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World Leaders Brace For Trump's Foreign Policy; Republicans Win White House And Senate, House Undecided; Democrats Play Blame Game In Wake Of Trump Victory. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired November 07, 2024 - 05:30   ET

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

[05:30:00]

MARGARET TALEV, SENIOR CONTRIBUTOR, AXIOS, DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR DEMOCRACY, JOURNALISM & CITIZENSHIP, SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY: We all know how this works.

But the bottom line is when you look at that exit poll data and all of the -- all of the polling and all of the focus groups in the rearview mirror you can see that the post-COVID economy and the post-COVID inflationary experience was the core of the driver of discontent and concern about the future. And it allowed all these other elements to pile on. And I think both things can be true at the same time.

Democrats do need to figure out how to recalibrate their message because in their quest to be a big tent that has captured people who were marginalized, including women and people of color, there is a risk that in focusing so much on some of these groups they may have left others feel that they are not part of the tent anymore. And it's geographic, it's educational. It's people who didn't go to college versus people who have four-year degrees.

There are all these splits that are -- create a real cleave where there is a big part of the country that doesn't feel that Democrats' policies represent them even though Democrats' policies are supposed to be geared toward caring for people who don't have college degrees, who don't have other options. Who have a harder time pulling themselves up by their bootstraps.

KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: Well, and look, speaking of working class voters, I mean this is what Bernie Sanders. "It should have come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned the working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they are right."

And I have to say -- I mean, I thought back to 2016 quite a few times on election night. I mean, not least because of Trump, obviously, but because I spent a lot of time covering Bernie Sanders.

TALEV: Yeah. HUNT: And when you were to walk into those -- I mean, he would pack these arenas with young people but in places like Michigan, also a lot of union workers. A lot of these voters who -- basically, they would tell me when I asked well, who else are you thinking about? Like, you clearly love Bernie Sanders but, like, who else might you vote for? They're like well, I like Trump, right?

There clearly is something significant here. Maybe it is an opening that shows that there are Democrats out there that could appeal to these people, but it doesn't seem to be -- I mean, Sanders' construction of the establishment versus the non-establishment -- it's an old one for him but it makes some sense here, no?

TALEV: Well, we see anti-establishment trends and these, I mean, literally going on for more than a decade -- for a couple of decades -- anti-establishment trends, anti-trust trends.

The trick with populism is that a lot of times the most popular populist messages are the ones that would have really different implications for the economy. So whether tariffs promising to go after prices at the supermarket or now, President-elect Trump who has promised tariffs and the implications of the tariffs could be exactly what he -- what he went in on the coattails of now. Like, if tariffs became inflationary, if tariffs cost U.S. jobs. If tariffs made goods very expensive for Americans. How would he thread that needle?

So I think when you're campaigning, populist messages are incredibly powerful because it's what most people want to hear -- that things can be cheaper and better. That it's a --

HUNT: Yeah.

TALEV: -- failure of leadership. But the reality is the global economy is much more complicated than that and translating a populist campaign message into a populist style of governing that's actually effective and reaches your promises --

HUNT: Um-hum.

TALEV: -- no matter which party you're in that's extremely complicated to pull off.

HUNT: Indeed.

Margaret Talev, thank you so much for being here this morning.

TALEV: Thanks, Kasie.

HUNT: I really appreciate it.

All right, the world is bracing for what is expected to be a significant shift in foreign policy when now President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House in January. This time around Trump is expected to insulate himself with loyalists rather than surround himself with experienced diplomats.

CNN political and national security analyst David Sanger joins us now live with more. David, good morning. I'm so grateful to have you here.

Your latest piece in The New York Times is headlined this: "Trump's win ends a post-World War II era of U.S. leadership." Tell us how you understand the change that we are about to see not just here in America but across the world.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST (via Webex by Cisco): Well, good morning.

You know, in the midst of the Biden administration there was sort of a debate among Europeans, Japanese, South Koreans about whether or not President Trump's first term was sort of a blip in American history. That after World War II, the U.S. had been the diplomat leader. It had been the guarantor with the nuclear umbrella for its allies. It had been the guarantor economically for free trade. All of the issues that over time eroded away were being questioned. And, of course, the Trump presidency was the hypothesis of this.

[05:35:10]

But when Biden came, he said we're back. Don't worry about this. We had a four-year diversion but really, Joe Biden represented everything that was in that promise of the post-World War II era. And, in fact, it was his era. He was born in the early 1940s, and he came of age as a senator in the Cold War and was committed to that. You saw it in the way he organized the allies after the invasion of Ukraine.

Now with President Trump coming back you can no longer make that argument. In fact, if anything, Biden looks like the blip. The sort of last gasp of this whole order.

And so I think what's most striking to me about his return, even though I think he was elected for all the economic reasons you were just discussing with Margaret, is that most of our allies think we're in a whole new world here where you can't rely on the United States for your security. That the tariffs you were just discussing may actually take apart the economic order the United States had helped build post-World War II.

HUNT: So speaking of that order, you write this of how Donald Trump conceives of the world differently in this way.

You say, "The essential difference that Mr. Trump embodies is this: Presidents from Harry Truman to Mr. Biden have largely viewed America's allies as a force multiplier. Mr. Trump views those alliances as a burden, often declaring he doesn't understand why the United States would defend nations with whom Washington has a trade deficit. He professed in his first term to reject the concept that Europe was a bulwark against the Soviet Union and, later, Russia, or that Japan was America's aircraft carrier in the Pacific, or that South Korea is key to containing North Korea."

So what does that mean for the world?

SANGER: You know, there is this oddity when you talk to former President Trump -- President-elect Trump in which he conflates the trade surpluses that he sees Japan, or South Korea, or (INAUDIBLE) -- they are much smaller than they once were -- with the question that we pay a lot of money for security.

Well, the fact of the matter is they pay a lot of money to keep American troops there. But even if they did not, having those troops placed around the world is sort of the forward edge of American defense and pretty critical to the way the Pentagon operates around the world. You can't just base everybody in the United States.

And he still, after four years as president, views this, as I wrote, as a burden -- something that we're doing as a favor for everyone else. And that's a fundamental difference of view.

Now, he was right, as President Obama was right before him, that the allies had to step up and spend more. And, in fact, in Europe now, I would say roughly 20 of the 31 other allies in NATO are now spending somewhere around two percent of their GDP on defense. In my view, that's probably going to have to go to four percent or so if you are going to mount effective defenses against a Russia that is clearly going to be an issue for a long time.

I also mention in the piece though that that fundamental change since he left office four years ago is that Russia and China have now come together in this uneasy but worrisome partnership.

HUNT: Yeah.

SANGER: And we have heard no discussion of that in the course of the war -- of the campaign.

HUNT: Yeah -- no. It's a really interesting and troubling point.

David Sanger, I'm always so grateful to have you. Thank you very much for being on early with us this morning.

SANGER: Great to be with you, Kasie.

HUNT: All right. See you soon.

Coming up here on CNN THIS MORNING, Republicans hopeful they've pulled off a clean sweep this cycle. What a Republican-controlled Congress could mean for Donald Trump's second term.

Plus, Democrats in despair playing the blame game.

(COMMERCIAL)

[05:43:35]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): Candidate quality is essential -- absolutely essential -- and I think we had the best candidates everywhere yesterday.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HUNT: The White House and the Senate flipping from blue to red. CNN reporting House Republicans are feeling bullish about their prospects of also keeping control of the House. Although the lower chamber, of course, is still undecided, this election could be a clean sweep for the GOP.

A senior GOP campaign official telling CNN, "We're going to hold the House," and adding, "The question is about what the size of the majority is right now."

Now, a different battle is brewing -- who will be the Republican's Senate leader? Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell announced earlier this year he'd step down from his role in leadership, but the race to replace him is still pretty wide open. Senators John Cornyn and John Thune are two possible candidates to replace McConnell. Senator Rick Scott also vying for the position after winning his re- election bid yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RICK SCOTT (R-FL): I think I'm going to win because I'm talking to the -- my colleagues about what they want, and here's what they want. They want change. They want to be part of the process. They don't -- they want to be treated as equals.

They want somebody that has a relationship with Trump. They want somebody that has a plan. They want somebody that has a relationship with the House.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right. Senators will vote behind closed doors by secret ballot next week.

Joining us now to discuss, Mychael Schnell of The Hill. Mychael, good morning.

[05:45:00]

MYCHAEL SCHNELL, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, THE HILL: Hey.

HUNT: It's wonderful to see you.

SCHNELL: You, too.

HUNT: So let's start with this leadership fight because I do think it's interesting. I mean, I think the result could have been different had Kamala Harris won the election.

What does Trump's win mean for this battle?

SCHNELL: Yeah. Well, it's exactly what Rick Scott just said right there -- he's playing up the fact that he has a relationship with Trump. There was always the question of how much will Trump influence this Senate leader -- Senate Republican leader debate whether he was in office or out of office. Now it's really becoming a key factor because he's going to be in the White House next year. This is going to be a partner. Whoever the Senate Republican leader is, is going to be a key partner of Donald Trump.

And we know that John Thune has his past problems with Trump though he's tried to clean that up. Rick Scott playing up his close relationship with Trump. All three of these candidates are going to -- are going to be trying to show their closeness to the president now that he is again going to be a key partner.

Now, the key thing is here, Kasie, it's obviously a secret ballot. So folks can be in public and say what they think but behind closed doors you're not going to know who votes for who. So I think that could play into things.

But absolutely -- I mean, the Trump factor here, and if he decides to endorse a candidate and weigh in it could immensely affect the race.

HUNT: Yeah. Well, that is, of course, a big question.

Who do you think has the edge at this writing?

SCHNELL: I think folks have been saying that John Thune is best suited and in the best place. He's got a lot of support within the -- within the conference. He's currently in Republican leadership, which could help him put a leg up. But, of course, this Trump factor now could throw everything on its head.

HUNT: Yeah.

Mychael, I want to show you -- I mean, one of the things that could be a big question here if Republicans do ultimately end up taking the House, likely to be a very narrow majority, of course.

SCHNELL: Um-hum.

HUNT: But still, that would give them unified control of government.

SCHNELL: Right.

HUNT: And it raises the question they're not going to have 60 Republican senators to work with. Do they want to get rid of the filibuster?

Congressman Jim Himes -- he's a Democrat -- was on our air yesterday. Watch what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JIM HIMES (D-CT): I don't have much doubt that Donald Trump is going to make a phone call on day one and say you guys get rid of the filibuster. And if they get rid of the filibuster, of course, it is open field running for the Republican Party. And from my standpoint, and if Donald Trump is to be believed about what he says he's going to do with tariffs, with national security, and with so many other things, that's a pretty scary thought.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Is this a real conversation going on behind the scenes on the Hill right now?

SCHNELL: I mean, we're going to have to see how it plays out, right? Interestingly enough, you just showed a clip of Mitch McConnell at the top of the segment. He's obviously the outgoing Republican leader now. But something he said at that press conference was the filibuster is now safe and the filibuster will now stay intact, something that he wants to happen. He's obviously not going to be in that position of leadership next year so we're going to have to see what happens with that.

But besides from -- you know, from the 60-vote filibuster, something we're going to be hearing a lot about if Republicans do take the House -- it's something you know well --

HUNT: Um-hum.

SCHNELL: -- budget reconciliation. This sexy process that lawmakers up on Capitol Hill like to use when they have control. Essentially, what it means is it's for specific policy undertakings. Republicans in the Senate will be able to bypass that 60-vote threshold. So expect to hear a lot about that in terms of whether the filibuster gets nuked for certain issues. We're going to have to see. But Republicans are going to be quick to figuring out what they can do under budget reconciliation to bypass that 60-vote threshold.

HUNT: Right. It can be hard to understand, opaque, lots of jargon. But block granting Medicaid, for example, a phrase that I think we're probably going to hear --

SCHNELL: Yes.

HUNT: -- a lot about. It's hard to understand but it's actually really, really important, so I love that you pointed it out.

All right, Mychael Schnell, thank you.

SCHNELL: Thank you.

HUNT: I appreciate it.

All right. For Democrats, it has been just over 24 hours of handwringing, soul searching, second guessing, and no small amount of finger pointing thrown in.

Kamala Harris' senior adviser David Plouffe -- he raised some eyebrows with this post on X praising his campaign staff while writing, "We dug out of a deep hole but not enough."

Several Democrats viewing that as an unmistakable swipe at President Biden and launching the blame game into full swing. Some Biden allies are privately upset with Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi for squeezing the president out of the race in both 2016 and then here in 2024, respectively. Many Harris insiders believing that Biden's deep unpopularity and his

use of the word "garbage" to describe Trump supporters in the runup to the election presented a hill too steep for her to climb.

Our next guest recently reporting about Biden's "garbage" gaffe that, "Some of Harris' top aides were blissfully unaware of the mushrooming crisis inside the White House, standing outside the building with limited phone service and no Wi-Fi. When they learned, they were exasperated. Biden wanted to clean it up, and the White House proposed to the campaign a post from Biden on X. The next morning, Harris distanced herself from the comment and her campaign tried to sideline the president from major audiences."

The writer of that piece, Tyler Pager of The Washington, joins us now. Tyler, good morning. Nice to see you.

TYLER PAGER, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Good morning.

HUNT: So what are you hearing about how Democrats are reacting to this? I mean, I have heard a range of sources talk about it and some of them do blame President Biden.

[05:50:00]

PAGER: Absolutely. I think there's a lot of blame to go around across the Democratic Party. We saw some of this reckoning after 2016 and we're in store for a lot more of it in the coming weeks -- both a lot of people looking backwards to try to figure out what went wrong, but also trying to look forward of what is the path. Who is going to be the leader of the Democratic Party?

I think one of the big differences here is there's not -- there's not like a Barack Obama figure who is going to be able to help the party cope and figure out what the path forward should be. Joe Biden is not going to be able to play that same role. So I think there's a lot of questions of who is going to lead the Democratic Party.

But to your point, there is also a lot of blame to go around. A lot of it is focused on Joe Biden and not just his decision not to run or step aside, but his initial decision after the midterms of 2022 to run in the first place. And a lot of the conversation that was around the 2020 election when Biden sort of hinted and suggested he would be a transitional president -- some people even assuming that meant he would only run for one term. He never said that publicly.

But I think that decision before the 2022 midterms and after Democratic success, he's under a lot of scrutiny right now.

HUNT: Does President Biden have any regrets about that?

PAGER: I don't think. My sense from talking to sources inside the White House and people close to the president is he has no regrets about that initial decision. He may have some regrets about his decision to withdraw from the race.

There are some longtime Biden allies who view this as he was pushed out again, as you said at the top here, and that he could have bid a more formidable challenger to Trump. That argument that he often made, and his allies made that he was the one that beat him in 2020, and he was the only one that was capable of beating him again in 2024.

Obviously, a counter-factual moment. We'll never be able to know for sure.

HUNT: Right.

I mean, how do they answer questions when you point to the fact that Harris' polling was much closer than Biden's was, and she still lost?

PAGER: Well, one of the things that they like to talk about is to not believe the polls. I don't know if that's the right way to approach this but that is a deep and abiding belief among Biden's deepest loyalists and longtime staffers. They say look, we lost Iowa and New Hampshire in the 2020 primary and we came back to win the nomination and defeat Trump.

Obviously, that's not the view of the vast majority of the Democratic Party. They wanted to move on from the president. And many of the party leaders, as we've discussed a lot on this show and across the news environment over the summer when it was not just a handful of lawmakers, but it was party leaders and party loyalists.

HUNT: Tyler, what is your sense of -- you mentioned that Biden is not in a position to lead the Democratic Party going forward. Do you get a sense of who might rise from the ashes of this?

PAGER: So I think one of the first things, and this is a very narrowly -- you know, narrow conversation in Washington, is already, there's going to be conversation about who is going to be the next party chair to run the Democratic National Committee. Jaime Harrison, the current chair, is not expected to stay in that role, and so there will be an election sometime next year. Already, Democrats are starting to jockey for that role.

I think one of the things that we'll start to see is Democratic governors step up to try to fill that void and that leadership. Democratics -- Democrats have had a lot of success in state capitals around the country and I think they will try to step up to the mantle and say voices outside of Washington need to lead. And I think you can see some of those blue wall governors -- Josh Shapiro, Gretchen Whitmer, Wes Moore in Maryland, Gavin Newsom in California. And obviously, there are senators that ran for president in 2020 we could see try to take up that mantle of leadership.

But it's a really open question and we're already seeing those divides play out in the Democratic Party, whether it is some of the liberal -- more liberal lawmakers, Bernie Sanders, with a scathing statement about the party's campaign apparatus and focus on the working class, or is it some of the more moderate members of the Democratic Party that try to usher in the -- usher the party more towards the center.

Someone was -- I was talking to someone yesterday and they said one of the things we need to figure out is are we the party of AOC? Are we the party of Joe Manchin? Are we the party of Josh Shapiro, Gavin Newsom?

Very different views on the future of the party and I think we're going to see a lot of internal family debate about what that looks like and ultimately, what the voters want to -- want to decide about how who is the right person to lead this party forward.

HUNT: For sure.

All right, Tyler Pager. Thank you very much for coming in this morning. I appreciate it.

All right, still ahead here on CNN THIS MORNING, a get out of jail free card? We're going to take a look at where Donald Trump's legal troubles stand now that he is president-elect.

Plus, the latest on Trump's plans to reward loyalists with key roles in his upcoming administration, as Joe Biden vows to uphold the tradition of the peaceful transfer of power.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIMMY FALLON, HOST, NBC "THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH JIMMY FALLON": At age 78, Trump has also become the oldest man ever elected president, breaking a record set by President Biden in 2020. But it's nice. Biden will pass the torch and his life alert necklace.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL)

[05:58:50]

HUNT: It's Thursday, November 7. Right now on CNN THIS MORNING --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) 2024 UNITED STATES PRESIDENT-ELECT: We're going to make it the best it's ever been. We can do that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Swept into power. Donald Trump vowing to move quickly as he sets up his return to Washington.

Plus --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, (D) VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: While I concede this election, I don't not concede the fight that fueled this campaign.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Kamala Harris concedes the race but says she's not giving up hope as her party faces a reckoning. And --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You can see a new big tent Republican Party.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Republicans crashing a red wave into Washington on the verge of unified Republican government.

And playing the blame game. The Democratic Party now searching for answers as President Biden prepares to address the nation.

All right, just a few moments before 6:00 a.m. here on the East Coast. A live look at the White House where the lights are still off. You may remember when we were here on Tuesday, the dawn of Election Day or pre-dawn Election Day, they had lit it up.