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Don Lemon Tonight
Protests Accross Country; Pence Heads Up Transition Team; Clinton Holds Event to Thank Campaign Staff; Fareed Zakaria talks about the two sins the past election had on both sides of the aisle; Glenn Beck is calling for the country to give Donald Trump a chance. The same messgage that he had about Barack Obama back in 2008. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired November 11, 2016 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:00:00] ANDERSON COOPER, AC360 SHOW HOST: And that's it for us. Thanks for watching. CNN Tonight with Don Lemon starts now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news.
DON LEMON, CNN TONIGHT SHOW HOST: Breaking news, you're looking at live pictures now, protests across the country with 70 days to go until Donald Trump takes the oath of office.
This is CNN Tonight. I'm Don Lemon.
Trump Tower, just a few blocks away from here on Fifth Avenue, a fortress tonight, meanwhile, after running on his promise to repeal and replace Obamacare, the president-elect says maybe he'll keep up some of it after all.
And shake up on team Trump. Vice President-elect Mike Pence takes the lead role on Trump's transition team, Chris Christie relegated to sharing the number two spot with Senator Jeff Sessions.
A lot to get to, but let's begin with CNN's Gary Tuchman, at an anti- Trump protest in Atlanta, Georgia tonight. Gary, you're in Atlanta with those protestors there what's happening there?
(CROWD CHANTING)
Gary Tuchman, can you hear me?
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Don, it's a little loud here. So if you talk to me I won't hear you but let me tell you what's going on right now. Yes, Don, I here you fine right now. Let me tell you where we are.
We're in the middle of Atlanta, Georgia right down the block from where Martin Luther King, Jr. was born, right down the street from where Martin Luther King is now laid to rest.
And right now we are with very angry people, people who are very upset that Donald Trump is the president-elect. Right now they're chanting "we reject the president-elect," and that's one of the few things we could tell you that's suitable for television that they're chanting.
Donald Trump has said to a lot of his rallies that he is leading the greatest political movement ever in the United States. These people completely beg to differ.
Can I ask you a quick question, ma'am? Tell me why you're here and what you're telling is about?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm here because Trump does support people of color. He is here to destroy America and I'm here to protest my right.
TUCHMAN: Did you vote in the election?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I did vote. I voted for Hillary.
TUCHMAN: OK. Do you object to the way the election was carried out? Do you think it was an unfair election?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just think the African-American people did not come out to vote the way they needed to. People of color, we need to stick together because Trump is not for us.
TUCHMAN: Your family and friends, did they vote?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, my family and friends did vote. We came to vote together.
TUCHMAN: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We all voted together.
TUCHMAN: Thank you for talking to us. You, sir, why are you here, tell me?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm here today because the Democratic Party took out somebody who mobilized millions of people, most people...
(CROSSTALK)
TUCHMAN: Who's that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Bernie Sanders.
TUCHMAN: So, you're a Bernie Sanders supporter, did you vote for Hillary Clinton for president?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely not.
TUCHMAN: Well do you think, I mean, you don't like Donald Trump either I'd say, right?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely.
TUCHMAN: Do you think that would have helped defeat Donald Trump if you voted for Hillary Clinton?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.
TUCHMAN: So, you can say -- thank you for talking, I really appreciate. So you can say there's a mixture, people who voted for Hillary Clinton, people who voted for Bernie Sanders, people who voted for a third-party candidate, and a lot of people here who didn't voted at all or either way.
The most important thing I can tell you right now about this rally, it's been lasting for four hours, Do. We've gone about four miles within the streets of Atlanta and most importantly it's been peaceful. Back to you.
LEMON: All right. Thank you, Gary Tuchman. We'll check back with you to see what's going on. I want to get to CNN's Phil Mattingly now live for us at Trump Tower. Phil, Donald Trump has been meeting with his inner circle of advisors all day. What you can tell us about the transition?
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. No public events for the president-elect, Don. But behind the scenes urgency, that's what I've been told from advisers is kind of the key as they go into this process.
Now think about it this way, Don, Donald Trump has thousands of appointments to make over the course of the next 70 days and into the next first couple of weeks of his administration. They are far behind.
Now the transition team itself leading up to the election, I'm told it was actually in a pretty good place. But they need the president-elect to start making decisions.
However, before he gets this he decided to shake up the transition team. First, Chris Christie, obviously the New Jersey Governor have been leading the team up until this point, Don. As of today, that is no longer the case.
Vice President-elect Mike Pence will take that role, he will take the reigns of it. I'm told that it is a little bit like in 2000 when Dick Cheney came in and exerted border control over the process.
And I met -- when asked why republican officials said Mike Pence is a crucial component of Donald Trump's outreach of Donald Trump's ability to both maneuver with Washington but also maneuver with the governors in the states, that's why he's taking on that role, but no question about it.
Chris Christie, taking a step back. Mike Pence moving in to kind of the most powerful role in that transition process, Don.
LEMON: All right. Phil Mattingly, outside of Trump Tower in New York. Phil, thank you very much.
Hillary Clinton holding an event tonight in New York to thank her campaign staff. She arrived a little while ago at all-staff party in Brooklyn, not far from her campaign headquarters. She also told volunteers on a conference call this, at her first remarks since her concession speech.
(BEGIN VOICE CLIP)
[22:05:00] HILLARY CLINTON, (D) FORMER U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is a tough time for our country. I think we've seen how people have been reacting to the event of this election and I know that we've got to be reaching out to each other to keep it clear in our own minds that what we did was so important.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: I want to bring in now Mark McKinnon, a former advisor to President George W. Bush and the co-creator of Showtime's The Circus - a great show. Also Ryan Lizza, Wasington correspondent for the New Yorker, and CNN contributor Salena Zito.
Thank you all or joining us. Mark, just quickly as we look at these protests that have happened, you know, since Donald Trump was elected on Tuesday night, do you ever remember anything like this with a president-elect?
MARK MCKINNON, THE CIRCUS CO-CREATOR AND CO-HOST: No, unprecedented really. I mean, it could have happened and might have happened in 2000 over the Bush recount except that got over weeks and weeks with legal.
First there was a lot of -- there was -- there was some protests around the ballot boxes and down in Florida, but nothing like, nothing like this. And it's understandable. I mean, this is all, this is a democracy and everybody has their first amendment rights and there is a lot of pent-up passion and frustration that completely understandable.
Because there are a lot of people out there that were quite certain that Hillary Clinton was going to be the president of the United States and this is an opportunity for them to vent that frustration.
LEMON: And part of it though is the rhetoric on the campaign trail. I mean, it was particularly, I mean he was particularly sharp in his tone and offensive in some peoples' minds.
MCKINNON Well, the whole campaign was.
LEMON: Right.
MCKINNON: The whole campaign was unlike any we've ever seen. So it was -- it was a lot of angry dialogue, a lot of angry campaign talk, back and forth, and so people are understandably taking this opportunity to let people know how they feel. And I think that's a good way to kind of release the valve a little bit.
LEMON: Yes. And blow off some steam as they say.
MCKINNON: Yes.
LEMON: Ryan, to you now, Donald Trump spoke with 60 Minutes for his first interview since the election. He talked about receiving phone calls from the Clintons, let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LESLEY STAHL, 60 MINUTES CORRESPONDENT: Hillary called you. Tell us about that phone call.
DONALD TRUMP, UNITED STATES-ELECT PRESIDENT: So Hillary called and it was a lovely call. And it was a tough call for her, I mean, I can imagine. Tougher for her than it would have been for me and for me it would have been very, very difficult. She couldn't have been nicer. She just said congratulations, Donald. Well done.
And I said, I want to thank you very much. You were a great competitor. She's very strong and very smart.
STAHL: What about Bill Clinton? Did you talk to him?
TRUMP: He did. He called the next day.
STAHL: Really? What did he say?
TRUMP: He actually called last night.
STAHL: What did he say?
TRUMP: And he couldn't have been more gracious. He said it was an amazing run, one of the most amazing he's ever seen.
STAHL: He said that?
TRUMP: He was very, very -- really very nice.
STAHL: You know you said that you might call President Obama for advice. Would you think of calling President Clinton for advice?
TRUMP: Well, he's a very talented guy. Both of them. I mean, this is a very talented family. Certainly, I would certainly think about that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So again, more of the gracious tone he has taken since the election.
RYAN LIZZA, THE NEW YORKER CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
LEMON: Do you expect to see that continue?
LIZZA: Well, he gave a very gracious victory speech early Wednesday morning and he was very courteous and gracious with President Obama in the Oval Office and so far from what we've seen in this interview, he's sounding all the right notes.
The major misfire in my mind is when he tweeted in frankly, what was his first substantive comment after the election, it's the only time he's actually said anything newsworthy or beyond just the platitude, he sort of whines about the fact that there were protests in the streets and that media was covering it.
I think that's a terrible sign, that the president-elect and that his first instinct, when he sees protestors and he see the press covering is to criticize to obviously first amendment-protected rights.
Now, obviously later on, after a lot of people criticized it, he tweeted something else and sort of gently praised the protestors, so you know, that's -- there's been two Donald Trump's here the last couple of days.
But I think we know Donald Trump pretty well after a year and a half of watching him in the campaign. He's a 70-year-old -- as Newt Gingrich once told me, you know, he's a 70-year-old billionaire. He's not going to change.
LEMON: Yes. He tweeted something very similar to what we said on this program, why didn't he tweet something like this, and then I woke this morning it was similar to what he had tweeted overnight.
Salena, I have to ask you, tonight we have audio of Hillary Clinton speaking for the first time since her concession. She held a conference call to thank her volunteers. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: It looks like we are, you know, on the path to winning the popular vote, and that says -- that says volume about the importance of your work and the lasting -- the lasting impact that it will have.
[22:10:13] This is -- this is a hard loss for all of us because we know what was at stake in this election and we've got to do everything we can to continue to support the causes that we believe in, because when you're ready, I hope you will get up and get back out there and keep fighting. I never thought this campaign was about one person or even one election.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: And that concession, Salena, she never talked about winning the popular vote, but it's something that many of her supporters are shouting now. Do you think that's going to be a rallying cry for democrats?
SALENA ZITO, WASHINGTON EXAMNER STAFF: Well, I understand why she did it. She wants to keep the people involved in her campaign to pass the torch and continue to do it forever, whoever the next candidate is, or for the upcoming mid-terms, which are very, very important.
What Mrs. Clinton probably should have addressed at some point is that she ran a campaign on the past. That she ran on her resume and never offered voters a tangible benefit.
People made fun of Trump saying make America great, but that was something that people latched on to. That was a benefit. And I think that's the next step forward for the Democratic Party and for Mrs. Clinton. LEMON: Mark, you want to say something?
MCKINNON: Yes, Salena, I wanted to give you a shout out. I think you had the best summary of this campaign of anybody when you said that the media took Trump literally, but not seriously and supporters took him seriously but not literally. That is like the perfect in capsulation of this campaign I think.
ZITO: Well, thank you so much. I think that just comes from straddling both worlds, right? Being there with the voters and talking and listening to them but also being a reporter.
MCKINNON: That make such a difference and so few reporters actually get out there in the field like you did.
ZITO: Thank you.
LEMON: Everybody, standby. We'll continue on after this. Stick around, everyone. When we come right back, Hillary Clinton winning the popular vote by hundreds of thousands, while losing the election and that has a lot of people asking, should we scrap the Electoral College.
[22:15:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Welcome back, everyone. Lots of outrage tonight over the fact that Hillary Clinton is winning the popular vote, but lost the election.
Back with me now, Mark McKinnon, Ryan Lizza, and Salena Zito. OK. Welcome back, panel. Mark, CNN is reporting that the choices for chief of staff right now are Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus. Trump prefers Bannon while others close to him they are pushing for Reince Priebus.
This is Steve Bannon in an interview back in 2010.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEVE BANNON, BREAITBART NEWS CEO: What we need to do is bitch slap the Republican Party and get those guys, you know, heating, too and if we have to, we'll take it over.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So what would choosing Bannon over Priebus suggest to you?
MCKINNON: Well, I think...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: Bannon who is one of this chief advisers to select and who runs Breitbart that sort of...
(CROSSTALK)
MCKINNON: Well, first of all, I think that Reince Priebus is a model chief of staff. This guy spun more plates through difficult times not just over the last year but over the last -- the last entire period of his 10-year at the RNC. It's amazing. I mean, people usually don't last very long there and he has an admirable job. But it took.
LEMON: He's been there for a while.
MCKINNON: He's been there for a long time and you know, and that's a big part of the job of chief of staff is to deal with all the incoming and the different factions. And he's great at that. I don't know Steve Bannon, but doesn't seem to me like that's even a job that he'd want.
I mean, he's a big thinker kind of guy, it's not -- and being chief of staff is just like, you know, you're just making the train run.
LEMON: What job should he have, meaning Steve Bannon if any, Ryan Lizza.
LIZZA: Look, this is the most important decision Trump will make since picking Mike Pence, his V.P. pick. This will tell us about -- this is the first important sign about the direction of the Trump presidency.
Does he pick a Washington -- I don't want to say insider as if that's a pejorative of thing. I want to say someone who knows Washington, who knows the most important relationships that Trump would need on Capitol Hill starting with Paul Ryan or...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: But the inside has been a pejorative at least in this campaign.
LIZZA: I know. But when you actually have to govern when you're not out there B.S.'ing on the campaign trail and you actually get to Washington and want to do things actually knowing things matters and Reince knows how Washington work.
Bannon is a brilliant guy, but he's a provocateur, he knows how to throw from the sidelines. He frankly hated Reince and the RNC leadership before this campaign, hates Paul Ryan and the leadership there, and if Donald Trump wants to come to Washington, if he wanted to send a message to Capitol Hill that he doesn't respect republicans up there, and he doesn't care what they think, he should pick Bannon.
Frankly, Bannon's associations at Breitbart will be extremely damaging. If Donald Trump wants the first few weeks of his running up to his inaugural to be about every crazy article that Breitbart run associated with the al-right...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: The alt-right connection.
LIZZA: ... and racist right wingers, then he should -- he should pick Bannon. If he wants someone that people in Washington respects, he'll pick Priebus. LEMON: Salena, wasn't that the same rational that you need someone
who knows Washington to be able to get things done, isn't that the same rationale for Barack Obama and Rahm Emanuel when he became his chief of staff? How did that serve him?
ZITO: Right. You know, I thought Emanuel was a really good chief of staff because he not only was -- you know, knew Washington and knew how to get things going, but he also was a really good no guy and I think all great administrations have that guy that can say, oh, my God, no, you can't do that.
And Emanuel was that guy. That also cost him his job, but if you look back in history, you look at someone know like FDR, everybody hated each other and everybody had you know, -- were opposing forces, but it made that administration and it made that White House work and work like clockwork.
LEMON: Rahm Emanuel, the mayor of -- he eventual mayor became the mayor of Chicago.
I have to ask you this, Mark, and I'm going to put this up. This is a list here. Christies is the vice chairman for this transition, he's the vice chairman along with Rudy Giuliani, Jeff Sessions, retired Lieutenant General Mike Flynn, Dr. Ben Carson, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, and Steve Bannon, as well as family members Donald Jr., Ivanka, and her husband and also Eric.
[22:20:09] Is this is political celebrity apprentice we're talking?
MCKINNON: It's not conventional. It's not conventional transitional team, it's not been a conventional campaign, it's not a conventional ending and I don't know if you're Donald Trump, why after all the success you've had unconventional, you should suddenly get conventional.
But I think again, there's some good signs I think that are, that make it more likely he'll be successful.
For example, I'd call at this time promotion of Mike Pence, not the demotion of Chris Christie, to take over the job of the transition team. Because he is a guy who's really trusted well-liked by republicans in Congress, knows the role really well.
I mean, Christie is a, you know, a governor from outside Washington. I think he'll have an important role and important job, but Pence is the right guy to be running that -- running that show right now.
LEMON: But Chris Christie was like the first one to come aboard and...
MCKINNON: But this is saying that Donald Trump has some judgment to say, yes, he may have first to him but he's not the best guy for...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: He's not the best guy. Yes. And especially with what just happened with Bridgegate and the indictment in New Jersey.
But I have to ask you, I mean, you know, Ryan, is it a good idea to put your kids on the transition team, the same ones who are going to be running your business in a so-called blind trust?
LIZZA: I mean, this is the -- this is the issue that frankly the press just did not focus on enough during the election, is the massive conflict of interest that we are going to have between what Trump claims to a $10 billion organization, and a new government in Washington.
And when journalists ask questions about this, we were told that it all of Trump's assets and finances and corporate entities would be put into a blind trust. Well, that phrase itself was not accurately used because a blind trust is not actually what they were describing.
But now they've made a mockery of that by putting the children that was supposed to run the blind trust, which wasn't even a blind trust, on the transition committee. OK?
So, this is a massive unprecedented conflict of interest that should be concerning to everyone when you have someone unprecedented in American history, with a $10 billion relies on government contracts like the one here in Washington at the hotel and is now going to have access to all of the most important insider information in the government.
And the Trump team needs to figure out a way to deal with this. When Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, the first thing the Obama team did is make all the donations to the Clinton Foundation public.
There were massive questions about the Clinton Foundation's ties and conflict of interest issues and I have heard nothing from the Trump people about how they're actually going to address this. It's really important.
LEMON: Salena, people have also been trying to figure out, what Donald Trump's core beliefs really are and what he'll act on first. We have a clip from Trump's first interview. This is on 60 Minutes. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STAHL: Let me ask you about Obamacare, which you say you're going to repeal and replace. When you replace it, are you going to make sure that people with preconditions are still covered?
TRUMP: Yes, because it happens to be one of the strongest assets.
STAHL: You're going to keep that.
TRUMP: Also with the children living with their parents for an extended period we're going to...
STAHL: You're going to keep that?
TRUMP: ... very much try and keep that. It adds cost but it's very much something we're going to try and keep.
STAHL: And there's going to be a period, if you repeal it, and before you replace it, when millions of people could lose...
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Well, we're going to do it simultaneously. It will be just fine. That's what I do. I do good job, you know what I mean? I know how to do this stuff. We're going to repeal it and replace. And we're not going to have like a two-day period and we're not going to have a two-year period where there's nothing. It will be repealed and replaced and we'll know and it will be great healthcare for much less money.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: He said that's what he does, and he does a great job, but he also has changed his mind on a lot of issues during this campaign season to repeatedly saying that he was -- he's going to repeal Obamacare, repeal and replace it on the first day. How is this going to sit with conservatives?
ZITO: Well, it's interesting. This isn't really first time he's said it. I've seen him -- I've heard him say it before. He also said it to me in an interview in April. And so, I reached back and talked to a couple of the people about 10 of people in a Washington Post story today about how they felt about that, and they overwhelmingly said they didn't expect things to first of all happen overnight, but they also said they had a level of expectation.
The parts that were good, the parts that people overwhelmingly approved of, like, you know, keeping your children on until they're 26. The understood that those were going to still be part of the -- of the healthcare bill and I don't -- and when I talk to these voters, you didn't get the sense that they expected a button to be turned and all of Obamacare should be gone and for it to start over again.
[22:25:03] LEMON: Yes.
ZITO: They have an idea of how process works.
LEMON: Hey, I have to do this, Mark, and if you can answer quickly, is it time, do you think it's time to ditch the Electoral College, because that's a lot of people are saying she got the popular vote and he didn't?
MCKINNON: No, we put it in place for a reason. The reason is it if we changed it, then the entire campaign would be in California, New York and that we wouldn't campaign in the middle of the country at all and the middle of the country it's a much better reflection of it.
LEMON: Thank you, all. I appreciate it. Up next, the two sins that Fareed Zakaria says were revealed by this election.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: In 70 days, Donald Trump will take the oath of office and become president of a deeply divided country.
Here to discuss now, Fareed Zakaria, the host of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS which I never miss on Sunday's here. Here's your piece. It's called the two sins that define this election. The sin you say is the elitism. Tell me about that.
FAREED ZAKARIA, FAREED ZAKARIA GPS HOST: Well, you know, I realize that the heart of why we, so many of us missed what was happening and the heart of why Trump won was that he got this extraordinary rural, white working class vote.
[22:29:59] That's what flipped these historically democratic states like, you know, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, and I thought, you know, I don't know this world. I feel like I live in New York, you know, I have a completely different world.
I decided I need to talk to my friends who work in that world, I've read about it and what I discovered was that, you know, this is a part of the world that the modern and post industrial revolution has just left behind.
You know, we don't think a lot about it, but these are people who if you look at employment data, so since 2008, in the Obama years, eight and a half million college graduates have gotten new jobs. That is the employment numbers have gone up eight and a half million for people with college degrees.
For people with high school diplomas, 80,000 have gotten jobs. So there's still basically in the same recession. So this is the anguish, the pain of rural America, and then I start talking to these people and I've discovered they -- from their point of view, we are all looking down on them.
They say, you know, that all of America, every movie, every song, every TV show, is set in New York, or L.A., or Chicago. You know, what about us? We are treated, in this way that is not just fly over country but it's just you don't even know we exist.
LEMON: Yes.
ZAKARIA: And what Trump gave them and what republicans are better at doing than democrats is they give them respect. He said, you know, I hear you, I listen to you, and so I felt like you know what the democrats are guilty here, they're kind of sin of elitism, of thinking we live in this meritocratic society, you know, that the best people rise to the top.
Well, but there's a lot of people in the country and you forget about the people who you don't see in New York and L.A.
LEMON: It used to be democrats also had that demographic and they sort of I think took it for granted, which is, you know, home of the subject. But listen, I'm from a red state and I go visit the red state all the time and I hear those stories.
I left the red state to come to New York and many people who lived in New York and L.A., you're right, and I lived in Chicago, they're in a bubble. They think the entire world is like them and it is not.
ZAKARIA: And I think the danger is it's even one step further, tell me if you agree, Don, which is, we think, you know, this is the meritocracy, the best people rise to the top and yet they probably end up in cities and things but actually a lot of the people who didn't rise to the top, maybe they were unlucky, maybe they had some tough breaks, maybe they have tough odds. Maybe they like living in...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: Maybe there's nothing wrong with a simple life.
ZAKARIA: Right. Right. And maybe there's nothing maybe they made a choice.
LEMON: Yes.
ZAKARIA: And that I think we sometimes think in a meritocracy, the people who are the -- who are not moving they're somehow inferior. I think that's the piece that clearly that was the signal they were getting.
LEMON: So, I don't think -- I don't think everyone thinks. And I'm sure there is some thinking, well, I've heard people...
(CROSSTALK)
ZAKARIA: It's subconscious.
LEMON: It's subconscious and I think people do think that and I hear it a lot here in New York. But let's be honest. Some of the jobs, you know, in the rust belt, or in the, you know, where there is coal, in coal mines, some of those jobs aren't coming back because there's not a need for them.
I mean, if you build an iPhone factory, then people, you can put people to work. If you build some other industry there, but you know that's like saying I'm going to -- we're going to make a whole bunch of typewriters. It just doesn't exist. Do those people understand that and is it an incumbent upon leaders to be honest with them about that instead of pandering?
ZAKARIA: So, you're absolutely right. There is no easy solution. This is a big deindustrialization process that is taking place, and what happens in these rural communities, is you know, in the city if you -- if your company goes bankrupt, you can still get a job in the service sector, you can do something.
In these towns, the towns are constructed around one company.
LEMON: Right.
ZAKARIA: A steel mill, a coal mine. When that company goes under, all the service sector jobs that exist, they collapse, because there's not enough density for people to find work. So, I mean, what an economist would tell you is these people need to move. LEMON: Right.
ZAKARIA: But people are human beings. They're tethered to -- what republicans have been very good about -- is maybe they don't have an economic solution, in fact, a lot of their economic ideas would actually hurt these people, but they give them respect by affiliating with them culturally, the guns, you know, religiously, emotionally. And that's what -- that's what I mean by the democratic...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: But that doesn't -- but that doesn't mean jobs.
ZAKARIA: No.
LEMON: Right. And that's quite -- that's not honest.
ZAKARIA: I will -- I will be stunned if four years from now, you have managed to reindustrialize the upper Midwest. Those jobs went -- first of all, those jobs went a long time ago.
LEMON: Yes.
ZAKARIA: It's very hard...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: It's sad. I grew up in a, you know, chemical plant town in Louisiana. You know, Exxon Chemicals, Dow Chemicals, or whatever, and the jobs have changed, but I mean, the oil industry is not going away for a very long time, so that what -- that sustains that economy, but if you're in a coal town, if you're in some manufacturing town...
(CROSSTALK)
ZAKARIA: And even if the factory comes back, by the way, the jobs don't come back. There are new BMW factories...
LEMON: Right.
ZAKARIA: ... which employ 100, 200 workers.
LEMON: And lots of computers.
ZAKARIA: Right.
LEMON: Yes.
ZAKARIA: And those workers are actually engineers. They're not, you know, low-skilled labor.
[22:35:03] Let me talk to you, this is about the other sin you said, which is about racism in the spread of worldwide right-wing populism. Explain that to me.
ZAKARIA: So when you look at the issue of race and it's very tough. And the minute I say this my friends, you know, in the south or in these places, they say, no, no, you know, you're accusing us of being racist. I'm not saying that.
But I'm saying look, Trump is not alone here. What you're noticing is this right-wing populous reaction. It's happening in a country like Sweden, which has very strong economic growth. You can't say there's an economic problem. It's happening in Germany, where there are lots of manufacturing jobs.
The Germans have managed to maintain those old factories. It's happening in France which has lots of protections in for the working class. So, what's the common theme in America, in France, in Germany?
All of these places you do have a white majority population that faces an influx of brown and black skin people coming into their countries, their towns and cities and you know, you can say and maybe it is true, it's a kind of cultural reaction against change, but it often expresses itself in something that would be more simply called racism.
LEMON: Yes. And the world changes.
ZAKARIA: Yes.
LEMON: It got to get used to that.
ZAKARIA: Again you can't get back to that old world. You know, there's no going back.
LEMON: Thank you, Fareed. I appreciate it.
When we come right back, he had some - some pretty harsh words for Donald Trump during the election. Now he says let's give Trump a chance. Glenn Beck is here next.
[22:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: My next guest says a lot of talk about Donald Trump is hurting the country. Glenn Beck is the founder of The Blaze and he joins me now in his first on-camera interview since the election, and I appreciate that. Welcome, Glenn. You are not a supporter of Donald Trump.
GLENN BECK, THE BLAZE FOUNDER: Thank you. No, not at all.
LEMON: And you took a whole lot of heat for your position during the campaign but today here's what you wrote in the New York Times. You said, "Mr. Obama and Hillary Clinton have offered wise counsel, give Mr. Trump a chance, the country needs him to succeed and represent all Americans." So, is this your olive branch to Donald Trump?
BECK: It is. You know, we have two obligations under the Constitution. One of them is to fight hard and speak the truth when it comes to a primary. And then when the president is the president, we need to do our best to give him a shot.
Now that doesn't mean that if he starts violating principles -- and I love what Salena said, I have taken this to heart and I think it's so true, that his supporters took him seriously, but not literally. I take him literally.
And the point, Don, that I'm trying to make is, I don't know how Donald Trump is going to end up as a president, and I do take him literally and by doing that, he scares me.
However, what I do know is that all of my -- many of my liberal -- very liberal friends have written me this week and said, is this the way you felt in 2008. To some degree, yes, you can't compare Donald Trump to Barack Obama in many ways because Barack Obama was a man that was a man hat was at least in control of himself and his words during the campaign.
So I understand the fear and what I want to say to people is don't make the same mistakes that I made. We are much more weak than we were in 2008, and I'm hearing people start to say things that will drive a wedge between us just like I was driving a wedge.
At the time unknowingly, it was not my intent, but it did and it happened because I was afraid of what Barack Obama was going to do, and we survived. And we will survive Donald Trump. We have to stick together. And there might be some things if he goes awry, that is very frightening and we need to be together.
LEMON: We're going to talk a little bit more about, you know, the differences between now and 2008 and you and I will talk about that later about what you said about the current president and then where you are now.
But my question is, a lot of people are freaking out, they don't even know what the man is going to do and I think rightfully so, to a degree, considering his rhetoric on the campaign trail and some of the policies that he espoused. And so I think people can beyond freak out a little bit.
BECK: And Don, and I will -- I will say your conversation earlier about Steve Bannon also should be concerning. Steve Bannon is not a name you just throw in there with Reince Priebus. Steve Bannon is a man who took a news organization and said we are the platform for the alt-right. That's a different category. So, I truly understand peoples' concerns.
LEMON: Yes. I want you to listen to what we had to say about Donald Trump. This was back in January. This is a conversion we had.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Are you saying secretly he's a democrat?
BECK: No, he's a progressive. There's a difference even between a democrat and a progressive. He's a deep, die-hard progressive.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So is that the common ground? Do you believe that he's a deep dive, do you think he is a progressive?
BECK: Well, I think policy-wise, but that's not what concerns me about Donald Trump. Policy-wise, I do believe he's a progressive. He is a guy who is -- has said -- and you can't take him at his word because I don't know what he's going to do.
But he's said that he wants single payer universal health pay. That's more aggressive than Barack Obama. He wants a trillion-dollar stimulus package. That is Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton combined.
[22:45:04] So, he's going down the path, at least from what he has said in the past, he is going down the path of progressivism. But my concern on Donald Trump has less to do with policies and more to do with principles.
LEMON: During the campaign you shared this prediction about a Trump presidency.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BECK: Believe me, if he gets in, you're looking at a -- I think you're looking at a South American dictatorship if we would go into war, civil unrest, and economic instability, I think he'll -- he's so unconnected to reality and disconnected to clear thinking on global issues, that I think you could see us going into a -- a horrible, horrible situation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Do you still believe that, Glenn?
BECK: Don, I have to tell you, I -- for a man to speak his mind like I do, and try to tell people to warn people, not to make predictions, but to warn people of how history can play out, always seems to get me into trouble.
I do believe that surrounding himself with people like Steve Bannon, and the things that he has done in the past, if they're for show and we shouldn't take him seriously, well, then we've got another set of problems but they're -- they're not as bad as the problems that if we're to take him literally.
I do believe that it doesn't have to end that way, but the reason why I'm talking to you tonight is that's why we need each other. We're not so different. Don, you and I have gotten along and there's I'm sure a ton of things that we disagree with. But you're a decent human being and you listen to people.
We need to start listening to people. It's the point I made in the New York Times editorial about Black Lives Matter. I need to shut up and listen to people I think completely disagree with me and truly understand them.
Others need to listen to the center of the country and really listen. You can say that there are Muslim terrorists, but you also have to say that not all Muslims are terrorisms, the same thing with Donald Trump supporters.
LEMON: Yes.
BECK: There are bigots and racists but that's not all Donald Trump supporters. There's a few.
LEMON: OK. All right. Glenn, stand by.
(CROSSTALK)
BECK: And they have to know the difference.
LEMON: Stand by. We'll continue our conversation right on the other side of this break.
[22:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Glenn Beck is calling for the country to give Donald Trump a chance. The same message that he had about Barack Obama back in 2008. He's back with me now. And by the way, if you're wondering, he's at a Boy Scout camporee with his son and that's why you see that he's gracious enough to join us this evening.
So, Glenn, let's talk about that. Because you brought up the current president in the last segment. Back in 2008, you had this advice for people on both sides of the aisle about the election of Barack Obama.
You said "Let's give the man the respect that the office deserves. Let's be better people than they were to George W. Bush, be better people than the left was to us. Let's treat them the way we would want them to treat us."
It is a strong message. Did you follow your own advice do you think?
BECK: No. No. But it was a different time. You know when I was on Megyn Kelly about three years ago, I said if I could go back in time, and I had the same information I had at the time, what would I do differently and I couldn't -- I've racked my brain for three years, what could I have done differently with the same information.
And it dawned on me about a month ago, wait a minute, wait a minute. After this election, I have new information but I'm in the same position no matter who wins. And I thought Hillary was going to win.
So, I can do things differently this time. I believe this may have started I don't even know with Clinton, but then, you know, we went into George Bush, we demonize each other, then we went into Barack Obama, and we just switched places and demonized each other.
It's getting worse, and in 2020 if we don't change this, I don't know how this works out, but we're not listening to each other. We're not -- we go to the grocery store now, Don, and you know this, we don't everyone buy the same products anymore. We are becoming balkanized.
And if we don't sit down and talk to each other and really listen, we can disagree on policies, but principles we have to find again, and it's imperative. I'm watching the news this week and I'm seeing people say -- I saw three people say, Donald Trump is a Nazi. Donald Trump is a Nazi. Donald Trump is a Nazi. I will tell you, I felt like I was watching me and I was like don't do that, don't do that.
LEMON: Yes, but you know what?
BECK: Because the other side -- the other side will stop listening. And I know because you stop listening.
LEMON: Yes. But also I would tell you, you know, sometimes when you use the word fascism, and I would say, Glenn, that a little harsh, but I think we should be able to talk to each other like that. And as I've said many times to you, without castigating each other because we're all not going to agree.
I mean, you wrote a great article, you said "Post-election reflection, a dysfunctional family is still a family." And so, even though, you know, people think, you know, that I live in a bubble in New York City, which I don't -- I do live in New York City but I definitely don't live in a bubble. I'm from a red state and I visit red state all the time, and with people of all different political persuasions.
But we're still a family and we can disagree with each other without hating each other and I don't know exactly how we do that.
BECK: But I don't think, Don, that we have the media that is self- aware enough, and each of us that are self-aware enough to be able to have that dialogue yet in the safety tree.
[22:55:08] We have to be able to have a few people that are modeling this kind of discussion so you can see, all right, they can get along and they can disagree, that they're not shouting at each other and they walk away friends.
We don't have that. Right now, if we're friends, I get this all the time. Why did you talk to the editorial board at the New York Times? Why would you sit with those guys? Are you -- have you sold out?
LEMON: Yes. I get it.
BECK: Good God. No. I sat -- I sat down. We have to be able to do that first.
LEMON: I get it and people would ask me, "Why would you want to interview Donald Trump?" or "Why would you want to sit down with a police officer in Ferguson?" It's like, why wouldn't I? I'm a journalist.
You know, why I wouldn't want to do that. I don't understand that there's so much polarization that goes on and I think knowledge is power and just getting to sit down to talk to someone to hear their views can start a conversation, and really and understanding instead of being judgmental about someone, be curious, and that can change mindset. It doesn't mean that you necessarily agree with the other person.
BECK: Honest questioning is required.
LEMON: Yes.
BECK: Not got you questions, not trying to come in to -- I did an interview with NPR a couple of weeks ago, and the host actually said to me, "So, you're just doing all this for money and it's all entertainment for you and really nothing has changed, has it," quote. And by the way, I consider that a rhetorical question.
What kind of journalist does that? What -- I mean honestly...
LEMON: Yes.
BECK: ... you have, you are judge and jury before I even speak. You are trying to just shut me down.
LEMON: Yes.
BECK: And that's fine if that's what you choose to do, but if we -- if I can't believe the best of you, Don, if you say, please give me another chance, I've learned. And you can't do that, or I won't do that for you then we're wasting our time.
LEMON: Well, let's continue to talk.
BECK: We have to find those people who are honestly questioning. Yes.
LEMON: Let's continue to talk and let's continue to try to help this conversation in America and help facilitate conversations all over America even if people may not be so open to it in the beginning. I think -- I think this is an opportunity to do that.
BECK: OK.
LEMON: Thank you, enjoy your Boy Scout camporee, and say hello to your kids.
BECK: God bless. Thank you very much.
LEMON: All right. We'll be right back.
[23:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
