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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip
Trump Blames Democratic Rhetoric for Assassination Attempts; FBI Says, Apparent Second Trump Assassination Attempt Very Serious; Rapper Sean Diddy Combs Arrested in Manhattan Hotel. Justin Timberlake Gets A Plea Deal After Arrest In Sag Harbor For Drunk Driving; Sean Combs Arrested By New York Federal Agents. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired September 16, 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]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Tonight, a race for answers and questions about whether candidates are safe.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We view this as extremely serious.
PHILLIP: After another extraordinary turn in an unprecedented election.
Plus, Donald Trump strikes a match by blaming his opponents for another apparent attempt on his life, as assassinations become politicized.
PHILLIP: And --
SEN. J.D. VANCE (R-OH), VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: If I have to create stories --
PHILLIP: -- more schools and hospitals in Springfield are forced to evacuate as J.D. Vance admits to being a teller of tall tales story.
Live at the table, Scott Jennings, Elie Mystal, Lydia Moynihan and Hillary Rosen. Welcome to a special edition of NewsNight, State of the Race.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening, I'm Abby Phillip in New York.
Let's get right to what America is talking about, an apparent second assassination attempt on Donald Trump. And this country is incapable of talking about this five alarm fire. Instead of focusing on the crisis of violence in our politics or how better to protect these candidates, this is being treated like any other political incident, along partisan lines.
Trump himself is blaming the rhetoric of President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris despite zero evidence to back that up. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: There's a lot of rhetoric going on, a lot of people think that the Democrats, when they talk about a threat to democracy and all of this, and it seems that both of these people were radical lefts.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: And Trump's running mate is doing the same.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VANCE: You know, the big difference between conservatives and liberals is that we -- no one has tried to kill Kamala Harris in the last couple of months and two people now have tried to kill Donald Trump in the last couple of months. I'd say that's pretty strong evidence that the left needs to tone down the rhetoric and needs to cut this crap out. Somebody's going to get hurt by it. And it's going to destroy this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: CNN Presidential Historian Tim Naftali joins us in our fifth seat. Tim, there is quite a lot of historical precedent, unfortunately, for this kind of thing, including Gerald Ford, who faced two assassination attempts, two near death experiences, within less than a month of each other. And yet, this is different because of the way that, right now, there's no sort of ability to see beyond the politics of the moment. This has just become another political incident in this country.
TIM NAFTALI, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: You know, we talk about how there's a parallel to 1968, and there's no parallel to 1968. After Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, the House passed the Fair Housing Act, one of the three pillars of the Civil Rights Act. And that passed because of a bipartisan majority.
[22:05:01]
The country came together. The elites of both parties recognized that we were on a knife edge. And they did the right thing.
What's unprecedented today is the inability of our elites to come together and realize that there's a red line that we're crossing. And that's the difference, and that's what makes this moment especially dangerous.
Now, part of the reason for that is that the parties have sorted themselves out and they were philosophically more diverse. They weren't more diverse in other ways, but they were philosophically more diverse at the time. So, bipartisanship was much easier and much less politically costly.
But there's something else too, which is I think there is a lack of seriousness in our politics today that was not true back then. So many elected members of Congress had fought together against fascism or against Imperial Japan in World War II. So many of them had shared the burden of the Great Depression, and so they recognized there were issues that this country could only take care of together.
I don't think that sense of common purpose exists anymore among our elected officials, and so they use cheap rhetoric when today they should be talking about coming together after a second assault or attempted assault on a former president.
PHILLIP: You and I, Tim, were sitting on the set the day that Donald Trump was attacked that first time.
NAFTALI: It's terrible.
PHILLIP: And we talked about the sickness in this country that assassination attempts represent. It's not about the politics of the individual. I mean, look at these people. The thing that they have in common is their complete lack of mental stability. Why is that not the conversation? Why are we in this place of who's to blame? It's that the Democrats or the Republicans, the Republicans aren't trying to assassinate the Democrats, and a lot of talk of they. When it's not a they, it's just a person, it's an individual.
HILLARY ROSEN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, that's what I'm trying to parse through what you said. You know so much about these issues, which is like, this is America. We don't kill people because of their political ideology. It's just not something that we do in modern America.
NAFTALI: Unfortunately, we have.
ROSEN: Not in modern America, let's just say.
So, when you say, people have crossed the red line, are you like agreeing with J.D. Vance? Is the red line you're saying a rhetoric line? What's the red line?
NAFTALI: I'm not agreeing with someone who makes up stories about immigrants killing cats.
ROSEN: Yes, and I'm not accusing.
NAFTALI: No. What I'm saying is that I remember so well July 13th. And I remember the conversations in the days that followed. I remember President Biden's speech about toning down the rhetoric, and I saw the rhetoric toned down on both sides. And then 20 minutes into his acceptance speech, Donald Trump turned up the volume.
I'm not blaming him for what happened, of course. In our country, you do not decide political disputes through violence. But the problem is that we have too much hate speech right now and we are creating an environment --
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Give me an example. What do you mean by hate speech, because I want to specifically know? Because I think I know what it is, but I'm interested in what you think about this, because I agree with you. I do think we have too much hate speech, but give me an example.
NAFTALI: I would say when you use the term vermin to describe your political opponents.
JENNINGS: So, you think it's Trump's fault that he got shot or got shot?
ELIE MYSTAL, JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT AND COLUMNIST, THE NATION: You just said that's what he thought.
NAFTALI: Thank you. Scott, I won't step in that trap. That's not what I said. There is no place in this country for violence. But let's be honest about why we have so much tension in this country. When you dehumanize people, you are using the rhetoric of the 30s. I'm not using -- I'm not going to say which country in the 30s, but when you dehumanize people you make it easier for disturbed minds to do the wrong thing.
And let me just remind you of something. In 2019, Donald Trump said that the internet is a dangerous avenue, okay, to radicalize disturbed minds. He was right.
JENNINGS: Yes.
NAFTALI: And he should remind us --
LYDIA MOYNIHAN, REPORTER, NEW YORK POST: None of this is new. And I do think there is a level of yolerance when it comes to violent speech about Trump since 2016. We had Kathy Griffith showing basically his head severed. There were people putting on Shakespeare in the park plays where that they had in his --
ROSEN: Her career was kind of ruined after that.
MOYNIHAN: I think there's a level of a violent rhetoric that has been directed, but that's happened for ten years.
JENNINGS: It's been normalized. But it's been normalized and adopted as part of one party's platform for president this year. The country will cease to exist if Donald Trump wins. There will be no more democracy --
NAFTALI: Joe Biden is the --
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JENNINGS: Listen, hey, look.
MYSTAL: Wait, no.
JENNINNGS: Why don't I get to finish? Everybody gets to finish. Go ahead.
PHILLIP: Let's let Scott finish and then I have something to say.
JENNINGS: You know, the Constitution won't exist. There'll be a bloodbath. He's going to be a dictator. When you effectively radicalize millions of people into believing that if an electoral outcome doesn't go our way, they're no longer going to be living in the country they thought they were. What do you expect to happen?
And I agree with you, there is too much hate speech. I'm in total agreement with you and I hear what you're saying, but I have to say when I see what Democratic politicians say about Donald Trump, when I see what Democratic commentators say about Donald Trump and their platform is built on a bunch of lies, frankly, that are designed to radicalize a political base. It makes me wonder how much do they really care about the violence that you and I both agree is terrible.
PHILLIP: I have that same question, you know, for Trump, because you're talking about -- okay, this is Donald Trump on September 10th. That's six days ago. If she ever got elected, she'd change it. It will be the end of our country. She's Marxist. He shared a social media video of Joe Biden tied up at the back of a pickup truck. He's called his political opponents vermin. He's -- I mean, Trump is not the best messenger for this, but isn't --
JENNINGS: Well, you're a pretty good messenger when you get shot and then nearly get shot again. I think that makes you a fairly credible messenger.
PHILLIP: Here's the conversation. I think that Tim is trying to have, which is that this has been a political climate in the country writ large for almost a decade of heightened, you know, political animosity. And a lot of people deserve blame for that, but Trump is not without -- you know, Trump's hands are not clean in this.
JENNINGS: Are they? I'm just asking.
PHILLIP: But you're not saying it.
ROSEN: Because in my view, both candidates have actually said it.
JENNINGS: I guess I'm going to be the only one out here that's not going to blame Donald Trump for his two near assassinations. I mean, honestly, he's the one being shot at. He's a target. He's not saying he can't even walk outside of his own house.
PHILLIP: We started the conversation by saying that this is not about assigning political blame. Trump is the one today assigning political blame. He is assigning political blame.
JENNINGS: Do you think he's earned any right to assign or ascribe blame to the two attempts on his life?
MYSTAL: Wait, so if you get shot at, you can say that somebody should shoot my opponents, that's the rule if somebody shoots at you? You can be like, oh, somebody should shoot at them. Because if you look at Trump's tweet today, what he said today was that Harris was an enemy from within and that she will destroy the country if she gets elected.
Now, personally, I do not feel comfortable having yet another conversation about the horrible gun violence in this country without talking about the guns. Because I agree with Tim, I want this political violence to stop. And to me, I would propose a solution to this. I call it the protect Trump at all costs assault weapons ban. If we want to protect our political leaders, if we want to protect people who don't have an elite fighting force protecting them 24/7, one of the best things we can do, not just for Trump, but for all potential victims of gun violence, is to ban assault weapons, to ban the AR-14, and to ban the weapons of terror that these crazy people use to menace not just our leaders, but everybody else in the country.
JENNINGS: Guns don't have radical ideology, but human beings do.
MYSTAL: Okay, so works -- ideologies kill people, not guns.
JENNINGS: And this guy setting up shop in the bushes outside of a golf course, it wasn't the gun that made him do it.
ROSEN: Yes, but the mental instability.
JENNINGS: Something got to this guy.
ROSEN: Both of these people were mentally unstable. And nobody prevented them from buying a gun.
JENNINGS: He believed Donald Trump needed to be eliminated. And he almost did it. Thank God for the Secret Service. How many more attempts are we going to -- how many more are we going to have?
ROSEN: That's the point.
MOYNIHAN: We've had guns for a long time. Unfortunately, there's always been a lot of mentally unstable people in the country So, what is it that's going on right now?
PHILLIP: And there are a lot more guns now.
MOYNIHAN: It is an issue. There aren't that many more guns than there were a year ago. When you look at where we are now, though, I mean, this is clearly a Secret Service issue. This is a failure I think on their part to not identify and then blame a slanted roof and shrubbery.
PHILLIP: I think that you're exactly right. I mean, look, that's such an important part of this conversation. Again, there are issues here. There are issues at play. But I am actually genuinely baffled by the choice to, within 24 hours of this thing happening, make it about, you know, blaming Kamala Harris and Joe Biden, who immediately condemned it and saying that they put this crazy guy up to this?
ROSEN: I mean, I think he's allowed to get freaked out. He has got shot out, so like I'm kind of okay with that.
PHILLIP: Of course, he's allowed to be freaked out. But to blame -- but to say without any evidence that this was the president --
ROSEN: Yes, he should have shut up, right? He should have shut up because that doesn't help. [22:15:00]
And I think if you're being politically honest the way I want to be politically honest right now, this has come from both sides of them. You know, when we talk about the enemy of the state, this country will never be the same. You know, Joe Biden has done that just as many times as Donald Trump has done that, and they both have said that.
The one thing about Kamala Harris is I would say that she's actually tried to bring a little more levity to the country and to these conversations, which I think is useful. But there's no question that Trump actually should have shut up today. But we also have to give him a little space for having this thing happened.
MYSTAL: You brought up Gerald Ford. After he was again, shot at twice within a few weeks, I don't remember the microfiche. Did Gerald Ford start fundraising off of the assassination attempts within the hour after he was shot at?
NAFTALI: Of course, he didn't. And to your point, after George Wallace was crippled, I mean, he wasn't killed, but he was gunned down, the Congress of the United States passed additional gun control legislation and outlawed the domestic production of Saturday night specials. After RFK was killed in '68, they prevented the importation of Saturday night specials, and then when yet another presidential candidate was attacked, they went a little further.
So, Congress, which included Republicans, thought, we have to do something. This is dangerous. They and so they said, let's do something, rather than pointing fingers at each other and saying, well, clearly, he was shot by a this or a that, or -- and why is it --
MOYNIHAN: Taking a step back, though, when it comes to rhetoric. Obviously, violent rhetoric is something to be afraid of. We don't want to encourage that in our society. And yet, it still is rhetoric. There's something that happens between somebody encouraging it and fanning the flames and actually taking a gun out and --
ROSEN: Which is what Abby started, this is a mental health issue.
JENNINGS: And look, just to address your point about Harris. I just don't agree. I mean, the underpinning of her campaign, I mean, she repeats it herself, Trump will be a dictator on day one. I mean, this country fights dictators. That's what our history is.
NAFTALI: Didn't he say that though? He'll be a dictator from day one.
JENNINGS: There'll be a bloodbath. There'll be a bloodbath. He wants to terminate the U.S. Constitution.
HARRIS: I don't think she didn't say that there would be a bloodbath.
MYSTAL: The first thing she said, which was true, and then the second thing she said --
JENNINGS: It is said by every Democrat working for or around her campaign every day on this network and every other one. The bloodbath thing is stated every single day.
PHILLIP: Okay, let me just --
JENNINGS: But my point is dictator, bloodbath, eliminate Constitution. What do you think that does --
PHILLIP: Let's just clear this up. You're referring to Trump's use of the word bloodbath when he was talking --
JENNINGS: And what was he talking about?
PHILLIP: He was I'm going to explain it to people because I think there's confusion about this. Use of the word bloodbath when he was talking about, you know, vehicle manufacturing jobs in the United States. Vice President Harris improperly and unfairly mischaracterized that as him saying there would be a bloodbath if he were elected. However, she did not say that if Trump were elected, there would be a bloodbath. She did not say that.
JENNINGS: I know you have interviewed and had people out here and have watched the same coverage I have. The bloodbath garbage, it is a pillar of the Democratic campaign against Trump, as is dictator, as is eliminate the U.S. Constitution.
MYSTAL: The dictator stuff is --
ROSEN: Do you feel the need to --
JENNINGS: But if I told you all that about somebody, he would say --
ROSEN: -- do what Trump is doing, which is to sort of blame Democrats instead of saying, oh, yes, maybe actually both of these guys are screwing up, which is sort of what I think the rest of us are saying.
JENNINGS: I feel the need to tell you all tonight that we can't even talk about the rhetoric moving forward because it's too late. So many people -- like for Trump, it's too late. He can't even go outside. So many people have already been radicalized by this. Now, moving forward, we have to do better, but for him, we'll never go nowhere.
ROSEN: He clearly feels like he has an advantage from what happened by virtue of what he's doing, which is really scary.
JENNINGS: I don't think anybody who's nearly been murdered twice thinks they're advantaged.
ROSEN: It's very scary. Now, believe me I'm sitting here defending him.
NAFTALI: The cordon should be tightened around him and he should be in as much of a bubble as he's willing to have, and he certainly should be protected. But, Scott, don't say it's too late to de- radicalize the rhetoric.
JENNINGS: It's too late for him. I think it's too late on Trump. Maybe not moving forward, but -- NAFTALI: The election is close.
ROSEN: You mean to change people's view of Trump? I'm not sure what you're saying.
NAFTALI: I'm sorry to interrupt, but this election appears to be close, yes, and means someone's going to win and someone's going to lose. If we don't work hard to de-radicalize the language, God knows what kind of violence could come after.
JENNINGS: I agree with you. So we can't give up --
PHILLIP: After the first assassination attempt, you know, Trump and his adviser said that he was a changed man, he was going to bring the country together. He didn't try to tear the country apart for about four days but there's clear -- it's clear, he abandoned that mission. I mean, wouldn't it be the thing to do right now to take that back up and say, starting with me?
[22:20:06]
JENNINGS: Yes, I think any politician could go on T.V. tonight and say, I am going to take personal responsibility for my own language and my own actions. But this point about de-radicalization, what I mean is, look, when you've had this kind of language about somebody be the underpinning of a campaign for years and intensely for the last several months, the only way to unwind it is for the people who've been saying it, chiefly the president and the vice president, to go on T.V. and say, you know what, we went too far. And what we said, honestly, is not true. The country will not --
MYSTAL: I think the Democrats will tamp down their language about Trump the moment Trump tamps down his language about the Democrats, about immigrants, about people of color, about women, and not a moment before.
JENNINGS: What about how many times are we going to shoot at him?
MYSTAL: Is your argument, literally, that you are not under threat unless somebody directly takes a shot at you? Is that actually what you're saying? Do you have access to Secret Service files about how many threats Harris and Biden have received over the past year, how many threats Barack Obama, the first black president, received for eight years while he was in the White House? Do you have those Secret Service files, or are you just out here talking because somebody was caught in the bushes on Saturday?
If you want something done, if you want to get away from this violence and hatred, the clearest thing to do is to take away the weapons that these people are using to cause the violence and hatred. Rhetoric does not kill people. Guns do.
JENNINGS: So you're okay with people being radicalized, you just want to Disarm them, but it's okay to continue to lie to them about what will happen to the country if your political opponents win?
NAFTALI: He didn't say that.
PHILLIP: Tim, last word, and then we got to go.
NAFTALI: We got to make steps towards each other. Donald Trump doesn't have to do this because he was shot. It's a terrible thing that he was shot. But de-radicalizing our country will take efforts on both sides. And one of the things he ought to do is to talk about what he means when he says he's going to be a dictator on day one, tell people that's not really what I mean. What I mean is I'm going to do the following. But he never wants to answer questions about what he means. He sometimes says, I was just joking. He often uses very divisive language in his rallies.
Maybe he's misunderstood. I don't know, but he should, as part de- radicalization process, explain, I believe in the Constitution, you should say that I love this constitution. I believe in all of your rights. Don't worry. Sometimes I say things just for effect.
ROSEN: And I think Kamala Harris owes the same --
PHILLIP: And I think that's exactly the point Tim is making, actions on both sides of this. Tim, thank you very much for joining us and for bringing a little bit of history to the conversation here.
Everyone else, stick around. Coming up next, another special guest will join us in our fifth seat, as J.D. Vance says that he doesn't regret, quote, creating conspiracies that are sending schools and hospitals going into lockdown in Springfield, Ohio.
Plus, we've got more on our breaking news tonight, the rapper and hip hop mogul, Sean Diddy Combs, has been arrested in New York after a grand jury indictment.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:25:00]
PHILLIP: We'll be back to the table in just a moment, but, first, some breaking news tonight. Sean Diddy Combs has been arrested in a Manhattan hotel this evening after a grand jury indicted the music mogul. His attorney tells CNN that he is currently being processed. The charges are unclear as of this moment.
Joining us now is CNN's Entertainment Reporter Elizabeth Wagmeister, and also with us, CNN Chief Legal Correspondent Elie Honig.
Elizabeth, you were appointed a big part of revealing some details about Diddy's conduct in private over the course of the last couple of months. That video led to a lot more scrutiny on what he has been accused of. What do we know at this point about what this case might ultimately be about?
ELIZABETH WAGMEISTER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: Abby, at the moment, we don't know what the charges are. I have information that he was arrested tonight at a Manhattan hotel. He is currently being processed. I heard from his attorney, they are still maintaining his innocence. They said that in anticipation of these charges that Diddy relocated to New York last week.
And here's a statement that I have from his attorney. He says, we are disappointed with the decision to pursue what we believe is an unjust prosecution of Mr. Combs by the U.S. attorney's office. He goes on to say that he is an imperfect person, but is not criminal.
Now, Abby, that video that you just spoke about was a few months ago when our team broke this disturbing video of Diddy violently assaulting his ex-girlfriend, Cassandra Ventura, better known as the singer, her stage name, Cassie.
Now, up until this point, when we broke this video, Diddy had denied the allegations against him. Cassie is one of ten civil suits against Diddy, nine of which she is accused of sexually assault. Up until that video, he denied everything. After that video came out, he changed his tone. He apologized for his conduct in that video.
But I have to tell you, Abby, just as of last week, a former member of Danity Kane, which was one of the bands from Making the Band, Diddy's show that was on MTV, she sued him for sexual assault and other disturbing allegations, and he denied that.
[22:30:06]
So, he continues the denials and he still maintains his innocence even though he has been arrested tonight.
PHILLIP: And Elie, not a huge amount of information available tonight, but Elizabeth brought up something that I want you to give us a little bit of insight into. Diddy is here in New York, in Manhattan. He apparently came here in anticipation that something like this might happen. What should we understand about what that might mean? It could very well be that this is a federal arrest being processed here in New York.
ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: So, Abby, there are some important things we do not know, including the specific charges that have been lodged against Sean Combs. But there are some really important things we do know.
First of all, based on the attorney's statement, based on our reporting, this is a federal prosecution. It's not a state prosecution. The fact that he's being processed in Manhattan tells me that's the Southern District of New York. That's consistent with the reporting that the Southern District of New York had been handling this case.
That's the office I used to work at. That's an office that sort of specializes in high stakes cases. Just in the last year or so, Southern District of New York, just as an example, has successfully prosecuted Sam Bankman Fried, Senator Robert Menendez. The other thing that we do know is a grand jury has indicted Sean Combs, meaning they found probable cause that he committed at least one federal crime. Now, as to what happens next, there will be likely tomorrow or within
the next couple days. But usually in the SDNY, you try to do it the next day, there will be an arraignment, meaning Sean Combs will appear in court with his lawyers. There are no cameras in federal court. He will be advised of the charges against him and he will almost certainly enter a not guilty plea.
But the key thing to watch for is then we'll have the question of bail. Will prosecutors agree to let him out on bail? Will prosecutors ask the judge to lock him up pending trial? That could end up in a contentious argument. So, these are things that are going to play out over the next 24 or 48 hours.
And finally, Abby, with respect to the charges themselves, it's important to note, we've all seen that video, but assault and sexual assault are not federal crimes. Those are prosecuted in state courts. So, what I expect to see when we see this indictment is some sort of crime with some element of organization to it, sex trafficking, something along those lines, if it's based on some of the allegations we've heard.
PHILLIP: And of course, back in March, his homes in L.A. and in Miami were raided. All of this leading up to this moment, Elizabeth and Elie, a lot more to this story will be coming up in the coming days and weeks. "Laura Coates Live" also will have much more on this breaking news at the top of the hour.
But coming up next for us, a town is now on edge, from schools to hospitals, thanks to a baseless conspiracy. And Senator J.D. Vance now insists that it doesn't matter if those conspiracies aren't true. We'll discuss that next.
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[22:37:20]
PHILLIP: Earlier, you heard J.D. Vance say that everyone needs to tone down the rhetoric, but his rhetoric is unwittingly putting a small Ohio town in the spotlight. It's impacting hospitals, schools, festivals. All in Springfield, Ohio, evacuated over these baseless claims that migrants are eating pets and yet, Vance is apparently fine with all of that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. J.D. VANCE (R-OHIO), VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: The American media totally ignored this stuff until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes. If I have to -- if I have to --
DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: But it wasn't just a meme. o VANCE: -- create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that's what I'm going to do, Dana, because you guys are completely letting Kamala Harris coast.
BASH: You just said that this is a story that you created.
VANCE: Yes.
BASH: So, the eating dogs and cats thing is not accurate.
VANCE: We are creating -- we are -- Dana, it comes from first-hand accounts from my constituents.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIP: Joining us in our fifth seat, CNN political commentator and Republican pollster, Kristen Soltis Anderson. Kristen, welcome. This is, God, how many days now of this story? And there's still no evidence of this happening, but I mean, it seems that J.D. Vance thinks that it's working for him.
KRISTEN SOLTIS ANDERSON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Donald Trump has always believed that there is no such thing as bad press, that any attention is good attention. And this is really of a piece with that consistent strategy.
The notion that saying something that's outlandish, even if it's something that's only semi-rooted in truth or not rooted in truth at all, as long as it gets attention, it will get attention on the issue that he cares about.
And frankly, Donald Trump has a long track record of that working out for him. There have been lots of times where he has said and done things that have been considered beyond the pale, and yet the more attention that gets put on it, the more he seems to benefit. And so, this just seems to be consistent with that strategy.
PHILLIP: The mayor of Springfield is saying, don't come here. Donald Trump has said he wants to campaign in Springfield. The mayor does not want him there, because the town now has been kind of turned upside down by all of this. Will he listen? Should he listen?
SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I don't know. I wouldn't campaign in Ohio either, because I think Donald Trump's going to win by double digits there. But I do think it's important when we think about this story. All weekend-long, we were told that what Trump and Vance were doing, they were directly responsible for these bomb threats and whatever.
Today, in case you missed it, the governor of Ohio said the bomb threats were hoaxes and they were coming in from overseas. And he said, quote, "Many of these threats are coming in from overseas made by those who want to fuel the current discord surrounding Springfield."
[22:40:00]
So, all weekend-long, J.D. Vance and Trump, but specifically Vance, were directly blamed for putting people in harm's way. Today, the governor says they're coming from overseas and I just, I mean, we can start the apology line today around the show. But the governor says it's overseas and it's not the supposed MAGA radicalized arm.
ELIE MYSTAL, "THE NATION" JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT AND COLUMNIST: Maybe instead of talking to the governor, you should talk about the Haitian immigrant community in Springfield that is being menaced by these people. There have been reports that these people cannot send their children to school. There have been reports of property damage.
One of the Haitian newspapers has shut down as they have been under threat. Maybe you should talk to Haitians instead of Governor Mike DeWitt, who has been part and parcel of some of the lies and attacks against the Haitian community. We just had a whole segment, Scott, where you proudly said that people should tone down the rhetoric and that we need to take personal responsibility for the things we say.
Well, here we have an example of stochastic terrorism against a vulnerable immigrant community which does not have Secret Service protection, Scott, which does not have military force watching their back. These are vulnerable people out there and they are being menaced because of lies J.D. Vance has made.
PHILLIP: I just want to say one thing about the governor, because I heard what you said about him, but he's also been out on television saying, they're good workers, they are not doing these things that they have been accused of, they are here to actually revitalize this community. The reason that Haitian migrants are coming to Springfield is because there are jobs that they could not fill until the migrants got to that town.
LYDIA MOYNIHAN, "NEW YORK POST" REPORTER: I do -- I do have to say, when you speak with people close to Vance, when you speak with him, he is very clear that he does have these first-hand accounts of people.
PHILLIP: He doesn't, because if he did, he would provide them.
MOYNIHAN: The sources, well, this is what he's hearing from constituents, and he feels obligated to defend that.
PHILLIP: He's claiming that he's gotten calls. No one has come forward. There have been no pictures, no videos. Nothing. There is no proof.
MOYNIHAN: He is hearing this from his constituents. He feels obligated to represent them. And so, he's trying to raise these concerns. And he did even note to Fed Chair Jerome Powell earlier this year that housing, inflation has impacted these people.
And I think there's a big question about how we absorb immigrants into society and New York has not done a great job of it. Even though we have eight plus million people, tons of resources.
PHILLIP: Well, you know --
MOYNIHAN: It is difficult for this community that doesn't have a lot of resources to integrate these people into society.
PHILLIP: Let me just make an important distinction here in this conversation because I think facts matter. The Haitians who are in Springfield, many of them, maybe most of them, are here legally. They are able to work, they are working. And there are issues that come with that, meaning that there are more people there. So, there are more people who are using housing, more people who are using public services.
But that's different from what's happening in New York, where there are people in New York who actually cannot work. And so, that's a different strain on resources. The problem here is this town was dwindling for many years until this moment. Now, there are people who look completely different from the population that was in Springfield before, that is also causing issues. And we have to be real about that element of it.
HILARY ROSEN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: And this was started as an attack on immigrants, as an attack on race. And, you know, this is, you know, live overseas, as you guys know, this is not unique to America, right? We've seen this in Germany with the ADF, and we've seen it in the Netherlands. I mean, using black immigrants or people of color to demonize a political position and accelerate, you know, division is actually a strategy and it's worked in many other countries.
And J.D. Vance and Donald Trump used it deliberately in the debate. It was a planned attack of Donald Trump's in the debate. He started this. And now, his own -- the own governor of Ohio said actually none of that is really true.
And yet he hasn't come back and said, oh, actually maybe facts do matter and maybe this isn't true. So, you know, that's really the problem. And honestly, Scott, no matter what you say, it changes those facts.
JENNINGS: But I do think it's an important conversation. How are they here legally? Because of executive action on immigration. I don't believe it is an attack on immigrants.
ROSEN: Are you saying they don't have a right to be here when they're essentially saving the town?
MYSTAL: Do you know what temporary protected status is and do you not agree with it?
JENNINGS: No, I think most Republicans do not believe that the executive branch or the officers of it should be able to waive what J.D. Vance correctly calls a magic wand so people can circumvent the normal immigration process.
ROSEN: You have the mayor and the governor saying that these businesses needed workers.
PHILLIP: Temporary protected status has been around for a long time.
ROSEN: Ohio businesses needed workers.
JENNINGS: Listen, most Americans think we need less immigration, not more. Most Americans think we need a process and -- and there is a legitimate --
ROSEN: That's true. Those two things are true.
JENNINGS: -- there is a legitimate conversation to be had about how cities on the border, in Ohio, in New York, and everywhere else are being expected to absorb large populations. That doesn't mean the populations are inherently bad, or the people are inherently bad, or that they don't provide value.
[22:45:03]
ROSEN: But he's saying they're inherently bad and that's the point.
JENNINGS: But when you put huge numbers of people in communities and they begin to have impacts on the policing system, the health care system, the roads, whatever -- the school, whatever it is, and then you just say to the communities, good luck, I think Americans have a right to a debate about this and this is what the Democrats don't want to have.
MYSTAL: No.
JENNINGS: They think it's fine and the Republicans want to talk about why we have an insane immigration system that cannot be controlled and reformed in a way that would make people think, okay, we actually have a process and it's under control instead of being out of control.
MYSTAL: That's where you're exactly wrong. Kamala Harris has a wonderful affordable housing policy, and if you guys are really worried about housing for these new Americans, then we should probably support her plan. Have you read it? It's actually pretty good.
You're saying that you want to process -- temporary protected status is a process. Now, you might not like the process, but it is a process that has been used by Democratic presidents and Republican presidents. If there is a problem --
JENNINGS: Does that make it right?
MYSTAL: If there is a problem, I think temporary protected status, which is something that we give to people when their countries are in crisis, is not just right, it is moral. So, if you really think that there is a problem onboarding these new Americans into our communities, then I think we should all support more affordable housing being built all across this nation, because we certainly have the space.
MOYNIHAN: That can't be done in the span of a month.
PHILLIP: What is the electoral play here in doubling down on this bizarre falsehood? I mean, the recent ABC News Ipsos poll basically showed independents aren't buying it. The only people buying it perhaps are Republicans, but independents are overwhelmingly, they believe this story is completely false. SOLTIS ANDERSON: So, the data that I've seen so far suggests yes,
that for independent voters, they tend to believe the story is more likely to be false than it is to be true. At the same time, we do still consistently see Donald Trump ahead of Kamala Harris on the question of who do you trust more to handle the issue of immigration?
And I think the question is, when the topic is around illegal immigration, that is one where we have seen the American public actually move pretty far to the right in the last four or five years. It's an issue that tends to favor Donald Trump. At the same time, legal immigration, the polling is a little bit more mixed.
And so, I find it in some ways electorally baffling to focus on this story, which has been so outrageous in its presentation and description when there are a lot of really valid proof points that are very factual that make the case that illegal immigration has gone up under the Biden-Harris administration, that there are real problems with it, that there's that whole argument available to them, and that's not the same as going after the cat story.
ROSEN: That's really smart, and you can have a thoughtful debate about it. But you know, this story was deliberately done to like merge people's favorite conversation, which is their pets -- their very favorite conversation. And the internet, which has accelerated people's very favorite conversation about pets.
PHILLIP: Ans also, to misrepresent the status of these immigrants.
ROSEN: And to demonize a sect of people to divide the community that the governor says that they need.
PHILLIP: Yeah, all right, everyone, hold on for a second, because coming up next, the panel is going to give us their nightcaps, including two surprising predictions about Kamala Harris and the upcoming elections.
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[22:52:38]
PHILLIP: And we're back and it's time for the News Nightcap. You each have 30 seconds to say your piece. Elie, you're up.
MYSTAL: My big story this weekend was "The New York Times" excellent reporting on John Roberts and how he's been putting the thumb on the scale for Donald Trump all past this term. So, my hot take is this. If Harris is lucky enough to win the electoral college by only one state, John Roberts and his Supreme Court will find a way to flip that state back into Trump and give Trump the victory. It will be a redo of 2000.
So, people in Harris's camp need to understand they need to win by more than one state. They need to win by two, three, four states to make their margin of victory so large that the Supreme Court can't take it away from them.
PHILLIP: There's a lot going on in that one. MOYNIHAN: I feel like they know they need to win by more than one
state.
PHILLIP: Yeah, I feel like --
MYSTAL: Because the Supreme Court is going to steal it.
PHILLIP: I feel like that might be the only way to do this thing this time around. Scott?
JENNINGS: I mean, for the record, Bush won Florida.
PHILLIP: All right, Scott --
MYSTAL: I would love to roll that week out of that.
ROSEN: I don't think so.
PHILLIP: Please.
JENNINGS: My God, it's a pretty fairy night here at the end of the Phillip show. Okay, all right, here's my -- I was reading in "The Hill" today and had an interesting headline about democratic lawmakers saying that they fully expected Kamala Harris' pivot to the center to be nothing but political rhetoric that she'll govern like a liberal when she actually becomes president.
Here's the quote, "I'm from Massachusetts, she's from California on climate, abortion, LGBTQ issues, we are absolutely in agreement. That's why Elizabeth Warren and I are so passionately campaigning for her -- Ed Markey." So, the next time a Republican tells you got to vote for Harris to save the conservative movement, show them this article and say, I don't think so.
PHILLIP: All right, Lydia?
MOYNIHAN: Justin Timberlake on Friday got a plea deal after he was arrested in Sag Harbor after drinking a martini, allegedly for drunk driving. Really interesting plea deal that he got. He has a very good attorney, Eddie Burke in the Hamptons. And as part of that, he paid a small fine, community service, and he offered a public apology.
What's interesting is, on the one hand, it seems like a great opportunity to say that you're opposed to drunk driving. On the other hand, is it basically giving somebody preferential treatment because they're a celebrity and they can use their platform, essentially, to reach people with their message.
PHILLIP: Well, it would not be the first time, nor will it be the last, that a celebrity has gotten an interesting deal. Hilary?
ROSEN: Well, speaking of celebrities, my view is this race is going to end up having a very technical result.
[22:55:01] There's not going to be anything that happens in the next several weeks that will create a national wave. So, that means every vote counts. You know, 80,000 votes in Pennsylvania may win this thing or lose this thing. Taylor Swift, when she can generate over a half a million voter registrations in three days, that actually has impact that, me, having worked in the music business as long as I did has never actually seen with a celebrity endorsement.
PHILLIP: All right. After the break, we'll have one final nightcap from Kristen. We'll be right back.
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PHILLIP: And we have one more nightcap before we go. Kristen,30 seconds.
SOLTIS ANDERSON: Well, politicians come and go, but celebrity rules everything around me. And tonight, we've talked about a couple of different celebrities. Turns out they were all in an ad together.
[23:00:00]
In 2012, Macy's, I believe leading up to the holiday season, had an ad featuring a number of bright stars -- Martha Stewart, Sean Diddy Combs, Taylor Swift and Donald Trump, all in the same commercial.
PHILLIP: Okay.
JENNINGS: The amount of legal fees for the commercial is amazing.
PHILLIP: Amazing.
UNKNOWN: They've all made quite a journey.
PHILLIP: You know what? It's amazing. The red tie -- it's still there. It's almost like it could have been reported.
UNKNOWN: Celebrity branding is powerful.
UNKNOWN: Some things don't change.
PHILLIP: Wow. Everyone, thank you very much. Thank you for watching "NewsNight State of the Race". "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.
