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Candidates Blitz Battlegrounds in Final Election Sprint; Biden and Trump Spar over Future of Obamacare; Undecided Voters Pay Close Attention to Final 2020 Debate. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired October 23, 2020 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:17]

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everybody. I'm John King in Washington. Thank you so much for sharing this very important day with us.

The debates are done. Today opens the final sprint to America's choice. The president is in Florida today. His vice president hits battleground Ohio and battleground Pennsylvania. Joe Biden plans a speech in the coronavirus at home in Delaware. Senator Kamala Harris heading to Georgia.

The weekend is busy with campaign events too. Just 11 days left now. A state by state chess match now that the final debate is in the books.

The instant polls after last night's final showdown gave the edge to Democrat Biden. The instant analysis was that the president maybe helped himself some by staying civil for a change and by drawing policy contrast on issues like taxes and energy. But no game changer in a race where the president needed one.

Now, America's take is sometimes very different from Washington's take and it will take a few days to know for sure what you think.

Biden's debate stage argument was the case for change. Arguing the incumbent does not have a plan. Not on healthcare, not on the pandemic. And Biden says the country needs a president who cares about you and who understands how to make government work.

It is a low bar, yes, but just that the president wasn't rude and allowed policy conversations gave Republicans cheer. And if you watched, you heard the president's obsession with recreating his 2016 map. He called out Texas and Pennsylvania. Ohio, too. That as Biden outlined his views on fracking and fossil fuels.

Being civil did not guarantee being truthful. Both candidates stretched or abandoned the facts at times, but in the president's case it was constant. The coronavirus pandemic is the defining November issue and was the night's first topic. The alternative facts from the president were many. He says vaccines are weeks from being ready, children are virtually immune, it's rounding the corner that's a direct quote, and it's going away.

But the numbers don't lie. Thursday, 71,000 plus new infections. 71,000 is the fourth highest single day total of this pandemic. The daily average of new cases, 61,000. 12 states hitting new highs for their daily average. COVID-19 has 40,000 Americans in the hospital today. And the daily average of new deaths sadly is ticking up again as well.

Let's go through some of these as we look at it. This is the pandemic election. And the virus is making a late campaign statement. No other way to say it.

32 states trending in the wrong direction. You see them here in the red and orange on the map. The red is Rhode Island. That means 50 percent more infections now than a week ago in Rhode Island. The orange means you have at least 10 percent more infections this week between 10 percent and 50 percent.

And you just see it. It's everywhere, including the big states that drove the summer surge. Florida, Texas, Arizona and California all now trending up again. The big populous states joining a lot of these smaller states out in the plains and the prairie. That's a dangerous sign as we move forward.

If you look at the cases, again, averaging 60,000 now. Went well up again yesterday. Remember, the president said this would disappear in April. Then the vice president said it would largely be behind us by Memorial Day. Again, in July, right at the peak of the summer surge, the president said the virus will disappear. President said that late July. Since then, more than 53 percent, 54 percent if you round up of the cases since the president said it will disappear. More than 36 percent or 36 percent of the deaths since the president said it would disappear. And the count of course continues.

This is troubling. And it's sad statistics. We saw how high the death trend went early on when doctors were still trying to figure out how to deal with this virus, came down, went up a little bit in the summer surge, came down again, starting if you see the end there to trend back up. 1,000 deaths a day.

The positivity rate is what is so alarming. Positivity right now means more infections today but also more infections tomorrow because a lot of people are infecting others. Look at the deep colors. Double digits Florida. Alabama and Mississippi, high double digits, 55 percent this week. Positivity rate in Iowa, 21 percent in Kansas. 35 percent, South Dakota. 31 percent, Wyoming. 33 percent, Idaho. That's just a bad map. It tells you the coronavirus is rampant in some of these places which means the new infections will continue.

If you look at the states with the highest rates per capita right now, these are the 10. These are the 10 states that this week have the highest per capita rate of new infections. If you're looking at it in a political context, nine of these 10 voted for Trump in 2016. Three of them, Illinois, Montana and Wisconsin have Democratic governors. With this, the Trump map, if you will, right now is dealing with coronavirus in a big way.

The president talked about blue states, blue states. He blames blue states governors for the coronavirus. It is true that the states ran by Democratic governors went up the hill early, the West Coast, New England, New York, they came down. We're up in the summer surge but nowhere near as much as there were states with the Republican governors. Everybody is going back up right now.

[11:05:03]

We should treat it as an American problem, not a red state or blue state problem. But if the president wants to make a political argument, the states with Republican governors, have a bigger problem at the moment than the states with Democratic governors but everybody is trending up.

This was a giant flashpoint in the debate last night. The president of the United States saying, we got this. We're turning the corner. Things are getting better. Joe Biden saying that is simply untrue.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: We're about to go into a dark winter. A dark winter. And he has no clear plans.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't think we're going to have a dark winter at all.

BIDEN: He talks about this is -- don't worry, it's all going to be over soon.

TRUMP: I say we're learning to live with it. We have no choice.

BIDEN: Learning to live with it? Come on. We're dying with it because he's never said - you see he said it's dangerous. When's the last time, is it really dangerous still? We're dangerous, you tell the people it's dangerous now, what should they do about the danger? And you say I take no responsibility.

KRISTEN WELKER, PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE MODERATOR: Let me talk about your --

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: Excuse me, I take -- I take full responsibility. It's not my fault that it came here. It's China's fault.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Let's breakdown last night and what it might mean looking forward.

Joining me right now, Dan Balz with "The Washington Post," CNN's MJ Lee and CNN's Jeff Zeleny.

Dan, I want to start with you because as I noted at the top, the instant analysis was the poll show Biden wins the debate. The instant analysis was the president did OK. He wasn't rude. Republicans are cheerful they're not being asked questions today about a rude and interrupting president.

The question is does it change the dynamic of the race, you write this, this morning.

"If, at worse, the debate was judged a draw, that alone would be less than the president needed politically. Trump stuck to a more traditional game plan in the hope that he could begin to win over or win back voters he needs to secure a second term.

If the latest polls are accurate, the president has considerable ground to make up, but a path still exists for him to win another electoral college majority, one essentially identical to the narrow path he followed to victory four years ago."

And that is the question. Did he do enough? He pressed Biden on taxes. He pressed Biden on energy. You could hear the words out of his mouth, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Texas, did he do enough?

DAN BALZ, CHIEF CORRESPONDENT, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Hard to say, John, probably not. I think for a number of reasons.

One, the - which was the top of this whole program, which is the state of the coronavirus pandemic. I think that we all wondered back in late July and August what this would look like in the final weeks of the campaign. Would it be going down? Would it look like it is being contained or would it not? We certainly have the answer at this point and it's not. And that's not good news for the president because it's the one big issue that continues to be a drag on him and the way people are judging his -- his presidency and the way he has handled his presidency.

I think the other big factor is that more than 47 million people have already voted. It's quite an astonishing number. Now, we're expecting record turn out and it may be another 100 million who are going to vote between now and Election Day. But there is a dwindling pool of people from whom Trump can get votes. Most of his voters or many of his voters still have not voted. He needs an enormous turnout from his supporters and people who didn't vote in 2016 from him but are like minded of his supporters.

And so, I think those are the main obstacles that he faces. I think he did what he came to do last night at the debate. And certainly, the Republicans and people around the president are quite happy with that. But it's a -- it's a high hurdle that he has to get over in order to change what has been a movement away from him for a long time.

And MJ, the frontrunner Joe Biden knows that coming in. He knows he's in command. So, his strategy was clearly more cautious. He clearly knew just don't make a mistake here.

But he also knew number one the coronavirus pandemic. He wants to make it a test of leadership, the president has failed. We need a new president. That is the Biden argument. But then he links into at the issue of health care. He says this president is arguing before the Supreme Court as early as a week after the election to try to take away Obamacare. Biden trying to make the point that in the middle of a pandemic this president simply doesn't get an issue that is critical to most Americans. Listen to the health care exchange.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: But it no longer is Obamacare, because without the individual mandate it's much different. Preexisting conditions will always stay.

BIDEN: He's been talking about this for a long time. There is no -- he's never come up with a plan.

What I'm going to do is pass Obamacare with a public option, become Bidencare.

TRUMP: When he says public option, he's talking about socialized medicine.

BIDEN: He thinks he's running against somebody else. He's running against Joe Biden.

I beat all those other people because I disagreed with them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: It was an interesting take. It was nice to actually have a policy debate last night, whether you're Democrat or Republican or in between to see that merit out. But Biden's position was number one, the president wants to take away Obamacare. And number two, I'm not Bernie Sanders.

MJ LEE, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And you know, I think it's fascinating when you take the issue of healthcare. I think this is a great example of an area where we didn't actually see the president make a successful affirmative case for what his second term in the White House would look like.

[11:10:09]

And he actually badly needed to do that last night, right? It wasn't enough for President Trump to just have a night with less interruptions and be a little bit you know more in control of his behavior. He really needed to use this sort of last opportunity to talk to the nation about why people should actually vote for him again and give him another four years.

And on the issue of health care this has been an ongoing issue for the president, he wasn't actually able to say what he would actually replace Obamacare with. He has been saying for a while, I have a plan, I have a plan coming, but we've not actually seen a full wholesome detail of whatever that plan is. And I think Biden really seized on that.

It's also the reason that we're going to see him back here in Wilmington making another speech that has to do with COVID-19 and the economy. I'm kind of losing count at this point on how many speeches, how many remarks, how many campaign events have been centered around this issue. Clearly, he has decided this is the issue that most Americans care about the most and nothing else matters as much as this issue and how the country is going to come out of this pandemic. KING: And Jeff Zeleny, that gets to the challenge for the president because the cases are surging, the president's record is on the public record. And most Americans do not think he has handled this virus correctly. So, he was trying to have a bit of a reboot last night.

You write this morning about how Republicans are at least cheered about the fact that it was not an insult fest and it was a policy debate. One of the big policy arguments the president wanted to make, and Republicans were grateful for this. Was this elect Joe Biden, the president says, he will raise your taxes and he will hurt the economy. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I'm cutting taxes and he wants to raise everybody's taxes and he wants to put new regulations on everything. He will kill it. If he gets in you will have a depression the likes of which you've never seen. Your 401(k)s will go to hell and it'll be a very, very sad day for this country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Biden's counter argument is that's not true. That you know, if you even look at the market - market has factored in a Biden victory. And he's not that worried. But the president was making a Republican economic argument there, instead of throwing insults which left Republicans happy.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely was. And that is something that was music to the ears of Republican Senate candidates in particular. The big reason, John, I was talking to an adviser to a key Senate race just a short time ago. They said they're not spending the morning answering questions about the debate last night. They're not spending the day or worried about spending the day defending the president or saying are you with him on whatever outlandish thing he may have said. So, the reality is the policy debate, it was a normal debate.

It was - you know it seemed like one of the most normal things we've seen in this campaign, was actually just that. But there are those policy disagreements out there. And it is one thing that Republicans believe that, in particular, in states like Pennsylvania and in Florida, they will keep some, either moderates or Republicans who are frustrated with Trump, from voting for Joe Biden by that economic argument. So, that is something that is going to playout over the next several days or so.

There hasn't been all that much of a discussion about the Biden -- a tax plan, of course, he says that he will only raise taxes on households for more than $400,000, but Democrats believe that that is sort of a barrier to getting some of the college educated men to vote for him because they're worried about the direction of the Democratic Party. That was one of the discussions that were happening there.

But John, I agree with Dan, it is hard to imagine that this is going to upset the trajectory of this race. Because it has not changed the fundamental elephant in the room and that is coronavirus. This is not going to change how people are living this every day in their lives, seeing the cases rise, the schools close, et cetera. So that is something that President Trump could not do last night.

KING: And so, Dan, you have this. You could see the different strategies. Joe Biden knows he's in the lead. He's talking big picture. He's talking coronavirus. He's talking leadership. I know how to make government work. Joe Biden also talking an issue that is important to him. Essentially, pointing to the president and saying think of who you want as a president, let's talk about character. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: You know who I am. You know who he is. You know his character. You know my character. You know our reputations for honor and telling the truth. I am anxious to have this race. I am anxious to see this take place. I am -- the character of the country is on the ballot. Our character is on the ballot. Look at us closely.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: The president then tried to turn the tables listen to this piece where he essentially says Joe Biden has been around forever, what has he gotten done. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WELKER: President Trump, your response?

TRUMP: Excuse me. He was there for 47 years. He didn't do it.

It was just a little while ago, right? Less than four years ago.

He didn't do anything.

He had eight years he was vice president. He did nothing.

[11:15:00]

You guys did nothing.

BIDEN: We did.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: You know, Joe. I ran because of you.

You're all talk and no action, Joe.

WELKER: Your response.

BIDEN: We got a lot of it done. We released 38,000 ...

TRUMP: You didn't get anything done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Biden has the edge, Dan. If you look at the polling when it comes to questions of character and honesty. So, that's a card he wanted to play. Can the president play that outside, a card that did work against Hillary Clinton four years ago? But he's the incumbent now. So, a little different. Isn't it?

BALZ: It's a lot harder today. Certainly, Joe Biden has a very long record in public service and there's a lot that the president can pick apart on that, as he did last night and as they've done through the campaign. But the idea that because he's been in office for 47 years does not seem to have been a great impediment to a lot of voters. They seem to at this point continue to trust Joe Biden more, certainly on the pandemic and on healthcare generally, on economic issues, most of the polls now show that there's kind of an even split on something that was a presidential advantage.

So, the president, I think, will continue to make this argument about him. But I don't know how far it will go. Certainly, on the character question, the vice president - the former vice president wants to keep that front and center because he knows that on that issue in particular, he has an advantage.

So, to some extent what we heard last night was a repetition of arguments on both sides that have been made for quite some time. What was different was it was done in a calmer way. And so, I think viewers got a better sense of both the differences between the two men in terms of who they are but also what they would like to do and the disagreements they have with one another over policy.

KING: Oh, actually we got to heard -- we got to hear what they wanted to say which I guess that is unusual I guess as part of our new normal. But it was. It was a normal debate. It was refreshing. Dan Balz, MJ, Jeff Zeleny, thank you all so much for joining us with your reporting and incites.

Up next for us, we continue the conversation. Undecided voters share their takes on the candidates' debate performances and whether the needle moved.

First, quick glimpse in a few of the catch races from last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: Come on, there's not another serious scientist in the world who thinks it's going to be over soon.

WELKER: President Trump, your response?

TRUMP: Excuse me. He was there for 47 years. He didn't do it.

BIDEN: Come on. Come on, folks.

WELKER: President Trump --

TRUMP: Excuse me. WELKER: -- please respond, and then I have some follow-ups.

TRUMP: We are energy -- we are energy independent for the first time.

BIDEN: Come on. What's the matter with these guys?

TRUMP: The bill that was passed --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:21:38]

KING: One giant question entering last night's final debate, are there enough undecided voters left to sway the November outcome towards either one of these two candidates. Joe Biden or Donald Trump? The Republican pollster, Frank Luntz, brought together a group of voters who before last night said they had yet to make up their minds. Now some say, they have decided.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I say that I want to write in somebody, but I may just vote Trump except for my conscience in a lot of ways really keeps me from wanting to do that frankly.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: According to tonight, I will be voting for Donald Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I begrudgingly Trump.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Joining our conversation, Republican pollster, Frank Luntz. Frank, it's good to see you. I just want to go through one of your tweets last night. This is what you tweeted after. "My focus group's words to describe Trump tonight, controlled, reserved, poised, con artist, surprisingly presidential. Words to describe Biden tonight, vague, unspecific, elusive, defensive, grandfatherly."

What is your take? Or in other words, you don't view this as scientific, you're bringing together a group of people, it's just one group of people. But what's your biggest take away about how this debate was different from the last debate in the eyes of these voters.

FRANK LUNTZ, REPUBLICAN POLLSTER: Even the debate itself was different between the first 20, 25 minutes and the last 20 or 25 minutes. The only people who were left undecided are actually ex-Trump people. That's the reason (AUDIO GAP) it's running by eight to 10 points.

Many of them voted for Trump four years ago and they're unwilling to say that they support him now because they don't like him, to be blunt. They don't like him. They don't disagree with his policies. They're not hostile to what he's done on the economy. But they don't like his demeanor. They don't like what he did in that first debate. And the reason why some of them shifted and made a commitment to Trump is because he was, for lack of a better phrase, better behaved yesterday and particularly well behaved in the first half hour. And I could see the comments from these undecided voters nationwide. That they were reacting to his tone and his demeanor.

And they were disappointed with the vice president for not being more clear, for not being more specific. They're not undecided based on policies. They tend to prefer Donald Trump's policies and they overwhelmingly prefer Joe Biden's persona. And that's why they're undecided. What they would really like is to get Joe Biden's persona with Donald Trump's policies.

KING: Well, that we can't do, obviously. And so, the question is, they have to make a choice in the end and several of them said reluctantly hold my nose, reluctantly to get to Donald Trump. One question is, are there enough of them?

The other question I guess is it's the low bar. It's pretty striking to hear Republicans keep describing this low bar for the president.

Here's how Peggy Noonan puts it today in "The Wall Street Journal."

"He wasn't a belligerent nut. He held himself together, controlled himself, presented opening remarks that made sense. He won, not a dazzling win but a win that kept him in the game."

She goes on to keep writing. But I want to get to that point in the end. You mentioned these were people who tend to lean Republican, who were Trump voters before, who have been offended by his conduct. Are there enough of them if they decide, OK, I can do this one more time to get into victory or just to close the gap.

LUNTZ: Statistically Trump would have to win 90 percent of the undecided. Because he's doing much better in those swing states, in those states that are marginal than he is nationwide.

[11:25:04]

So, let's say he has got an 8 percent (AUDIO GAP) politics says. At an 8 percent lead he will be 5.5 percent ahead on swing voters. 6.5 percent of Americans are still (AUDIO GAP) undecided or say that they could change their vote.

So, Trump has to win 90 percent of that. But it does mean it's a serious, serious -- uphill battle for him and the ads won't do it, the speeches won't do it, the rallies won't do it. He needed to do it last night and I'm not convinced he did well enough to - to close that gap.

KING: One of points you made coming into the debate was you thought the whole Hunter Biden thing was a side show, unnecessary because of the deep ditch the president is in, maybe in a normal year but not in the middle of a pandemic, not when people have lost faith in your leadership. I want to play a little bit of that. Last night, the exchange over ethics and this is about Hunter Biden.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Don't give me the stuff about how you're this innocent baby. Joe, they're calling you a corrupt politician.

BIDEN: Nobody believes it except the -- his and his good friend Rudy Giuliani.

TRUMP: You mean the laptop is now another Russia, Russia, Russia hoax? You've got to be --

BIDEN: That's exactly what -- that's exactly what was told.

TRUMP: This is where he's going. The laptop is Russia, Russia, Russia?

(CROSSTALK)

WELKER: All right. Gentlemen, I want to -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Anybody win that with voters who matter?

LUNTZ: The problem is, they all, 100 percent of them, prioritize jobs and the economy over whatever happened with Hunter Biden. 100 percent of them prioritize dealing with COVID over Hunter Biden. That the president was talking about issues that these critical voters don't care about.

And John, what he could have done is he could have asked the question, how much is it going to cost every time Joe Biden threw out a plan like health care, who's going to pay for it. He could have related to issues that these taxpayers care about. But instead, he talked about corruption because that's what he's interested in. And quite frankly, Donald Trump's biggest enemy, his biggest opponent is not Joe Biden, it's himself.

KING: Frank Luntz, grateful for your insights. Focus groups always interesting to watch what real people think. Take care, sir.

Up next for us, the coronavirus case count hits a high the country has not seen, sadly, since summer.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)