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CNN Live Saturday

Dean To Announce Refusal Of Public Money

Aired November 08, 2003 - 12:03   ET

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

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


FREDERICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Now, back to our other leading story. Leading democratic presidential candidate, Howard Dean, is about to make a live announcement about a very important decision, as he leads into his race for president. There from Burlington, Vermont, a live picture, now. He reportedly is about to make an announcement that he may not accept public funds in his campaigns.
President Bush has already said he's not going to accept it, and this announcement coming from Howard Dean, in just moments from now, after he was able to raise quite a significant amount of money from some fundraising events, just over a two day period, he was able to raise some $5 million, that was pledged.

He apparently has made this decision after asking his constituency about whether he should accept the funding, and apparently about 85 percent of those who responded to his website say they're in favor of him opting out of any kind of public funding.

Our Bruce Morton has been following this story and is continuing to help us monitor the pictures, here. Just before Howard Dean is about to take the stand, there.

Bruce, let's talk a little bit about how significant this is, for this leading democratic candidate to not accept public funding.

BRUCE MORTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fredricka, if he turns out to be the nominee, this will be the first time, since this law was passed, back in 1976, that both major party nominees have rejected public financing for the primaries, and the reason is he's afraid he'll get caught in a money gaffe.

The difficulty is if you accept public financing you get something like 18.7 million dollars from the government, but you accept a spending limit of $45 million. You get to the end of the primaries, and that sounds like a ton of money, but you've probably spent it all, television is very expensive.

So, there you are a nominee and you're broke. President Bush, meanwhile plans to raise $170 million so he can attack the democratic nominee nor months, April, May, June, July, August, all the way up to the republican convention in August and the democrat won't have any money with which to answer back. So, you're really stuck. All these democrats like the idea of public financing, but it's a very tough road for a challenger to follow these days, you're just subject to a huge avalanche of television from the much better funded other side

WHITFIELD: So Bruce, what does this say about the amount of money that Howard Dean has already been able to garner from his supporters.

MORTON: Well, he probably won't be able to raise as much as the president, the president has already raised something like $80 million. He has the so-called "rangers" who go out and raise $200,000 a piece. But, Dean obviously thinks he can do better than that $45 million limit, doing it on his own.

WHITFIELD: In just a two-day period, Howard Dean apparently, was able to raise some $5 million from his supporters in that area. Looking at the timetable with some of the first primaries taking place in January, how much money does he need to earn or get from his supporters before the primaries?

MORTON: Well, the shorter -- short answer is, Fredricka, as much as he can, I think that's how these things work, really. You can always buy more television; you can always hire more people; you can always work harder at getting voters to the polls. Primaries are won -- you know, with money, and muscle, and volunteers, and the more you have of all of those things, the better off you are.

WHITFIELD: We're watching the live pictures out of Burlington, Vermont, which is the chosen place for him to make this very important decision, a number of his supporters stepping up to the podium, apparently many of these likely to be some who visited his website. Let's talk about, in fact Bruce, this very creative way in which Howard Dean was able to try and get a read from his constituency, choosing to hear from them through the Web site and even through phone calls.

MORTON: Well, he really is, I think the first presidential candidate, Fredricka, who -- or whose managers figured out that the internet is an important strong, powerful political tool. Nobody else has really done it this way before. This is to a much better degree than any campaign I've covered in the past -- an internet campaign. And, he reportedly made this decision by asking some 600,000 of his internet supporters what they thought. The other thing about it, is he's used it as a fundraising base. His contributions on the average are smaller than those the president gets, but he's gotten lot of them, they're small givers and he thinks they can be persuaded to give again.

WHITFIELD: OK. Well Bruce, here he is, Howard Dean. Let's hear from the horses mouth, just whether he will, in fact, be opting out of public funding for campaigning.

HOWARD DEAN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you. First of all, let me thank these folks for coming for a long distance, not just a long geographic distance, but a long distance in terms of leap of faith. This really is a movement to take our country back. And one of them said to me, as we were coming out, thank you for how far you've come and I said no, it's not how far I've come, it's how far we've come. And, this campaign is about us, not about one person, it's about all of us. This is a movement for every American to take their country back from special interests.

Today, by a margin of 85 percent to 15 percent, the people who made this campaign possible have voted to decline public financing. We have supported public financing, but the unabashed actions of this president to undercut our democratic process with floods of special interest money have forced us to abandon a broken system. Our campaign has not just been about talking about campaign finance reform, we have campaign finance reform. Our campaign is campaign finance reform. Over 200,000 people have given us an average of $77 to bring us here and now, they have overwhelmingly refused to be intimidated by George Bush and his cronies giving him $2,000 a piece.

(APPLAUSE)

DEAN: Let me thank all of you, Vermonters, New Yorkers, for coming also, to be part of this. This started in Vermont and it couldn't have been possible without -- I hate to quote a republican president, but I'm going to -- what Calvin Coolidge called, said about Vermont was this, it couldn't have been possible without the courage. Calvin Coolidge said about Vermont, if this country should ever fail and lack courage, they can find an ample store in the brave people in the small little state of Vermont."

Thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

WHITFIELD: You're listening to leading democratic candidate, Howard Dean. And he was making his promise there, that he is not going to be accepting public money, as he continues to campaign and momentarily, we understand he'll also be signing, sort of a doctrine, a promise on that being made. It is the result, he says, of hearing from his constituency. About 85 percent of people who logged into his website and made phone calls all voted in favor of him opting out of public funding. We'll have more on that a little bit later on in this hour.

Well, less than two months away before some of the first presidential primaries, to make your selection among the nine democratic candidates in all. If you missed most of those candidates square off on CNN earlier in the week, you'll have another chance to see them. We'll replay the "America Rocks the Vote" forum from Boston, that's tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. Eastern time.

Well, straight ahead, the strategy: Was brainwashing a factor? The defense has plans to help the teenage suspect in the sniper trial?

Also, history repeats itself. A new anthrax scare in Washington D.C., nearly a dozen post offices shut down.

And later, the new $20 bill designed to help to avert counterfeiting -- has it backfired?

You're watching CNN Live Saturday.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired November 8, 2003 - 12:03   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDERICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Now, back to our other leading story. Leading democratic presidential candidate, Howard Dean, is about to make a live announcement about a very important decision, as he leads into his race for president. There from Burlington, Vermont, a live picture, now. He reportedly is about to make an announcement that he may not accept public funds in his campaigns.
President Bush has already said he's not going to accept it, and this announcement coming from Howard Dean, in just moments from now, after he was able to raise quite a significant amount of money from some fundraising events, just over a two day period, he was able to raise some $5 million, that was pledged.

He apparently has made this decision after asking his constituency about whether he should accept the funding, and apparently about 85 percent of those who responded to his website say they're in favor of him opting out of any kind of public funding.

Our Bruce Morton has been following this story and is continuing to help us monitor the pictures, here. Just before Howard Dean is about to take the stand, there.

Bruce, let's talk a little bit about how significant this is, for this leading democratic candidate to not accept public funding.

BRUCE MORTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fredricka, if he turns out to be the nominee, this will be the first time, since this law was passed, back in 1976, that both major party nominees have rejected public financing for the primaries, and the reason is he's afraid he'll get caught in a money gaffe.

The difficulty is if you accept public financing you get something like 18.7 million dollars from the government, but you accept a spending limit of $45 million. You get to the end of the primaries, and that sounds like a ton of money, but you've probably spent it all, television is very expensive.

So, there you are a nominee and you're broke. President Bush, meanwhile plans to raise $170 million so he can attack the democratic nominee nor months, April, May, June, July, August, all the way up to the republican convention in August and the democrat won't have any money with which to answer back. So, you're really stuck. All these democrats like the idea of public financing, but it's a very tough road for a challenger to follow these days, you're just subject to a huge avalanche of television from the much better funded other side

WHITFIELD: So Bruce, what does this say about the amount of money that Howard Dean has already been able to garner from his supporters.

MORTON: Well, he probably won't be able to raise as much as the president, the president has already raised something like $80 million. He has the so-called "rangers" who go out and raise $200,000 a piece. But, Dean obviously thinks he can do better than that $45 million limit, doing it on his own.

WHITFIELD: In just a two-day period, Howard Dean apparently, was able to raise some $5 million from his supporters in that area. Looking at the timetable with some of the first primaries taking place in January, how much money does he need to earn or get from his supporters before the primaries?

MORTON: Well, the shorter -- short answer is, Fredricka, as much as he can, I think that's how these things work, really. You can always buy more television; you can always hire more people; you can always work harder at getting voters to the polls. Primaries are won -- you know, with money, and muscle, and volunteers, and the more you have of all of those things, the better off you are.

WHITFIELD: We're watching the live pictures out of Burlington, Vermont, which is the chosen place for him to make this very important decision, a number of his supporters stepping up to the podium, apparently many of these likely to be some who visited his website. Let's talk about, in fact Bruce, this very creative way in which Howard Dean was able to try and get a read from his constituency, choosing to hear from them through the Web site and even through phone calls.

MORTON: Well, he really is, I think the first presidential candidate, Fredricka, who -- or whose managers figured out that the internet is an important strong, powerful political tool. Nobody else has really done it this way before. This is to a much better degree than any campaign I've covered in the past -- an internet campaign. And, he reportedly made this decision by asking some 600,000 of his internet supporters what they thought. The other thing about it, is he's used it as a fundraising base. His contributions on the average are smaller than those the president gets, but he's gotten lot of them, they're small givers and he thinks they can be persuaded to give again.

WHITFIELD: OK. Well Bruce, here he is, Howard Dean. Let's hear from the horses mouth, just whether he will, in fact, be opting out of public funding for campaigning.

HOWARD DEAN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you. First of all, let me thank these folks for coming for a long distance, not just a long geographic distance, but a long distance in terms of leap of faith. This really is a movement to take our country back. And one of them said to me, as we were coming out, thank you for how far you've come and I said no, it's not how far I've come, it's how far we've come. And, this campaign is about us, not about one person, it's about all of us. This is a movement for every American to take their country back from special interests.

Today, by a margin of 85 percent to 15 percent, the people who made this campaign possible have voted to decline public financing. We have supported public financing, but the unabashed actions of this president to undercut our democratic process with floods of special interest money have forced us to abandon a broken system. Our campaign has not just been about talking about campaign finance reform, we have campaign finance reform. Our campaign is campaign finance reform. Over 200,000 people have given us an average of $77 to bring us here and now, they have overwhelmingly refused to be intimidated by George Bush and his cronies giving him $2,000 a piece.

(APPLAUSE)

DEAN: Let me thank all of you, Vermonters, New Yorkers, for coming also, to be part of this. This started in Vermont and it couldn't have been possible without -- I hate to quote a republican president, but I'm going to -- what Calvin Coolidge called, said about Vermont was this, it couldn't have been possible without the courage. Calvin Coolidge said about Vermont, if this country should ever fail and lack courage, they can find an ample store in the brave people in the small little state of Vermont."

Thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

WHITFIELD: You're listening to leading democratic candidate, Howard Dean. And he was making his promise there, that he is not going to be accepting public money, as he continues to campaign and momentarily, we understand he'll also be signing, sort of a doctrine, a promise on that being made. It is the result, he says, of hearing from his constituency. About 85 percent of people who logged into his website and made phone calls all voted in favor of him opting out of public funding. We'll have more on that a little bit later on in this hour.

Well, less than two months away before some of the first presidential primaries, to make your selection among the nine democratic candidates in all. If you missed most of those candidates square off on CNN earlier in the week, you'll have another chance to see them. We'll replay the "America Rocks the Vote" forum from Boston, that's tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. Eastern time.

Well, straight ahead, the strategy: Was brainwashing a factor? The defense has plans to help the teenage suspect in the sniper trial?

Also, history repeats itself. A new anthrax scare in Washington D.C., nearly a dozen post offices shut down.

And later, the new $20 bill designed to help to avert counterfeiting -- has it backfired?

You're watching CNN Live Saturday.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com