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NASA Astronaut Returns to Earth; Interview With Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams; Interview With Harris Campaign National Press Secretary Ian Sams. Aired 11:30a-12p ET

Aired September 23, 2024 - 11:30   ET

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

[11:32:03]

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to drill down on two key issues this week, the economy and foreign policy.

She and President Biden are set to meet the leader of the United Arab Emirates at the White House today as world leaders begin to gather for the United Nations General Assembly this week. And then, later this week, Harris will deliver a speech with more details on her economic vision for the country.

Joining us now, Ian Sams, senior spokesman for the Harris 2024 presidential campaign.

Hi, Ian.

So, say what you want about the polls, but the polls consistently show Trump has an advantage when it comes to the economy, particularly in those key battleground states. What's new about Kamala Harris' economic message that you think could move voters on this issue?

IAN SAMS, HARRIS/WALZ CAMPAIGN SENIOR ADVISER: Well, thanks for having me, and congratulations on your new anchor spot here this hour.

BROWN: Thank you.

SAMS: Big day for Appalachia, East Tennessean and Kentucky and on CNN together.

BROWN: Yes.

SAMS: I think, when it comes to the economy, you're seeing actually in these polls that Vice President Harris is narrowing that gap.

And I think that, in these polls over the next few weeks to come, I think that that's going to narrow even further. And I think part of what you're going to see this week in her speech on Wednesday about the economy is a real contrast in visions between the two candidates and what they would do on the economy if they win in November. Vice President Harris is talking about cutting middle-class taxes.

President Trump is talking about raising middle-class taxes by about $4,000 a year with his plan. She's talking about creating more small businesses and financial incentives for small businesses. Donald Trump's talking about another big tax cut for big corporations and billionaires.

And so I think, over the coming weeks, as we close out this campaign, the choice on the economy is going to be crystal clear. And you're going to see that this week when she speaks in Pennsylvania about her own vision for the economy and what she believes in as a capitalist and how this economy can work best for the middle class.

BROWN: You say you think she's going to close that gap. But the bottom line here, when you look at a metric like grocery prices, they're up still 20 percent compared to four years ago.

And Harris was asked recently on the debate stage whether she thinks Americans are better off now than four years ago, and she didn't directly answer that question. So I will ask you, does she think Americans are better off now or not?

SAMS: Well, I think that she talked pretty openly about the mess that we inherited when President Trump left office and the economy and the -- and the crash that happened because of his total mismanagement of COVID and the way that COVID itself created global inflation numbers that were out of control.

And so she thinks that the American people have made progress, but that we have to go even further. That's why she has a plan specifically to take on corporate price gouging when they jack up prices and emergencies like that, especially on things like food and at the grocery store.

And at the same time, you have Nobel Prize-winning economists who have come out and said that Donald Trump's economic plan would actually blow up inflation and make it worse.

[11:35:01]

BROWN: But I'm just going to follow up on the question again.

SAMS: And when it comes to cost, when it comes to high prices for people, the choice in the election is also very clear.

And she's going to keep talking about her plans to bring down those grocery costs, while Donald Trump is going to explode them.

BROWN: But let me just follow up then on that, because you said her plan to bring down grocery costs.

As you know, Republicans would argue, well, they have gone up under the Biden/Harris administration. I will ask the question again. Are Americans -- does she think Americans are better off now than four years ago?

SAMS: Well, I think, when people are running for president, they want to see what are you going to do for me? And it's not a retrospective question. It's actually a forward-looking question. And that's what she's doing on the campaign trail every day, is

saying, I understand that we have to go further for people. There are still too many people out there who are hurting. Yes, inflation has eased a little bit and prices are starting to come down, but, man, we have got to go even further.

And when you look at the choice on the ballot in November, it's either me or it's Donald Trump. And my plan is actually to take on these things and to work for you and to try to help you bring those costs down, whereas Donald Trump is pushing the same old trickle-down agenda that's going to help those people at the very top and billionaires, while jacking up prices on everybody else, including a nearly $4,000- a-year increase on taxes for the middle class.

And so that's not going to help bring people's costs down. And so when you look at the future, not the past, but the future, and what these two candidates as president will do if they get elected, she's focused on making sure that people's lives continue to get better and don't go backwards, like they would with Donald Trump.

BROWN: Let me just follow up with you, because I hear what you're saying, wanting to focus on the future and not the past.

And when you look at this latest poll -- and, again, I know people have their views of the polls, but this is a credible "New York Times"/Siena College poll -- they actually asked voters about policies from both Trump and Harris that they think could impact them in the future.

And 45 percent of voters say Trump's policies would actually help people like them, versus just 37 percent for Harris. That's looking at the future, not just the past here. What do you say to that, Ian?

SAMS: Well, again, there's been some Quinnipiac polls just over the last few days that suggest a different picture of the country, of people thinking that her economic or immigration or reproductive freedom plans would help them more.

The polls are going to kind of shift around a little bit. I think what we are seeing consistently in this election is that, when voters start to hear the choice between the two candidates, whether that's on the debate stage -- and Vice President Harris is very excited to accept CNN's invitation to debate on October 23.

Donald Trump continues to come up with excuses why he won't participate. Most recently, it's too late, even though it's the day after the one he participated in 2020. And, in fact, in 2020, on October 23, the exact date of CNN's proposed debate this year, he was asked in the Oval Office, would you do another debate?

And he said yes. But, suddenly, it's too late for him. We need those debates so that people can see the choice on the economy, on immigration, on foreign policy, on all the issues that are so important to the American people. We need that debate so that they can hear one last time from these two candidates. One general election debate between Vice President Harris and Donald

Trump isn't enough. And Donald Trump's team is indicating just this weekend in "The Washington Post" he's still thinking about it. Kellyanne Conway has allegedly been pushing him to do it. Is he going to listen? Is he going to be in the mood to do it? Or is he going to balk and walk away?

We think that he should come to the debate stage.

BROWN: Yes, it is worth noting that he had agreed to doing a debate around the same time just a few days earlier in 2020 and 2016. Now he's saying, oh, early voting is already happening. It's too late.

We shall see how this all plays out. We have seen a lot of debate over the debate this election cycle.

Ian Sams, thank you so much.

SAMS: Thank you.

BROWN: Still ahead: The FBI is investigating suspicious packages like this one that were sent to election offices in more than 20 states.

Up next, I will speak with Kentucky's chief election official about his concerns about safety and misinformation.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:43:20]

BROWN: The FBI is investigating suspicious packages into election offices in at least 20 states last week. These threats even triggered evacuations in some states.

And with the election just weeks away, a CNN review found that election officials across the country are largely struggling to implement measures to adequately keep their workers safe.

Michael Adams, a Republican and a top election official in my home state of Kentucky, has vowed to ensure a free and fair vote in the state to come November.

We bring in Secretary Adams now to discuss all of this.

Secretary, thanks for coming on.

So, your office received a suspicious letter last week. Tell us about that. And have you since made any changes to your practices there to keep everyone safe?

MICHAEL ADAMS (R), KENTUCKY SECRETARY OF STATE: Well, it was sent to our state Board of Elections on the morning of our regular monthly meeting.

I don't think that was a coincidence. It contained a powdery substance. We immediately had the help of the FBI, who confirmed for us that it was not toxic. And we went on with our business. And that's our policy, is to go along with people's business.

BROWN: Some election offices across the country, though, are very concerned about threats. They're receiving death threats.

CNN has reporting out in Maricopa County in Arizona, how they're now creating sort of fortress around the election workers and where voting is because of concerns. Tell us about your concerns and what kind of threats you're seeing against election workers.

ADAMS: Well, the good news is, we're not seeing threats to our poll workers. There's no reason for folks not to volunteer to help us work the polls.

[11:45:02]

The bad news is, unfortunately, we still get threats to me, to my staff. These are not new. We dealt with these in 2020. And they have not gone away. It's very frustrating. We have got, fortunately, a law enforcement presence on every one of our local boards of elections. By statute, the sheriff is on that local board.

And so there's a law enforcement presence as necessary. Unfortunately, we have fewer places to vote today compared to five years ago because we have to have locations that are secure. We can't use locations anymore that don't have adequate cell phone coverage, for example, in case there's an incident.

BROWN: I'm wondering, though, if you have concern that we're going to see another election denial movement potentially like after we saw in 2020, and we saw so many of those threats. As you said, you even received threats in 2020.

ADAMS: Yes, in 2020, the threats came from the left. We were falsely accused of voter suppression due to misinformation, and we had calls coming from New York and California threatening to kill us, kill our staff.

And now it's coming from the right. The folks sending these powdery envelopes call themselves the Traitor Elimination Army. And both parties need to do a better job of calming tensions and saying violence is not OK.

BROWN: But do election officials have the money and the resources they need right now to keep the vote safe, given this threat environment that you just laid out?

ADAMS: Well, fortunately, we have not seen threats to voting locations. There have been sporadic incidents of violence over the years, but there are bank robberies next door, or a gas leak, things like that, not anyone threatening a voting location.

We do have contingency plans in case there is something like that. But, fortunately, we have not suffered that. If you look at the way that these people think, if that's the word for it, they're conspiracy theorists, and they think that there's some shadowy cabal at the top, that it's the elites.

They're not after poll workers. They're not even after voters. They're after me, and they're after leadership, because they think that we're up to something because we're the government, we're the elite, we're the establishment, whatever it is.

And so we have looked at our security presence. We have also encouraged our local government officials to work with federal law enforcement to make sure that they harden their offices.

BROWN: I do want to note that the portal for requesting an absentee ballot in Kentucky opened over the weekend. I want to know, what kind of demand are you expecting for absentee ballots this cycle?

ADAMS: Well, I think it'll be higher than normal because we have higher-than-normal turnout when we have the presidential election.

But we're a 2 percent absentee state. About 1.5 percent of Kentucky into vote used a mail-in, absentee ballot. We're a state where the culture is voting in person, whether it's on Election Day or early. And so I think that the absentee requests will be not a good indicator of what the turnout is going to be.

BROWN: But do you have the confidence in the U.S. Postal Service that it will be able to handle the volume of absentee ballots that you're expecting and other states across the country are expecting?

ADAMS: Well, certainly, from my state, I have every confidence.

We're talking about a pretty modest percentage of the ballots. I did have a meeting, along with other colleague secretaries, last week with the postmaster general. He's listening to us. He's promised us regular consultations as we get into this election campaign.

My hope is that we will see less of the vote cast by mail compared to four years ago, because, the post office, they're doing their best in good faith, but they have got challenges. They're reducing their infrastructure because the demand for the mail has gone down significantly.

So, I certainly want to encourage people to vote in person or to use a drop box if you're concerned about timely delivery of your ballot.

BROWN: All right, Michael Adams, secretary of state of Kentucky, thank you so much.

ADAMS: Thank you.

BROWN: Well, after a grueling six months in space, a NASA astronaut is back on Earth.

We're going to show you that dramatic touchdown up next.

And you're in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [11:53:18]

BROWN: New this morning. After six months on the International Space Station, NASA astronaut Tracy Dyson is now firmly back on Earth.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Touchdown, right on the money, a textbook touchdown on the step of Kazakstan.

Tracy Dyson is home after 184 days in space. Oleg Kononenko and Nikolai Chub are home after 374 days in space, a record for an International Space Station mission.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And she touched down along with two Russian cosmonauts in a remote part of Kazakstan a short time ago. You saw that amazing video, really.

CNN's Tom Foreman has been following this mission and joins us now.

And she had some scientific experiments she was doing up there, all kinds of things, as part of her mission.

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: All sorts of cool things.

BROWN: Yes.

FOREMAN: And this is old-school, parachuting down into Kazakstan.

BROWN: Yes. It really is, right?

(CROSSTALK)

FOREMAN: How many times have we all parachuted down into Kazakstan?

(LAUGHTER)

FOREMAN: Yes, she did some amazing work up there, as they all do. That's what they do for a living.

She was doing some look into stem cell research. And they were doing 3-D printing of tissue for hearts. They did operating robots on Earth from space and fire safety in microgravity, a lot of great experiments going on up there.

But as she points out herself, you kind of have to be a jack of all trades when you do this or a Jill of all trades. You have to be able to work on the spacecraft if need be. You might have to handle medical emergencies in space and you have to run these experiments. It all fits very much into her life.

She has a Ph.D. in chemistry, always interested in all of these things, so, glad to be back. She said her number one concern in all of this was getting back to her family. She misses her family the whole time.

BROWN: Yes, because she was there for, what, six months? That's a long time.

FOREMAN: Yes, six months.

[11:55:00]

The two Russians who were with her, Chub and Kononenko, were there for a year. Kononenko, actually, coming back today, he set the all-time record for days in space.

BROWN: Wow.

FOREMAN: Total number of days in space, 1,111. So that's an awful lot up there.

But you know what's really interesting about this? She said, Tracy Dyson said what inspired her to become an astronaut was Christa McAuliffe, who, as we know, passed away on the Challenger accident back in 1986. McAuliffe got into this to inspire kids.

BROWN: Oh.

FOREMAN: Tracy Dyson was a kid at the time, became an astronaut and now this fantastic flight.

(CROSSTALK)

BROWN: So she delivered on her mission to inspire kids.

FOREMAN: Yes, absolutely, fantastic story.

BROWN: And we're seeing it play out here.

FOREMAN: Yes.

BROWN: Wow, we love good feel-good stories.

FOREMAN: Welcome home. Welcome home.

BROWN: Tom Foreman, thank you so much. Welcome home, for sure.

Thank you so much for joining me in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Pamela Brown.

Stay with us. "INSIDE POLITICS WITH DANA BASH" starts right after a short break.