold medals and shout out to Yeri (ph) from Croatia, who's a teammate of hers and swam the 50 free today. It's been awesome to watch.
BOLDUAN: That's so un-American of you. I'm just kidding.
OSBORNE: No, still, but I mean, the American women, Katie Ledecky and the story behind Caeleb Dressel has just been -- it's been phenomenal.
BOLDUAN: Aisha.
MILLS: Well, go team USA Women's Gymnastics gold medal. I'm so stoked. So, first of all, Suni Lee is the MVP, got the bronze. Simone Biles got the gold. But what's really fascinating to me about this team is that when you look at our gymnastics team and most of our teams, it's America. It's America. This is the first time that this team got a gold.
And if you look at the women on this team, most of them, women of color. And that is really reflective of who we are as a nation and where we're going because we're not going backwards. We're going forward and we are winning. Go, USA.
BOLDUAN: S.E.
CUPP: Well, I hate to rain on this parade, but my hot take is Chris LaCivita needs to quit the campaign. She needs to quit. She needs to quit right now. Save yourself. Save yourself. You're too good for this. And you have two people in J.D. Vance and Donald Trump, your principals, who are disasters and are incapable of listening to your very good strategy advice. So, quit. Quit now.
JONES: My hot take, a literal hot take, the average temperature in Death Valley for the month of July was one hundred and eight and a half degrees, which is per, I believe, "The Washington Post", literally the hottest month in the history of the earth --
[23:00:09] UNKNOWN: Hottest month of all the months.
JONES: -- of the whole Earth. The hottest month that there ever has been.
BOLDUAN: And, you know --
JONES: We might have a problem that needs some attention.
BOLDUAN: We might. I mean, or we just really like being unprecedented.
MILLS: So, let's come back and talk about climate change policy in the next show.
BOLDUAN: Yeah, and how climate change policy is so weird. Thank you guys for having me this evening. And thank you all so much for watching "NewsNight State of the Race". "Laura Coates Live" will start now.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
