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Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) Pushes Back Against Democrats Calling for Stimulus Compromise; Trump and Biden Take 2020 Messaging on the Road; Colorado Reports Highest Single-Day Spike in New Cases. Aired 11:30a-12p ET

Aired October 14, 2020 - 11:30   ET

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

[11:30:02]

JOHN KING, CNN INSIDE POLITICS: A spokesman says that call was productive and that they will speak again tomorrow.

Joining me now to discuss is Time's Molly Ball. She's also the author of The New York Times best-seller book, Pelosi.

Molly, you know the speaker well and you detail her style, her negotiating style in your book, which is fascinating, and I highly recommend it. She is in a showdown here with the president. She is also in a showdown with some of the members of her own caucus. And you know how she prides herself being the leader and on loyalty. Is she failing to do something here? Is she failing to communicate enough to keep the fellow Democrats on her side and her keep them quiet or is that just impossible?

MOLLY BALL, CNN POLITLCA ANALYST: I think it's impossible to keep literally every member of the caucus in the tent but she has been trying to, in that interview and others, project the message that most Democrats are still onboard with the strategy, even as some of them have gone wobbly, even publicly so.

She firmly believes she has the leverage in this situation that Republicans have finally seen after months of waiting, that it is in their political interest to come back to the negotiating table, and they've made an offer. She used that at the beginning of the negotiation, not the end of it.

So the question now is whether there is actually some possible way for these two sides to meet in the middle or whether they are both sort of just play acting this negotiation that neither side really believes can happen just because they don't want to be seen as the one that walked away from the table.

KING: Right. And so you look at 1.8, 2.2, you think that's an easy middle ground, right, just settle at 2 billion and compromise there -- 2 trillion, just split the difference and compromise.

However, listen to this conversation with Wolf Blitzer yesterday. You detail this in your book. When you mentioned the name President Trump, the speaker gets interesting. Look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Let me read a line from the letter you wrote. The president only wants his name on a check to go out before Election Day and for the market to go up. Is that what this is all about, not allow the president to take credit if there's a deal that will help millions of Americans right now?

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): No, I don't care about that. He is not that important.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: He is not that important. He is the president of the United States. I get it, she negotiates with Secretary Mnuchin and now chief of staff, but the president actually is kind of important here. He has to sign it.

BALL: He does. And, obviously, he is important to getting any potential deal of this kind. In fact, the main reason that there hasn't been further legislation has been the president's inconsistency and lack of involvement in this particular issue.

So -- but, obviously, that reflects the speaker's attitude towards Trump, the erosion of that relationship that has been going on for the past couple of years. Neither of them has any particular affection for the other or respect for the other at this point. And we've seen on multiple occasions her expressing her views that he's basically beneath contempt. And so ever since impeachment, there really has been no relationship personally between the two of them.

KING: It is remarkable dysfunction. Hard to strike a compromise with such dysfunction, but we shall see. Molly Ball, as always, grateful for your insight there.

Coming up for us, we go back to the campaign trail. President Trump trying to defend his 2016 map. Joe Biden, watch him travel from Pennsylvania into Ohio to Wisconsin. He's trying to rebuild that so- called blue wall.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:35:00]

KING: We're getting close to Election Day and where the candidates travel tell you a lot about the state of play. Joe Biden spending time in states he does not need to win, meaning he's leading the race and trying to stretch his advantage. President Trump retracing his 2016 map because some of the big states he flipped then are leaning blue this time.

Let's go back and look at it through the context of 2016, bring up the map here. This is the map that carried Donald Trump to the presidency. Remember, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but the president won the Electoral College in part because of right here, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, right?

So the president was back in Pennsylvania last night. It was a blue state that he flipped red but just barely, fewer than 45,000 votes, the margin at 44,292. The president wants to get these 20 electoral votes again. They are key to his map. That's why he was there last night.

Joe Biden was born in Pennsylvania. He thinks he can flip it blue, interesting to see him this week campaigning in Ohio. This one was not close four years ago, nearly 500,000 votes. 446,000 votes, a big Trump lead, but Joe Biden there thinking he can turn Ohio from red to blue, that would block President Trump.

If you look at this part of the country, in every presidential election, the industrial belt from Pennsylvania across to Wisconsin, always a big competition ground and always the big issue, jobs.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: They will lose, you will lose in Pennsylvania a million jobs.

And when I'm president, America will remain the world's number one energy producer with Pennsylvania workers leading the way.

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I come from automobile state and an automobile man. The auto industry supported one in eight Ohioans, was on the brink. It was more than ten years ago but you remember like it was yesterday, it was on the brink. But Barack and I bet on you and the American worker and it paid off.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[11:40:00]

KING: Let's get some on-the-ground reporting from reporters in Pennsylvania and Ohio. Jonathan Tamari is National Political Writer for The Philadelphia Inquirer, Jackie Borchardt is Columbus Bureau Chief for the Cincinnati Enquirer.

And, Jackie, let me start with you in Ohio, because this one is interesting, right? You know the cliche, but it happens to be true, no Republican won the presidency in modern times without carrying Ohio. Listen to some of Joe Biden. This is a state Mike DeWine, the current governor, John Kasich, the former governor, yes, President Trump carried it big but they're not Trumpy Republicans, Joe Biden reaching for the middle. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: It's time to rebuild the backbone of this country, the middle class. And this time bring everybody along, no matter your race, your age, your gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability. Everybody gets to come along. It's time to unite America and we'll do that by choosing hope over fear, science over fiction, truth over lies and unity over division. (END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: What is the late sense there, Jackie? And does that kind of a message work in a state that the president carried quite handily four years ago?

JACKIE BORCHARDT, COLUMBUS BUREAU CHIEF, CINCINATTI ENQUIRER: You know, I think the message Joe Biden gave in Ohio this week is exactly the message that he needs to give in Ohio for all of the reasons you mentioned at the top of this segment. Although Ohio went sharply for President Trump four years ago, it also voted for Obama twice, and the areas where Trump made inroads were on the jobs message.

When you went to places in Ohio where he swung the vote away from Obama, jobs, the economy, returning good paying jobs to those areas were high on their list. So it's exactly why former Vice President Biden focused on that.

I think in Ohio, we were a little surprised to see him come back. The narrative for the last two to four years has been that Ohio is now a red state. We're not included in a lot of the national media's list of battlegrounds or swing states this time around. But it seems like in the last few weeks, we're definitely feeling like a swing state.

Also on Monday, Vice President Mike Pence was in Ohio. And we just heard that Ivanka Trump will be in Cincinnati on Friday and Kamala Harris will be in Cleveland. So we're starting to feel more like a swing state and it seems that that -- I think that that's the message that both candidates are going to have to drive home on that jobs and economy, it's still the number one issue here.

KING: Jonathan, A, if Joe Biden can win Ohio, forget about it, game over. But if Joe Biden can take back Pennsylvania, Donald Trump so needs those 2020 electoral votes. They were so important to him last time.

It's interesting, I want to play a little snippet from his rally last night. This is a president, of course, who is the president in a middle of a pandemic. That has been the biggest drag on his popularity. But in your state last night in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, he tried to tie Joe Biden to the governor and governor's restrictions about the coronavirus. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Joe Biden would terminate our recovery, delay the vaccine, prolong the pandemic and annihilate the economy with draconian, unscientific lockdowns, like you're having right now in Pennsylvania with this governor who is killing you, Tom Wolf, Tom Wolf. Come on, Tom, open up Pennsylvania, Tom.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: So this becomes, as it always the case in Pennsylvania, a close election, a turnout game, in the sense that Joe Biden's message, and I think the governor's position is stronger in Philadelphia and the suburbs and maybe Allegheny County. But you get to the middle of the so-called T the middle of the state, that's where the president is trying to hope people come out of the woodwork again.

JONATHAN TAMARI, NATIONAL POLITICAL WRITER, THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER: That's right. And the president has been attacking Governor Wolf, a Democrat, on this, pretty much since the start of the pandemic. And this works really well with his base, as you saw at that rally last night.

The challenge for him is that most polling shows that the governor's response is much more popular than the president's response has been.

And so what you're seeing is the president is preaching to the people who are already with him. He is trying to basically do what he did in 2016 but bigger. Just get those people out in even larger numbers than he already got.

Biden is kind of running more of a multifaceted campaign. He's counting on big turnout in Philadelphia and its suburbs and Pittsburgh and its suburbs, even bigger than in the last election, but he's also going to the very same areas President Trump is campaigning in and trying to peel off some of those moderate voters, some of those Democrats who maybe felt alienated from the party and win some of them back.

I mean, the president was in Johnstown last night. Biden was also in Johnstown this month. Biden was in Erie County, another place that swung to the president.

[11:45:00]

He was in Westmoreland County.

So he is also trying to reach those same voters but with more of a moderate message while the president is just trying to rally the people who are with him with greater numbers.

KING: And it's a nationalized climate, obviously, the coronavirus pandemic being issue number one. And let me close by asking each of you, and, Jonathan, you can go first in this round, is there anything unique though, is there a state issue playing out? Sometimes we get a surprise, or something local going on that impacts an election. Is there anything else going on that we should keep an eye on in Pennsylvania, or is it largely that nationalized climate?

TAMARI: I mean, I think it's largely nationalized but an issue where you've heard the president talk about relentlessly is fracking and energy. Fracking is a huge piece of the economy in Southwestern Pennsylvania. He's attacked Joe Biden, accusing him of wanting to ban fracking, which is not Biden's position. He has said repeatedly he would end new permits on federal land, allow existing fracking to go on.

But the president is hammering that message, really trying to say to those kind of blue collar voters in Southwestern Pennsylvania that your jobs would be on the line. And so that's an issue that is not unique alone to Pennsylvania but is very significant there.

KING: And, Jackie, same question to you. You look at Ohio, an incredibly complicated state given its diversity, is there anything else going on the ground that could impact the presidential race?

BORCHARDT: Yes. I agree that probably the national politics are what most people have in mind, but given our diversity in the eastern part of the state, fracking is an issue here as well. Manufacturing remains an issue.

And then we did also have a statehouse scandal, corruption scandal, over the summer with the house speaker who is Republican getting caught up in a $61 million bribery scheme. So I don't know if that will reverberate up but that's something that the local candidates are, you know, advertising for and against -- everyone's mailbox is getting stuffed with those kinds of ads.

KING: Jackie and Jonathan, grateful for the reporting from the ground, on two of the big battlegrounds as we head into the final days. Thank you both so much. We will check back in another day or two.

Coming up, officials in Colorado now warning that state is in a make or break moment as coronavirus is again on the rise.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:50:00]

KING: Colorado, one of four states reporting its highest single day jump in new coronavirus cases since the start of this pandemic, Colorado reporting nearly 1,000 new cases just yesterday. In Denver, the city's mayor says cases are increasing at a, quote, concerning rate.

Joining us is the Denver mayor, Michael Hancock. Mr. Mayor, thank you for your time.

You say you're at a fork in the road. What is the issue? Do you have a single problem or is this a little bit of everything causing the case count to go back up?

MAYOR MICHAEL HANCOCK (D-DENVER, CO): Good morning, John. Good to be with you. And it is a little bit of everything to have our cases go back up. We've had our young people go back to school. We have three major university and college campuses here in Denver, a lot of young people coming back to those campuses, driving our numbers up through some of their activities and really, quite frankly, just people being more active.

And so we really do have to get back to the basics with regards to our battle against the COVID and do what we can to bring down these numbers, because they are alarming and concerning. We've done a lot. We flattened it. We were very successful. It's time to get back to the basics. KING: When you say, back to the basics, will this impact your school plan? You mentioned some kids going back to school. Elementary schools are supposed to open next week, middle and high school wouldn't return until early November at the earliest. You've got older students continue remote learning. You've got to look at this at the end of the month and decide.

Are you at the point where you're going to have to -- whether it's schools or something else -- step back or impose new restrictions?

HANCOCK: Well, right now what we are seeing, our seven-day average in terms of cases are up 40 percent. Hospitalization rates are up 30 percent. The reality is that our young people have been trickling back to school. The Denver Public School System, Board of Education and superintendent have already announced that our middle and high school students will be delayed even further in terms of going back to in- person learning.

Our elementary kids have been back for the most part and they really haven't seen much of an impact from their presence in the classroom. It's the older kids who have been really learning virtually. And so, yes, we are concerned. With our positivity rate close to 5 percent, we've got a lot of work to make sure that we bring those numbers back, that we rein them in.

So we are doubling down on the efforts to encourage folks to wear masks, not gather in groups no matter how large, to do whatever you can, even if you can't. And if you can stay home, stay home instead of going out socially. But more importantly, don't gather in groups, wear the mask, and social distance when you are out in public.

KING: 36 states right now, 36 states, are heading in the wrong direction in the United States. Let me ask the question in this context. Do you get any contact yourself or any data from the White House coronavirus task force, from the CDC, is there anybody in Washington who is sending you information as this plays out saying, sir, pay attention, here is the problem, here is the solution, or are you on your own?

HANCOCK: Well, listen, for the most part, states and cities throughout this entire pandemic, John, let's be very clear, have been on our own. This White House has been an absolute failure helping our states and cities. We've had to figure this thing out ourselves.

We are fighting a battle. And while we're fighting this battle, we have the commander-in-chief, if you will, mocking this virus and not doing things necessary to demonstrate and to show the American public how serious this virus is within our society.

You know, we talk about the importance of wearing a mask. He mocks and play games about wearing a mask.

[11:55:00]

We talk about social distancing. He brings groups together in the White House and doesn't require them to social distance. He is mocking this virus at the same time we have 216,000 people who have lost their lives and cities and states are fighting uphill to try to do what we can to rein it in but to keep people safe, which is our top priority.

I'm pretty sure that the CDC and the National Institute of Health and Disease are in contact with our public health folks here in Denver, Colorado. And I'm in daily contact with them as they are part of my cabinet. They help guide and direct and advise.

But I'll tell you, in terms of true, pure leadership, the president modeling what is necessary to protect the American people, we do not have it and, quite frankly, we have had to struggle for supplies on national testing policy, you know, just pure guidance on how we can fight this virus, it hasn't happened. It's been an absolute failure.

KING: Mr. Mayor, grateful for your time today and certainly wish you luck in these challenging days ahead. I know you say you're at a fork in the road. We'll check back on how things go in the days and weeks ahead in Denver, across Colorado.

HANCOCK: Thank you.

KING: Thank you, sir.

Up next, the president says we've rounded the final turn, victory is in sight. We'll break down the numbers to tell you something quite differently.

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[12:00:00]