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Democratic Debate Viewing; Biden Run; Clinton Comment; Jerusalem Stabbing. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired October 14, 2015 - 14:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:00:22] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: And we're up. You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Great to be with you here.

What a night. What a day after. We begin with the most watched Democratic debate ever. More than 15 million people tuned in to CNN as five presidential candidates duked it out in Vegas. And, you know, as oftentimes what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, perhaps this is not the case. This one with the shortest odds here coming out on top. Many observers, including Donald Trump, are declaring frontrunner Hillary Clinton the winner. Still, many on social media claim Bernie Sanders was also the victor. And the man who many wanted to see up on that stage, Vice President Joe Biden, just said this moments ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And I thought every one of those folks last night (INAUDIBLE) I thought they all did well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: While about 10 million fewer households tuned in than watched last month's Republican debate, the Democratic did outdo the Republicans in one way. Politicos are saying they showed way more class compared with the mudslinging seen in the other party's debates. In fact, the best line of the night wasn't even a dig on Hillary Clinton, it was a rallying call, it was a gift to end the questions about her use of that private e-mail server when she was secretary of state and it came from her top rival.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: But tonight, I want to talk not about my e-mails but about what the American people want from the next president of the United States.

ANDERSON COOPER, MODERATOR: Senator Sanders?

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Let me say this. Let me say - let me say something that may not be great politics. But I think the secretary is right. And that is that the American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn e-mails.

CLINTON: Thank you. Me, too! Me, too! SANDERS: You know?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: That got a standing ovation in the debate hall.

I have with me from Las Vegas, our senior political reporter Nia- Malika Henderson, and with me here in New York, senior media correspondent Brian Stelter, who is also hosting our show, "Reliable Sources."

So great to see all of you the day after here.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: You too.

BALDWIN: And, Stelter, let me just turn to you and ask you, I mean, how many viewers? How many people tuned in?

STELTER: Over 15 million. And, Brooke, I didn't want to admit this before the debate, but I was thinking, maybe if CNN was lucky, CNN would have 8 million or 9 million.

BALDWIN: Single figures for sure, yes.

STELTER: But I didn't want to admit it because I thought that was way too high. The bosses here at CNN, they were also lowering expectations. After all, Donald Trump helped bring in 25 million viewers back in August and September. Nobody thought -

BALDWIN: There was baseball games last night.

STELTER: Yes, there was a baseball game. There was so much competition on TV. There were all these reasons to think -

BALDWIN: Yes.

STELTER: The numbers would be, you know, maybe 5 million to 10 million. Well, 15 million is a record for the Democratic Party in history. You think back to debates in 2007, October, November of 2007 -

BALDWIN: Yes.

STELTER: Two million or 3 million.

BALDWIN: Incredible.

STELTER: The highest rated debate ever on CNN for a Democratic debate, 8 million. So the idea we have so many people tuning in for a Trumpless debate, it suggests that something's going on. It's not just about Trump. I think, for one thing, it's Hillary Clinton. We should not underestimate how big a star she is. She's attempting a comeback story. We saw her on the stage in 2007. We saw her so close to the nomination and then lose.

BALDWIN: Right. STELTER: She's trying to come back now. So there's a lot of interest in that.

And then on the flip side, Bernie Sanders has a big fan base and we saw them tune in last night also.

BALDWIN: I agree with you, a huge tune-in factor for those candidates. But you say Trumpless, and I feel like we need to say asterisk, footnote. But a lot of people were watching and watching the Trump live tweeting, which makes me -

STELTER: That's right.

BALDWIN: Follow-up with you. I'm just wondering, with Donald Trump's presence, love him, hate him, somewhere in between, I am wondering if he is making people tune in.

STELTER: I think there's a Trump halo effect. There's something about his presence in the political primaries at all, Republican or Democrat, that makes people curious about this entire election cycle. We've heard a lot about the angry voters that are supporting Trump. The disenfranchised voters. Well, they're not just on the Republican side. They're in the middle and they're on the Democratic side as well. These were voters who tuned in last night because they want to see change, they what to see what these politicians are going to do. And that is significant for our - I don't, you know, I don't mean to be cliche, but for our democracy.

BALDWIN: Yes.

STELTER: When you see 15 million viewers watching a debate, what is it, 14 months before an election, that means something real is happening in the country.

BALDWIN: Yes. Yes. Thank goodness. Brian, thank you.

Nia, you were there. Let's just go through - we asked you to choose two high points from - from the debate last night. What were they?

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: Well, I think two of the highlights came with Hillary Clinton and, in some ways, they were courtesy of a man who didn't necessarily present himself well and many people think shouldn't be on that stage, and that is Lincoln Chafee. He went after her and essentially said that her Iraq War vote disqualified her from the White House. She had a good comeback with that when she said, well, listen, we debated that in 2008 and my president, President Obama, thought my judgment was good enough to name me secretary of state. So I thought that was a good, crisp and sharp exchange that she had with Lincoln Chafee.

[14:05:04] But then it came up again when he tried to sort of point to ethical lapses and also - also her judgment. And here's what she had to say in response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) LINCOLN CHAFEE (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We need someone that has the best in ethical standards as our next president. That's how I feel.

ANDERSON COOPER, MODERATOR: Secretary Clinton, do you want to respond?

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No.

COOPER: Governor - governor -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: There you go.

HENDERSON: Yes. And, Brooke, I'm - Brooke, I'm sure you're familiar with the phrase, "by phylicia" (ph). And in many ways I think that is what that moment was for Hillary Clinton. It was delivered with a death hand, sort of a soft touch. It was dismissive, but it wasn't nasty. So I thought that was a good moment for her. And, of course, the crowd ate it up in that moment. And she, I thought, had a lot of other good moments, as well as others as well.

BALDWIN: What about the low points, Nia, let's go there? Two of your low points were?

HENDERSON: Yes, I - yes, I think one of the low points for Sanders was he isn't quite sure on this answer about socialism. He mentioned Denmark and Hillary Clinton, I thought, had a good response basically saying, listen -

BALDWIN: I love Denmark.

HENDERSON: This ain't Demark, this is America. Yes, I love it, but this ain't Denmark. And then Lincoln Chafee, right? Lincoln Chafee saying, listen, I was new to the job, my father just died, I didn't really have all of my stuff together when he went to the Senate. I thought that was in some ways disqualifying. I think many people will be surprised if he's on that next debate stage for the next kind of clash between these Democratic candidates.

BALDWIN: Nia-Malika Henderson, excellent assessment, thank you so much, live in Las Vegas.

HENDERSON: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Here's the other part of this story here, Joe Biden. Joe Biden may have watched the CNN Democratic debate last night, but he won't be influenced by it when it comes to if he chooses to run for president. This is what a senior Democrat source close to him is telling CNN. In fact, some Biden insiders say the key factor here in the vice president's decision is whether Biden would forever regret not running.

So let me bring someone in who is trying to get him to run. She is Nomiki Konst, a Biden supporter and the executive director of the Accountability Project. We've had you on before.

NOMIKI KONST, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Yes.

BALDWIN: You love some Joe Biden.

KONST: I love Joe Biden.

BALDWIN: Do you think, though, watching Hillary Clinton, truly when you listen to everyone soar last night, do you think that will make it more difficult for Biden to say, you know what, I want in?

KONST: So the Democrats did an extraordinary job laying out the issues that represent the Democratic Party in 2015 and 2016. Democrats don't have a problem unifying. That's the question. What we do have a problem right now is unifying the country. And there's only one candidate in my mind who really has a rapport with the Republicans and Democrats, who's polling well with Republicans, who beats all of the Republicans, and that is Joe Biden, pre and post debate.

And, you know, in going back to what Lincoln Chafee just said.

BALDWIN: Yes. Yes.

KONST: You know, I heard that quote about, you know, when I first entered office, when Joe Biden, just after his family had died, first entered office in the Senate, the first issue he championed way back in the '70s was campaign finance. And that was an issue that Bernie Sanders kept bringing up over and over and over again last night. And I think that's the issue that's really going to separate Hillary Clinton from Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton from the rest of the pack.

BALDWIN: So then do you think that this would encourage him?

KONST: You know, it's really his decision. I want him to run, and I think that he is the most viable candidate. And after watching that debate, there is still a lot of room to grow. There's still a lot of issues that haven't been represented on the Democratic side. And I think he's an incredible debater.

BALDWIN: What issue would he tackle? If Joe Biden were to have been up there last night, or behind that sixth podium, how would he have differentiated himself from the other five?

KONST: Well, I think he would have been a little bit better at explaining foreign policy issues, having been there in the White House next to Barack Obama. I think he would have explained how Barack Obama improved the economy. You know, there was a little bit of reference -

BALDWIN: Hillary Clinton was secretary of state.

KONST: Yes.

BALDWIN: Jim Webb was, you know, Navy secretary under Reagan, assist Sec. Def. Still? KONST: Yes. Well, there are significant differences between Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden on foreign policy. And that was brought up over and over while in the White House. You know, they ended up coming together and working together and they have a rapport and that's great. But Joe Biden, you know, his son was in the military and he didn't want to rush into the Iraq War. He did vote for the Iraq War, but he wanted a different solution. He wanted to split Iraq into three parts, which is now - you know, at the time was questionable, but now all the military experts are saying that was the way to go and he was on the right side of history.

BALDWIN: Quickly, I'm fresh off a plane from Vegas, a lot of betting there. If you were a betting woman, do we know within seven days?

KONST: I personally -

BALDWIN: Over/under?

KONST: Over.

BALDWIN: OK. Nomiki Konst, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

KONST: Don't take that bet (ph) on me.

BALDWIN: There we go.

Coming up next, Hillary Clinton says she is most proud that her biggest enemy is the Republicans. Might that comment at the debate actually hurt her come a general election? We'll explore that.

Also, Donald Trump may be going after Democrats, but breaking today the frontrunner is revealing that his new target is one of his own Republican opponents.

And we have to talk about this breaking news out of Jerusalem, violence escalating. Another woman stabbed. This is the second attack today. We will take you there live.

[14:10:01] I'm Brooke Baldwin, and this is CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Question, could one of the most lighthearted moments from last night's debate end up being Hillary Clinton's deadliest? During the closing moments, Anderson Cooper asked the candidates, who is the enemy you are most proud of making during your political career? Coal lobby, that was Lincoln Chafee's response. O'Malley, the NRA. Sanders, Wall Street. Jim Webb, he said, well, the guy I killed on the battlefields of Vietnam. But this was Clinton's response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, in addition to the NRA, the health insurance companies, the drug companies, the Iranians, probably the Republicans. (END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: I've got Sally Kohn with me, CNN political commentator and "Daily Beast" columnist. Also Cheri Jacobus, Republican strategist.

So, ladies, lovely to see both of you.

[14:15:02] SALLY KOHN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Hello.

BALDWIN: Listen. I mean, you think of the crowd and obviously that last line, Sherry, with, you know, saying the Republicans were her enemy, got a huge, huge applause. But come general election time, will that comment come back to bite her?

CHERI JACOBUS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: It could hurt her. I mean the electorate has a pretty, you know, short memory of course, but this can be played -

BALDWIN: But there are ads.

JACOBUS: Yes, this can be played on loop. This country, we're about 50/50. So, in the end, it's going to be the independents or people who maybe some Republicans who this time want to go a different direction. Maybe they like the fact that she's a woman. She kept repeating that last night. But she's going to need some Republican votes in order to win. And so lines like that don't help her. It sounds like it was something that was just sort of last minute, off -

BALDWIN: She's shaking her head. Shaking her head.

JACOBUS: Yes, it was kind of off the cuff, but I'm guessing that she addressed it a little bit (INAUDIBLE).

KOHN: No. Me?

BALDWIN: Go, Sally.

KOHN: No, not at all. I mean she was making the point that she's - first of all, she was a fighter. It obviously does help her with the Democratic primary. But even Republicans and independent vote know what she means. They're talking about a Republican Party that is hell- bent not on substantive debates, not on issue debates, but on just destroying Hillary Clinton on the umpteen billionth Benghazi hearing. One the umpteen billion critique of her e-mail servers.

JACOBUS: No. Hillary - Hillary does a pretty good -

KOHN: That's what they're talking about and the American people are fed up with it too, I think.

JACOBUS: No, I disagree. Hillary has a problem. She's her own worst enemy on the Benghazi situation, on the e-mails, and on lines like this. So what she needs to be doing, especially since she's really dropping with women, she lost a lot of women support this summer, Hillary needs to be, you know, basically trying to make as many friends as possible and that - that didn't help her. KOHN: Sorry, let me just - wait, wait, wait, wait. When the head of

the Republican Party - one of the heads of the Republican Party admits that the millions of dollars that's spent, the dozens - I believe almost a dozen committee hearings, thousands of pages of documents on Benghazi alone was all just to damage Hillary Clinton politically, the American people don't want that. End of discussion.

JACOBUS: No.

BALDWIN: There is the FBI investigation. (INAUDIBLE). We're not going to go - we're not go over Benghazi. We have a whole other segment on that. So let me just - let me pivot back to you.

KOHN: We should talk about better things.

(CROSS TALK)

BALDWIN: Socialism and stigma (ph). Listen, this was question number two out of the - from Anderson toward Bernie Sanders. We knew it had to be asked, how would he explain what a socialist is to, you know, all the Americans who are watching, the 15 million Americans who were watching last night. Here was his response.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: What Democratic socialism is about is saying that it is immoral and wrong that the top one-tenth of 1 percent in this country own almost 90 percent - almost - own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. That when you look around the world, you see every other major country providing health care to all people as a right, except the United States. And I think we should look to countries like Denmark, like Sweden and Norway and learn from what they have accomplished for their working people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Hillary Clinton's response, and I'm paraphrasing essentially, like, I love Denmark, but this isn't Denmark, this is the United States of America. My question is, if he were to get the nomination, should - does that - you know, should Republicans start measuring drapes in the Oval Office now?

KOHN: Well, no. Look, I mean, first of all, almost half of Americans have said they would consider voting for a socialist president, number one. Number two, his -

BALDWIN: (INAUDIBLE).

KOHN: His definite - right, but his definition, right, is different than the sort of textbook definition, right? It doesn't mean state- owned this, state-owned that. It mean - it means -

BALDWIN: Do you think people got that?

KOHN: Well, I don't know, that's why we have primaries and debates. But let's also be clear, what's more important is if you take the words out of it. When they did a poll of Americans and said, look, which kind of economic inequality do you favor? Do you favor the kind in the United States where like 1 percent of the country owns 84 percent of the wealth, or do you favor something that looks more like this, this other diagram actually being Sweden in this case, 89 percent of Americans say we like the economic distribution of Sweden. Yes, are they going to say we like socialism? No. But they like the results of what he's talking about.

BALDWIN: Go ahead, Cheri.

JACOBUS: Bernie Sanders is one of your guys. He's a socialist. He's there so that it makes Hillary seem a little less socialist. Makes the Democratic Party, you know - he's go to make some people happy because you have socialists in your party and that's fine. It is. But now we all know it. So -

KOHN: That's an inaccurate and cynical view. I'm sorry, but -

JACOBUS: But he's - he is there to make Hillary seem a little bit more palatable to moderate middle folks.

BALDWIN: OK.

KOHN: No, he's there because the American people are fed up with an economy that only works for the very few. And, look, this isn't a left-right thing. People in your party are fed up with it too. This is about people being tired of a political system on both sides that favors the status quo, that favors big business, that favors Wall Street and hurts small business owners, working people and average Americans. That's what this is a conversation about. This is plain and simple.

JACOBUS: But people want the government - but people want the government to get out of way - get out of the way so that they can make it on their own and -

KOHN: That's absolutely not true. Look at the polling data. That's not true.

JACOBS: And, look, this redistribution - the redistribution of the wealth line that Obama was caught saying off camera -

KOHN: Oh, boy. I didn't know we were - I didn't know we were having a debate.

JACOBUS: Well, you know -

KOHN: But, you know, working people do better when a Democrat's in the White House.

BALDWIN: Let me - let me just (INAUDIBLE)

(CROSS TALK)

JACOBUS: That's exactly what I'm talking about, socialism is a Democratic Party after the Obama presidency and the secretary of state will probably be the nominee.

KOHN: Oh, boy. Hey, at least now the Republicans know what a real socialist is as opposed to accusing Obama of being one.

JACOBUS: And now (INAUDIBLE) talk about this. I'm fine with that.

BALDWIN: So - so -

JACOBUS: As a Republican, I've talked about it a lot in the Democratic primary (ph).

BALDWIN: A quick, quick turn for me, Donald Trump. He was live tweeting during the entire debate. I don't know if it steered some people who maybe normally wouldn't watch to actually watch. Bottom line, I am curious, and I would love to hear both of you on this, as to whether or not, love him, hate him or not, is he making people care? This early on that 15 million people watching the Democrats last night, do you think people are more engaged in politics of because of this man? This man?

[14:20:14] JACOBUS: No, I don't - I think they're looking at him as sort of the clown show situation. Donald Trump announced with the help of all the media, you know, hyped up the fact that he was going to be live tweeting throughout the night and then all he did was re-tweet and had very few tweets of his own. I think he has trouble following the substance of the Democratic debate, just like in the Republican debate -

BALDWIN: All right, sorry, we're -

KOHN: We agree!

JACOBUS: In the Republican debate for CNN, he stood there for about 20 minutes kind of looking around with nothing to say. So, you know, the big Twitter star last night was Mike Huckabee. He filled in the blanks (ph).

BALDWIN: Can we talk about - I'm glad you went there.

KOHN: Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa.

JACOBUS: He was interesting. He was funny. And we're all talking about it today.

BALDWIN: If you didn't know, if you weren't following along, if you weren't' following along, this is a Huckabee tweet. It seems he may have - quote, "I trust Bernie Sanders with my tax dollars like a trust a North Korean chef with my Labrador." Re-tweeted 7,600 times.

KOHN: Hopefully 7, 599 of those people were offended by it. Look, first of all, I think so many people turned out -

BALDWIN: (INAUDIBLE).

KOHN: To the Democratic debate because they actually are interested in democracy and interested in a party that's going to solve the inequality and the wage stagnation that's hurting Americans, number one. Number two, I'm sorry, Mike Huckabee, when he said as president he wouldn't follow the Supreme Court, eh would disobey the Supreme Court, if that didn't disqualify him enough, tweets like that which are -

JACOBUS: You know what -

KOHN: Borderline xenophobic, borderline racist -

JACOBUS: Oh, yes, the left - the left - the left is covering him today.

BALDWIN: Quickly, quickly, quickly.

JACOBUS: There's all this faux outrage of pretend hurt feelings.

KOHN: That's real outrage, actually. Real.

JACOBUS: I would say that Mike Huckabee won Twitter last night. Good for him. We're all talking about it. "The Washington Post," (INAUDIBLE) Sally's all upset. Good for Mike Huckabee. (INAUDIBLE).

BALDWIN: Cheri and Sally, there you go. The debate continues into this afternoon. Ladies, I appreciate it.

JACOBUS: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Healthy debate. We like that.

KOHN: Yes.

BALDWIN: Both sides.

JACOBUS: Definitely healthy.

BALDWIN: All right, coming up next here on CNN, this is an important story we've got to talk about, breaking news here out of the Middle East. Jerusalem on high alert after another stabbing hours after police thwarted two similar attacks. We have a U.S. secretary of state, John Kerry, on his way to the region. How close is this to a tipping point?

Plus, fighting for his life. Former NBA and reality star Lamar Odom found unconscious at a brothel in Nevada. More on his condition and what may have happened, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[121:26:32] BALDWIN: Breaking news out of Israel. Violence escalating with new attacks in Jerusalem. A 50-year-old woman is in serious condition after she was stabbed near Jerusalem central bus station. Police say officers neutralized, their word, neutralized the attacker. The assault came after Israeli authorities shot and killed a man they say tried to stab several officers at the Damascus gate. I have our senior international correspondent Ben Wedeman standing by live in Jerusalem with the very latest. Ben, what more do you know?

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, just refer to the attack in the bus station, which is really just up the street from here. We understand from the Israeli medical service that the woman wounded was 72 years old. She was stabbed in the upper body on a sidewalk just outside the very busy central Jerusalem bus station. When that happened, a bus driver helped her onto the bus to provide her some assistance. He closed the door in order to prevent the attacker, who apparently is a man in his late 20s from the east Jerusalem superb of Rasalmud (ph).

Now, when the attacker - when this happened, the attacker went in a different direction, started running up the street. Bystanders, obviously, seeing this happen started to shout and police quickly arrived on the scene. And, as you said, according to a statement by the Israeli police, they neutralized him. We understand that he has been killed.

And that, of course, just happened about two and a half hours after this incident at Damascus gate, one of the main entrances to the old city of Jerusalem, where a Palestinian man, according to the Israeli police version of events, was acting in a suspicious manner. He was approached by border police. Of course, the number of border police and normal police in that area has been beefed up dramatically. When they approached him, they say he took out a knife and when that happened, the police opened fire. However, he was able to run away from that group of police, encountered another who shot him, according to eyewitnesses, more than a dozen times, right in front of the gate itself.

In the process, however, a tourist was lightly wounded. That tourist was treated on the scene. A local resident more seriously wounded and in the hospital.

Brooke.

BALDWIN: Ben Wedeman, we'll stay in close contact with you. Thank you so much, sir, in Jerusalem for us.

Coming up next, one of the best parts of analyzing the debate, the optics, the body language, style tactics, who was the most awkward? Who stood out? A debate coach joins me next.

Plus, tension hitting a high during a battle over gun control. We'll talk live with the parents mentioned during the debate sitting in that debate hall in Vegas last night as Hillary Clinton and Martin O'Malley called out Bernie Sanders.

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