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Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump Uses Controversial Rhetoric about Immigration and Internal Enemies of U.S. in Final Weeks of Campaign; Democratic Presidential Candidate Kamala Harris Attacks Donald Trump as Weak and Unstable; Florida Death Toll From Milton Rises to 23; US Sending Troops, Anti-Missile System to Israel. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired October 14, 2024 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

ANNA STEWART, CNN REPORTER: Lots that will be sold. It's also really interesting the P.A. of the manager managed to rescue it from the office just after, I think, the bailiffs had gone in and ransacked it.

Unreleased demos, these are versions of tracks, you may know, but I'm told they sound really different. One master tape has "Up from the Skies," "Ain't No Telling, "Little Miss Lover". The auction house has estimated this lot at $260,000. It may be, though, whoever buys this has to just listen to it themselves. To actually commercialize that, we need some sort of agreement with the estate, the family, of course, of Jimi Hendrix. Also handwritten notes, all sorts going in these lots. It is next November on the 15th, and it will be broadcast live.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: I am circling my calendar to not spend money.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: Anna Stewart, nice to see you. Thank you very much. Fly on little wing.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts now.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: As we get closer and closer to Election Day, Donald Trump is ramping up his rhetoric against immigrants and others and already sowing seeds of doubt about the election.

Florida continues to pick up the pieces after two major storms as the death toll from hurricane Milton is climbing once again.

And the U.S. is sending an advanced anti-missile system and U.S. troops to Israel to guard against potential retaliation by Iran.

I'm Sara Sidner with John Berman and Kate Bolduan. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

BERMAN: This morning, listen to what the candidates are saying. The words are new, they are different, and they are important, with just 22 days to go before the election. Donald Trump will be in Pennsylvania today after talking about the U.S. using the U.S. military on U.S. citizens, people he calls "the enemy from within," rhetoric that really does have a dark history over the last 100 years.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) U.S. FORMER PRESIDENT AND 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's the enemy from within. All the scum that we have to deal with that hate our country. That's a bigger enemy than China and Russia.

I think the bigger problem are the people from within. We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics.

It should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: For her part, Vice President Harris unveiled a new line of attack calling Trump weak and unstable. It all comes as polls show a very, very close race. CNN's Kristen Holmes is here with the latest from Trump world. Kristen?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and John, that rhetoric you heard there talking about the enemy within, specifically referring to Democrats and using the military on liberal voices, that followed a weekend of incredibly dark and divisive rhetoric on immigration in particular. We were with him in both Aurora, Colorado, and in California where he had really ramped up just how dark his immigration rhetoric could get. He called our country occupied America in terms of migrants. At one point he was showing slides at an Aurora, Colorado, event that showed hooded figures with guns saying your apartment complexes under Kamala Harris. And we heard him continually say things like "the enemy within" and talking about immigration with these really dark terms.

And one thing to point out here, John, as you noted, those polls are tightening. Theres also some indication that Donald Trump is chipping away at any lead that Kamala Harris had. And the reason I'm pointing that out is because there is a reason he is using this rhetoric. They believe that this is working moving forward. Donald Trump himself believes that the issue of immigration and particularly the dark rhetoric that he used around it in 2016 helped propel him to the White House. They also believe that that could help propel him to the White House in 2024. So that's why you're not going to hear any kind of dialing back on this rhetoric.

The other part of this to note is that Donald Trump and his team, they are trying to reach voters that aren't traditional Republican voters. They actually aren't traditional voters at all. They're called low propensity voters across the country. And in years past, cycles past, those low propensity voters tended to lean Democratic. There is now a belief, and this belief is really on both sides, that those low propensity voters, particularly in certain areas across the country, lean Republican. So if they can access them, if they can reach them and drive them to the polls in November, they can increase the electorate for Donald Trump.

And part of that is this rhetoric. They believe this is working for them, so you're not going to see any changes in posture no matter how much we talk about how polarizing it is, how dangerous it is, how divisive it is. And he's going to continue using that. Today's speech in Philadelphia, or just outside of Philadelphia, it's a town hall. It's supposed to be about the economy.

[08:05:00]

It might stay more on message because of the fact that people are asking questions about the economy. But still, expect him to talk about immigration, expect him to use this dark language as he goes into it because of the fact that you're seeing those poll numbers, you're seeing the tightening, and you're seeing the fact that Donald Trump and his team believe this is a winning message for them ahead of November.

BERMAN: It is certainly the message he is leaning into with just 22 days to go. Kristen Holmes, thank you very much. Kate?

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's talk about that message and its impact. Joining me right now is pollster and communication strategist Frank Luntz and Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha. Thanks, guys.

Chuck, let me start with you. I want to play for you something else that we heard from Donald Trump this weekend. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: For four straight years she's imported an army of illegal alien gang members and migrant criminals from the dungeons all over the world.

They come from prisons and jails, insane asylums, mental institutions, from Venezuela, from the Congo, all over.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Chuck, you have talked about what concerns you is this kind of language should turn voters away, but it doesn't. And you focus a lot on Latino voters. How does this fit into the appeal to them?

CHUCK ROCHA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST AND FOUNDER, NUESTRO PAC: Well, this message is actually for suburban women. And let me make my cases. In every race that I'm working in in the 20 congressional races, Republicans use this language because, as you all said earlier, abortion is a major issue here. So Republicans know it's their Achilles heel, and they are trying to demonize immigrants and Latinos to say you should not vote for the Democrats because they're going to come and get you. And don't forget about this Dobbs thing. So they're trying to scare people back to their party.

Now, what that does with Latino voters -- I'm in Arizona today. I campaigned out here all weekend, is that you start seeing an erosion of folks, mainly older Latinos who are closer to the immigration experience, saying, is he talking about us? Is he talking about my community or my grandmother who immigrated here? So it's a double- edged sword that cuts both ways.

But specifically, what he did yesterday is to scare white women who he is losing dramatically because of abortion and Dobbs back to him with a scare tactic.

BOLDUAN: Add to this conversation, Frank, in what you've heard and seen on the campaign and from all the focus groups that you've run. I thought it interesting in "The New York Times" and some of the polling this weekend that the poll found that the escalating attacks on immigrants had not driven Latino voters from Trump to Harris. Two- thirds of those surveyed said they believe Trump was not referring to people like them when he spoke about immigrants. What are you hearing from voters?

FRANK LUNTZ, POLLSTER: It really is the same thing. For immigrants, for Latinos, for all Americans, the number one issue is not immigration. It's affordability. How to afford to put food on your table, put gas in your car, health care and housing. Thats number one.

Number two is that they regard our immigration system is being broken, fundamentally broken. Democrats agree, Republicans agree. They have different solutions.

But third, and probably most important, what we regard as horrific language -- and I'm shocked by it -- it's not having an impact because those who live in these border states, in Arizona, for example, or in Nevada, which has a significant Latino population, they're afraid. Crime has gone up there. Violence has gone up there. And the concern right now is if we don't get control of that border, it's only going to get worse.

Harris made a statement which I thought was -- I was surprised by it, which is there's no difference between her campaign or her issues and Joe Biden's issues. On immigration, the public thinks the Biden-Harris administration has failed. I would have counseled Trump not to be so negative, not to be so personal, to dial it back. But it actually is working, which is why you see the numbers that you do with Latino voters.

BOLDUAN: And Chuck, if I can ask you, Frank is talking about affordability as such a key issue. And one demographic that we know that affordability is absolutely a key issue is a group that that the Harris campaign is now focusing, laser focusing in on, which are -- when it comes to black men. And I want to play for you what Jim Clyburn told Dana Bash just this weekend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JAMES CLYBURN, (D-SC): Yes, I am concerned about black men staying home or voting for Trump. But my concerns don't tend to keep me from being energetic about this campaign.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Chuck, are you concerned like Clyburn is concerned?

ROCHA: I'm very concerned. And the reason I'm concerned is just a little bit, let's ground this, that black men and black women will overwhelmingly support of Vice President Harris.

[08:10:04]

Black women at 90 percent, black men at over 85, but that needs to be even higher if she can win the three most important states that your network talks about all the time, is Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, lots of African Americans, Michigan, Detroit, lots of African Americans, and in Milwaukee. If you have just a two percent loss of Latino -- not Latino, but black man move to Donald Trump, there's no way he can win.

So sure, we all get nervous. We're overwhelmingly winning them. But the big difference here are really focused on younger black men. When James Clyburn first ran for office, you could talk to every black man on three TV stations. Now that has been broadened across thousands of stations, streaming, podcasts, and it's harder to for reached a young black male, just like, ironically, we were just talking about Latino voters, the average age of a Latino voters is 27. That's why you start seeing the slippage there. It's harder to get the message to them because they're more disconnected, they don't have a landline at home. They're more transient. They rent properties. So any pollster like Frank or anybody else just knows it's harder to get a message to that younger group.

BOLDUAN: And Frank, you've done focus groups with exactly this. You've done them with younger black men. What sticks out to you in those conversations that would be -- that the campaigns would be wise to listen to in their final pitch?

LUNTZ: That they actually like Trumps attitude, that we may be negative in this discussion, but they're tired of being targeted by the government. They're tired of being forgotten or left behind. They're tired of being criticized. They see Donald Trump and they see themselves in him, not the wealth, but they see opportunity, they see the chance to be heard and the chance to fight back. They actually, it's not an anti-Harris vote among young black men. It is a pro Trump vote. It's going to be one-third of the young black men. And that will affect Georgia and North Carolina more than any other states.

BOLDUAN: One thing we also, John Berman, was talking about it earlier, Kamala Harris made a shift this weekend and started focusing on a bit of a new focus in her tone, focusing on kind of age and mental acuity of Donald Trump, saying that he's weak, he's unstable. They're hiding him. Why are they hiding him? Do you think this -- from your conversations with voters, does it work when it comes to Donald Trump, less a message of he is dangerous, more a message of he's weak and unstable.

LUNTZ: No. We know everything there is to know. There's nothing new about Donald Trump. She should be talking about herself, promoting herself. In fact, if I was a Democratic adviser, I would not be focusing on the negative because it's not telling anyone anything they haven't heard. They do not know where she stands on the issues. They do not know why she's changed her point of view in some cases. And she is preferred to Trump in her likability, in her persona. Why is she not focusing on that? Trump is dragging her down, and that's hurting her campaign.

BOLDUAN: Big choices, important ones to be made on where are you putting resources, time, and personnel in these last moments. It's great to see you both. Frank, thank you so much. Chuck, it's great to see you. Thank you.

Sara?

SIDNER: All right, this morning, Florida, of course, still recovering after hurricane Milton. President Biden pledging more than $600 million dollars to bolster the state's electric grid as hundreds of thousands of people remain in the dark.

Plus, the U.S. sending 100 troops and an anti-missile system to Israel as tensions continue to escalate in the Middle East. This morning, the death toll rising after a Hezbollah drone attack on an army base inside Israel.

And new this morning, Kamala Harris rolling out a new push to court black male voters, where she stands with that key democratic -- demographic ahead of Election Day. We'll have those stories and more ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:18:15]

SIDNER: This morning, 23 people are now confirmed dead after Hurricane Milton tore across the state of Florida and hundreds of thousands of people are still without power there, and the problems don't stop there. Residents are also facing electricity and fuel shortages and waiting in long lines for gas like the one you're looking at there. That's near Tampa.

Over the weekend, President Biden surveyed the latest damage and announced more than $600 million of federal assistance for projects in areas impacted by Hurricanes Milton and Helene.

CNN's Isabel Rosales is joining us now.

Two major hurricanes in just two weeks. This has just taken a devastating toll on Floridians and the area, and what they're going to do next because they've been hit twice. A lot of people are wondering which storm to blame for the damage they have gone through. What can you tell us about what is happening now from Milton?

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, and it has been a one-two punch for Floridians dealing back-to-back with Helene and then Milton, and we know that officials have said this was not the worst-case scenario, it could have been a lot worse in terms of Milton. But for people living in these communities, I mean, their lives are

uprooted. This is extremely devastating and it is a daunting task ahead, Sara, for them to recover, to turn the page on this, especially because flooding is still a major concern.

There are active flood warnings along the rivers of Hillsborough. The Alafia River that's in the Valrico/Lithia section of Hillsborough County. You have the Withlacoochee River.

I mean, I was there on the ground at the Alafia River seeing entire homes underwater, cars under water, and we know that Milton dumped 16 inches of rain over Hillsborough County.

So you have the sheriff warning people, hey, we are not out of the woods there, and then there are those long fuel lines that you mentioned that we saw wrapped around the block, people waiting for hours to be able to get to a pump that has that fuel.

[08:20:08]

We know from GasBuddy, the tracking website that under 30 percent of Florida gas stations have no fuel, especially in hard-hit Tampa and St. Petersburg in Pinellas County to the point where for the state has been escorting these fuel tankers to get them to those spots where they're needed and even opening up public fueling sites where people can get up to 10 gallons of fuel for free to help them on this stage of recovery, this process of recovery.

And then there is the debris removal, something that Governor Ron DeSantis has called a major priority. That was a big issue with Helene, all of that debris. They're working 24 hours a day, seven days a week to get that debris out of the way, which can be so dangerous, especially since were still not out of hurricane season.

The state has removed a lot of the red-tape, sizing, weight issues of those vehicles to just get this stuff out of neighborhoods.

And then you mentioned Biden, his tour of these hard-hit areas where he approved a major disaster declaration. What this does, Sara, is it opens up FEMA funding, so people can get some grants for home repairs and for temporary housing and basic needs that they have.

Here is what else the president said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This is a whole government effort from state and local to FEMA, to US Coast Guard, Army Corps of Engineers, the Energy Department, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Defense just to name a few.

FEMA has delivered one 1.2 million meals, over 300,000 liters of water, two million gallons of fuel, and so far we've installed 100 satellite terminals to restore communications in impacted areas.

(END VIDEO CLIP) ROSALES: And then there is the issue of electricity. I mean, a lot of

progress has been made, Sara, but still 400,000 people without electricity in Florida.

The power companies are saying that most people should have power back by midweek, so that's going to be hugely important to getting over Milton.

SIDNER: Yes, we are looking at Siesta Key right now where the roofs have just been ripped off so many houses there.

I do want to ask you also about North Carolina, which has been dealing with devastating flooding from the storms, and there is this issue, you're hearing Biden talk about the federal assistance that has come in to Florida and North Carolina.

And we are now hearing these reports of FEMA workers being threatened as they're trying to go about helping the people who need it the most. What do you know about that?

ROSALES: This is serious business, Sara.

I mean, I've spoken to so many officials locally on the ground in Asheville, North Carolina; Buncombe County, even all through Florida who have been very concerned about this backdrop of misinformation about federal aid in light of Milton, and in light of Helene to the point where FEMA had to launch a hurricane rumor response section in their website.

So what happened here in Asheville over the weekend actually, at least two counties, Ashe County and Rutherford County in the hard-hit western portion of North Carolina is threats being made to FEMA workers to the point where they had to halt operations to help out people, just out of an abundance of caution for the FEMA workers.

"The Washington Post" first reported that National Guard troops saw "armed militia" making threats of FEMA workers, so that's why they had to pause these operations. It is not clear if that threat was credible, and we certainly reached out to FEMA to get more information on that.

But I do want to leave you with this, the Ashe County Sheriff Phil Howell saying -- urging residents to "stay calm and steady during our recovery, help folks, and please don't stir the pot." His words.

SIDNER: Yes, it is going to be a really long recovery and it is just really disturbing to hear that.

Isabel Rosales, thank you so much for your reporting on Florida and on North Carolina -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: So, The Pentagon is sending some of its most powerful anti- missile defense systems to Israel, along with 100 US troops to help operate it.

It is the first significant deployment of US troops to Israel since the war with Hamas began.

And Bath & Body Works is now apologizing after one of their winter candles caused an uproar and this is why, the controversial design that had people comparing it to a Ku Klux Klan hood.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:28:37]

BERMAN: All right, new this morning, a Hezbollah drone attack killed at least four Israeli soldiers at an army base, dozens more wounded. Israeli officials are trying to figure out how the drone or drones slipped past the country's warning systems.

Separately, The Pentagon is sending a powerful anti-missile system along with about 100 US troops to help run that missile system. CNN's Oren Liebermann is at The Pentagon with the latest on this -- Oren.

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: John, this is a THAAD battery, one of the US' most advanced anti-ballistic missile systems and the US doesn't have a large number of these, so each of these deployments is significant and that's why this is such a big deal.

THAAD stands for Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense. It is an advanced system designed to intercept short, medium, and long-range ballistic missiles and that clearly is what it is there to do.

It takes about a hundred troops to operate a THAAD battery and that is why you see that number going into Israel to make sure the system is operational and ready to go along with working with the Israeli systems that are there, and then for example, the naval ships that have also been used in ballistic missile defense there right off the coast of Israel there.

So there is a clear threat or belief in the possibility of another Iranian ballistic missile attack, that because the US has been in very close touch with Israel about its own response to October 1st.

And even if Israel hasn't finally decided how to carry out that response, Israel's senior leaders, including the Defense minister and the prime minister have promised a response would be coming, and in turn, Iran has promised its own retaliation. That's why this THAAD battery is headed to Israel to help in that defense.

We have seen THAAD batteries deployed in the Middle East before, including right after the October 7th attack on Israel. We've also seen the US deploy a THAAD battery in Israel in 2019 as part of a training and exercise.

So we have seen it in these situations before, but of course, not with a threat that is hanging over Israel right now, and that is why it is such a significant deployment and it will add not only quantity, but quality to Israel's own air defense system that has the shorter range Iron Dome, medium-range David's Sling, and the Arrow missiles.

So John, this is another layer of aerial defense as the US is watching very closely what is happening with Israel and of course with Iran.

[08:30:51]