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Republican Congressman Comments on Harris; Mar McKinnon is Interviewed about Biden's Exit; Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) is Interviewed about Harris. Aired 6:30-7a ET
Aired July 23, 2024 - 06:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[06:30:00]
DEREK VAN DAM, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Of rain coming your way.
Kasie.
KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: All right, Derek Van Dam for us this morning.
Derek, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
VAN DAM: All right.
HUNT: All right, coming up here, still ahead on CNN THIS MORNING.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're full of (EXPLETIVE DELETED) today. You're just being completely dishonest.
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HUNT: The director of the Secret Service getting grilled on Capitol Hill by lawmakers in both parties.
Plus, we look back at the, well, shall we say, dramatic consequences of the CNN debate less than one month ago.
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[06:35:37]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. TIM BURCHETT (R-TN): Biden said - first off he said he's going to hire a - a black female for vice president and that not - just - he just skipped over - what about - what about white females? What about any other group? It just - when you go down that route, you - you - you take mediocrity. And that's what they have right now as a vice president.
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So, are you suggesting she's - she was a DEI hire?
BURCHETT: One hundred percent she was a DEI hire.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: OK. Our panel is back.
Elliot Williams.
ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes. You know, well, look, he's - he's on to something. He's on to something insofar as it's really troubling that a candidate is led by someone who got into law school partly on the basis of gender and a number of characteristics about them that bumped their chance - oh, wait, that's J.D. Vance. I'm sorry. J.D. Vance, by virtue of being from a diverse part of the country, a first generation college student, and right now male, all would necessarily have - have helped his chances of getting in. That's diversity and DEI when you use the term. The consideration of people's backgrounds in their advancement.
And so, this whole debate is sort of nonsense. It's a slur. It's a buzzword. He knew exactly what he was doing.
KAREN FINNEY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, it's a bullhorn, I would say.
WILLIAMS: Yes. Yes. It's not a dog whistle, it's a bullhorn.
FINNEY: To - it's a bullhorn.
WILLIAMS: Right.
FINNEY: And, I mean, and it's offensive. And again, I think what we're going to see is an effort to try - on the part of the GOP to draw Democrats into this kind of argument and this sort of, you know, let's talk about culture wars and let's talk about racism instead of the issues. They would rather see us defending them and having a conversation about that than - than the issues.
But it's also - let's be honest what it is. It is the - it is othering. It is a way to undermine her credibility, her intelligence. I mean we see this with women, candidates of color, all the time. So - and I don't think it's going away. I think Donald Trump is not going to be able to help himself. And that's mild.
HUNT: Well, yes. I mean, and -
FINNEY: Based on where I think we'll be in a couple weeks.
HUNT: Well, to that point, let me see if I have it here. The - the - our friends over at "The New York Times" write this. This is Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swan. "Mr. Trump, for his part, has been trying to soften some of his harshest rhetoric about seeking vengeance on his rivals ahead of the general election. But over many years, he has turned off a sizable proportion of college educated voters and suburban women with his rhetoric on gender and race. And the Harris candidacy introduces the risk of Mr. Trump lashing out at her and further alienating those voters." And I had one person who used to work for Trump who emailed me and said, this is just going to play right to the worst of his instincts.
MIKE DUBKE, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: So, let me jump into this pool again.
There is a - first of all, I think when you see these twits (ph), it's clickbait. Again, we talked about words matter and context matters and all of that. So, I think for these members of Congress, they're using the - they're saying these things to a certain extent for clickbait.
More importantly though, and this is a debate that's really happening in corporate America and other places in America, where you're seeing ESG, DEI, this language, these - these acronyms kind of lose some of their luster because there's been a bit of an overreach in terms of where they affect everyday Americans in terms of the hiring process and other things. So, I think you're seeing a cultural backlash against this language. And with that, I think the Republicans are trying to take advantage of, you know, companies are doing away with the term DEI. They're now talking diversity. They're doing away with the term ESG and they're talking about other parts of environmental concern.
So, I - you know, again, language matters, words matter. This is a bit of clickbait.
WILLIAMS: Yes.
DUBKE: But there is an open debate in this country -
WILLIAMS: Sure.
DUBKE: About whether or not we've gone too far to the other side.
WILLIAMS: Let me - let me - (INAUDIBLE). But I think it's chicken and egg because folks turned those acronyms into slurs and buzzwords. No one in America, I assure you, can tell you - many people cannot say what DEI stands for or what it represents in workplaces and businesses and so on. A lot of people probably couldn't tell you what CRT, critical race theory, stands for, but right away opponents found a way to sort of turn this into a buzz word. The don't say gay bill on the left, never says -
HUNT: I was going to say, let's say Ron DeSantis, right?
WILLIAMS: Right. So, all of the above.
HUNT: I mean that has been the focus of a lot of this.
WILLIAMS: And so it's - this is - this is your world. It's communications strategy, right?
DUBKE: Well, this is my - this is my point, though, words matter, acronyms matter. Acronyms can be turned into weapons.
[06:40:01] And, in this case, that's -
WILLIAMS: But it - but - but I - but when I say chicken and egg, it's sort of - it's not necessarily always the left weaponizing it. I think the folks who were opponents were very, very successful at turning these things into problems.
FINNEY: Yes.
HUNT: Yes.
WILLIAMS: Yes.
HUNT: I mean, look, this is a debate, discussion now we're going to be having basically every morning.
WILLIAMS: Yes. (INAUDIBLE).
FINNEY: Yes.
DUBKE: Yes.
HUNT: So, welcome to it.
WILLIAMS: See you tomorrow. Right.
HUNT: Still ahead here on CNN THIS MORNING, we're going to be joined live by Senator Chris Coons to discuss his party's whirlwind the last 36 hours.
Plus, Kamala Harris' presidential campaign getting the Beyonce treatment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And I'm going to continue to move until we get the total ban on the - the - the total initiative relative to what we're going to do with more border patrol and more asylum officers.
JAKE TAPPER, MODERATOR: President Trump.
DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT AND 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I really don't know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don't think he knows what he said either.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[06:45:02]
HUNT: Moments like that one on the CNN debate stage in Atlanta sent the Democratic Party into a tailspin, nearly, but not yet, one month ago. The lead-up to the debate was being billed as a make-or-break moment for Biden's struggling campaign. And, of course, we now have the answer. It was break.
Joining me now, Mark McKinnon, former adviser to George W. Bush and John McCain.
Mark, always grateful to have you, in no small part because before the debate you wrote something right along these lines in "Vanity Fair." You said this, quote, "if Biden goes down in this first match, Democratic bedwetting could become a firehose. And I know it's not the strategy that team Biden intends, but under this scenario, there really could be a mass cry among delegates and party mandarins for a plan B at the convention."
Well, we have not even gotten to the convention, and all of that, which you wrote, has come to pass.
Honestly, I'd just like to hear kind of what you think about both what we saw from the president, but also kind of the way Harris has really stepped in so efficiently in the ensuing 48 hours.
MARK MCKINNON, CREATOR AND CO-HOST, "THE CIRCUS" ON SHOWTIME: It's really amazing, isn't it, Kasie? I mean the other thing I wrote is that it could be the most consequential debate in American history. And there's no question that it - that it was.
You know, the first campaign I ever did was with James Carville 40 years ago. And last fall in the last episode of "The Circus," I interviewed him - or we interviewed him and he said that the era of strategic certainty is over, and he predicted - he said the only thing I'll predict is a year from now we'll look back and say, God damn, I didn't see that one coming.
So, here we are. and this is - it's a really exciting time for the country and especially for Democrats, obviously, because now they're enthusiastic. And that was the big problem for Democrats really. They had a 25-point enthusiasm gap. And for those of us who do campaigns, we know that's - that's a really important metric. Your base, your supporters have to be excited about voting. And as much as people liked and respected Joe Biden, they weren't excited. And they're excited now.
HUNT: Yes, it's - I mean it's a great point. It's really fundamental.
Mark, I mean, one of the things that we have been talking so much about, I mean, and it speaks to the excitement and why there's excitement in the Democratic base, but it also kind of previews the dark campaign to come, and that's race, which is already - you know, we just played comments from Congressman Tim Burchett, who called Vice President Harris a DEI hire. There was a moment at the J.D. Vance rally yesterday where he said that he doesn't feel that Kamala Harris is - you know, regularly express gratitude for America in the way she talks.
And then there was this moment where he talked about Diet Mountain Dew and also racism. Just watch it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) J.D. VANCE (R-OH), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Democrats say that it is racist to believe - well, they say it's racist to do anything. I had a Diet Mountain Dew yesterday and one today. I'm sure they're going to call that racist too, but - it's good. I love you guys.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: So, there were some pleased clap vibes. I sort of hate to do this to you, but let's just recall, like, what happened with Jeb back in the day.
Watch this.
MCKINNON: Yes. Yes. PTSD. Jeb Bush.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEB BUSH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE (February 5, 2016): The next president needs to be a lot quieter, but send a signal that we're prepared to act in the national security interests of this country, to get back in the business of creating a more peaceful world.
Please clap.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Obviously a funny moment there worth reliving just because. But, I mean, look, tell me what you think about what Vance is doing there. I mean this is going to be - Trump has been firmly on this terrain before. I think we have seen how he's handled it. I have talked to Republicans who are concerned about his inability to not go there. This is new territory for J.D. Vance, and he clearly is already struggling with it a little bit.
MCKINNON: Yes, really cringe - cringe moment there. And it testifies to what we're hearing more and more of, which is that the Trump campaign is really having second thoughts about J.D. Vance. He was the guy that they picked when they - they all assumed that Biden was going to be the nominee and they thought that they were in a comfortable position, they could double down and pick a guy who would be very popular with the MAGA base. But he doesn't - there's no addition in the J.D. Vance equation. He doesn't add any voters. He doesn't expand the tent at all. And in fact, he contracts that tent by doing this sort of comments like that about DEI with the race-baiting on dog whistles.
This is really problematic, I think, for the campaign. I - listen, I think that despite the, you know, the history that Americans are more than prepared to not only vote for a black candidate, as they proved with Barack Obama, but for a woman, I think they're anxious to. And I think they're ready to.
And so, I think taking the - I think it's a real mistake for the Trump campaign to go there. I think the place they ought to go is just to say it's Joe Biden times two.
[06:50:03]
That, you know, Joe Biden was old and out of touch. Kamala Harris is just younger, but she's more out of touch. And I think keep it on the border issues, on policy issues, like inflation. But to go to DEI and that territory, I think it's a huge mistake.
HUNT: Mark, very briefly, I just want to ask you the question, since you've done this so much that members of my family are asking me, which is, do you think Kamala Harris can win this election?
MCKINNON: I do absolutely. I mean I think, first of all, I'll say the obvious, which is, she's got a much better shot than Joe Biden.
And listen, you can just feel it in the last 24 hours. The one thing about Kamala Harris that I'll say is that I think she is a way undervalued stock. I think people kind of heard all this negative stuff about her. And you've seen her. And, listen, she's a - she's a performer. Man, you don't get to be the attorney general of the United States and the vice president of the United States by - by not having some really good chops. And she's, you know, just gotten better and better and better. And I just think that she's come out of the gate really fast, really hard. And you can really feel the excitement in the Democratic Party. So, I think she's going to weigh exceed expectations and I think she's absolutely got a shot.
HUNT: All right, Mark McKinnon, always grateful to have you, sir. Thank you so much for your time.
MCKINNON: Yes, Kasie, thank you.
HUNT: All right, 50 minutes past the hour, here is your morning roundup.
Donald Trump's lawyers trying to get his $454 million civil fraud penalty thrown out. In an appeal filed this week they argue the case should be thrown out because the allegations are too old. New York's Court of Appeals could take up the case as soon as September.
And this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT AND 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is going to be one of the greatest rounds of golf ever played.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Donald Trump finally getting his golf tournament. Not going to be against Joe Biden though. Today, Trump will challenge 2024 U.S. Open golf champion Bryson Dechambeau. The two men will try to score less than 50 from the shortest tee boxes over 18 holes. Dechambeau says he invited both Trump and Biden to play.
Well, I guess this - this is another thing that underscores how the race on the 2024 campaign trail has changed. No more talk about handicaps.
Anyway. Vice President Kamala Harris made her first visit to campaign headquarters in Delaware since becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee. And she offered the sharp contrast Democrats have been demanding between her and Donald Trump. Harris also received a phone call from Biden, who delivered this message directly to Harris and staff that was working for him, and now working for her.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I want to say to the team, embrace her. She's the best.
I know yesterday's news was surprising and hard for you to hear, but it was the right thing to do.
I'm watching you, kid. I'm watching you, kid. I love you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: OK, joining me now, Democratic Senator Chris Coons of Delaware.
Senator, always wonderful to see you. Thank you so much for being here.
SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE): Thanks, Kasie. Great to be on with you.
It was great to be in that room yesterday here in Wilmington, Delaware, where Vice President Harris and First - Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff came and fired up the crowd, got the campaign team here in Wilmington excited for the path ahead and where President Biden called in and spoke with everybody, engaged them, challenged them, and got them excited about supporting our nominee -
HUNT: Yes.
COONS: Our most likely nominee for president, Kamala Harris.
HUNT: So, Senator, you did, I will say, tell ABC News back right after the June presidential debate that you thought that President Biden was, quote, "the only Democrat who can beat Donald Trump," end quote. Would you like to revise and extend those remarks?
COONS: I would welcome a chance to revise and extend those remarks, because underlying that was my confidence that the record that President Biden and Vice President Harris have built over the last three-and-a-half years is the strongest legislative record of any first term presidency in my lifetime.
And Kamala Harris was right beside Joe Biden every step of the way as they strengthened NATO, as they came up with creative and powerful combinations of allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific, as they got to the president's desk legislative accomplishments that reduce the price of prescription drugs, that invested in the fight against climate change, that made our communities safer with strong gun safety legislation. I will say that on every one of those core points, Vice President Harris will continue, will get the job done, and, Donald Trump, the former president, will roll it back.
Donald Trump and JD Vance don't think climate change is real and they will reverse the progress we've made under Biden-Harris.
HUNT: All right.
COONS: They've made it clear that they will revert the reduction in prescription drug prices and that they will reverse the investments that have been made in reducing student loan debt and investing in our infrastructure and manufacturing, and in making us stronger on the world stage.
HUNT: Sir -
[06:55:06]
COONS: By choosing a vice presidential pick in JD Vance, who doesn't believe we should fight for Ukraine's freedom, Donald Trump's made it clear the direction he would take us on the world stage.
HUNT: Yes.
COONS: By standing next to and working alongside Biden, Vice President Harris has made it clear she would continue his direction of making us stronger and safer around the world.
HUNT: I appreciate your on message delivery here, sir.
I do want to ask you, though -
COONS: It's early. Come on. Don't laugh (INAUDIBLE).
HUNT: You know I love having you on the show very much. But, look, I want to ask you, we know that the - one of the principle lines of attacks, and I've talked to sources who say the polling shows this is a serious vulnerability, that Republicans are going to say that Kamala Harris knew that President Biden wasn't up to four more years. I mean they would say that about you, I think, as well. And they're going to allege a coverup. They're going to say, she knew. She covered it up.
How do you answer that charge considering what we have seen transpire over the last month?
COONS: First, I think it's B.S. Second, I don't think it's particularly relevant, because what the American people are going to be looking at in November is Donald Trump versus Kamala Harris. And that is a fundamentally different race going forward and a different electoral challenge and a different direction for the American people than we were looking at before.
Vice President Harris is a generation younger than Donald Trump. She's younger by 20 years. She has energy, engagement, and enthusiasm. She's got a record of accomplishment as an elected prosecutor, the attorney general of our largest state, as vice president alongside Joe Biden.
And let's look at what's just happened. Donald Trump had to go find a new vice presidential candidate in JD because his vice president from his first term and his chief of staff and his secretary of defense, and his national security adviser from Trumps' first term -
HUNT: Yes.
COONS: All (INAUDIBLE) wants nowhere near the White House. Joe Biden will be running for and campaigning for his vice president. I never saw any episode or incident with Joe Biden as we saw on that debate stage. I don't think that there is a huge coverup underway here. And I, frankly, don't think that matters to the discussion and the debate going forward because, as she said here on this stage in Wilmington, engaging with this excited and fired-up campaign team, this is going to be the prosecutor against the felon.
HUNT: Yes. All right.
COONS: As the attorney general of California, Kamala Harris had quite a strong record, going after fraudsters, cheaters, and, frankly, predators. And Donald Trump has been held liable in a court of law for commercial fraud, for his Trump University -
HUNT: Yes.
COONS: For his ways in which he defrauded loans and lenders, and for sexual assault.
HUNT: All right.
COONS: I think the contrast here going forward on who's truthful and who's a convict is going to be sharp.
HUNT: All right, Senator Chris Coons, I'm coming up against the top of the hour, but I'm very grateful to have you. Thank you so much for your time.
COONS: Thank you, Kasie.
HUNT: See you soon.
All right. So, I want to turn to something now that I tend to love about both baseball and politics. What is your walk-up song? We learned Kamala Harris' yesterday. Here was her campaign anthem of choice.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BEYONCE, MUSICIAN (singing): Freedom, cut me loose. Freedom. Freedom. Where are you? Cause I need freedom too.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Harris making her big entrance at campaign HQ to Beyonce's "Freedom." The popstar gave approval to Harris to use the song throughout her presidential campaign. The VP's walked out, coinciding with another pop culture phenomenon. The Harris campaign is embracing Charli XCX's "Brat" album. I - I'll be candid. I had to ask about this. After the singer posted that Kamala is a, quote, "brat," TikTok has been swarmed with Kamala edits like this one.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 360 (INAUDIBLE) you see.
KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE U.S. (D) AND U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE).
HARRIS: Youth (ph) exists in the context (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Six, six, six with a princess tree. I'm everywhere (INAUDIBLE).
HARRIS: Of all in that you live and what came to be (ph).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARRIS: OK, is there anyone on this set who is able to explain this to me?
DUBKE: I will say this, I - I'm more Brat pack than Brat summer.
FINNEY: oh.
DUBKE: But what it - I had to ask as well. What it strikes me as, as I understand what Brat summer is, it's an excuse for making mistakes during your summer - during your summer between school. So, if that's what, you know, they want to push out there, that's what they're pushing out there.
HUNT: I'm, unfortunately, too lost to have a good response.
Elliot.
FINNEY: I thought it was just fun, though, to show that like it's culture. Like, this is - you know -
DUBKE: Yes.
FINNEY: Culture sort of said like, we embrace her.
[07:00:02]
Let's have some fun with this.
HUNT: I do you think there's some here - some there there -
WILLIAMS: Yes.
HUNT: In terms of how she is in this space in a way that a lot of political candidates, politicians are just not.
WILLIAMS: Absolutely. And sort of - in a very online gen x. And that's their appeal. HUNT: Z. Z. Not x.
FINNEY: Z. Z.
WILLIAMS: I - for the - I am - as you can see, I am not cool at all.
DUBKE: I'm - I'm gen x.
FINNEY: Yes, me too.
WILLIAMS: No, no, no, no, as am I. As am I. As am I.
DUBKE: Yes, so -
WILLAIMS: But, look, I am not cool at all. I knew the Brat thing because there's an "Atlantic" article on the rise of the Brats starting with Sabrina Carpenter (ph).
FINNEY: It's not the Brat. It's Brat.
HUNT: It's Brat.
FINNEY: Just Brat. The Brat. B-r-a-t.
(CROSS TALK)
WILLIAMS: You know what I meant.
HUNT: OK.
FINNEY: You've got to say it right if you're going to -
DUBKE: And someone's staying quite through all of this.
(CROSS TALK)
HUNT: It's 7:00.
DUBKE: Very certainly staying quite.
HUNT: All right. Thank you, guys, very much. Thanks to you for joining us. I'm Kasie Hunt. Don't go anywhere, "CNN NEWS CENTRAL" starts right now.
[07:00:00]
