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CNN This Morning

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis Suspends Campaign for Republican Presidential Nomination and Endorses Donald Trump; Republican Presidential Candidate Nikki Haley Questions Donald Trump's and President Biden's Cognitive Acuity; Sen. Tim Scott Backs Trump Despite Haley Appointing Him to Senate; Trump Defends Mocking, Misspelling Haley's Birth Name. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired January 22, 2024 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So they're saying that her job is there if she wants to return. And not only that, but now they're saying they're also going to revise their company policy because of all of this. Marissa also released a video on social media saying that she acknowledged that apology, saying that she likely will not return because she said she didn't find it appropriate to return to that company. But also said she's encouraged to see the changes within the company. Poppy, Phil?

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Camila, thanks for the reporting.

And CNN THIS MORNING continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIKKI HALEY, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: There were 14 people in this race. There were a lot of fellas. It's now, oh, my God, one fella and one lady left.

(APPLAUSE)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: I think that right now we have the highest level of enthusiasm that anybody's ever seen.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: I think we're going to have the same kind of result here as we did last week in Iowa.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Good morning, everyone. So glad you're with us on a beautiful Monday morning in New Hampshire. We are one day away from the first in the nation primary and only two candidates are left standing. Ron DeSantis quits the race, how his decision could impact Donald Trump and Nikki Haley.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: All as Haley and Trump launching some of their sharpest personal attack lines yet. Haley questioning Trump's mental fitness, Trump defending mocking her name.

HARLOW: But Trump will ditch the campaign trail for the courtroom again today. The high stakes showdown that could happen in the defamation case against him, all of it this hour on CNN THIS MORNING.

CNN THIS MORNING is live in New Hampshire, and it is all on the line here one day before the primary. And we are in, I think, one of the best diners in New Hampshire.

HARLOW: The coffee says yes.

HARLOW: The coffee says yes. MaryAnn's Diner, thanks to them for having us.

Nikki Haley is the last Trump challenger left after Ron DeSantis has dropped out. The first polls open here in just 16 hours on the campaign trail. Nikki Haley is focusing her attacks on Trump's mental fitness after he confused Nikki Haley with Nancy Pelosi over and over again when talking about January 6th.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIKKI HALEY, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He claimed that Joe Biden was going to get us into World War II. I'm assuming he meant World War III. He said that he ran against President Obama. He never ran against President Obama. Don't be surprised if you have someone that's 80 in office, their mental stability is going to continue to decline.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: This morning Trump will once again be in court in New York City before heading back here to the granite state for a for a rally tonight. He is racking up endorsements from his former rivals with Ron DeSantis being just the latest to kiss the ring, I guess you could say. The latest CNN poll shows Trump widening his lead over Nikki Haley to double digits. He has been relentlessly attacking her on social media and the campaign trail.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Nikki Haley, I know her well.

(BOOS)

TRUMP: But she's made an unholy alliance with the RINOs, the never Trumpers, Americans for no prosperity, globalists, the radical left communists. And they want to get liberals and Biden supporters.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Kristen Holmes here with us now. Good morning. Thank you for joining. Did they give you some eggs yet?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Not yet. I just had a water because I think I overdid it on the coffee. So maybe eggs after that.

HARLOW: The very good coffee.

OK, so DeSantis is out. He immediately gets behind Trump. And what does this all mean for Trump, what does it mean for Nikki Haley here?

HOLMES: So I'm sure in terms of votes cast, it doesn't really mean anything. Trump's team had already seen this as a two-person race with Nikki Haley. They were putting out all of these ads attacking her, spending all their time hitting Nikki Haley. This changes with an endorsement. The endorsement gives Trump an opportunity to say, look, the Republican Party including this guy that I relentlessly attacked for the last year, is getting behind me because I'm supposed to be the nominee. And that is really what we heard from him last night. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Get your neighbors, get your family -- get everybody. You've got to vote, because we have to win by big margins. We have to let them know this is a movement.

Tomorrow, I go to that, I do the court thing, then I come back and I make a speech tomorrow night. And hopefully that should wrap it up because we're so far ahead, it's incredible.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: We have to win on Tuesday. You know Vivek just came with us. And now Ron just came with us. They are all coming with us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: So clearly there touting that endorsement, saying the party should get behind him.

The other thing is he talks about going to court. Again, this is all voluntary. He does not have to be in the courtroom. He is choosing every night that he is campaigning in New Hampshire to sleep in New York -- last week we saw the same thing -- then go to court the next day.

[08:05:02]

This is part of a larger campaign strategy. A lot of it is to take the oxygen out of the race. They know that there is a focus on the fact that former president is sitting in a courtroom. They want to take the oxygen out of the race and away from Nikki Haley the day before the votes are cast.

MATTINGLY: They've also had a very clever, and I think it has worked strategy, of he's above it, right? Like he's the Republican nominee, he is kind the incumbent. Everybody has coalesced. He doesn't need to do it. And that has also been drawn out in the vice presidential sweepstakes, which we have seen almost auditions here in the state, including a couple of people, very prominent supporters. Take a listen to what they've said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ELISE STEFANIK, (R-NY) REPUBLICAN CONFERENCE CHAIR: Of course I'd be honored. I've said that for a year to serve in the future Trump administration in any capacity. Right now, we have so much work to do.

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Would you like to be Donald Trump's running mate?

SEN. TIM SCOTT, (R-SC) FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The only thing I want is four more years of Donald Trump.

BASH: That wasn't a no. That door is wide open. Fair read?

SCOTT: Well, Dana, you could take it any way you want.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: The beauty of Dana Bash just being like no, no, I'm going to actually tell people what you are doing right here, which is leaving the door wide open. This is why I love her so much. Trump just a few moments ago on FOX News saying that DeSantis very unlikely to be a vice presidential pick, even a cabinet pick, as well. But those two, Elise Stefanik, Tim Scott, clearly in the running, fair?

HOLMES: I would say that right now it's very early. One of the things that Donald Trump likes to do is create his own media narrative, and he's doing that with these various people, essentially kind of hinting at that he's already chosen his V.P. I did think it was very interesting on FOX that he said absolutely no to DeSantis, because it gives you this idea of, even though DeSantis, who again, was ridiculed by Trump for an entire year and then got behind Trump, he's still essentially saying but he couldn't even serve in my cabinet or be a vice president. It's really just -- this is Donald Trump in peak Donald Trump, and you can see that he is obviously feeling the fact that he is getting all these endorsements.

But when it comes to V.P., here's what I've been told. There are no serious official conversations. Donald Trump will go into a room at any time and say to a group of people, what do you think about this person? Then they will talk about it. Next day, totally different person, different crowd. Asks questions. He likes to hear what everyone else thinks about everyone. But in terms of is there an official conversation happening? No. And I'm told that is because he is superstitious. He wants to win at least one more contest before his team actually starts actually having conversations and looking into that.

HARLOW: Fair enough. Kristen, thank you, appreciate it.

Even if Nikki Haley manages to have a strong enough showing to stay in the race, the road forward is unclear. While the current target Donald Trump, her ideal target a few months from now would be President Biden. Dana Bash spoke with Haley on Sunday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: We've heard you over and over in recent weeks on the campaign trail lumping Donald Trump and Joe Biden together. Do you believe that they are equally bad for America?

NIKKI HALEY, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's not even what I believe. It's what Americans believe.

BASH: What do you believe? Because you're the one who is saying that.

HALEY: I worry about the fact that they are so focused on investigations and things that they don't like, and focused on the past. When do you ever hear either one of them talk about the solutions of the future? I'm doing this because I don't want my kids to live like this. We have got to start looking forward. You've got a country in disarray, you've got a world on fire, and you are going to focus on people who hurt your feelings? You are going to focus on investigations that are involved with your families? You're going to focus on vengeance?

With me, it's no drama, it's no vendettas. It's just hard work. And it's making sure we're not thinking four and eight years. We're thinking 20 and 30 years out. That's what it should be. And we've lost that, we lost that long time ago. But we can get it back. And I'm going to prove every day to every American that they made the right decision when I get elected.

BASH: You don't want to go there on whether or not they are equally bad?

HALEY: If either one of them was good, I wouldn't be running. Yes, they are equally bad. That's why I'm running, it's because I don't think we need to have Biden or Trump. I don't think we need to have two 80-year-olds sitting in the White House when we've basically got to make sure that we can handle the war situation that we're in. We need to know that they are at the top of their game. We need to know that they can take care of our national security and our economy. Right now, I don't know that people feel like that with either one. So that's why we're giving them a choice.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: And CNN anchor and chief political correspondent Dana Bash joins us now. It's not why I said a nice thing about you earlier. I thought you were off set.

(LAUGHTER)

MATTINGLY: But I'm very pleased to see you.

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Thank you.

MATTINGLY: I thought it was a fascinating interview, the way your team also pulled it together, I think like that, right after DeSantis got out was quite impressive. Your sense, you've spoken to her a lot over the course of the last several months, this moment in time, she got the one-on-one race. At the same time, the Trump campaign puts out a memo last night, Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles, basically threatening her, like it's time for you to drop out if you don't win tonight or else we're going to destroy you essentially. What's her campaign feeling right now in this moment?

BASH: You know, it is a combination of relief because this really is the one-on-one race that she's been saying existed. Now it actually does exist.

[08:10:06]

Anxiety, anticipation, all the things that you would expect any campaign to feel no matter what the rest of the field would look like at this time. She -- I, actually, in that interview asked her whether or not she is absolutely going to stay in it, whether she will pledge to her fellow South Carolinians that she will stay in this race until South Carolina, which is in another month. And she said yes.

Now, to be fair, I don't know what I would expect her to say otherwise. She's not going to say nope, if I'm not going to do well here, I'm going to get out of the race. She can't say that right now. But the pressure is intense. And I do find it interesting that as the only woman in the race, this is where she leans into that. She'll say, well, the fellas didn't make it. I'm the one standing against Donald Trump. Or the fellas want me to get out of the race and I'm not going to do it. She plays into that idea without being -- she doesn't play into her sort of femininity, if you will, but she plays into that part of the gender issue which I find fascinating.

HARLOW: I think the way she's done that this entire campaign has been so fascinating.

BASH: Hasn't it?

HARLOW: It really has. What about the age argument? She's more than 20 years younger than both of them. She's been saying increasingly you don't want -- this is what you get when you have 80-year-olds in the White House or trying to be in the White House. Is that argument landing?

BASH: I will tell you that before the Ron DeSantis news broke, I was walking around talking to voters at the event where I interviewed her in Seabrook, here. And pretty much to a person the two reasons that I heard from voters about why almost all of said that they voted for Donald Trump here in 2016, why they are moving away from him, are age and chaos. So those two arguments that she is making over and over again, those are her two, sort of twin reasons right now for running. Those are her closing arguments. And I'm not sure if they are saying it because they like her and they are hearing it or she's saying it because she is hearing it from them.

But I will say she had an interesting supporter on the trail with her, Judge Judy. She flew up from Florida, and she has only endorsed one person, political person, ever in her life before and that was Michael Bloomberg. And I asked her why now and why Nikki Haley. Here is what she said. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDY SHEINDLIN, FORMER JUDGE, T.V. SHOW HOST: Joe Biden is now older. I'm not getting -- I won't get into it with you what everybody talks about with regard to his cognitive ability. But I know he's my age. And I said in my article, I run a big business. I'm the matriarch of a family of 20-plus. I make decisions that affect hundreds of people every day. I need a nap in the afternoon. So does Joe Biden. Probably two.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: That was just one of the many colorful things she said. We're going to play more of it on INSIDE POLITICS later. But it will be interesting to see what you guys think about her other reasons for supporting Nikki Haley.

HARLOW: We also need naps in the afternoon for other reasons.

(LAUGHTER)

BASH: Well, yes, I don't think she gets up at 2:00 in the morning like you guys do.

MATTINGLY: Can I ask you, we already used it earlier, but your interview with Tim Scott, which I think his endorsement, the timing of the endorsement, why, and his effusive endorsement in the way that he gave it, it's fascinating. Your conversation with him yesterday, what stood out to you?

BASH: Several things, but the largest is what you said, how incredibly effusive he is about Donald Trump, and really didn't want to show any daylight even on some of the most obvious things, like January 6th. And also, when he announced himself, because he, of course, did run for president, he talked about the idea that we need to not be so divisive, the victimhood, that kind of campaign needs to go away. It certainly seemed at the time he was talking about Donald Trump. When I played that soundbite for him, asked him about it, he suggested that it wasn't about Trump, it was about Biden. And that was very telling. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: And you don't see any grievance in Donald Trump's campaign for president?

SEN. TIM SCOTT, (R-SC): Well, here's what I can tell you. For a person who has seen the DOJ weaponized against him, for a person who before he was ever sworn into office, "The Washington Post" said they were going to make sure that he is a one-term president, when you look at the challenges he faced, there's no doubt that he's been aggrieved.

The question is, what are the American voters looking for? Here is what they are looking for. They are looking for a president who represents their best future and not his. That president is not Joe Biden. It is Donald Trump. (END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:15:00]

BASH: So every question I asked about Donald Trump, he turned it into Joe Biden, which is an art and it was a definite choice, but it certainly was very telling, first and foremost about Tim Scott and about where he wants to go in the future, but also about the larger Republican Party and where it is right now.

I will say quickly, Adam Kinzinger, I talked to him last night, and he said that listening to him actually hurt because they served together for so long in the House.

MATTINGLY: And he's such a different politician than Donald Trump.

BASH: Yes.

MATTINGLY: And he always has been.

It was great interview. We'll see more of your interview with Judge Judy later today on "Inside Politics."

BASH: Nice to see you.

MATTINGLY: Great to see, bud. Thanks for coming by.

BASH: Thank you, too.

HARLOW: Thank you, Dana.

MATTINGLY: Well, Donald Trump says he is retiring his nickname for Ron DeSantis, big moment, but he is defending mocking Nikki Haley's birth name.

HARLOW: We will ask former candidate turned Haley supporter, Asa Hutchinson about the attacks and why he thinks the GOP could be "headed toward a cliff."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know, Vivek, just came with us. And now Ron just came with us. They're all coming with us. They're all coming.

Senator Tim Scott, what a good guy. He came with us.

NIKKI HALEY (R), 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: And then you got Trump saying, oh, but look at all of these congressional endorsements I have. I don't want political. I don't want the political elite.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:20:01] MATTINGLY: CNN THIS MORNING is live in New Hampshire as Donald Trump

and Nikki Haley get personal attacking one another now that the race is indeed a one-on-one matchup.

Trump also defending mocking Haley's birth name.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: And with her, it's just something that came. It's a little bit of a takeoff on her name, you know her name, wherever she may come from.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Haley's family is from India. She has used her middle name for decades. But last week, Trump misspelled her birth name, it is Nimrata, and later referred to her as Nimbra. It is the same unequivocal dark racist dog whistle Trump has blown for years going back to when he emphasized former President Obama's middle name as Hussein. Trump says it's just good old fashioned name calling.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Well, I do that with a lot of people like Hutchinson, I mean, he was polling at zero for about one year. And I called him rather than Asa, I called him Ada Hutchinson. And, and it just felt good to me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Well, joining us now is Arkansas governor, ASA Hutchinson.

He endorsed Nikki Haley after finishing sixth in the Iowa caucuses ending his own 2024 campaign.

Governor, I appreciate your time this morning.

To start there, you know, as somebody who has been in politics a long time, has served both on the state level and the federal level as well. That's the Republican frontrunner by far talking about how he chooses nicknames for the people that he's running against.

What goes through your mind?

ASA HUTCHINSON (R), FORMER ARKANSAS GOVERNOR: I just love it when he owns up to it, that it's just old fashioned name calling, and it is rather sad in this political environment, and that's how I view it.

Now, the sad thing for our country is, is when he engages in name calling to our foreign leaders, and nothing is going to stop with him.

And so, you know, he looks at the race today. He tries to drive everyone out, which is his right, but I'm honored today to say I'm supporting Nikki Haley for president of the United States, and I think that Donald Trump is a candidate that's going to drive the GOP off the cliff. I'm proud of Nikki Haley for raising the issue as the weaknesses of

his candidacy and the risks that he poses to our country and party. So I think this is going to be a good fight. I am pulling for Nikki in New Hampshire.

MATTINGLY: Do you think that her message should have gotten sharper earlier on those specific issues? There's no question, it shifted over the course of the last couple of days, but you had been talking about these same issues for months on end. Did she wait too long?

HUTCHINSON: Well, I mean, you can't complain about her strategy. She was the second person in the race right after Donald Trump and she survived 15 others. So I would say, hats off to her on her strategy.

Clearly, I started earlier, in terms of pointing out the risk of a Donald Trump candidacy. She has tightened and strengthened that message, particularly in the last month, and she's right on target.

And so she has survived. It is a one-on-one race now, and she has got to show the contrast, but the reasons, the reasons that she is the right one to lead our country, and I think she's doing a very, very good job of it with her global experience, but also, she has been a governor and I always want to support somebody who has been a governor to lead our country.

MATTINGLY: I was struck you had an interview with POLITICO where you said that you believe even this year, there's still a significant chance that the Republican Party will have to abandon Donald Trump.

You were on the campaign trail, I'm struck what you saw that makes you think that, which is so disconnected with what I think everybody else is seeing right now.

HUTCHINSON: Well, I think that's a good point, and you look at Donald Trump's candidacy, it's almost like he is nervous that he can't wrap this up quickly.

And so he's in a desperate situation to wrap it up quickly because the longer this extends, the more at risk he is. And so as you move into later this year, spring and then summer, you're going to see his candidacy weaken and not strengthen.

And so, this is not just a one-on-one contest now, but it's a survivability race and Nikki needs to be committed not just in South Carolina, but beyond that, because Donald Trump's candidacy is going to weaken as we go forward with more and more court cases, a realization that the American public and the Republican Party can't win with him.

He has lost three races.

MATTINGLY: Right.

HUTCHINSON: And now we're going to be saddled with his candidacy again if Nikki Haley is not successful. MATTINGLY: I do want to ask you before I let you go, you got a phone

call from the White House chief-of-staff, Jeff Zients related to a tweet. I'm not trying to take a shot at the DNC social media staffer, but the tweet which attacked you when you dropped out or kind of mocked you to some degree.

Jeff Zients picked up the phone called you. What was that conversation like?

[08:25:02]

HUTCHINSON: Well, it was a very gracious apology on behalf of the White House for something that was totally out of line and unnecessary. I accepted it.

I actually think that's a good moment in in American politics that you can have that kind of exchange and move on. And so I hope it's an example that we don't have to demonize each other and hopefully, we can recognize that we're all in this fight to try to save our country, even though we have serious, serious policy differences. Let's move on and let's see if we can do better together in a civil atmosphere.

MATTINGLY: Yes, civil atmosphere and a discussion about policy. What a novel concept. I'm here for it.

Governor Asa Hutchinson, always appreciate your time, sir. Thanks so much.

HUTCHINSON: Great to be with you. Thank you.

MATTINGLY: And tonight on "Laura Coates Live," an exclusive interview with Vice President Kamala Harris on the state of the presidential race and President Biden's plan to win that second term. You can watch it tonight live at 11:00 PM Eastern on CNN.

HARLOW: Donald Trump once again today will be in the courtroom. He will be back in New Hampshire tonight, but he is going to spend his day in the courtroom. A big question is whether he will testify in this defamation case brought by writer, E. Jean Carroll.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: Welcome back to MaryAnn's Diner, New Hampshire where the coffee is --

MATTINGLY: Excellent.

HARLOW: Excellent and the eggs, I think smell pretty good. We'll have to see.

Former President Trump though taking a detour from this critical primary state today and he is going to be in the courtroom in New York City for the E. Jean Carroll defamation case against him. Big question is, if he is going to take the stand and testify.

[08:30:19]