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Trump's Popularity Grows; Reop. Gret Cazar (D-TX) is Interviewed about Trump's Agenda; Israel Fails to Meet U.S. Criteria; Trump Picks Zeldin for EPA; Nazi Flags Outside Anne Frank Play; Attacks on women Surge on Social Media. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired November 12, 2024 - 08:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:33:20]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: The one and only CNN's senior data reporter, Harry Enten, is joining us because today he's talking about love and politics. Is that even a real thing? President-elect Donald Trump feeling a lot of love. Show us the numbers.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR DATA REPORTER: Show us the numbers. You know, he wants those senators, perhaps in recess appointments, to allow folks to get into his cabinet. And I want you to give an understanding. You know, it used to be that the Republicans in the Senate tolerated Donald Trump. Now they l-o-v-e-y-o-u him.

Core Trumpers in the Senate, who endorsed Trump in the primary season. In 2016 there was just one GOP senator, that was Jeff Sessions, who, of course, then Trump through overboard later on after he joined his cabinet. This time around, look at this, the vast majority of Republicans in the United States Senate endorsed Trump during the primary season.

The bottom line is this. They tolerated him last time. They love him this time around. They're basically going to probably allow him to do whatever he wants as long as he doesn't go too far. And honestly, I'm not sure for them how far is too far, Sara.

SIDNER: All right, so, these senators have a reason to think that they could face anything from the voters or what do the voters say?

ENTEN: Yes, so, you know, is there any way that they could go too far for the Republican base in their state? So, Trump won the primary in their state. You go back to 2016. About - only about - in about 60 percent of GOP senators did Trump win the primary caucus convention in their state. You go to 2024. Look at this, 100 percent. One hundred percent. Trump won the primary convention caucus in all of their states.

The bottom line is, Trump can't go too far. The GOP base loves Donald Trump, at least when it comes to the primaries and caucuses within their states. The GOP senators have no real fear of facing any backlash from the voters. [08:35:00]

The other thing I will note is, for every single GOP senator, except for Susan Collins, Trump also won the general election in their state in 2024.

SIDNER: Right, he won the popular vote as well, so far as we can see.

It's not just sort of the breadth, though. It's the - it's the depth of this. Explain that.

ENTEN: Yes, so, you know, one hundred percent. That's wide, right? But how deep does your love go? How deep is your love, as the Bee Gees once said.

OK, GOP who view Trump very favorably. Very favorably, right? This is not just like, this is love. Again, this is a segment about love.

In November of 2016, 39 percent of Republicans had a very favorable view of Donald Trump. Look at where that number is now, 71 percent. Nearly double - nearly double the GOP base says that they have a very favorable view of Donald Trump. So, the bottom line is, Sara, what do all of these numbers mean? It means GOP senators much more likely to love Trump than they were eight years ago. And the GOP base is much more likely to love Donald Trump than eight years ago.

The bottom line is, l-o-v-e-y-o-u when it comes to Donald Trump.

SIDNER: And this has a lot to do with policy and what we will see them do when he has policies he wants them to pass.

ENTEN: When - exactly right. When Donald Trump says something, it's very likely that the GOP senators will go along in large part because the GOP base loves Donald Trump.

SIDNER: Harry Enten, appreciate it.

ENTEN: Thank you.

SIDNER: John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, that's the Republican side. Let's look at the other side now.

With us now, Congressman Greg Casar, Democrat from Texas and the whip, a whip, of the House Progressive Caucus.

Congressman, thanks so much for being with us.

You just heard right there, Donald Trump has the support of Republicans in Congress. He will have control likely of all three branches of government. So, my simple question to you is, what you going to do?

REP. GREG CASAR (D-TX): Well, even if Donald Trump may be popular right now with many of those voters, if you remember, during the beginning of his first term, his agenda was deeply unpopular with working people. He tried to undo congressional ethics because he's so corrupt. He tried to get rid of the Affordable Care Act time and time again, and quickly his numbers plummeted.

And so it is the job of Democrats to remind the American people what they want from their government. And I don't think they're going to see that from Donald Trump. They're just going to see grift and attempts at tax cuts for billionaires as the beginning of his agenda. That's not what working people actually want.

BERMAN: So, remind them how - and does reminding them actually do anything to stop the agenda that you think Trump and Republicans will try to enact?

CASAR: If you remember, from last time, there were fights that Democrats picked where we won. We were able to bring folks like Senator John McCain over to save the Affordable Care Act and keep millions of people on their health care. There were also fights that Democrats righteously fought and lost in the short-term. For example, Trump saying he was trying to help the middle class actually mostly gave tax cuts to billionaires and big corporations. And although Democrats fought and lost that fight, it destroyed Trump's numbers and favorability. That's what we will attempt to do again here.

But I think we have to do it not just with facts and figures, but by showing working people that we are ready to stand up to the real bullies, not just to Donald Trump, but when they see their credit card fees go up because Trump tries to get rid of some of the Biden-era protections. We should be calling out Visa and Mastercard. When people start to see, oh, why are my bank withdrawal fees going up? We should be willing to call out Wall Street and point out who the real villains are so that Trump's attacks on things - people like immigrants start to be shown as really just distractions and divisiveness. Democrats should be willing to call out the real villains in the system.

BERMAN: I think you're going down this road right now in this discussion, but one of the things you said as you were welcoming the new members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus who won, Democrats who actually won this race, you praised them because you said they're not bringing a policy book to a gunfight. What do you really mean by that? What should they bring to this fight?

CASAR: Yes. When you look at the Democratic Party platform versus the Republican Party platform, basically anybody can see, who is trying to help working class and working families more than anybody else. It's clearly within the Democratic policy platform.

So, in this election, Democrats are soul searching and saying, why is it that traditionally the party of the working class is losing some of those working class votes? And you can't show up and act like this is Harvard moot court, or a policy debate. This is really about showing the American people who to trust.

It's not just about the truth, unfortunately, it's also about trust. In this era of social media and massive propaganda, we've got to show whose side we're on. And that means standing up to special interests in a way that the Democratic Party, sometimes has tried to do, but I think we have to fiercely do it.

[08:40:00]

Say, you know what, we're not with the billionaires. Whether it's Elon Musk or anybody else. We're going to stand up to those big corporations that are raising prices and make that distinction really clear because Donald Trump, I think, is going to show his true colors.

BERMAN: What about the border? I mean you are in Texas. You are in a border state. You know Donald Trump ran very much on the idea of mass deportation. Stephen Miller says they'll begin on Inauguration Day, deportations will. It seems that it has the support of the American voting public. So, what will you do on this front?

CASAR: I have spoken with so many voters about the immigration issue throughout Texas. Voters that agree with me and disagree. But at American people - the American people's core, they wanted to see a Congress deal with increasing prices. And Donald Trump said, hey, your increasing house price, that's on immigrants. Your worsening health care, that's also on immigrants. It was the answer to basically every single question. And Democrats have to lay out the alternative case much more clearly. Your house prices are going up, not because of immigrants, but because of hedge funds. Your health care is worsening, not because, of immigrants, but because of big pharma. We have to make that clear and show once again that Donald Trump is going to try to divert resources to separating families, to undoing civil liberties. Resources that should be going to lowering costs, to improving your child care, to improving your health care. And I think you're going to quickly see a change in that polling if Democrats clearly point out who the villains are, because Donald Trump is just going to keep on scapegoating vulnerable people without bringing real solutions to folks.

BERMAN: Who's the future of the Democratic Party? Any names that come to mind?

CASAR: Look, I am so saddened by the loss of Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown. He clearly showed how you could have a Democratic Party coalition that ranged from progressive activists and young people, all the way to folks that were voting for Donald Trump because they wanted somebody that they thought would stand up for - against special interests. And I think that there needs to be a new set of people coming up, new people running for office, just like the new members we saw, that come in that mold. And I think that he really showed the path of how it is that we can regain majorities. And I hope that our current House Democratic leadership learns from those lessons. I expect that they will as Democrats recognize that we need to be an economically populist, economically popular and principled party. Also holding on to civil rights, not throwing vulnerable people under the bus in this moment, but instead regaining our brand as the party of the working class.

BERMAN: Congressman Greg Casar, from Austin, Texas, appreciate you being with us. Thank you so much.

Kate. KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: So, this morning, President Biden is meeting with Israeli President Herzog at a critical point in - another critical point in the war against Hamas in Gaza. Today is the deadline that the Biden administration had set for the Israeli government to significant increase the amount of aid reaching Gaza. In a joint statement, eight humanitarian aid organizations say that the Israeli government has not only failed to do that, but also, quote, "to take actions that dramatically worsened - took actions that dramatically worsened the situation on the ground."

CNN's Kylie Atwood is live in Washington with the very latest.

And, Kylie, if today is the deadline, what happens now?

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's a great question, Kate, and one that we are waiting to hear from, from the Biden administration. As you said, this is an assessment that eight humanitarian aid organizations did because this letter was a public letter. It was from the secretary of state, the secretary of defense, to their Israeli counterparts, making these demands. More than a dozen very clear demands about what Israel had to do in terms of taking steps to allow more humanitarian support into Gaza.

Now, what these aide organizations are saying is based on what the United States laid out, their assessment is effectively that Israel failed this test. That they did not live up to the demands that the U.S. was making. On all of the demands that the U.S. made, they said that they failed to meet the criteria and on none of them did they see full or significant progress from Israel.

As you said, across the board, these aid organizations felt that Israel actually made the humanitarian situation in northern Gaza over the last month worse than it became better. And so what we're waiting for now is what the U.S. government is going to say about this.

So, in this letter that the two secretaries penned about 30 days ago today to the Israelis, what they said is that failure to actually demonstrate commitment on these measures, to actually implementing progress on these measures could mean that the U.S. policy would be impacted when it comes to U.S. policy with regard to U.S. military assistance for Israel.

So, the key question here is, will the Biden administration be willing, based on their assessment, if Israel hasn't lived up to these commitments, to make some changes to U.S. military assistance to Israel.

[08:45:10]

The State Department, at this point, is saying that they weren't going to get ahead of any actions that the U.S. government may or may not take. And they've been in touch with the Israeli's about progress they've been making throughout the course of the last 30 days on this.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Kylie, thank you for the reporting. It's good to see you.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, new this morning, climate experts have long warned about the consequences of Donald Trump returning to the White House. Now the president-elect has tapped former Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin to head the EPA. And Zeldin is already promising to roll back regulations. At the same time, the United Nations secretary-general issued this warning at the COP 29 climate summit today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTONIO GUTERRES, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL: The sound you hear is the ticking clock. We are in the final countdown to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius. And time is not on our side.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: Time is not on our side, you're hearing there.

CNN chief climate correspondent Bill Weir joins us now. He's on our side, though.

Let's start with the warning from the U.N. Secretary-general. He - I mean their - we were just talking about this. There aren't enough words for them to use.

BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: Right.

SIDNER: Each time it's a dire warning and each time -

WEIR: I feel for the secretary general. Every year he has to go to the thesaurus and try to find another scary metaphor to wake up the world.

But I try to go back to 2015, when the entire world, enemies and allies, agreed this was a huge problem, they were going to do serious things about it. And as a result of the Paris climate accords, real strides have been made. The reason 40 percent of the energy in Texas is clean today is not because of woke Texans, it's because the costs came way down. And so you have to look at the alternative of these conferences is not doing anything.

So - but the big shadow being cast over this one is Donald Trump.

SIDNER: And he has made his choice for EPA director -

WEIR: Yes.

SIDNER: Lee Zeldin, who voted against President Biden's 2022 climate law. Now he's giving him this prominent role. What is this going to mean?

WEIR: More important, I think, for Zeldin on his resume with the president is he voted against certifying the 2020 election.

SIDNER: Right. WEIR: He has a core of real loyalists. Has no real record on environments. He - other than voting against it. He gets a 14 out of 100 score from League of Conservation Voters.

Back in 2014 is his most recent quote about climate change. And he seemed to express some skepticism, saying, "it would be productive if we get to what is real and what is not real. I'm not sold yet on the whole argument we have a serious problem, as some other people are."

We asked his office, does he still believe this? The statement from a spokesman yesterday, "Congressman Zeldin was an outspoken leader in the House, advocating for clean air and clean water throughout his time in Congress."

His voting record actually proves that not to be true. He voted against clean air and water and pollution regulations again and again in the House.

But overnight, the Biden administration really tried to secure - tried to Trump-proof more climate laws, including a methane rule. This is methane, natural gas, as we know it as, is a planet-cooking blanket 80 times thicker than carbon dioxide. A huge problem. The whole idea is, you fine oil and gas producers for this excess stuff they let leak or flare or you incentivize them to catch it and put it into market. Zeldin and Trump are vowing to undo all that on day one.

SIDNER: We will see what happens, but there is a lot of concern from conservationists and others, and those inside the EPA themselves who I've talked to.

Bill Weir, it is always a pleasure to see you.

WEIR: Good to see you too.

SIDNER: All right, Kate.

BOLDUAN: More than 1.6 million middle school and high school students reported using e- cigarette products this year. The loopholes that teens are finding and using now to get around all the safety restrictions in place on vaping.

And the disturbing spike of really gross social media posts targeting and belittling women that have been flooding the internet since Election Day. Why Donald Trump's victory has set off this extreme and crude right-wing trolling.

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[08:53:49]

BERMAN: All right, this morning, a new study finds that despite regulations, teens are still able to buy restricted vaping products online. Researchers found that despite bans and shipping regulations on many e-cigarette devices, many underage smokers still able to buy the products online and then get them delivered through the U.S. Postal Service and required ID scans at delivery apparently are rarely happening. The research suggests existing health laws should be enforced to regularly monitor online retailers to make sure they're following the regulations.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, thank you, John.

New this morning, shock and fear at a performance of "The Diary of Anne Frank," not because of the disturbing details from her diary, but because of what was happening outside. Nazi flags being held by several people gathered outside of the production. This video shared on social media shows the demonstrators flying the Nazi flag outside the American Legion where the play was being performed.

CNN's Polo Sandoval joins us now.

You are tracking this. Were there words? Do we know anything about these protesters? And did people inside know what was going on?

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They were told during intermission, Sara. Important to call this exactly what it is, as you point out, this is anti-Semitic hate. And it was on full display over the weekend in Livingston County, Michigan.

[08:55:06]

Several men - not just what - several individuals using masks to hide their faces, not only waving Nazi flags, but also reportedly shouting racist slurs outside that legion where the play was taking place. According to several reports, they eventually vacated the premises after the legion asked them to leave.

We have reached out to authorities for more information about this. And what we understand is they were out there demonstrating during this production of "The Diary of Anne Frank," which, as we know, tells the story of the Jewish teen that lived in hiding from the Nazis along with her family during the atrocities of World War II. The theater company that put this production together, that did manage to actually complete that performance after that intermission, releasing a statement, Sara, which I believe is really quite powerful. I'd like to share this with you. The Fowlerville Community Theater company writing that, "the presence of protestors outside gave us a small glimpse of the fear and uncertainty felt by those in hiding. We hope by presenting Anne's story we can help prevent the atrocities of the past from happening again." They wrote that this play really centers on real people and things became very real, more real than we - they expected on Saturday.

I want you to hear directly from the Army veteran, Bobby Brite, who actually shot some of that video, as he described the events of Saturday night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOBBY BRITE, VETERAN AFFILIATED WITH AMERICAN LEGON HOSTING ANNE FRANK PLAY: People were shocked. They were appalled. You know, everything that you would expect. Seventy-five people downstairs that watched that play. And out of that 75, there was 50 or 60 of them that were afraid to leave this building. We had to escort them to their cars. Nobody in America should feel like that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANDOVAL: Now, some members of Livington County has had to condemn this kind of behavior in the past. In fact, as recent as July, white supremacists marched through the city of Howell. The local ADL office, Sara, calling this absolutely disgusting, this presence of what they described as far-right extremists. And really, they're at a complete loss when you see these images of individuals spreading this message of hate in 2024 outside of this play.

SIDNER: So disturbing.

Polo Sandoval, thank for tracking it and bringing it to us to make us aware.

John.

BERMAN: All right, this morning, red flag warnings in effect for 30 million people in the northeast. Strong winds fueling a 5,000 acre fire in New Jersey. Hundreds of first responders currently battling the blaze. There's been no rain anywhere around here for such a long time.

All right, this morning, a new title for an American hero. Harriet Tubman was officially recognized as a one-star general in the Maryland Army National Guard for her service to the Union Army during the Civil War. Tubman risked her own life to help lead more than 700 slaves to freedom via the underground railroad.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: So, since Election Day it's become clear that attacks on women on social media has just surged. Sexist, gross, and honestly just stupidly offensive. Boys who would like to pretend they're real men, but instead are very clearly intimated by women pushing phrases like, "your body, my choice." This is getting millions of views.

CNN's Clare Duffy is here with more on this.

How bad is this getting, Clare?

CLARE DUFFY, CNN BUSINESS WRITER: Yes, it's really significant. These are characters and this is the kind of language that has existed in dark corners of the internet. But it's become clear that these people feel emboldened in the wake of this election where there was so much focus on women's rights, women's bodily autonomy.

This really started on Tuesday night when white nationalist Nick Fuentes tweeted, posted on X, this post that said, "your body, my choice forever." As you can see there, 90 million views. And since then, according to this analysis by a non-profit human rights group, mentions of that phrase on X have grown 4,000 percent in just a couple of days. They've also recorded increases in the use of phrases like, get back in the kitchen, and, calls to repeal the 19th Amendment, which, of course, gave women the right to vote.

And this is all part of this growing - what researchers called the manosphere. These online, misogynistic communities where the discussions range from anti-feminism to these more explicit calls of violence against women. And there are already women who are being targeted by this. You saw TikTok videos being posted by women who said that "your body, my choice" was showing up in their comments and their DMs.

And I'll tell you, Kate, when I woke up this morning after writing this story yesterday, I had this phrase in my email inbox. And I think the concern for researchers really is that this online rhetoric will translate to offline harassment and abuse.

BOLDUAN: Yes. There's not a - it's not a big step we've seen, you know, in the not-too-distant past to see what online rhetoric, how it can translate into real-life, real problems. I mean it's - it is dumb, stupid, and idiotic on the most basic level. But it is also dangerous.

DUFFY: Right.

BOLDUAN: And it's pervasive, mostly on Twitter, now X. Is there any - has Elon Musk said anything about it? Has - any chance in you know what that Elon Musk will be doing anything about it?

DUFFY: Yes, the company hasn't said anything about this latest surge.

[09:00:02]

But I do think we have to look at the changes that he's made to the platform. He has rolled back moderation in other areas. We've seen increases in other kinds of hate speech