Return to Transcripts main page

CNN News Central

Harris & Trump Spar Over Abortion, Immigration, Economy; Source: After Debate, Harris Team Strategizing With Assumption That Trajectory Of The Race Remains Unchanged; Rep. Michael Waltz (R-FL) Discusses About Fact-Checking Vice President Harris; Francine To Unleash Heavy Rain, Raise Flood Risk For Gulf Coast. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired September 11, 2024 - 15:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:00:45]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Some of the first ballots of the 2024 general election are in the mail, and just hours after the debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump. The Harris campaign is already pushing to get back on the debate stage, while Trump claims that he won last night and doesn't need a round two.

Plus, conditions are rapidly deteriorating across the Gulf Coast. Hurricane Francine is barreling toward Louisiana. Millions are bracing for strong winds and severe flooding. We're on the ground there, and we'll take you there.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: And police arrest a man on arson charges as several wildfires in California explode in size. The out-of-control fires now prompting even more evacuations.

We are following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SANCHEZ: The clock is ticking: After squaring off in their first and possibly only debate, there's less than two months until Election Day. The Harris and Trump campaigns are running out of time to win over critical, undecided voters in key battleground states.

Now, we're learning new details about how the Harris campaign views the race post-debate. CNN Senior White House Correspondent MJ Lee is with us covering the latest from the Harris campaign.

MJ, talk to us about their strategy now.

MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, the Harris team is certainly feeling really good about last night. They felt good about the vice president's performance. They were pleased to see Donald Trump taking the bait from her at multiple moments. But I think today, back in Wilmington, according to aides that I have spoken to, the vibe is very much it's back to work, even as the campaign is trying to strategize over how to maximize and capitalize on the momentum that they felt like they had last night. There is no sense from the campaign right now that that one debate ended up changing, fundamentally, the trajectory of this race.

The assumption from here until Election Day is that this is going to be an incredibly close race and that the really hard work for them is to come still in the coming weeks. As one senior campaign aide put it, it'll be incredibly close. We cannot take our foot off the gas even when the moment feels really good. That, of course, again, is a reference to last night.

In other words, I think, Boris, there's no sense right now in the Harris campaign that this race is suddenly a 45-55 race, that they still see this as a very close 50-50 race. And remember, this is a team that certainly remembers really well that the 2020 election ended up being decided in a number of battleground states by margins of 10s of thousands of votes.

Now, obviously, this is why we are going to be seeing the campaign continue to be focused very much on a number of battleground states. If you even look at the places that Vice President Harris and Gov. Tim Walz are going to be traveling to in the coming days, Harris is going to North Carolina and Pennsylvania in the next couple of days. Tim Walz will be going to Michigan and Wisconsin. That just tells you everything that you need to know about where the campaign continues to focus its attention.

Now, one other thing coming out of last night is, of course, this Taylor Swift endorsement. We are told that the bracelets, the friendship bracelets that the campaign started selling quickly last night, they actually sold out. They were $20 a pop, but if you go on the store website for the campaign, it says that they are sold out. So currently, they are taking pre-orders to come later in the month. The campaign so far is being very tight-lipped on whether there are discussions about potential events they could do with Taylor Swift herself, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Something to keep an eye on. MJ Lee, thanks so much for that.

Let's turn now to CNN National Correspondent, Kristen Holmes, covering the Trump campaign.

So Kristen, why is former President Trump casting doubt on the potential for a second debate?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, quickly, I just want to mention something that MJ just said, this idea that Taylor Swift would campaign potentially or go to an event with Kamala Harris.

[15:05:01]

That is something that would really get under Donald Trump's skin.

I just want to remind everyone that, despite the fact that he went on TV today and said that he didn't think he would get Taylor Swift's endorsement. He wasn't a big fan of hers, anyway. It was just last month that he was posting AI pictures of Taylor Swift, essentially pretending that she had endorsed him saying, Taylor, I accept, with these AI photos of her and of other women wearing Swifties for Trump shirts.

And so that is something that would really irk Donald Trump, regardless of how many times he says he doesn't care what Taylor Swift does.

Now, in terms of the debate, Donald Trump says last night was one of his greatest debate appearances ever. However, after months or weeks of saying that he wanted a second debate after this one with Kamala Harris, he now appears to be backing away from that idea. Here's what he said this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: When a fighter loses, he says, I want a rematch. I want a rematch. They always - the losing person, the fighter, the debater, they always ask for a rematch. I won the debate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, Mr. President ...

TRUMP: I don't know that I want to do another debate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, I don't know anything about fighting, but I do know that, generally speaking, if a campaign comes out immediately after a debate and says, we want to do another one, that generally means that they thought that they did well. If a campaign comes out and sends their own candidate into the spin room, it generally isn't that good for that side.

Now, regardless, I've spoken to a number of Republican allies of Donald Trump's who say they were disappointed in his performance last night. They don't think it's going to move the needle at all. But they did believe, after talking to him in the lead up to this debate, that he would stick to the issues, that he had been warned enough times that Kamala Harris was going to try to get under his skin, that he - she was going to try to goad him with specific questions or specific responses and he fell right into that trap.

SANCHEZ: Hey, Kristen, we're going to interrupt you really quick, because the former president is speaking in Shanksville, Pennsylvania right now. Let's listen in.

TRUMP: And, you know, we're looking at it. But, you know, when you win, you don't really necessarily have to do it a second time, so we'll see. But we had a - I thought we had a great debate last night. Thank you very much, everybody.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What we need to change for you to agree to a second debate? Would you want different rules? Would you want a different format?

TRUMP: Well, you know, when you don't win, it's like a fighter. When a fighter has a bad fight, gets knocked out or loses the fight, the first thing he says is, we want a rematch. So we won the debate according to every poll, every single poll. I think that - are we going to do a rematch? I just don't know. But we'll think about it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Would you still do the one on NBC on September 25th? You proposed that. Are you still committed to that?

TRUMP: Yes, I would do NBC. I'd do Fox, too. I'd do Fox, too. But right now we have to determine whether or not we even want to do it. We had a great night last night. And you see by the poll numbers, it was really fantastic. Thank you very much, everybody.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) debate, sir?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you, Press. Back to the van. Thank you, Press.

SANCHEZ: That was former President Donald Trump at the - in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, for the anniversary - the 23rd anniversary of the September 11th attacks, United Flight 93, which went down over Shanksville. The former president being asked by reporters about the potential for him to do another debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, the former president saying, we'll think about it.

He repeated the idea that he won last night. He said, we had a great night. He said the polling shows that. That's not what CNN's polling reflects, which gave the edge to the Vice President. He did say that when you win, you don't have to do it a second time. Comparing himself to a prize fighter and the losing side in a boxing match, saying that they want a rematch, he says that he may not need one.

He would do NBC or Fox, according to him, for a debate. Of course, we're going to keep an eye on the former president's remarks and get the latest from his campaign as he speaks to the press. Brianna?

KEILAR: All right. Boris, thank you so much. Former President Trump and his supporters are slamming ABC News after last night's debate. They are calling out the network after its moderators fact-checked the former president in real time.

Trump made at least 33 false claims, according to CNN's count. And this morning, he called the debate a rigged process and baselessly suggested that Harris cheated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: They had a rigged show with somebody that maybe even had the answers. I mean, I watched her talk and I said, you know, she seems awfully familiar with the questions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: CNN Media Correspondent, Hadas Gold is with us now.

Hadas, how often did ABC step in last night? HADAS GOLD, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Brianna. Fact-checking is always such a thorny issue for debate moderators. That's dogged them for years.

Now, ABC, before the debate, never committed one way or another whether they were going to fact-check. But clearly, they had made a conscious decision that they were going to step in at certain times. But they stepped in, in very sort of quick and crisp moments. There were two very clear, very obvious fact-checks.

Let's get to the first one. This was about 20 minutes into the debate, and this was by Linsey Davis on the subject of abortion.

[15:10:04]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: And you can look at the governor of West Virginia, the previous governor of West Virginia, not the current governor, who is doing an excellent job. But the governor before, he said the baby will be born and we will decide what to do with the baby. In other words, we'll execute the baby.

LINSEY DAVIS, DEBATE MODERATOR, ABC NEWS: There is no state in this country where it is legal to kill a baby after it's born.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GOLD: Now, the second fact-check was about the whole thing of people eating pets in Ohio. I never thought I'd have people eating pets on my - in Ohio on my 2024 debate bingo card, but here we are. But there were other more indirect fact checks, which I think was a very interesting and smart way for the moderators to do a fact check, where they don't go right to the can and say, actually, this is not true.

David Muir, for example, when Trump refused to say that he had lost a 2020 election, then turned to Vice President Harris and said, okay, he still believes he did not lose the election. That was won, actually, by President Biden and yourself.

But as you noted, Trump's allies, Trump himself, the right wing media, they are howling over this. Some have even gone so far as suggesting ABC should somehow be criminally charged or should have something happen to it just for fact checking, you know, saying what is true and what is not in a debate stage. And they're saying that they should have also been fact checking Harris.

And sure, as we noted, Harris did have at least one instance where they could have potentially fact checked. But, you know, ABC was just going for the most obvious, most extreme examples of outright mistruths and that just happened to be said by Donald Trump, Brianna.

KEILAR: All right, Hadas. Thank you for taking us through that, Hadas Gold.

And joining us now to talk more about the debate last night is Trump's surrogate and Republican Congressman Michael Waltz of Florida.

Sir, I do want to go through some of the key moments of the debate. And I should note, to be clear, that largely our fact checkers did find that there was more issue with Trump. But there was a particularly important comment that Harris made that our fact checkers found misleading. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And as of today, there is not one member of the United States military who is in active duty in a combat zone in any war zone around the world the first time this century.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: You, I should note, are the first former Green Beret in Congress. What did you think of that comment?

REP. MICHAEL WALTZ (R-FL): Well, I about fell out of my chair. I mean, immediately thought of the three soldiers from Georgia who were killed by Iranian-backed missiles. And drones in Jordan, I thought of the two Navy SEALs who died trying to intercept Iranian smugglers in - off the coast of Somalia. I thought about the ships that have been used as target practice by the Houthis with drones and anti ship missiles supplied by Iran. Heck, an aircraft carrier just got a combat medal for the first time since World War II for its actions off the Red Sea.

We could keep going down the list. The special operators that are in Syria right now as we speak. We just had six wounded in a raid on an ISIS compound. We had another six wounded by a missile attack.

I mean, this is a long list. So either she's a wallflower as vice president and had nothing to do with any of these actions and decisions. Oh, by the way, nothing to do with the debacle in Afghanistan, or she was at the table and was deliberately misleading the country. And it's right on the heels of Biden and his debate saying he hasn't lost anybody on his watch. It's completely out of touch with the Gold Star families and completely out of touch with the chaos that is engulfing the world on Harris' watch, on Biden's watch.

KEILAR: I do want to ask you about Russia's war in Ukraine. Twice in a row, Trump would not answer the question when asked if he wants Ukraine to win the war. Is that a problem?

WALTZ: Well, look, I thought he was actually has been consistent that he wants to end the war. I don't think President Trump and many Americans ...

KEILAR: So he wouldn't say that, so is that a problem that he won't say that?

WALTZ: No, he - actually, Brianna, let's roll the tape.

KEILAR: No, he wouldn't ...

WALTZ: He very clearly said I want to drive this to a diplomatic solution.

KEILAR: ... he wouldn't say that he wants Ukraine to win the war. He says he wants the war to end.

WALTZ: Well, President Biden nor Harris can define what winning is. And if I could finish is expelling every Russian from every inch of Crimea, former Ukrainian territory, is that winning? Is that how you would define winning?

Look, at the end of the day, he talked about driving both sides to end the war in a diplomatic solution and actually laid out how he would engage the leaders on both sides as he's done in rally speeches and at the debate. So I think he's been very consistent.

What we haven't heard the last four years is a strategy. How far, how long, how much, how are we going to get to any type of negotiated solution, which is obviously where this war needs to go?

[15:15:07]

KEILAR: So Trump claimed that he would negotiate the end of the war with Zelenskyy and Putin before he even takes office ...

WALTZ: Yes.

KEILAR: ... if he wins, that's, you know, that's not legal. And when Punchbowl News asked you if you were open to serving as defense secretary, if asked by Trump, if he wins, you were open to it.

WALTZ: Mm-hmm.

KEILAR: Would you personally commit to not negotiating if you were in that position with your Russian counterpart in a transition?

WALTZ: Well, as part of a trend - I mean, look, you're getting all kinds of hypotheticals there, Brianna, and there's all types of engagement during a transition. I think what President Trump has made clear that he could do very quickly is go to the Kremlin and Putin and make it clear to them that we will unleash America's arsenal. We will unhandcuff Ukrainians as they've currently been handcuffs, and we will flood the world with clean American oil and gas, drive down prices, put his economy on life support, and actually enforce the sanctions. That will get Putin to the table.

At the same time with the Ukrainians, hey, you don't have a blank check here. You guys need to lay out a framework for how to negotiate an end to this conflict. And as - I'm not sure what you're asking me there on some hypothetical position and how we would lay that out.

KEILAR: We did see some negotiation in the last transition, which is why I ask you. It wasn't hypothetical in that transition, which is why I'm asking you.

WALTZ: If you're referring to ...

KEILAR: But ... WALTZ: If you're referring to Mike Flynn talking to the Russian ambassador when the transcripts were actually released, it was completely appropriate. And we also had text messages of FBI agents saying, do we want to catch him in a lie or do we want to just get him fired? So I'm happy to go down that road, because that was despicable behavior on the part of the FBI and perfectly legitimate for an incoming National Security adviser during a transition to engage his counterparts.

KEILAR: I want to ask you about abortion, because JD Vance publicly said ...

WALTZ: Sure.

KEILAR: ... that Trump would veto a national abortion ban. We've seen Trump backpedal on that. He would not commit to that. He didn't at the debate. Why not?

WALTZ: Yes.

KEILAR: If he really thinks that this is about states and that states should make the call, why not just say that he'll veto a national abortion ban?

WALTZ: Well, you know, look, I think the president doesn't want to back himself into a hypothetical position when it's very clear, as Nikki Haley repeatedly said and was praised by many in the media, you don't have the votes. Why do we have to kind of message on this that's going to be used by the other side?

But notably, Kamala Harris also wouldn't denounce late term abortion up to the ninth month. She completely pivoted away from that and refused to answer the question.

KEILAR: I will just note that when it comes to abortions after - at or after 21 weeks, less than 1 percent account for that. And in a lot of those cases, it has to do with the life of the mother or it has to do with the extreme medical conditions of the fetus that it will not survive after birth.

But I do want to ask you, you said it was a hypothetical - you said ...

WALTZ: Well, that's important commentary, the 1 percent of millions is still a large number. And I mean, when you have ABC doing wrongly fact-checking ...

KEILAR: Or in the rape or incest barriers to access - for instance, if someone ...

WALTZ: Look, I mean, when you have eight children in Minnesota that died after attempted abortions were born and then still died, but you have ABC saying this never happens. When you have eight states that have zero restrictions - eight states that have zero restrictions all the way up to the minute of birth, ABC was all over the place and one sided. KEILAR: Sir, you know, that's not ...

WALTZ: (INAUDIBLE) ...

KEILAR: You know, that's not, you know, that's not how it happens.

WALTZ: I'm quoting on an article from ...

KEILAR: But I do - I want to ask you ...

WALTZ: ... I'm quoting up an article from the (INAUDIBLE) ...

KEILAR: I want to ask you, because you're a surrogate ...

WALTZ: ... from CNN (INAUDIBLE) ...

KEILAR: ... you are a surrogate for the Trump campaign. You said it's a hypothetical, but his running mate, the person a heartbeat away from the presidency, where if Trump wins, he's the oldest president, has previously called for a national abortion ban.

So I hear you say it's a hypothetical, but it's important to ask because he will be of advanced age and this is someone who has said what he has - he's called for a national abortion ban, JD Vance.

WALTZ: Mm-hmm. So, Brianna, we're talking about - well, I guess it's not that fantastical, President Trump was almost killed, but should he get elected?

[15:20:02]

Should he die in office? Should a bill get brought up, make it through the House, make it over the filibuster in the Senate? And now Vance, his vice president, is now president, what would he do? I mean, I think those are about five or six hypotheticals.

President Trump has been clear that what Roe versus Wade did was take legislating out of the hands of the judiciary, put it down in the states, and now people have a vote. And he even went through the vote that happened in Kansas, the vote that happened in other states. We're about to have a vote in Florida. He's weighed in on how he would vote, but it's now in the hands of the people.

And that's where - you know, that's where such, I think, a difficult issue, which is when does life begin? It should be in the hands of the voters and that's what moving it out of the Supreme Court and back into state legislatures has done. He said it over and over again.

KEILAR: Well, it was certainly a big night last night. We'll have to see if there's another one.

WALTZ: Yes.

KEILAR: It is still TBD. Congressman Waltz, thanks for being with us.

WALTZ: Sure. Okay, thanks, Brianna. KEILAR: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:25:27]

SANCHEZ: Landfall for Hurricane Francine is drawing closer with the storm's eye now just hours away from striking southern Louisiana. Wind gusts are strengthening, but it's the rain from this storm that could cause the most problems with life threatening storm surge and flash flooding possible in some places. CNN Meteorologist, Derek Van Dam, is in Morgan City, Louisiana, for us, where landfall could happen later this afternoon.

Derek, the outer bands are now starting to move in. How much of conditions changed since you've been there?

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, Boris, it's been a marked difference in what we reported on just last hour because the strongest part of Hurricane Francine is now starting to move on shore. We were looking at the latest radar and the eye of Francine is about 50 miles directly to my south. In fact, an elevated oil platform just south of here reached 112 miles per hour. That's about a hundred feet in the air. But that's still saying something about the power of this.

So we're getting these rain bands coming through, pushing up the water in this Appalachian river basin where we are currently located. So we're actually outside of the flood plain that protects the flood wall that protects the city of Morgan City. And this just shows you how vulnerable the coastline of Louisiana is.

Right now, we're standing at about six feet above sea level and with a storm surge potential of six to 10 feet in this vicinity, you know that it's not about how far away from the coast you actually evacuate to, but it also has to do with how far an elevation above sea level that you actually are.

So the threats here going forward as these outer rain bands from Hurricane Francine make their approach is, of course, these hurricane force winds that will bring down trees and a very saturated soil that's above average for this year. That could take down electricity.

Entergy, one of the main electrical suppliers in the state of Louisiana and other companies prepositioning about 10,000 personnel to quickly restore power to the areas that get impacted. I know our power is currently down right now where I'm located, but also the potential for spin up tornadoes. We have a tornado watch within this area. It extends all the way to New Orleans. It is possible that we see these spin up tornadoes. We've already had warnings occur within the past 45 minutes.

So going forward, the storm surge threat, the heavy rainfall from the inland flooding that could bring some potential problems to the inland low lying cities that dot the landscape here in southern Louisiana. Boris, it's going to be a rough next five hours before this next landfall. SANCHEZ: Derek Van Dam, please, you and your crew stay safe out there. Keep us updated with the latest that you're seeing. Thanks so much.

Still to come, what the Harris and Trump campaigns are saying about holding another presidential debate with fewer than two months until Election Day.

Plus, a deadline to keep many key parts of the government open and running is only three weeks away. And House Speaker Mike Johnson's effort to keep the lights on is falling apart. The latest in just moments.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)