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New Poll Provides Final Snapshot Of GOP Iowa Caucuses; Subzero Temps Expected For Iowa Caucuses; Trump Thanks Mobster, Posts Veiled Threat To Judges. Aired 9-10p ET

Aired January 13, 2024 - 21:00   ET

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

[21:02:24]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington. Good evening. It's 9:00 here on the East Coast.

And we've got some breaking news just into CNN right now. With less than 48 hours before the Iowa caucuses, we're just getting highly anticipated final "Des Moines Register" poll. Any political junky knows how important this poll is.

CNN's Jeff Zeleny is in Des Moines with the results of the poll known for its accuracy.

Jeff, what do you have? Do we have the numbers yet?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: We do, Jim, and every campaign is watching this "Des Moines Register" Iowa poll, which does have a historical pretty good average of showing what will happen on Monday night. It certainly shows the trajectory of campaigns. And there is news in this. Donald Trump is still leading this field quite dramatically at 48 percent in this poll, which is down slightly from last month. But second place now is Nikki Haley. She's vaulted over Florida governor Ron DeSantis who's at 16 percent in this poll.

So, let's go through the numbers again. Donald Trump, 48; Nikki Haley, 20; and Ron DeSantis at 16 percent.

So going into the final hours of this caucus campaign here, this is so important certainly for Haley because it shows that she has some movement here in Iowa, as well as, of course, as we've seen in New Hampshire.

But Donald Trump still in overwhelming lead in this race, slightly below the 50 percent mark. He was at 51 percent just a month ago, but that's basically within the margin of error. So he leads dramatically. The question is, will all of these supporters be able to turn out Monday night?

I've covered seven Iowa caucuses. I cannot recall one with this much uncertainty where weather is a wild card. Do these supporters who respond to polls actually make it to the caucuses? That's why I would add a bit of caution to these numbers, but that's where this race sits right now, Jim. ACOSTA: And, Jeff, as you know, as you've covered some of the Iowa

caucuses, and I've covered some but not as many as you. Iowans are hardy folk. So they're going to get out there. Whether these numbers are suppressed somewhat, you're absolutely right. That could absolutely be the case.

And I just want to have you walk us through this one more time, Jeff, because I -- forgive me, if I'm -- I don't want to over dramatize things or hype this or anything like that, but the fact Nikki Haley has surpassed Ron DeSantis, is that correct? Is that what we're hearing right now? The significance of that?

ZELENY: That is --she's in second place in this poll. And she -- really as what we've been talking about for weeks this has become a race for second place.

Historically, there have been three tickets out of Iowa. Three candidates have gone onto the race.

[21:05:01]

Iowa does not necessarily have the role of predicting the nominee. It mainly has a role of winnowing the field. It has already done that in many respects.

Historically, there's been three big tickets out of Iowa, three campaigns out of Iowa. That may not be the case this year because the field is already so winnowed down.

So if the Florida governor does not have a second place here, he'll have serious decisions to make about his path forward. That's why he's campaigning so aggressively here, not for first place necessarily. Of course, he would love that but for second place. So, that's why on Monday night, the result most of us will have our eye on are a couple of things.

One, does Donald Trump surpassed the 50 percent mark? That would be significant, of course, but it is that race for second place.

But, Jim, we were talking earlier about the margin here. The margin of Trump's victory is something that is going to be studied very, very carefully. And that's what his campaign is slightly worried about, because this poll is raising the expectations for him, 48-20.

ACOSTA: Right.

ZELENY: That's 28 points, and his campaign is saying they're hoping for a 12-point victory. That's the biggest in the history of the Iowa caucuses. That, of course, is true. But a 12-point victory would mean there are huge questions about Donald Trump among Republican voters.

ACOSTA: Yeah.

ZELENY: Jim, as we sort of take a step back and look at all of this, the reason this is important this is the first time Republican voters will have a say in sort of analyzing and a assessing, giving their judgment on him as a former president who, of course, faces many criminal charges in many jurisdictions.

This will either set him on a glide path to the nomination or perhaps slow that somewhat.

ACOSTA: Yeah. And, of course, the weather is a big wild card in all this.

Jeff, standby.

I want to bring in Ron Brownstein, our CNN political contributor and analyst.

And, Ron, you're hearing Jeff Zeleny read off these numbers, and we don't want to have this skate by too quickly. If we can show the viewers at home these numbers one more time. There you have Donald Trump at 48 percent, Nikki Haley at 20 percent. She has passed Ron DeSantis, according to this "Des Moines Register" poll. Ron DeSantis at 16 percent, Vivek Ramaswamy, not much of a factor here at 8 percent.

But, Ron Brownstein, Donald Trump, I mean, there's also -- there's a story line about Nikki Haley versus Ron DeSantis and, of course, we can talk about that. But what Jeff Zeleny was talking about a few moments ago, this poll showing Donald Trump so far ahead, a former president now leading the Republican Party with all the legal questions hanging over him being cast as a threat to democracy by the sitting president, Joe Biden who defeated him, this is a significant poll.

And if Donald Trump can replicate this on Monday, that is a significant moment because it is really going to make him by and large the front-runner in this field and somebody who is on his way to perhaps crushing the competition and getting to the nomination.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yeah, you know, Jim, like Haley and DeSantis themselves, you can lose track of the big picture here by focusing solely on their competition for what will be a very distant second place. I mean, if Haley does come in second ahead of DeSantis, his campaign would really have no rationale for continuing, given how much he's invested in Iowa.

It's not clear to me even with this lead in the poll, that she will do so because she's drawing on the voters or the most alienated from the Trump era Republican Party, and they may be the least likely to show up, you know, on very difficult conditions. But the larger point is that neither of them have really found -- had they been unable or unwilling to make an argument that makes them a serious threat to Trump.

I mean, that is -- that is the big point here, that what they're doing is not working. I mean, if you look at where they are spending their money on television, I believe the two of them are now approaching $40 million in negative ads against each other compared to $1 million in ads against Trump.

And you have Haley somewhat dialed up her criticism of Trump at the CNN debate a couple nights ago but has reverted back to her very valued judgment-freeway of talking about him. Chaos follows him rightly or wrongly. This would be a good result for her.

It would show that she has filled the space DeSantis left open by trying to run to Trump's right. But ultimately I think as you are suggesting, it suggests -- it says to her as clearly as to DeSantis that if they are going to make this a race, they have to put forward a more persuasive and probably more pointed case against the front- runner than they're willing to risk so far.

ACOSTA: And, Ron, I guess I can hear the viewers at home saying, well, they had all the time in the world to do that, and they made the conscious choice not to do that. It has been a political strategic choice all along thinking Donald Trump's going to fall apart at some point, something's going to happen with these legal cases, and it will inherit his voters because we didn't go after him when we had the chance.

[21:10:04]

And, Jeff Zeleny, the other thing that is crossing my mind is having -- I mean, when we covered Donald Trump pretty much start to finish back in 2016 from Iowa on, I mean, the other thing that he is benefitting from once again is a fractured field. If there was just one strong non-Trump candidate here perhaps this would be a tighter race, if we can show those numbers again.

If you didn't have Ron DeSantis in this field and all those voters went to Nikki Haley, you might have that 12-point margin that we were talking about earlier, that sort of threshold as to how strong Trump is doing. He's benefitting from this again.

ZELENY: He is. And the fact is, in 2015 and '16, the field was separating the vote by 6 or 8 candidates. Now it's just three candidates, but it's still the same effect. They are splitting the vote.

But, Jim, as we take a deeper look into these numbers here, also some interesting findings here, 68 percent of respondents of this poll say their minds are made up, 25 percent say they can still be persuaded. And this really reflects our conversations with voters on the ground here in Iowa. They are trying to make up their minds. If they're not with the former president and they're considering Haley or DeSantis, they are really trying to weigh this.

I ran into several voters on Friday who attended -- on Thursday, excuse me, who attended both events, Haley and DeSantis, who are trying to weigh their options. What this poll can do is show that Haley has a bit of juice here and that sometimes affects people's minds.

But one other number from this poll, Jim, that we are just defining, we're reading it along with everyone else here, 82 percent of Trump supporters are locked in. They say their minds are made up. Only 64 percent of DeSantis supporters and 63 percent of Haley supporters say they are locked in. What that speaks to is commitment, enthusiasm, energy. All of those

things are three essential ingredients to the turnout and organization for the Monday night showing here particularly with the weather. So, those numbers certainly important, Jim.

ACOSTA: Yeah. Ron, if you can pick up on that thought, but Jeff Zeleny just passed along -- I mean, the numbers matter and we should -- of course, to our viewers, this is a poll, it's not taking into consideration this devastating winter blast that I suppose could affect things around the margins and so on.

But, Ron, when Jeff Zeleny says 82 percent -- Jeff, correct me if I'm wrong, jump in if I said it wrong, 82 percent of Trump supporters say their mind is made up.

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah. That's a big number.

ACOSTA: That is -- those are folks who have made up their minds, and it suggests that this field may not move a whole lot between now and Monday and may not move a whole lot after Monday.

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah, I mean, look, I mean, Iowa is good terrain for Trump, a lot of evangelical voters, a lot of rural voters, a pretty conservative electorate. DeSantis to his credit has formulated in the kind of final stage said here, a coherent argument against Trump, but it's a very idiosyncratic one. I mean, basically he's saying that Trump can no longer be trusted to deliver the MAGA America-first agenda, that you can't trust Trump on abortion, on LGBTQ rights, on draining the swamp, on spending, on building the wall.

You know, the universe of people, the universe of voters who support building a wall on the southern border but don't think they can trust Donald Trump to do that is probably pretty limited, which I think is what DeSantis is learning even in pretty favorable terrain in Iowa.

Haley has more runway because she still has New Hampshire in eight days after Iowa, where there is a more moderate, more upscale electorate. Independents can vote. And she is consolidating a lot of that -- those voters, the ones DeSantis really kind of left out there by running to Trump's right so resolutely, who are the most resistant to the Trump direction for the party.

But that is not enough to win. And I think the message for Haley in this poll is that it is likely after New Hampshire, she will be seen as the sole remaining viable alterative to Trump. But that if she is truly going to give him a race, she is going to have to find -- she's going to have to be willing to make a more pointed case against him than she has been willing to do so far to try to peel away some of those voters who Republican pollsters call the maybe Trump voters, who basically are in favor to him but are open to an alternative in part because his style rubs them the wrong way.

She will have a period of time leading into South Carolina to kind of make that case. But I think if we don't see more from her between now and New Hampshire, which is the ideal terrain if she is going to turn up her argument against Trump, we're probably never going to see it. And so, the clock really is ticking for both of them to see if they can make this anything more turbulent than effectively a glide path to coronation for the former president.

[21:15:10]

ACOSTA: Yeah, it doesn't have anything to do with the cold. This may be a bit of a frozen field in terms of where the numbers are. And when you were saying -- when Nikki Haley, she could go potentially after Donald Trump a bit more in the coming days. Jeff Zeleny, before we go to break, she has said just in recent days if I'm not mistaken, she's just not going to do that. She has said along the lines of people have said I could attack him a whole lot more than I am right now, I'm just not going to do that.

ZELENY: She has said that. About as far as she goes is a chaos follows him, it's time to turn the page from him. She sharpened a tone a little bit, but certainly not to the degree of Chris Christie or other things. But, Jim, one more number from this poll as we've been reading this alongside you here this evening. The extremely enthusiastic support is a very interesting finding.

Forty-nine percent of Trump supporters say they're extremely enthusiastic, 23 percent of DeSantis supporters they are extremely enthusiastic. Only 9 percent of Haley supporters say they are extremely enthusiastic. So, those -- you know, perhaps get to the center of who is going to get in their car on Monday night and find their caucus location, scrape off the windshield and drive there.

So, without a doubt the bottom line in all this Trump still has the commanding lead in this race without question. He's dipped slightly below 50 but that's within the margin. But Haley is clearly in the hunt for second place. What this does not guarantee is organization, and DeSantis still has an edge on that.

So, this certainly informs our thinking but Monday is still important for the race for second place. But the race for the first one is Trump's clearly to lose right now, and it doesn't seem like he's going to -- Jim.

ACOSTA: Yeah. All right. Jeff Zeleny, Ron Brownstein, thanks for all the great insights and reporting on this very important poll that comes out just before the Iowa caucus every go around, and it is something that is trusted by a lot of political professionals in this business.

Of course, we'll see how it plays out on Monday. You have to go and caucus and vote and have your choice made.

But Jeff and Ron, thanks so much. We'll be right back in a few moments. Standby.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[21:21:28]

ACOSTA: And we're continuing to follow the breaking news. The final "Des Moines Register" poll showing Donald Trump still holds a wide lead over his rivals in Iowa, but Nikki Haley is gaining some momentum after leapfrogging past Ron DeSantis, at least according to this poll.

Let's discuss now with CNN political commentator and former Biden White House communications director Kate Bedingfield, and former Republican consultant and senior advisor to the Lincoln project, Stuart Stevens. He's also the author of the book "The Conspiracy to End America". All of Stuart's books are terrific.

Stuart, great to have you on. Kate, great to have you on as well.

Stuart, let's start with this poll. How -- for the folks at home, and I think a lot of our folks know how important is this poll is? But how important is this poll -- and how important are these findings that we're looking at this evening do you think?

STUART STEVENS, FORMER REPUBLICAN CONSULTANT: Well, look, of the many things in life to be thankful for, that you don't have to go out and spin this for DeSantis or Haley should be at the top of the list.

You know, I think it's accurate that the most any person has won with -- in an open race like this, non-incumbent is 35 percent that Dole got in '96. Trump is really functioning more in this poll like an incumbent than a challenger.

ACOSTA: Yeah.

STEVENS: And I'm sure Haley comes in second they're going to say this is great victory. But, look, I mean if Trump gets anything north of 35 this is going to be what I would call a blowout. You put the dollars in hours and efforts that the other candidates put into Iowa and it's a lot more than Donald Trump did and he's going to get a lot more out of it.

ACOSTA: Yeah, I mean -- I have to ask you, Kate, I mean, are you surprised by these numbers?

KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I mean I'm not based on what we've seen over the course of this kind of primary that hasn't, the primary that wasn't. I mean, Trump is kind of -- Stuart is right, Trump has served as an incumbent. He's sort of gone wire to wire here. I mean, we'll see happens on Monday, obviously, but he sort of gone wire to wire here as the leader.

I mean, obviously, Haley's movement across the course of the primary is probably the most interesting story line. And I think, you know, DeSantis has essentially said numerous times that he expects to win in Iowa, that he sort of has to win Iowa.

So, you know, for him this is -- really feel like Monday is a do or die moment. It's just hard to see another path for him. Haley obviously has a convincing case about her standing in New Hampshire, and then we go to her home state of South Carolina. Obviously, Trump heavily favored there, too, but, you know, she can make a case having been the governor of South Carolina. Hard to see a path for DeSantis.

So if these numbers hold, I would expect this probably becomes a two- person race really quickly.

ACOSTA: And, Stuart, I mean you and I -- I used to see you out on the campaign trail when you were working with Mitt Romney, and he had that close shave in Iowa with Rick Santorum, which was a little bit of a surprise. But usually this poll is not too far off.

And I keep coming back to this point, and maybe you can talk me off the ledge here, but it seems to me that these poll numbers kind of reflect the reality that a lot of people have been talking about. And that is these other non-Trump candidates, they just have not really gone after him in any sort of normal conventional way that we've seen in campaigns past. And are we seeing the end result of that reflected in these numbers?

STEVENS: Well, I'm not going to talk you off the ledge. I think I'm going to push you off the ledge.

[21:25:06]

You know, I mean, what's going on here is that Donald Trump is giving the Republican Party what it wants, and this ultimately isn't about Donald Trump, it's about the party. And there really is not a market for a non-Trump candidate.

Chris Christie went out and proved that. Asa Hutchinson is still proving it. The party wants to be where Trump is. And, I mean, I can't really imagine working for a candidate in a race, running against somebody that has 91 counts against them, and you don't even bring it up in a debate? I mean, like, how sad and pathetic is that? It just shows you're really not interested in winning.

A lot of this is going to be about '28, who's going to be after Trump because Trump is going to be the Republican nominee. And, you know, I think Biden is going to win this thing. I think when it's a two people race here, people are going to focus on Trump a lot more, and I think Biden is going to win it more comfortably than he did last time. But this is just a terrible indictment to me and I think a lot of us who used to work in the party of the depth the party has fallen to that it's embracing Trump with this kind of intensity.

ACOSTA: And, Stuart, I mean, just to follow up on that, what was the strategy all along here for Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis, and to some extent, Vivek Ramaswamy, although he's sort of a nonfactor here. We were talking about with Jeff Zeleny and Ron Brownstein earlier, is it that they thought with all these indictments and legal cases, that Trump was going to go by the wayside at some point and so they had to kind of play nice with the MAGA base and not lay a hand on Trump in hopes of reaping the reward at some point? Was it cowardice? Was it both?

STEVENS: I think their strategy was they hoped Donald Trump would get out of the race. That's not a strategy, you know? That's like going into a game and you hope the other team doesn't show up.

I think that it just shows that they were confronting the reality that they had to run against Trump but they knew if they ran against Trump, the base would not respond. So it comes down to the question of why are you running? If you're going to raise your hand and say you're still going to support you're running against even if he's convicted of a felony for trying to overthrow the government.

I mean, it's sort of an absurd process going on here and I think it's playing itself out. Trump crushed these candidates.

ACOSTA: Yeah.

And, Kate, I mean, we do want to remind our viewers once again this is poll. The voters have not been heard yet. The caucusgoers have not done there thing. We're waiting until Monday. Caveat, caveat, caveat.

But, Kate, just to get to what Jeff Zeleny was saying in the previous segment, 82 percent of Donald Trump supporters say they have made up their minds and they're going to support Donald Trump. I suspect it could be negative 100 degrees outside, they're going to get in their pickup trucks and their cars and they're going to go caucus in favor of Donald Trump.

Now, Stuart was just saying a few moments ago, he thinks Joe Biden is going to win. But the level of dedication inside the Trump base of the Republican Party is still a force to be reckoned with, is it not?

BEDINGFIELD: No question. No question. And I think the cold will probably depress turnout across the board, but I think that's right. I think Trump's supporters are clearly motivated in a way that Haley supporters and DeSantis supporters aren't.

I mean, I think the only way the cold could wiped up hurting Trump is I suppose if his -- folks who look at this poll and see he's got it in the bag and think, well, I'm not going to brave, you know, negative 27 and go stand in the gym around the corner for a few hours to make this happen when he's clearly going to win. So, you know, there's some risk of complacency there. But I think generally speaking, it's pretty clear the enthusiasm for him is there.

You know, it's interesting. I think Stuart was talking about strategy. It's interesting to me none of the candidates zeroed in on making the electability argument. They sort of started to do that in these final weeks, but nobody really came out of the gate coming at what a weak general election candidate Trump would be.

That could have been a way one of them could have threaded the needle. To me that doesn't necessarily, that doesn't let them off the hook for allowing -- for not being willing to say that Donald Trump is unfit to be president as a multiply indicted candidate. That is one way to speak to a Republican base that enamored with him but also go at is this really the guy we want to put forward, you know, when he's facing 91 indictments and we know he's divisive and not as appealing as some of the rest of us who will try to -- try to enact the MAGA agenda without that baggage.

[21:30:00]

It's just interesting that seems like a missed opportunity to me. But in the end it seems Donald Trump has a death grip on the base of the Republican Party.

ACOSTA: All right. Kate Bedingfield, Stuart Stevens, great to talk with both of you. Great to catch up. Thanks so much for your time this evening. Really appreciate it.

STEVENS: Good to see you.

ACOSTA: Good to see you. Good to see you.

All right. We'll dig even deeper into this final poll before the Iowa caucuses. What history tells us about this poll's ability to predict who actually wins in Iowa. We're not, you know, overselling this. This poll has been pretty solid in the past. Of course, the caucusgoers have to do their thing, but we'll talk about some of this on the other side of the break.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ACOSTA: All right, this just in. Nikki Haley's campaign is responding to the new "Des Moines Register" poll saying, quote: The poll shows the Haley momentum continues to grow, but we take nothing for granted.

Senior data reporter Harry Enten joins us now to run the numbers.

[21:35:02]

I guess there's some sign of Haley momentum. I wouldn't call it like a groundswell, earthquake kind of thing, but let's take a look at the new poll, Harry. This shows it right here. Forgive my magic wall amateurishness here.

But, Harry, show us what should we be looking at here? Obviously, Donald Trump 51 percent, December, 48 percent now. But Haley has jumped past Ron DeSantis. That's what's interesting about this.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR DATA REPORTER: I mean, yeah. She's jumped past Ron DeSantis, but she's still 28 points behind the leader. And Ron DeSantis right now at 16 percent has basically based his entire campaign on at least coming in second in the state of Iowa.

ACOSTA: That's right.

ENTEN: If this result is right, he's a dead man walking in this race because he ain't going to New Hampshire and finishing any better than third place. He might finish fourth. South Carolina afterwards. He's third in the polling there.

But the fact is Donald Trump is well ahead in this race, and you were speaking about it with all the different folks you have had on. I have looked at all the numbers, all the different polls.

Everyone is mentioning the cold, the cold. First off, Iowans can jump in a car and they'll be perfectly fine getting on those caucuses.

ACOSTA: They are hardy folk.

ENTEN: Hardy folk. I went up to school in New Hampshire just like Iowa, we're a hardy folk. But even --

ACOSTA: So for the year (ph).

ENTEN: Yeah, there you go.

But if you look at the polling, you look at the enthusiasm, Donald Trump supporters are the most enthusiastic. You look at those most certain to vote, Donald Trump has the same percentage of the vote as he does among the probable to vote.

The fact is this particular poll there's never been an error in the poll large enough going back since 1900, since the first "Des Moines Register" poll, any error even close to large enough to indicate Donald Trump is heading close to anything other than a massive win.

ACOSTA: And I know from covering these campaigns that "The Des Moines Register" poll is basically the cold standard when it comes to these polls right before the Iowa caucuses.

What about -- I mean, how predictive is it historically? Let's look at this historically. Best Iowa showings, George W. Bush in 2000 -- help us out here.

ENTEN: Yeah, these are the final results. George W. Bush with 41 percent in 2000, Donald Trump obviously at 48 percent ahead of that. I'll also note in the final "Des Moines Register" poll we were talking about, he was at 43 percent which was the best showing ever in that pre-election poll.

ACOSTA: Interesting.

ENTEN: So, the fact is at this particular point, Donald Trump is beating not just his actual showing in the caucuses but also the best poll showing ever. This is huge showing for Donald Trump.

Forget who comes in second, forget who comes in third. Yes, Haley wants to come in second, knock DeSantis out of the race.

But we shouldn't lose fight of the fact at this particular point, Donald Trump is helping towards something very bizarre that we've never seen happened.

Now, we do live in a weird world, so maybe something does, so I don't put a past on the world.

ACOSTA: A major snowstorm, yeah.

ENTEN: A major snowstorm maybe one that clicks, maybe. But at this particular point, you really have to like where Don -- if you're Donald Trump's campaign you really have to like where you are at this point. He looks like he's heading toward history and the history of the good type. ACOSTA: And well, and Stuart Stevens was saying in the previous

segment, Donald Trump is almost running like an incumbent this time around. And just because you win the Iowa caucuses doesn't mean you necessarily go onto become the nominee. There has been sort of a quirk on the Republican side.

We can show this to our viewers, right, Harry?

ENTEN: Look, if you want something you want to take away and you don't want Donald Trump to win the GOP nomination, this is the slide for you because only 2 of 7 times in the modern era has the Iowa winner gone onto be the GOP nominee. One was Bush in 2000. One was Bob Dole in 1996.

But the vast majority of the time the answer is no on that particular question.

ACOSTA: That's right.

ENTEN: But that's something you hang your hat on. Obviously, Cruz didn't win, Santorum didn't win, Huckabee didn't win. Dole didn't win in '88. Bush didn't win 1980. But the fact this is really the only good sign if you are someone who's not a fan of Donald Trump at least looking at this poll and looking at history.

ACOSTA: And let me go back to this latest "Des Moines Register" poll and talk about Ron DeSantis a little bit, because, Harry, we might have just raced past this point. Ron DeSantis traveled to all 99 counties in the state of Iowa. His whole, you know, existence as a Republican candidate seems to be banking on winning Iowa. These can't be good numbers. This cannot be a good result for Ron DeSantis.

They say three tickets out of Iowa, but does Ron DeSantis really have a ticket out of Iowa if he's going to finish third in the fashion that we're looking at right here?

ENTEN: He has a ticket back to being the governor of Florida, that's what he has.

ACOSTA: Yeah, back to Tallahassee.

ENTEN: I mean, look -- back to Tallahassee. I mean, the fact is this is not going to work for him. You look at the New Hampshire polling, you look at the South Carolina polling, you look at the national polling, he can't finish second in Iowa forget about it.

[21:40:02]

Jim, can you do me a favor and hit that last, the fourth slide I just want to put there.

ACOSTA: Let's do it.

ENTEN: Very quickly, I just want to note, you know, we said in that third slide, okay, Iowa doesn't predict the winner, it does predict the winner when it matches the national polls and that is a very good sign for Donald Trump.

ACOSTA: Yeah, Dole did it. George W. Bush did it, and they were pretty much the party establishment candidates. I remember the dole race. I remember the George W. Bush versus Al Gore race. Of course, back in those election cycles, they were essentially the Republican establishment candidate.

And this time around people might say, well, Donald Trump's not an establishment candidate. To some extent, he is. The party is Donald Trump, and Donald Trump is the party. So, it is sort of following in this fashion.

ENTEN: Exactly. Donald Trump the establishment whether you like or not, Jim.

ACOSTA: Yeah. All right, Harry Enten, I heard you had a little lobster earlier. Thanks so much for finishing that quickly.

ENTEN: It was delicious.

ACOSTA: Was it the kind where they took it out of the shell and put it --

ENTEN: Absolutely, I'm very lazy.

ACOSTA: That is the lazy man's lobster. That is my favorite. Chef's kiss.

ENTEN: Go Bills!

ACOSTA: All right. Harry Enten, all right, thanks.

On Monday, not tomorrow.

ENTEN: That's right. Tune into your show.

ACOSTA: That's exactly right. Thank you. You've learned well.

All right. See you, Harry. Thanks so much.

All right. In the meantime, what remains to be seen is whether the dangerous record breaking cold will impact the Iowa caucuses.

Let's go to our CNN meteorologist Elisa Raffa live from the CNN weather center with the latest on this winter blast.

Elisa, what are you seeing over the next couple of days? I mean, you've got -- you've got a magic wall there, and it's not very magical right now. This is -- this is heart breaking, and people need to be careful.

ELISA RAFFA, CNN METEOROLOGIST: No, this is serious. Some of these wind chills could be dangerous. They can be life threatening. I mean, we are already finding this wind chill at 40 degrees below zero from Des Moines to Council Bluffs, up to Sioux City, nearing 50 degrees below zero up in Sheldon. A couple of snow showers exiting to the East.

But we still have blizzard warnings in effect until midnight not because there's snow falling but the fresh snow that fell yesterday is still blowing around and causing blizzard conditions. Here's that wind chill warning where we're going to have the wind chills down to 45 degrees below zero. Frostbite can happen in 10 minutes or less, and that will be the case as we go into tomorrow morning.

Iowans waking up with those wind-chills as cold as 40 degree below. And then you're looking at wind-chills staying 30 degrees below zero by Monday evening, as a lot of those caucus events are happening. Look at the history of all the caucuses most of them in the 30s and 40s. But looks like Monday, we might not break zero. Minus 2 is the forecast right now -- Jim.

ACOSTA: All right. Elisa Raffa, thank you very much. Just a note to our viewers, please be careful out there. When it gets this cold, it can be extremely dangerous.

Much more straight ahead. Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[21:47:10]

ACOSTA: Donald Trump skipped campaigning in Iowa for much of the week, choosing instead to attend a court hearing at his civil fraud trial. He also spent time on multiple public comments about his various legal woes.

Let's talk about it now with defense attorney and former federal prosecutor Shan Wu.

Shan, lots to talk about. Let's talk about, though, we want to show this to our viewers. Trump was actually praising the mobsters Sammy the Bull today on social media for his, quote, fairness, straight, and honesty. Trump goes onto say in the social media post he hopes Judges Engoron and Kaplan see what Sammy has to say about them or about him.

I mean, again, he's bringing up names of judges. And in the context of a social media post about Sammy the Bull, does this sound like a threat to you?

SHAN WU, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Sammy the Bull who's a paid assassin?

ACOSTA: Yeah, exactly. Notorious violent mobster.

WU: Yeah, unfortunately, it's par for the course for him. He could easily say, oh, he was trying to use Sammy the Bull as a character witness ignoring the fact he's a man who killed people. Really something should be done with his constant commentary on public officials and judges. But everyone is very afraid to do that because they want to look like they're being so even-handed, and it's becoming quite a dangerous situation. ACOSTA: Yeah, and I have to wonder where's the line? Is there a line

with Donald Trump? Does he not have a line because people are afraid of -- of whatever consequence may come and an appellate court might say, well, this judge wasn't fair because he put Trump in jail for a day or whatever? I mean, is that essentially what we're dealing with right now?

WU: He really doesn't really seem to have a line. His lawyers aren't giving him any guardrails. Obviously, his supporters don't.

And the problem is I don't think it's even the judge is necessarily afraid of an appellate court reversal. But they're so concerned with making sure the institution seems fair, that they're kind of ignoring what's happening in this instance. It's not just possible threats. I mean Judge Engoron's house, you know, got swatted.

ACOSTA: I was just about to ask you that.

WU: A bomb threat.

ACOSTA: Right.

WU: It's happening constantly with people. It's a very, very volatile situation. It would not be unreasonable to say that Trump let's say in the upcoming defamation trial -- sir, you cannot comment about people in this case because it's too dangerous.

ACOSTA: But he does it. Not only does he do it, he puts it in a social media post, which for all the world to see, and this comes on the heels of Judge Chutkan.

WU: Right.

ACOSTA: Having a threat. Jack Smith having a threat. I think that was on Christmas, a swatting incident.

[21:50:00]

And now what took place with Judge Engoron.

And so how does -- how can our judicial system operate when you can have a defendant who's so hyperbolic that you have threats coming into the judges and the prosecutors handling these cases?

WU: Well, it operates because --

ACOSTA: There's a lot of complaints about two forms of justice, two systems of justice.

WU: Right.

ACOSTA: Doesn't Trump benefit from having a separate system of justice for himself?

WU: Oh, absolutely. Operates because there is security, thank goodness for judges and public officials, but it shouldn't have to be amped up to this degree. What could be done about it is he could be held in serious contempt. Fines could be enormous. He could be threatened with jail if he violates that. And that's something that the system is going to have to come to terms with at this point.

ACOSTA: If these things are enforced in a significant way.

Judge Engoron slapped Trump on the wrist with fines here and there. It's not very much.

WU: No, it's not very much.

ACOSTA: And at the same time, we should also note, in addition to the swatting incidents, he has his own attorney at a presidential immunity hearing saying that the president can order SEAL Team Six to assassinate a political rival and he can't be prosecuted unless that president is impeached and convicted in the Senate first.

WU: Right. It's a preposterous prerequisite to put in there.

ACOSTA: What a world.

WU: And, you know, the D.C. Circuit argument on the presidential immunity issue after the Supreme Court chose not to take it directly, that panel made mincemeat out of Trump's lawyer and it really seems like the lawyer was just playing for Trump. He could have had an opportunity, like with Judge Pan's question, to come up with a good answer that ran between the goal posts there, but instead he wanted to try to run over the goal posts.

ACOSTA: Yeah, yeah, no question.

All right. Shan, thanks so much. Appreciate it. We'll be right back.

WU: Good to see you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[21:56:18]

ACOSTA: Finally, an update in the investigation into Boeing and how one of their door plugs blew off an Alaska Airlines plane mid-flight last week. U.S. aviation officials say the door plug from that 737 MAX 9 jet has now arrived at their lab in Washington where they will study whether four critical bolts meant to attach the plug to the plane may be at fault. This is as we are hearing more from one of passengers on that near catastrophic flight.

This passenger was the closest to the door. He told CNN affiliate KCAL his shoes flew off as he was nearly sucked out of the plane. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PASSENGER: My feet was like this the whole time. And I was getting jammed on to the chair that was in front of me. I couldn't move. I needed to check the cardiac control because this is one of the biggest company in America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Wow. He is lucky to be alive.

For now, both United Airlines and Alaska Airlines have grounded all Boeing 737 MAX 9 planes that have the door plug.

Thanks very much for joining me this evening. It was a busy one. I'm Jim Acosta. See you again tomorrow night starting at 4:00 p.m. Eastern. Good night.