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Inside Politics

Trump Lashes Out At Women Who Have Accused Him Of Sexual Misconduct; RFK Jr. Ballot Challenge Delays Start Of Early Voting In NC; Poll: Harris, Trump Tied Among Younger Voters In NC; Soon: Judge To Decide If He Will Delay Trump Hush Money Sentencing. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired September 06, 2024 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: -- for Jack Smith and his team by letting them sort of present the arguments that they think where the President -- where they can bring evidence against the President, and then we'll see what they do with it.

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: And they probably needed a win because --

WILLIAMS: Yes.

REID: -- really the Supreme Court gutted their ability to hold that trial before the 2024 elections. At this point, the former president needs to be reelected if he wants to avoid likely these two federal cases. The Mar-a-Lago documents case will likely be revived on appeal, and then you have whatever will remain of the January 6th case. These are very serious cases, and the only way he will avoid these is to be reelected.

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: Such an important point that we've made so many times when these cases first started. But now that we're closer and it's still very much alive, we need to remind our viewers that they are so intertwined. Thanks.

Don't go anywhere because Donald Trump did just end but he had called a press conference and like we suggested might happen, he didn't take any questions from the press. Much more ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:35:37]

BASH: I want to turn to CNN's Alayna Treene, who is at Trump Tower, where the former president just finished speaking. I know, Alayna, you were prepared for questions for the candidate, as were others there, and you didn't get a chance to ask them.

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN REPORTER: That's exactly right, Dana. This was dubbed as a press conference clearly, it was just him delivering remarks, kind of airing his grievances. He did not take questions from the press, I think, to the dismay of many reporters here today.

But, look, I mean, this was Donald Trump really trying to defend himself. You know, we've covered Donald Trump for years now. I've been covering all his legal cases very closely. It was very clear to me today watching him in this room that he is very angry and frustrated that his legal problems are back in front of him and that he felt the need to defend himself against them.

What I found very interesting was, of course, this morning he attended a hearing to appeal his case against -- or his case with E. Jean Carroll. But, you know, he went into rants about many other cases as well. He also shared in detail many of the allegations that several women have made against him regarding sexual misconduct, sharing their stories at length.

He spoke for close to an hour today. So really walking through all of those different cases. And hearing, you know, we kind of heard some of the greatest hits that he always says when he talks about his legal cases. He attacked the judges. He said that this was electioneering interference.

He blamed the Department of Justice. Of course, the E. Jean Carroll case is a civil case. It has nothing to do with the Justice Department, but he did that anyway. One notable moment, Dana, that I found is he had several of his legal advisers and attorneys standing behind him throughout.

A couple of them spoke in the middle of his remarks. But at one point, he said that he's actually very disappointed with his legal team. And I think that's very notable. Of course, one, he was flanked by those legal advisers. But also, we know this is the case, that he feels that, you know, his team isn't doing enough to defend him.

He likes to have very aggressive lawyers. He actually mentioned someone else, Bobby Knight, that he thought attacked the right way. He likes fighters, screamers. I think that was what he was alluding to today. And so. all in all, this was kind of a repeat of a lot of what we would hear in public remarks from Donald Trump when he talks about his cases.

And I think notably the reason why he did this is remember, when he talks about these legal cases, many times he sees fundraising, he sees a boost in polling, that was tied to some of this today as well. Dana?

BASH: Yes. Wow. I had missed the part that where he was trashing his own legal team with them standing there. That's very notable. And I just want to add that you talked about the fact that he was defending himself. Clearly, he does.

And we've seen this over and over, feel that he is the best defender of himself, maybe more than his legal team and his spokespeople, which is why he wants to go out and do what he did. But he went beyond that and really did continue to attack and demean the women who are making these allegations against him personally.

Thank you so much for that, Alayna. We're going to go to who else would we be bringing in right now, but Daniel Dale, who was listening closely to Donald Trump. Daniel, you have a fact check and I know that you're zeroing in on one particular claim about a photograph.

DANIEL DALE, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Yes, so a lot of repeated claims and a lot of repeat nonsense. But one thing I think at least was new. He claimed that this now famous photo of him with E. Jean Carroll could have been AI generated. That is just completely bananas.

He has never claim that before. This photo has been in circulation since 2019 and he himself has appeared to acknowledge that it's a real photo before. He said at an event in early January in Iowa, he said, I never met this. Never saw this woman.

Except 25 years ago, there's a picture of her and her husband who was a nice guy. And he continued, I never saw this woman. Other than they have a picture standing on a reception line where I'm a celebrity, I'm shaking hands or something with hundreds and hundreds of people, that's the only picture they have.

So he's previously minimized the significance of the photo, but today he claimed that it might have been fabricated with computer technology clearly grasping at straws, and it's just not true, Dana.

BASH: And I will -- I know you were in and out of this. I will just add that what you just quoted him saying that he only met her once on a photo line, talking about how nice E. Jean Carroll's then husband was, he said that again in the same press conference where he said --

DALE: Oh he -- that's very interesting --

BASH: -- it was AI. So there you go. I'm glad you brought that up because it reminded me. He had a lot of things to say, so I'm glad that reminded me to mention that as well.

[12:40:20]

DALE: Absolutely. And I think it shows that his lying can veer from one lie to a contradictory lie in just a matter of a few seconds. Often people think of this kind of dishonesty as strategic, like, what is the grand plan or play here. And I think often it's just his unique brain coming up with something in the moment that he thinks will get him successfully to the next moment.

BASH: Daniel Dale, thank you so much. Appreciate all your work.

Up next, we thought we'd be reporting on the first ballots of 2024 going out in North Carolina, but RFK Jr. and his lawyers just threw a wrench in that plan. We'll explain after a break.

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[12:45:32]

BASH: ?Today was supposed to be the day we saw the first ballots in the first state being mailed to voters, but this just in to CNN, a court has put that on pause because of a dispute over whether Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s name should stay on the ballot there since he's dropped out of the race and endorsed Donald Trump. Vice President Harris is campaigning hard to flip that crucial battleground state, which has been reliably red for decades other than Barack Obama's win there in 2008.

Joining me now is North Carolina Democratic Party Chair Anderson Clayton. Thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate it.

Let's just start with the news about the ballots going out, being on pause, so they're not going out. Since RFK Jr. is not running for president, why should his name remain on the ballot in your state?

ANDERSON CLAYTON, CHAIRWOMAN, NORTH CAROLINA DEMOCRATIC PARTY: You know, RFK. Jr. fought to get on the ballot as a political party on our -- in our state. And we believe that what we're seeing right now is actually a cost that our election system, you know, ballots to your point, we're supposed to go out today. And we had a Republican court of appeals that came in and stopped that decision or halted that from happening to get RFK's name removed from the ballot.

And what we're seeing right now is a great corruption in our court of appeals with the Republican takeover there, but we're also seeing that in the sense of this is going to cost election or folks in North Carolina, voters in North Carolina, potentially millions of dollars and having to reprint these ballots.

BASH: And Anderson, obviously, you make the legal argument but -- and the expense argument, but there's also a political argument. I'm just going to just go out on a limb and say you would not be arguing for him to stay on the ballot if you didn't think it would help Donald Trump, excuse me, hurt Donald Trump.

CLAYTON: We're arguing for him to stay on the ballot in the sense of that ballots are supposed to go out today. It's egregious, in my opinion, that a court of appeals came down with the decision that on the day that ballots are supposed to go out to stop this. It's interfering with our election system and the integrity of it right now, which is why we're fighting back against this.

BASH: OK, North Carolina has voted Republican 10 out of the last 11 presidential elections. It is the state in its 16 electoral votes. That is kind of been a bit of a white whale for Democrats over the past however many cycles. What do you think right now as the party chair in North Carolina? Is it wishful thinking or do you believe it really is in play?

CLAYTON: Well, I wouldn't be here if I didn't believe that it was in play.

BASH: OK.

CLAYTON: But the energy we have seen on the ground so far this year is a testament to that. But one thing that I like to tell people is that when Barack Obama won our state in 2008, there was an energy unlike anything that we had seen come before in North Carolina. He had someone in every county that was talking to voters. And what we've seen this year is that impact tenfold in North Carolina. And so I think the ground game which anyone can get involved with us right now by going to NCDP.org to knock doors with us. Because we are doing that every single weekend, especially in competitive state legislative districts, which is typically what's going to help us decide this election this year up the ballot as well in North Carolina.

BASH: Anderson, you are 26 years old. The youngest majority, excuse me, the youngest major political party chair in the country. A recent Fox poll out of North Carolina found that voters under the age of 35 are essentially split between Harris and Trump in a head to head matchup. How should the Vice President go further in trying to appeal to voters who are undecided in who they're going to vote for or even undecided in whether they will vote at all in your generation?

CLAYTON: You know, here in North Carolina, how we're doing that is we're just actually organizing those college students and those students that are maybe working right now that are out of college or you're out of high school and really haven't built the opportunity of a campaign that speaks to them, that's talking to them about their issues.

We've got a program that's being led up right now by our coordinated campaign with a city councilman Theodore Nollert at a Chapel Hill, who's leading 30 college campus fellows across the state in North Carolina on all of our college campuses, but also community college campuses throughout our state to make sure that young people are organizing young people this year.

A lot of folks don't know right now that North Carolina, our state minimum wage matches our federal minimum wage with $7.25 (ph) in our state.

[12:50:03]

Most people right now that are working service level jobs are young people. These issues impact them. And we need to be able to have folks that are out there talking to them on their campuses but also in their place of work and bringing this campaign to them. And that's exactly what the Vice President is doing this year, what Governor Tim Walz is doing this year by trying to make sure that we're campaigning in a way that I think that politics needs to be going forward, which is bringing this to people and not asking folks to come to us.

BASH: All right, Anderson, we're out of time, but I want to have you back, especially to talk about the rural urban divide between the parties. One that you are trying to close there in North Carolina.

Thank you so much. Good to see you. Appreciate it.

CLAYTON: Thank you.

BASH: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [12:55:08]

BASH: Now to a ruling that could have a major impact on the home stretch of the 2024 race. Any moment now, we'll hear if Judge Juan Merchan will delay Donald Trump's sentencing in his hush money case until after election day.

Trump is facing up to four years in prison after being convicted on 34 counts stemming from business fraud related to paying off adult film star Stormy Daniels during the 2016 campaign. Stay with CNN for that news on the decision and perhaps much, much more that we're not sure is coming. So stick around.

Thank you so much for joining INSIDE POLITICS. CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts after the break.