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American Morning

The Final Day

Aired October 06, 2003 - 09:04   ET

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

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


BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: The California recall battle looks too close to call, according to polls. The final day of the campaign is today. They vote tomorrow. No shortage of finger-pointing among candidates. The number of sexual misconduct accusations rising again this weekend against Arnold Schwarzenegger. The number, officially 15 have come forward.
Here's Bob Franken live in L.A. for the fallout.

Good morning, Bob. Almost there.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

Almost there. Arnold Schwarzenegger is trying very, very hard to get back on message, as he goes into this last day of the campaign, but his opponents are having none of it. They are continuing to raise every chance they can the various allegations that were made about his past conduct, particularly the one about the relationship with women. It comes up over and over. Governor Gray Davis was only too willing to talk about that when he appeared last night on "LARRY KING LIVE."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. GRAY DAVIS (D), CALIF.: There have been some evasions, occasionally an apology, occasionally a denial. And the question gets down to this, are all 15 of these women lying? Or is Arnold Schwarzenegger not telling us the truth?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FRANKEN: Schwarzenegger is trying to avoid the issue as much as he can on the campaign trail. When he does have to talk about it, he normally blames his political opponents for a smear campaign. But the questions keep coming, as they did when he was interviewed by ABC's Peter Jennings.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIF. GOV. CANDIDATE: No one ever came to me in my life and said to me that I did anything, that I don't want you to do that, you went over the line, Arnold. Now, all of a sudden, isn't it odd that three days, four days before the campaign, all of a sudden all these women want to have an apology? Isn't it odd?

(END VIDEO CLIP) FRANKEN: The wisdom about this election? Well, it's hard to have any wisdom, except to say that, right now is too close to call, or at least nobody wants to call it.

HEMMER: Bob, listen to Gray Davis talking about LARRY KING last night. He talked about Arnold Schwarzenegger giving some sort of explanation. What is he expecting from Schwarzenegger at this point?

FRANKEN: Probably nothing. But he's expecting to keep the heat on him. It's an issue that the Democrats see has some prospects. Of course, he's desperately trying to avoid the recall. Their polls show that the margin is closing, and so they're just keeping the heat on him.

HEMMER: Thank you, Bob. Bob Franken in L.A.

Let's stay in L.A. now, political analysis on the race with our senior political analyst, Jeff Greenfield, live in L.A.

Nice to see you, Jeff. Good morning out there.

It is early, 6:00 a.m. Answer the impossible, if you could. These accusations having any impact yet?

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST: I'll tell you in about 24, 36 hours.

HEMMER: We'll all know then.

GREENFIELD: No, no, but fairness. The one impact we do know, the only measurable one that I can see, is that "The Oakland Tribune," a legendary conservative Republican newspaper, withdrew its endorsement of Schwarzenegger, because of these allegations and suggested its people vote no on recall. You hear all kinds of rumors in the closing days of a campaign. I spent the other night at a place with a lot of Democrats buzzing about polls showing that the margin collapsing. We do not know how accurate that is.

And one of the reasons is, I believe, because these charges came so late, first of all, you have two million people who have already voted absentee or early; they can't change their votes. And once people are invested in Schwarzenegger, as the entire Republican establishment is, they tend to be much harder to move away from that position. So we just don't know. And we also, by the way, Bill, have no idea know who's going to turn out tomorrow. It's going to be a completely unique collection.

HEMMER: And I think that is absolutely the factor that we'll all start to mull over when the polls close tomorrow.

What about a backlash against Gray Davis? Do some people log on to this and say, you know what, this is dirty politics, we've seen it in the past, it's not going to stick now?

GREENFIELD: Well, "The L.A. Times" reports that about 1,000 people have canceled their subscription to the paper. That's not a high percentage of their circulation, but it shows you that some people were angry.

Interesting enough, a few days ago, Susan Estrich, who teaches out there, who was Michael Dukakis' 1988 campaign manager, said that "The L.A. Times" should apologize for this late hit.

And you certainly do get -- look, out here "The L.A. Times" for conservatives is what "The New York Times" is back east for conservatives. It is seen as a Democratic, liberal, insider, elitist paper. And they were -- those folks are not about to believe these charges, I think, no matter what.

The real question is, whether this has moved a lot of the independent voters who were leaning toward Schwarzenegger, a lot of the first-time, or rarely voting voters, who the Schwarzenegger people expect to come out in droves because of this new phenomenon, whether those people will change either their minds or be discouraged from voting. And I've got to be honest with you, Bill, I don't know.

HEMMER: None of us do. That's why we're watching it.

There's a piece out today that called Gray Davis a pinata for an aggrieved electorate, which is possibly where this whole thing is aimed in the first place.

Before we let you go, what happened to Cruz Bustamante?

GREENFIELD: He had a very bad debate. He's run a very kind of sluggish campaign. And in that debate, which was seen by more people than have ever watched a non-presidential debate, the two things people remember is he came out for higher taxes on alcohol, tobacco and the top 4 percent of wage earners, and basically said illegal immigrants should have driver's licenses and basically pretty much whatever citizens have. And in California, that not only alienates Anglos and Asians, but alienates a fair percentage of Latino voters. So he was expected to fire up a base, and it just didn't happen for him. Now he's still within striking distance, so let's not write him off, but he did not run a good campaign.

HEMMER: That's why they play the games, huh. That's why they vote tomorrow.

Thank you, Jeff.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired October 6, 2003 - 09:04   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: The California recall battle looks too close to call, according to polls. The final day of the campaign is today. They vote tomorrow. No shortage of finger-pointing among candidates. The number of sexual misconduct accusations rising again this weekend against Arnold Schwarzenegger. The number, officially 15 have come forward.
Here's Bob Franken live in L.A. for the fallout.

Good morning, Bob. Almost there.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

Almost there. Arnold Schwarzenegger is trying very, very hard to get back on message, as he goes into this last day of the campaign, but his opponents are having none of it. They are continuing to raise every chance they can the various allegations that were made about his past conduct, particularly the one about the relationship with women. It comes up over and over. Governor Gray Davis was only too willing to talk about that when he appeared last night on "LARRY KING LIVE."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. GRAY DAVIS (D), CALIF.: There have been some evasions, occasionally an apology, occasionally a denial. And the question gets down to this, are all 15 of these women lying? Or is Arnold Schwarzenegger not telling us the truth?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FRANKEN: Schwarzenegger is trying to avoid the issue as much as he can on the campaign trail. When he does have to talk about it, he normally blames his political opponents for a smear campaign. But the questions keep coming, as they did when he was interviewed by ABC's Peter Jennings.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIF. GOV. CANDIDATE: No one ever came to me in my life and said to me that I did anything, that I don't want you to do that, you went over the line, Arnold. Now, all of a sudden, isn't it odd that three days, four days before the campaign, all of a sudden all these women want to have an apology? Isn't it odd?

(END VIDEO CLIP) FRANKEN: The wisdom about this election? Well, it's hard to have any wisdom, except to say that, right now is too close to call, or at least nobody wants to call it.

HEMMER: Bob, listen to Gray Davis talking about LARRY KING last night. He talked about Arnold Schwarzenegger giving some sort of explanation. What is he expecting from Schwarzenegger at this point?

FRANKEN: Probably nothing. But he's expecting to keep the heat on him. It's an issue that the Democrats see has some prospects. Of course, he's desperately trying to avoid the recall. Their polls show that the margin is closing, and so they're just keeping the heat on him.

HEMMER: Thank you, Bob. Bob Franken in L.A.

Let's stay in L.A. now, political analysis on the race with our senior political analyst, Jeff Greenfield, live in L.A.

Nice to see you, Jeff. Good morning out there.

It is early, 6:00 a.m. Answer the impossible, if you could. These accusations having any impact yet?

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST: I'll tell you in about 24, 36 hours.

HEMMER: We'll all know then.

GREENFIELD: No, no, but fairness. The one impact we do know, the only measurable one that I can see, is that "The Oakland Tribune," a legendary conservative Republican newspaper, withdrew its endorsement of Schwarzenegger, because of these allegations and suggested its people vote no on recall. You hear all kinds of rumors in the closing days of a campaign. I spent the other night at a place with a lot of Democrats buzzing about polls showing that the margin collapsing. We do not know how accurate that is.

And one of the reasons is, I believe, because these charges came so late, first of all, you have two million people who have already voted absentee or early; they can't change their votes. And once people are invested in Schwarzenegger, as the entire Republican establishment is, they tend to be much harder to move away from that position. So we just don't know. And we also, by the way, Bill, have no idea know who's going to turn out tomorrow. It's going to be a completely unique collection.

HEMMER: And I think that is absolutely the factor that we'll all start to mull over when the polls close tomorrow.

What about a backlash against Gray Davis? Do some people log on to this and say, you know what, this is dirty politics, we've seen it in the past, it's not going to stick now?

GREENFIELD: Well, "The L.A. Times" reports that about 1,000 people have canceled their subscription to the paper. That's not a high percentage of their circulation, but it shows you that some people were angry.

Interesting enough, a few days ago, Susan Estrich, who teaches out there, who was Michael Dukakis' 1988 campaign manager, said that "The L.A. Times" should apologize for this late hit.

And you certainly do get -- look, out here "The L.A. Times" for conservatives is what "The New York Times" is back east for conservatives. It is seen as a Democratic, liberal, insider, elitist paper. And they were -- those folks are not about to believe these charges, I think, no matter what.

The real question is, whether this has moved a lot of the independent voters who were leaning toward Schwarzenegger, a lot of the first-time, or rarely voting voters, who the Schwarzenegger people expect to come out in droves because of this new phenomenon, whether those people will change either their minds or be discouraged from voting. And I've got to be honest with you, Bill, I don't know.

HEMMER: None of us do. That's why we're watching it.

There's a piece out today that called Gray Davis a pinata for an aggrieved electorate, which is possibly where this whole thing is aimed in the first place.

Before we let you go, what happened to Cruz Bustamante?

GREENFIELD: He had a very bad debate. He's run a very kind of sluggish campaign. And in that debate, which was seen by more people than have ever watched a non-presidential debate, the two things people remember is he came out for higher taxes on alcohol, tobacco and the top 4 percent of wage earners, and basically said illegal immigrants should have driver's licenses and basically pretty much whatever citizens have. And in California, that not only alienates Anglos and Asians, but alienates a fair percentage of Latino voters. So he was expected to fire up a base, and it just didn't happen for him. Now he's still within striking distance, so let's not write him off, but he did not run a good campaign.

HEMMER: That's why they play the games, huh. That's why they vote tomorrow.

Thank you, Jeff.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com