Return to Transcripts main page

Inside Politics

Awaiting Critical Decision In Trump Hush Money Case; Gallup: 60 Percent Now Unsure About False Claim That Vaccines Cause Autism; The "Trump Dance" Takes Sports World By Storm; Manhattan DA Agrees To Postpone Sentencing In Trump Hush Money Case Until Appeals Process Plays Out. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired November 19, 2024 - 12:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:33:48]

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: Now to New York, where we're awaiting a key decision in the criminal hush money case against Donald Trump. CNN Correspondent Kara Scannell has the latest. Kara, what are you hearing?

KARA SCANNELL, CNN REPORTER: Well, Dana, today was the deadline at 10:00 a.m. for the District Attorney's Office to submit a letter to the judge saying how they want to go forward with this case. And it could be a range of options on the table, anything by them saying they don't think there is a legal path forward because of some of the challenges that exist with Trump as the president-elect, and this being a state prosecution which would then put it in the hands to decide whether or not to grant Trump's motion to dismiss the case.

They could also say that they do think they have good grounds to move forward and propose a schedule for that or they could say table the whole thing until Trump is out of office. And the people I've spoken with suggest also it could be anything in between.

So we're waiting to see what that decision is and depending on what the DA's office says. That will let us know how this will play out. There could be an opportunity for Trump's team to respond if the DA wants to proceed or the judge. He'll ultimately have to weigh in either setting a briefing schedule or granting one of the motions.

So we're really still on standby until these letters become public, which we're hoping becomes public today.

[12:35:03]

But a lot obviously hangs in the balance here for the future of Donald Trump's conviction in the hush money case for falsifying business records to influence the 2016 election. Dana?

BASH: Kara, thank you so much. Obviously, raise your hand if you hear something from that judge.

Coming up, science versus fiction. How has RFK Jr.'s anti-vax rhetoric changed the way some Americans feel about vaccine safety? Some surprising numbers next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:40:05]

BASH: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has spent much of his career pushing false information that questions the safety and efficacy of vaccines. With Kennedy nominated to the top health job and the Trump administration, we wanted to take a look on how this activism has influenced how people perceive vaccines.

CNN's Harry Enten's crunched the numbers for us and seen what has changed over the years. Harry, show us what you're finding. It feels like it could be somewhat disturbing.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR DATA REPORTER: I think it's extremely disturbing, especially as the son of a pediatrician. So, look, let's look here. Government should require childhood vaccines against contagious diseases such as measles.

You go back to 1991. Look at this. It was 81 percent. By 2019, it was 62 percent. Look at where we are today in 2024, just 51 percent. That is a 30-point drop over the last 33 years. My goodness gracious, not good, if you're a big believer in public health.

What is one of the big reasons why we have seen this decline in folks who believe that in fact the government should require childhood vaccines? Well, child vaccinations are extremely important. I want you to look at this. This is broken down by party identification, Democrats and Republicans.

You go back to 2001, there really wasn't much of a party gap, right? It was 66 percent for Democrats, 62 percent for Republicans. You jump up to 2019, you're starting to see a party identification gap develop.

Look here, Democrats, 67 percent, Republicans, 52 percent. Look at where we are now in 2024. Look at this chasm. Democrats believing that childhood vaccinations are extremely important, 63 percent. Very similar to where we were at the beginning of the century.

Republicans on the other hand, look at this drop from 62 percent down to just 26 percent, less than half the level than what we saw at the beginning of this century, Dana.

BASH: Do we have any idea why Republicans change so much? I mean, if you think about those dates, particularly right before 2024 when people thought vaccine, they thought COVID.

ENTEN: Yes, yes. I -- you know, part of this is all the myths that folks like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have been putting forth, right? All right, this is among Republicans. Some vaccines cause autism in children. My note here is, of course they do not.

But this is about sowing doubt. This is about sowing doubt among Republicans. So you look in 2019, it was 10 percent. Look at that jump now, up to 20 percent doubling. But it's not just the yes category, it's the uncertain category. The unsure 53 percent in 2019 to 60 percent now.

So this combined, look at this. This is a huge, huge number. And what we're really talking about in this situation here is that even though the no, the no is very low, and the yes, and it's really the uncertain -- it's really that uncertain category here, that 60 percent, it's about sowing doubt, Dana. That's what it really is. It's not necessarily yes, it's I'm not quite sure, and therefore, maybe I don't want my child to get a vaccination.

BASH: Yes, I mean, when you put those numbers on the screen, it scares me a little bit if somebody's just tuning in and they see that, please look at the bottom of your screen. False claim. There is no --

ENTEN: False claim, false claim.

BASH: -- evidence.

ENTEN: No evidence.

BASH: No evidence.

ENTEN: No evidence. Nothing.

BASH: That these childhood vaccines, which prevent measles, mumps, polio, it goes on and on, no evidence over decades and decades --

ENTEN: Correct.

BASH: -- that it is a cause for autism. OK. So another question is, how do Americans see RFK Jr. outside of active activism against vaccines? And is that even a possibility?

ENTEN: Yes. Look, here's the deal. I think part of the reason why he is a, you know, pretty good vessel for these messages, these false messages is I want you to take a look at the net favorability rating. This is the trend over the last year.

You know, if you go back to late 2023, it was plus two, right? That's not half bad, given how unpopular politicians are in this country. You look at mid-2024, it was minus 11 points. Once RFK dropped out of the presidential race, he's back at net even. He's back at net even, and that is so important because again, politicians are so unpopular.

He's one of the most popular politicians out there right now by breaking even. And the reason why he's one of the most popular politicians is because if you take a look, he does very well with Republicans, right? His net favorability is plus 46. He doesn't actually do half bad in the middle at plus 8.

Among Democrats, he's way underwater at minus 59. But the bottom line is among Republicans, who of course would be so important to his nomination to getting to be the HHS secretary. And among Independents, he's actually not doing half bad. So, honestly, this entire segment, you know, I like to come on here, have some fun, a lot of this is just frankly, very disturbing to me.

BASH: Harry Enten, but important, thank you so much for being here. Appreciate it.

ENTEN: Thank you.

[12:45:04]

BASH: Coming up, remember these dance moves? Well, they have moved from campaign rallies to major sports arenas. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BASH: ?Now to a dance move we saw a lot on the campaign trail. Donald Trump rocked out, sort of, all over the battleground map. And now his signature fist pumping and hip shanking is being adopted by athletes throughout the sports world. We've seen it in NFL and college football games, the Ultimate Fighting Championships, even U.S. Soccer.

I'm joined now by CNN Sports Anchor Coy Wire, and CNN Sports Analyst Christine Brennan, also a sports columnist for USA Today. Coy, walk us through this.

[12:50:09]

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Hi, Dana. Hi, Christine. What has been deemed the Trump dance took the sports world by storm this weekend. U.S. men's soccer star Christian Pulisic, several of his teammates did the Trump dance last night in St. Louis. Pulisic scored twice in a win over Jamaica as they head to the final four of the Nations League tournament.

He said it wasn't a political dance. He saw other athletes doing it over the weekend and said he thought it was fun. NFL players from the Lions, Titans, Raiders, they broke out the dance this weekend as well. Raiders star tight end rookie Brock Bowers was asked about it. He said he too had seen everyone doing it, thought it was cool.

He said he saw Jon Jones doing this. The UFC star, Jon Jones, knocked out his opponent, did the dance, smiled at President Trump who was sitting in the front row. Jones started chanting USA. The entire arena started chanting along with him. He said he was proud to be an American.

Jones went over handed President-elect Trump his championship belt. Now, LPGA tour star Charley Hull, she appears to do the dance on her way to finishing tied for second at the ANNIKA. On one hand, Dana, you have many of these athletes saying this is fun, it's funny, it's what's viral, trend at the moment.

On the other side, some people want them to be disciplined, saying it's a political statement. One NFL official told me just a bit ago the league has no issues with celebratory dances. They're sticking to their language from the rule book and the player manual, which outlined when a celebration will be flagged or a player could be fined for unsportsmanlike conduct. Those include things like using props, any violent sexually suggestive or offensive gestures or prolonged or excessive celebrations.

BASH: All right, Coy, thank you so much.

Christine, I'm so sorry. Stand by because we do have some breaking news in that hush money trial. I want to go right to Paula Reid. Paula?

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: So, Dana, here are -- the Manhattan District Attorney has said they would not oppose delaying the criminal sentencing for President-elect Trump. While the two sides of litigate whether this case should be dismissed.

As we previously reported, the president-elect's attorneys have said that now that he is headed back to the White House, that he has the same constitutional protections as a sitting president so that he should be protected from state level proceedings and that includes sentencing.

Now the judge wanted to hear what the prosecutors said about that and here they're OK to once again delay this sentencing that was scheduled for next week where he would have been sentenced on those 34 counts that he was convicted of falsifying business records.

They're saying it's OK to delay that. Well, the two sides argue if this case should be dismissed outright. Now we're hearing from the Trump team in a statement, his spokesman, Steven Cheung tried to spin this as a complete victory, saying that this is a total and definitive victory for President Trump and the American people who elected him in a landslide.

The Manhattan DA has concluded that this witch hunt cannot continue. The lawless case is now stayed and President Trump's legal team is moving to get it dismissed once and for all. So that is not exactly an accurate description of what has transpired here. Here the district attorney's office is saying that they're OK with pushing the sentencing back once again.

Well, they discussed this issue of whether the case should be dismissed outright. So again, we were waiting to see how the district attorney's office would view this idea of the president's legal team that he has constitutionally protected as a president-elect from the sentencing. And here they're willing to kick the sentencing while they litigate the larger issue of the fate of this case, Dana.

BASH: And Paula, before I let you go, I just want to make sure that I and our viewers understand this, that this is going to be delayed until after the appeals process. If Donald Trump was Donald Jones, or if Donald Trump had lost the election, would that be a potential option? Because is it accurate that if a person is convicted, then they are sentenced and the appeal process happens after the sentencing generally, correct?

REID: So there's a few things going on here. Right now, they're dealing with this new question of his status as president-elect. Once he was convicted, his lawyers already started an appeals process that continues to this day. It's working its way through the court. But the question right here is, what do we do now that he is president-elect? Do they delay sentencing until after he's out of office? Did they dismiss the case? And here, the Manhattan District Attorney's Office said that they do not oppose delaying this sentencing while they determine what his status as president-elect means for dismissing the case. And because he's president elect, this is certainly not the way this would play out for any other defendant.

But of course, other defendants do have the right to appeal. So he's trying every possible avenue to delay, delay, delay the sentencing. And so far, he has been successful. And now they will argue, Dana, a really unprecedented question which is, can you sentence a president- elect, or should the case be dismissed? That's the next question that'll go before this judge.

BASH: Which has not yet been decided, which is key. Thank you so much, Paula, I appreciate that.

[12:55:02]

Let's quickly go to Kristen Holmes. Kristen, what are you hearing from Team Trump? We just heard a little bit of the official response. What are you hearing unofficially?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Dana. And they're celebrating here. They believe that this is absolutely a win to go to what Paula just said. The two questions of course, being, can you actually sentence a president-elect and what would that look like?

And I am being told by people close to Trump that they don't believe that there will be a sentencing for the president-elect. Now, of course, he's going to have to go through the appeal process as we heard. We also heard from Paula, they're saying that this statement is not entirely accurate in terms of what exactly this ruling in this filing means.

However, what we are being told by Trump's team is that they are completely viewing this as a victory. They believe the more that they can delay, the stronger they are and that this case will ultimately be dismissed. But, of course, Dana, this is going to be in the hands of the court. This is just how they believe this is going to play out.

BASH: Yes, and we cannot reiterate enough how much when you told us so many times when Donald Trump first ran, delaying or even defying these several court cases was a big part of his strategy to get back in the White House.

Thank you so much. Appreciate that, Kristen.

Thank you for watching Inside Politics. CNN News Central picks it up after the break.