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Kamala Harris to Campaign with Celebrities in Georgia; Kamala Harris Calls Donald Trump Fascist after Former Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly Says Same about Trump; New Poll Shows More Voters have Unfavorable View of Harris Compared to August. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired October 24, 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]

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: They're suffering 1,200 casualties killed and wounded a day in the fighting in Ukraine. And that means Russian president Vladimir Putin may need, effectively, more bodies to fight his war.

The White House also made very clear what this means for North Korean troops if they end up fighting on behalf of Russia. That means they are, quote, "fair game", and will essentially fight and perhaps die like Russian troops as they fight against Ukraine. Here's the U.S. being very clear here.

Sara, one of the key questions that is still out there is what does North Korea get in exchange for not only the weapons they're providing, but now the troops they are providing to Russia? And could that be something like nuclear or satellite technology? And that would be very problematic.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Wow. All right, Oren Liebermann, thank you so much.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: The stars coming out today for Kamala Harris on the campaign trail fresh off the big CNN town hall event. She's off to battleground Georgia to be joined for the first time by former President Barack Obama and a long list of celebrities.

And officials in Arizona have arrested a man in connection with multiple shooting at a DNC office, and authorities now say they think the man was preparing to carry out a mass casualty event.

Plus, access denied or attempted to be denied. Officials in Georgia say they have thwarted an attempted cyberattack targeting the states absentee ballot website. Who they think and behind the attempted hack.

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: New this morning, what do you do after you call your political rival a fascist for the first time out loud? If you're Kamala Harris, you hit the campaign trail with Barack Obama, Bruce Springsteen, Spike Lee, and more. We should note that Harris also picked up new endorsements from a couple more Republicans, a key mayor in Wisconsin, a former Republican congressman.

Overnight on CNN, Harris also brought back the word she used when she first entered this race this summer "joy."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, (D) VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I believe the American people deserve a president who is saying, look, let's just be practical. Let's get things done. And let's not be afraid of having a little joy to the point of, you know, what gives you, what makes you feel good about your work. Let's, let's do it in a way that is grounded in optimism.

I think people are exhausted with the idea that were just going to be divided and angry instead of working on the problems and working together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, let's get right to CNN's Priscilla Alvarez, who is in Georgia where the big event for the vice president will be today. What do you expect, Priscilla?

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN REPORTER: Well, John, we have turned now to the phase of this election that is turning out the vote. So this event here today in Atlanta, Georgia, is going to be about energizing voters and doing that with former president Barack Obama. This will be the first time that Vice President Kamala Harris and Obama well be campaigning together.

And it's going to be headlined by Bruce Springsteen, who, of course, has been a regular presence in the waning days of the election for Democratic candidates. But even so, John, as you were just showing that clip of the town hall, the campaign is still doing the work of introducing and reintroducing the vice president to voters. And on that front, she was asked during the town hall how she would be different from a Biden administration. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, (D) VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: My administration will not be a continuation of the Biden administration. I represent a new generation of leadership on a number of issues. I bring a whole set of different experiences to this job and the way I think about it than Joe Biden.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Some voters, though, might ask, you've been in the White House for four years, you were vice president, not the president, but why wasn't any of that done for the last four years?

HARRIS: Well, there was a lot that was done, but there's more to do, Anderson.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ALVAREZ: Now, she remains pretty vague about policy positions, but what was clear is that the vice president has been trying to underscore that she would work across the aisle to accomplish policy solutions. She also in some moments showed a more authentic version of herself, talking about faith and grieving her mother. But notably, she also agreed that former President Donald Trump is a fascist. It was the first time we heard that from her so explicitly as she also repeatedly invoked John Kelly and his remarks to "The Atlantic" and "The New York Times." And that is part of the task over the next several days, according to campaign officials I've spoken with, which is reminding voters who former President Donald Trump is, because they worry at some voters have forgotten about some of that.

[08:05:02]

And we have also learned that part of that closing argument will be delivered on the National Mall on the location where former President Donald Trump delivered that fiery speech in January 6th, on January 6th, that set in motion that attack on Capitol Hill by his supporters. So all of this coming together in the final days as the vice president not only tries to differentiate herself from President Biden, but also tries to remind voters of foreign President Donald Trump and warning of a second potential Trump term.

SIDNER: All right, thank you to Priscilla Alvarez there for that report.

All right, joining us now to discuss, Scott Jennings, CNN senior political commentator and former special assistant to president George W. Bush, Kate Bedingfield, CNN political commentator and former communications director in the Biden White House, and Tara Palmeri, senior political correspondent for "Puck." Thank you all for being here.

All right, let me start with this. We heard in the town hall from Harris. She's really sharpening her attacks on Donald Trump after a long time talking about joy and talking about weirdness. Here is what she said about Trump being accused of being a fascist.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Do you think Donald Trump is a fascist?

KAMALA HARRIS, (D) VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Yes, I do. Yes, I do. And I also believe that the people who know him best on this subject should be trusted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: All right, those are really stark words. And first to you, Kate. It feels like it gets lost in the sauce that you have a vice president accusing her opponent of being a fascist. What do you think it is, why she's making this turn from talking about joy and weird to calling her opponent a fascist? KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, don't forget, she's not just calling her opponent a fascist. She's using the words of the people who know him best and served most closely with him when he was president the United States. I mean, she's using a word that John Kelly, a conservative general who stood by Donald Trump's side in the Oval Office saw all the ways in which Trump wanted to flout the Constitution, use the military against American citizens. Those are John Kelly's word.

So I think it's important not to lose sight of that. This is not Kamala Harris calling names. This is her lifting up the fact that somebody who served very, very closely with Donald Trump and was a supporter of Donald Trump is calling him a fascist.

And I think, look, the practical reality, the political reality, we are coming into the final stretch of this campaign. One of the things the Harris campaign has to do is jolt people up off the couch who have been apathetic about the process, who feel burned out by politics over the last now decade in this country. And so what she's trying to do is remind people what the stakes are. And so using blunt, direct language that goes to some of the ways in which Donald Trump is a threat to the American way of life is reminding people that this is not just your average election and the stakes are very, very high.

SIDNER: Yes, I do want to mention Harris did seize on this, right? Scott Jennings, she seized on hearing from John Kelly in his own words who said that he is a fascist and basically said that Hitler did some good things. So what is your take on her using those? Because that is what his chief of staff, who is the longest serving chief of staff, said about Donald Trump.

SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, my take is that she's running the exact same campaign here in late October that Joe Biden would have run. And we've come full circle. They change candidates, but we got the exact same campaign. And also out of Harris, we get no meaningful separation from Biden, no meaningful differences on policy. She's basically just running the campaign that Joe Biden wanted to run.

I think the problem with this vector of attack is that Donald Trump was president for four years. He didn't do anything Hitler-ish. He didn't do anything dictatorial that I know of. I mean, he was the president. People remember it. And if you look at "The Wall Street Journal" poll this morning, he has a higher job approval for his time in office then she has for her time in office as vice president. I'm just not sure people are going to buy this thing.

And for Democrats, it's just kind of stunning to me. You changed at your candidate, but you got the exact same campaign anyway.

TARA PALMERI, SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, "PUCK": Except that he was reluctant to hand over power, a transfer of power, on January 6th. But also Democratic pollsters have found that for independents, this closing argument about democracy is particularly persuasive, even more so than the economy, immigration, reproductive rights. So for those last remaining voters, those Nikki Haley type voters, the independents, the center-right, soft Republicans, you have to induce anxiety to get them out because they're essentially doubled haters. And that's what the Democrats are seeing. And that's why you see her leaning into in the final hours and days?

[08:10:02]

JENNINGS: In my opinion, if Democrats, all Democrats really believed in this, you would not have Senate Democrats running TV ads and Pennsylvania and Michigan and other places touting their work with Donald Trump. If they really believed it, if it was really a core value, would you be running ads saying, I partnered with Hitler, I partnered with a fascist? And if you really believe he is a fascist and you really believe he's going to, quote, terminate the Constitution, I think somebody ought to ask a Democrat today, how can you hand over power and Donald Trump if you actually believe that? That's why I think this is ultimately going to be an empty argument because Dems are running with Trump, not against him in these --

PALMERI: These are the people who have still not made up their mind. Republicans are Republicans. They're already with Trump. She's talking to the remaining soft Republicans, those Lot K Dads. Maybe they're like the Brian Kemp, Romney type Republicans who are still on the fence. And this is an argument they don't like that about Trump. They don't like the danger. They don't like the existential threat to democracy. They don't want to see people storming the Capitol again. And so that's why they're pushing this language in the final days.

And you're right, it was Bidens messaging. At the time everyone thought it was out of touch when most people cared about the economy, immigration. But now, if you're a Democrat, you're with Kamala Harris. If you're still on the fence, then you need to be pushed a little bit further. And one of Kamala Harris's advisers said were activating a little bit of Trump PTSD, and that's how you get people out now.

SIDNER: Let me ask you, let's hear from one of the voters in the town hall last night, one of those voters said, stop trashing each other. We don't care. Stop trashing Trumps. She's talking to Kamala Harris, but she also said stop trashing the vice president. We do not care. The voters don't care.

Kate, when you hear that from a voter who is still undecided and who still was undecided at the end of the town hall, what does that tell you?

BEDINGFIELD: Well, it shows again is fatigue with politics, with the tone of our politics, the way it has descended again, particularly over this course of this last decade as its coarsened, and we could talk about a lot of reasons why that is. Obviously, I would argue including Donald Trump, but including social media. There are all sorts of reasons for that.

But it underscores a core fact of this election, of course, fundamental, this elections, that there are a lot of people who are tired of the process. And this is where I think Harris was very smart early on in her campaign after she went to the top of the ticket. She was very smart in trying to set the frame and set the framework for turning the page from -- turning the page from Donald Trump, as opposed to turning the page from Biden. She's trying to make an argument that she's a new way forward and the kind of benchmark that she set around that at the beginning of the campaign was less about separating herself from Biden economically, although I think she had has done a better job of kind of articulating that over the last few weeks of this campaign than she did a couple of months ago.

But she really tried to make this about representing a new kind of politics and turning the page from Donald Trump. And I do think that that is where a large section of voters who are ultimately probably going to be determinative in this election are. And you hear it there in the comments from that person. They're tired of the name-calling. They're tired of the vitriol. Donald Trump is the standard bearer for that kind of politics. And she was smart to push off of that and present herself as a new direction and a new way forward on that.

SIDNER: I want to discuss his new "Wall Street Journal" polling. I'm showing that more voters now have an unfavorable view of Harris compared to the split of favorable and unfavorable in August. Tara, I'm curious if what's happening here is when you go negative, that you -- is that it? IS that why this has happened? Or do you think it's something else?

PALMERI: I think when you go negative, yes, you got a little bit of that dirt on yourself as well. It's not a great thing that the more she's out there, the less people are liking her. I mean, she had a huge bump, but she also had a flawless rollout when she came out there. She was basically -- she wasn't out there in the media for the first month. She had celebrities around her endorsing her. She had this DNC, DNC rollout.

And now there are a lot of attack ads running, and they're based on her own words. And, for example, the interview she did with "The View" when she was asked, how would you separate yourself from Biden? And she said she wouldn't change a thing. And so those ads are running. There's the transgender ads that are running that Trump has pushing out.

So we're in the final weeks and people are going to -- they're going to get a little dirty from these ads on both sides. I wouldn't be surprised at Trumps unfavs are dropping, although I've heard that his favorables are actually going up some. And it reflects the closest of the race. I mean, that's the truth, that they are at parity right now. So it's not surprising to see them sort of even out.

JENNINGS: I agree with Tara, when the rollout happened, it was good. But then when her candidacy made contact with the general public and reporters finally, in October, that's when the inversion happened. And what's surprising to me she keeps getting the same questions over and over again, just like she did from Anderson last night. And she keeps having the same non-answers. I think people pick up on this, and it's one of the reasons she's not been able to maintain that progress that she made when she got into the race.

SIDNER: All right, Scott, Tara, Kate. Thank you all for having this good discussion. Appreciate it. [08:15:00]

All right ahead, the FBI finding more than 100 weapons at the home of a man they say shot an Arizona DNC office three times. They think he was planning a horrific attack. Details on that coming up.

Plus, Georgia election officials say a foreign country likely tried to hack a website for voters, how they fended off that cyberattack.

And, Donald Trump's former National Security adviser, Michael Flynn has spent years falsely claiming the 2020 election was stolen but he's telling a different story in court. We'll explain, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:20:11]

BOLDUAN: New this morning, officials at Arizona say the man arrested for the shootings of a Democratic National Committee office there, that man may have been planning a mass casualty event.

An Arizona prosecutor says a search of his home recovered 120 guns, more than 250,000 rounds of ammunition, scopes, body armor, and silencers also found.

CNN's Julia Vargas Jones has the very latest following the details of this case. What are you finding?

JULIA VARGAS JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, a disturbing amount of ammunition at his home, but also, Kate, in the car he was driving at the time of the arrest yesterday, a machine gun.

Now, Jeffrey Michael Kelly, 60-year-old, retired aerospace engineering, at some point he did have top clearance. He's from Ahwatukee, Arizona and was arrested in connection with these three incidents of shooting at the Democratic National Committee office in suburban Phoenix.

They took -- it was over the span of 20 days starting on September 16, when investigators believe that more than ten rounds of BB rounds of BB gun were shot at this building outside of Phoenix, Arizona.

The second incident took place just a week later, but this time, he brought a real gun with real bullets. This was on September 23rd around just after midnight that took place, and then two weeks later, another incident with a real gun. This time, authorities came to the scene about five minutes later, this was shortly after midnight, again, on those two last two occasions, they had surveillance video of a silver SUV leaving the scene and they say that that was key to finding Kelly.

They were able to find him through a tip from the community and once they started following him, they saw him putting up signs with razor blades attached to them, criticizing the Democratic Party and VP Kamala Harris, he was putting that around the area of Ahwatukee where he's from. And Kate, he also attached, and this is a bit of a disturbing part of this story, this white powder to these signs that said biohazard on it. At this time, he's charged with two counts of unlawful discharge, two counts of shooting at a non-residential structure, three counts under the Terrorism Act, and three counts of criminal damage, but additional charges might still be filed, police say, in relation to that white powder that we're not sure yet what contents.

Of course, the big picture here is that we're 12 days from the presidential election. Another incident of political violence, but I want you to hear what the Tempe police chief had to say

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF KENNETH MCCOY, TEMPE, ARIZONA POLICE DEPARTMENT: Let me be clear, justice does not have a political party. The Tempe Police Department will uphold the law and protect everyone no matter their political affiliation. There is no place in the city of Tempe for political threats or intimidation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JONES: And Kate, Arizona, of course, one of these key battleground states in this election, the authorities are painfully aware of the significance of this arrest.

BOLDUAN: Julia, thank you so much -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right, still ahead, foreign hackers trying to hack into Georgia's absentee ballot system. How officials found it and stopped it.

And, actress, Olivia Munn takes the brave step of showing her mastectomy scars in a brand-new ad campaign. Those stories ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:28:01]

BERMAN: All right, new this morning, Georgia says it fended off an attempted cyberattack that officials believe came from a foreign country. The state's cybersecurity defenses were able to block the attempts to hack into the website where Georgia voters request absentee ballots.

Official say their systems kept working without any disruption of voters. Still, obviously, reason for concern, not just in Georgia, but around the country.

CNN national security reporter Zach Cohen here with the latest.

Zach, what are you learning on this?

ZACHARY COHEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes, John, this is a good reminder of the keen interest hackers have in election-related targets and coming just obviously, days from the 2024 presidential election.

Look, we've been hearing from US officials for months now that hackers of a variety of shades and a variety of domestic and foreign could look to hack and target political campaigns, election offices for their own purposes.

And in Georgia, we're learning about this incident that happened a couple of weeks ago. Officials telling us that they thwarted an attempt to take the absentee ballot website offline -- it is that website that is used to request absentee ballots and this is consistent with what we've heard about other cyber incidents and other states as well.

Efforts to target the election have really centered around not trying to change or flip votes as some conspiracy theorists have said is ongoing, but instead of trying to change the perception around the security of the 2024 election.

Listen to Gabe Sterling. He's a top election official in Georgia. He's talking about the security of the voting systems there despite the fact that there have been some vulnerabilities exposed in the past. Take a listen to what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GABRIEL STERLING, CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER, GEORGIA SECRETARY OF STATE'S OFFICE: Though we have multiple layers of security around several systems. And there's a misunderstanding that is one of the reasons disinformation can take root so easily is people think, oh, hackers are doing something to the voting system, that lack of understanding has been exploited by those who want to undermine people's confidence in our systems.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: So, there's no evidence that hackers have changed votes, changed the results of past elections. And despite the fact that there is real incredible evidence of vulnerabilities in the election system infrastructure, state officials like Gabe Sterling insist that the layers clearly that are in place do make those -- it means that those systems are secure.

So, state officials remain vigilant and very aware of the intent of hackers to target the election systems in a variety of ways. And while a concern though, he's trying to reassure the public that those systems are secure and that their vote is secure.

[08:30:22]