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CNN This Morning
Harris Rehearses with Trump Stand-Ins; Vance on How He Would Have Handled 2020 Election Results; Trump and Harris Debate in Philadelphia. Aired 6:30-7a ET
Aired September 10, 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]
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JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, "JIMMY KIMMEL TONIGHT!": Harris has been doing highly choreographed rehearsals with a stage and replica TV lighting and an adviser in full Lee Strasberg method acting mode playing the part of Donald Trump. I don't know, is she trying to win an election or a Tony Award here? Because, how can you possibly prepare to debate Donald Trump? This is a man who, if he doesn't like the direction a hurricane is going, just draws a new hurricane on the map. You can't debate that.
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KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: Paging Philippe Reines, he is actually really good at getting into character. As she, Kamala Harris, gets ready for one of the most important nights of her short campaign, Kamala Harris expects to defend herself from personal attacks from a man that, until tonight, she has never actually met before.
In a new interview, Harris says she's preparing for a debate against Donald Trump that could turn ugly.
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KAMALA HARRIS, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT AND U.S. PRESIDENTIAL DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE: He plays from this really old and tired playbook, right, where he -- there's no floor for him in terms of how little he will go. And we should be prepared for that. We should be prepared for the fact that he is not burdened by telling the truth.
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HUNT: Joining me now to discuss, Maryland's democratic governor, Wes Moore, who is of course supporting the Harris-Walz campaign. Governor, as someone with an O's mug on the desk every morning, I'm very grateful to have you in a nonpartisan way representing the State of Maryland. Go O's, and as we head towards the post season.
GOV. WES MOORE (D-MD), AUTHOR, "THE OTHER WES MOORE": Go, O's.
HUNT: But look, I want to start with what has become a tough question for Kamala Harris, which we've learned from this New York Times poll, 30 percent of Americans say, we want to learn more about her. We don't know enough. So, my question for you is, is Kamala Harris a progressive or a centrist?
MOORE: I think Kamala Harris is someone who knows how to get things done, you know. And I have to tell you, I have better chance of seeing that firsthand.
HUNT: But is she going to get progressive or centrist things done?
MOORE: Well, I think that if you look at the work and the product that she has not only accomplished as the vice president for the Biden-Harris campaign, but also, the things that she has said that she wants to be able to get done, you know, talking about a $6,000 child tax credit, that could have one of the largest impacts on child poverty that our country has ever seen.
You know, when she's talking about things like being able to increase liquidity and capital to small businesses and being able to increase the number of minority-owned businesses and women-owned businesses and getting our economy going.
[06:35:00]
When she's talking about actually not giving away tax breaks and tax giveaways to billionaires, but also -- but actually giving a middle- class tax cut. She's talking about practical things that actually have data behind them to show that it actually creates economic momentum. And I think that's the kind of future that she wants to lead us towards.
HUNT: Let me show you something that Bernie Sanders, who, of course, is a very progressive, senator from Vermont, had to say over the weekend on Meet the Press. Let's watch what Sanders said.
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SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): No, I don't think she's abandoning her ideals. I think she's trying to be pragmatic and doing what she thinks is right in order to win the election. My own view is slightly different.
KRISTEN WELKER, HOST, NBC MEET THE PRESS: Do you still consider Vice President Kamala Harris to be progressive, Senator?
SANDERS: I do. Her views are not mine, but I do consider her progressive.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: So, Bernie Sanders says he does consider her a progressive. Is that helpful and do you agree?
MOORE: You know, I don't think that it's helpful to put her or any person into a box as to where they are. I mean, I -- when I ran for governor, I'd never run for office before in my life. And people said, well, are you a progressive? Are you with this? And I said, I'm a person who believes that we need to have accountability and supports when it comes to public safety, and I'm a person who believes that we need to give second chances. And I signed the largest pardon, 175,000 pardons in the history of this country for cannabis convictions.
You know, I don't know how putting her into a box or a classification is useful. I think she is someone who believes in getting big things done, being able to build the right kind of coalitions in order to do it, and actually building an economy that serves everybody, and not just some.
HUNT: Governor, what do you see as the reason behind why, in particular, young African American men, and also Hispanic men seem to be supporting Donald Trump in bigger numbers than -- or supporting the Republican candidate in bigger numbers than they have in past elections, and what do you think Harris needs to do tonight to speak to them?
MOORE: Well, I think the skepticism that you see amongst many, you know, young African American men and many Latino men as well, it's not something unique to this moment, frankly. I think it's a long-term skepticism that people have about a larger system. And actually, I don't see this this larger infuse that's going towards Donald Trump.
I think the biggest question is, are we going to get people mobilized to vote in the first place? Are we going to get them engaged in a way where they feel like they are part of a larger solution and not just simply a problem that people are trying to solve for?
And I think the only way that you do that is, you have to be able to engage. You have to actually be able to go where people are. And you have to be able to present a future that they are seen in that future, creating pathways for work and wages and wealth for them and their families, creating pathways where you're creating real economic opportunities for people. That's the way you're going to engage African American voters. It's where you're going to engage African American men. It's where you're going to engage men of color.
But you're not going to do it by making trite statements like, well, I'm a felon. So, therefore, you wonder -- I understand your pain. That's not the way you're going to move people, but we've got to get people from going from the sidelines to actually saying we want to be actively engaged in this election process.
HUNT: All right. Maryland Governor Wes Moore, so grateful to have you on the show. I hope you'll come back and I hope to see you at Camden Yards.
MOORE: I will, Kasie.
HUNT: Ideally in October.
MOORE: You know you will. In the World Series. That's right.
HUNT: All right. Thanks very much, Governor. I appreciate it.
MOORE: Thank you. HUNT: All right. Our panel's going to turn now to this, Republican Vice-Presidential Candidate J. D. Vance, appearing on the All-In podcast, arguing that Former Vice President Mike Pence could have done more to address what he said were, quote, "problems with the 2020 election." Asked multiple times whether he would have certified the election results, Vance went on to say this.
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SEN. JD VANCE (R-OH), REPUBLICAN VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I would have asked the states to submit alternative slates of electors and let the country have the debate about what actually matters and what kind of an election that we have --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You wouldn't have certified?
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HUNT: That is an incredible moment right there from J. D. Vance, Mark McKinnon.
MARK MCKINNON, CREATOR, "THE CIRCUS" AND FORMER ADVISER TO GEORGE W. BUSH AND JOHN MCCAIN: Here's the problem with J. D. Vance. Just in the last couple of days he's been echoing and touting the story about immigrants eating pets.
HUNT: Yes, we have a whole segment on that coming up. Yes. Continue.
MCKINNON: Well, OK --
KAREN FINNEY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: To be clear, black immigrants eat pets.
MCKINNON: But my point about it is that he is echoing what they said in the 2020 election, which is, instead of, like, getting to the truth, they said, oh, we hear it from people, so that's why I'm saying it. I'm hearing it from constituents. Your job as a leader is not to report what you're hearing from constituents, it's to tell constituents what the facts are. And that's what Mike Pence did well.
HUNT: So, where did those constituents hear it?
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ALEX THOMPSON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST AND NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, AXIOS: And this is why Trump picked J. D. Vance. That clip right there is exactly why he is now at the top of the ticket, because Trump, who is not over 2020, who really -- if you really listen to him, does not believe he lost that election and believes that Mike Pence is part of the reason he did lose the election. He wants someone like J. D. Vance, who will do his bidding.
Now, one underappreciated, you know, accomplishment of the Biden administration is that they did reform the Electoral Count Act, which is the loophole that the Trump team was trying to use probably, you know, unconstitutionally, but that has been reformed to avoid that scenario next time.
HUNT: I want to show you -- this is out this morning from the Lincoln Project. First hear that it's a new ad that they're putting out. They're obviously very focused on this specific issue as it relates to the election. And here's how they compare vice presidents in this ad. Watch.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In 2020, they met in a historic debate.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please welcome California Senator Kamala Harris and Vice President Mike Pence.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But today, for the first time in history, the two participants of a vice presidential debate agree on one basic fact --
MIKE PENCE, FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: I cannot in good conscience endorse Donald Trump in this campaign.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mike Pence joins another Republican vice president, Dick Cheney, in saying he cannot support Donald Trump. It's time to put country first. America or Trump?
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HUNT: I mean, Brad Todd, it is a remarkable confluence to have the current vice-presidential Republican nominee saying that he would have let Congress consider to including one fraudulent slate of electors, and you have Dick Cheney, Mike Pence on the same page against Donald Trump.
BRAD TODD, PARTNER, ONMESSAGE INC. AND CO-AUTHOR, THE GREAT REVOLT: This is a big trap for Donald Trump tonight. Every candidate that has a blind spot and they have a trap, electoral trap that they just cannot let go of that hurts them in the election. If Donald Trump is looking in the rear-view mirror at 2020, he's going to lose.
He has to confront Kamala Harris on her leftism. She's been left her entire career. He has to make that the entire focus of the debate tonight. And I think that's one of the big questions for him.
HUNT: All right. Coming up next here on CNN This Morning, we just mentioned this claim that is flying around about immigrants eating pets. We're going to dig into how disinformation took off online somehow became an issue in the campaign.
Plus, I will speak with Lara Trump, the co-chair of the Republican National Committee, ahead of the one and only debate, we think, maybe, between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. A night almost certain to feature contentious moments.
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HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: You talked about Ronald Reagan being a transformative political leader. I did not mention his name.
BARACK OBAMA, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Your husband did.
CLINTON: Well, I'm here. He's not.
OBAMA: OK. Well, I can't tell who I'm running against sometimes now.
CLINTON: You know, well --
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[06:45:00]
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DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT AND REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I just won two club championships, not even senior, two regular club championships. To do that, you have to be quite smart and you have to be able to hit the ball a long way, and I do it. He doesn't do it. He can't hit a ball 50 yards.
JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: I'm happy to play golf if you carry your own bag. Think you can do it?
D. TRUMP: That's the biggest lie. He's a six handicap of all.
BIDEN: I want eight handicapped. Eight --
D. TRUMP: I've seen your swing. I know your swing.
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HUNT: OK. That was how Donald Trump responded when he was asked about his capabilities to serve another term back in June. But without an 81-year-old Joe Biden to face off against, Trump's age could be in the spotlight tonight. He is the oldest candidate on the stage by 19 years. He will be tasked with not only demonstrating his own fitness, but also appealing to younger voters, a group that Harris has made some gains with.
Joining me now to discuss how the former president is preparing for tonight's debate is Lara Trump. She is the co-chair of the Republican National Committee, also Donald Trump's daughter-in-law. Lara, good morning. Thanks so much for being here.
LARA TRUMP, CO-CHAIR, REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE: Thanks, Kasie. Great to be back with you.
HUNT: So, let's start with how the former president is preparing, especially considering there is a very significant contrast here in the age of these two candidates. And, they've never actually met in person. Should we expect some of the personal attacks we have seen him make online show up in person on the stage tonight? L. TRUMP: Well, I think Donald Trump is very focused on this debate tonight. He knows how important it is. He doesn't take anything for granted. He has been preparing for this debate. He's done traditional debate prep, but he also, Kasie, has been out talking with the media, whether that's in town halls. He did a town hall last year here on CNN. Whether it's in press conferences where he fields questions from every reporter or whether it's in the podcast or sit-down interviews that he continues to do.
He wants to engage more with the public, not less. And it is a stark contrast, of course, to what we've seen from Kamala Harris. So, she has really upped the stakes for herself in this debate. I think that many people already know who Donald Trump is, and they can harken back to how their life felt when he was in office.
And so, he's prepared for this debate. He's ready for tonight, and he's ready to talk about why your life was better when he was in office and why would you want to vote for four more years of what we're in right now, which is what you're going to get with Kamala Harris.
HUNT: So, speaking of how people's lives could be better, the former president was asked when he was giving a speech earlier this month about child care. I want to play the answer that he gave there and then I'll ask you about it on the other side. Let's watch.
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D. TRUMP: I have to stay with child care. I want to stay with child care. But those numbers are small relative to the kind of economic numbers that I'm talking about, including growth, but growth also headed up by what the plan is that I just told you about. We're going to be taking in trillions of dollars, and as much as childcare is talked about as being expensive, it's, relatively speaking, not very expensive compared to the kind of numbers we'll be taking in.
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[06:50:00]
HUNT: So, there seemed to be a lot of Americans who were confused by what he said there. What would Donald Trump do to make child care more affordable?
L. TRUMP: Yes, there's no doubt that the cost of everything, Kasie, has skyrocketed. You know, life is 20 percent more expensive right now for people than it was when Kamala Harris and Joe Biden took office. And you go back to Donald Trump stays in office, when he left the White House 1.4 percent was the inflation rate. He wants to make sure that wage growth is meeting inflation and that we bring inflation down.
If you recall, when he was in office, he doubled the child tax credit. He advocated for him passing paid family leave. These are important factors for working families out there, and he does not discount for a second how expensive life has become. We all as parents, I have two young kids, want to know that we can make this life in America a life for our kids that is better than the ones we are in right now. And for many people, it doesn't feel that way.
That is very antithetical to the human spirit and human nature. He wants to afford people life again, and whether that's child care, whether it's going to buy groceries, whether it's filling up your gas tank, he wants to make sure every American can do that.
HUNT: Lara, I also want to ask you about something he posted recently on Truth Social where he actually called on the RNC, the organization you're a co-chair of, to activate now, and this was around mail-in voting. He said -- he was quoting Tucker Carlson here with an election expert that 20 percent of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania are fraudulent. Here we go again. Where is the attorney general, the FBI to investigate? Where is the Republican Party in Pennsylvania? The RNC must activate now.
Now, in August, the RNC, your RNC, and the Trump campaign launched a get out to vote tool where Pennsylvania voters can request a mail-in ballot directly. Is the former president saying that Republicans in Pennsylvania should not ask for these ballots?
L. TRUMP: I know, quite the opposite. Donald Trump wants every voter, no matter if you're voting Republican, Democrat, or third-party candidate, to feel comfortable that you can vote --
HUNT: So, why is he saying that 20 percent of them are fraudulent?
L. TRUMP: He's specifically referencing information from the 2020 election. What we're talking about right now is making sure that every vote matters and every vote counts. And I've worked very hard at the RNC --
HUNT: What information do we have? What evidence is there that 20 percent of the mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania in 2020 were fraudulent?
L. TRUMP: I didn't see that report. So, I'd have to go back and look at it. So, I can't directly speak to that. But what I can tell you is we've worked very hard on the ground at the RNC to make sure every voter in this country feels like when you cast a ballot, whether it's via mail, whether it's early voting in person or whether it's on Election Day in an election office around the country, your vote matters and your vote counts.
And Donald Trump very much wants every Republican voter to vote however they feel most comfortable and every voter in this country to vote however they feel most comfortable. So, I would have to go back and look at that. I have not studied that.
HUNT: All right. Lara Trump, I do very much appreciate your time. Thank you very much for being here on a very historic day in this campaign. Thank you.
L. TRUMP: Thank you. HUNT: All right. 52 minutes past the hour. Here is your morning roundup. Today, an Appeals Court is set to rule on Trump's effort to pause his criminal hush money case. A federal court will decide whether to stay the case from proceeding in state court. Last week, the judge in the case delayed both his decision on Trump's motion to overturn his conviction and Trump's sentencing.
And this --
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get out.
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HUNT: -- dramatic newly released body camera footage showing the moment when Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill was pinned to the ground by police.
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TYREEK HILL, MIAMI DOLPHINS WIDE RECEIVER: The reality of it is, it's the truth. If I wasn't Tyreek Hill worst case scenario, we would have had a different article, you know, Tyreek Hill, you know, got shot in front of, you know, Hard Rock Stadium. It's crazy that, you know, I -- you know, me and my family had to go through this.
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HUNT: Hill was just outside the stadium on his way to play against the Jaguars when he was pulled over for a moving violation. Really difficult stuff here.
Also, this --
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RYAN SEACREST, HOST, WHEEL OF FORTUNE: Welcome to Wheel of Fortune. I am your host, Ryan Seacrest.
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HUNT: Look at that. Ryan Seacrest making his hosting debut on Wheel of Fortune last night. He was joined by the singular longtime co-host Vanna White. Seacrest took over the gig after Pat Sajak retired.
That's really -- it's amazing how much this show is part of our collective American experience. Seeing a different face walk out there than Pat.
TODD: Right, the pride of North Myrtle Beach.
HUNT: Love it.
THOMPSON: I'm more of a Jeopardy person.
HUNT: I love Jeopardy too.
THOMPSON: To be contrary.
HUNT: Anyway -- all right. Let's turn now to this, a viral -- we touched on this earlier in the show. A viral but fake claim involving Haitian immigrants in America eating house pets.
[06:55:00]
The hoax centers on the City of Springfield, Ohio. It started as a rumor that was posted on a Facebook page. And to be clear, it was later debunked by local officials but not before the lie had already taken off, promoted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, by Trump allies, including Elon Musk, Senator Ted Cruz, and even his running mate, J. D. Vance. The rumor making it all the way to the halls of Congress.
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REP. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-GA): Can we add in that there's Haitian illegal migrants taking over towns, eating people's pets. But yet, there's not a government show of force against that. However, it is against these people that protest the election.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, they're not as dangerous as --
GREENE: Sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to interject that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: OK. Mark McKinnon, you were the one who raised this earlier. Now that we have laid out exactly what is going on here, I think when I first signed up to be a political journalist, I didn't quite realize this is where we were going to be, but here we are.
MCKINNON: Well, I think the greatest casualty in politics over the last decade or so has been truth. I mean, we used to debate and we -- but there were facts, facts that you'd agree on. Then suddenly, we have the notion of alternative facts. But now, when you have candidates out there promoting absolute unverifiable falsehoods and then say, well, you know, I just heard it from our constituents. Your job is to tell the constituents what the facts are. To you, madam.
FINNEY: But it is also, let's be honest, as Donald Trump has done consistently, trafficking in racist othering of immigrants. Because it wasn't just that these were immigrants, Haitian immigrants. It was about fear mongering. It was about, in the same way that we've heard -- you know, Trump goes on these just vicious screeds about poisoning the blood, which is actually based on the Nazis got it from Jim Crow, because if you had one drop of black blood, guess what? Then you're you were poisoning the blood of white people.
So, you know, this screed that he goes on over and over and over again about they're sending these dangerous, violent people, when, guess what, our economy runs in part on immigrant labor in this county. And there are plenty of immigrants in this country who are law abiding citizens, who, you know, love this country, who deserve to be here. But when you traffic in this kind of just screed it, all it does is make people fearful of each other and just deep in racism.
TODD: Hang on a second. The mayor of Springfield, Ohio, which city of 60,000 people, his name is Rob Rue. He says the cat story is untrue. But what is true is that the Biden-Harris administration has put 15,000 to 20,000 immigrants in Springfield without asking or telling them. He says the city is overwhelmed. It's saturated. They would have hired 25 more cops, 25 more firefighters had they known.
And this is not the only place. During this administration, we've had nine and a half million people cross the border illegally and they've moved them all over the country.
HUNT: So, if that's not true, why let it get lost in this --
TODD: Marjorie Taylor Greene is the gift that keeps on giving. You know --
FINNEY: But what's also true -- hold on.
MCKINNON: Yes, but J. D. Vance is the vice-presidential nominee who's echoing those laws.
FINNEY: Right. But the other thing that's also true is that the bill that the Republicans killed would have provided more funds and resources to cities that are dealing with the overflow of migrants in this country and the Republicans walked away from it. So, that mayor would have had resources.
TODD: No, because it would have guaranteed 5,000 people --
FINNEY: No, no, no.
TODD: -- crossing illegally before it triggered.
FINNEY: No, no, no. Republicans walked away from it because Donald Trump told them it was not good for him politically. That would have provided resources to that city.
TODD: If we can secure the border, we would. If Biden wanted to, he could.
FINNEY: Actually, crossings are down.
HUNT: All right. I hate to cut this off, but I really do not want to miss the opportunity to memorialize the person that I want to talk about here next. So, we will leave you with this.
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JAMES EARL JONES, ACTOR, "FIELD OF DREAMS": One constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America is ruled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a black boy rebuilt --
(END VIDEO CLIP) HUNT: Hollywood. Millions of adoring fans, me included, mourning the death of the iconic actor James Earl Jones. Fathers and sons and mothers and daughters everywhere bond over their love of baseball, thanks in part to his stirring portrayal. He played Terrence Mann in "Field of Dreams." And there was this, too.
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JONES: No, I am the father.
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HUNT: I mean, who can forget it? The list of credits was so long. It was, of course, James Earl Jones, who brought that sinister malevolence to Darth Vader in the "Star Wars" films.
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JONES: You are my son and the one true king. Remember who you are.
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HUNT: That was also Jones with elegant gravitas to parenting as brave Mufasa in Disney's 1994 animated classic "The Lion King" and its 2019 remake. And of course, all of us here at CNN have an incredible special place in our heart for the Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony EGOT award-winning actor because he is, after all, the voice of CNN.
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JONES: This is CNN.
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HUNT: James Earl Jones was 93. He passed peacefully on Monday with his family by his side. And we, here, will never forget him.
Thanks to all of you for being here. Thanks to you for joining us. I'm Kasie Hunt. Don't go anywhere. CNN News Central starts right now.
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