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American Morning

Discussion with Joe Trippi

Aired February 02, 2004 - 09:17   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.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Dean is looking beyond tomorrow for help from delegate-rich states like Michigan. Is that a sound strategy?
Joining us this morning from Washington is Joe Trippi, who until last week, was running Dean's campaign.

Nice to see you, Mr. Trippi. Thanks for being with us.

JOE TRIPPI, FMR. DEAN CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Howard Dean said you were not fired, that he'd love to have you stay with the campaign. You were invited to stay, but chose not to. Why did you decide in the end that you had to leave?

TRIPPI: Well, you know, I'm proud of what I did in terms of trying to come up with new ways to get people involved in politics. All the people who campaigned in Burlington, who fought so hard to put that together. I think the Dean campaign has done an amazing thing and deserves credit for really giving the party back its voice and moving things forward.

But when the governor decided he wanted to bring someone else up to manage it, Roy Neel, someone I respect a lot, I just decided that you can't have two captains, and the best thing for me to do was leave to campaign and keep trying to change the country. Had a crazy idea about a year ago the use the Internet to try to get peopled involved. I'm just going to go out and try to do it differently and be a citizen soldier for the Dean campaign.

O'BRIEN: Do you inherently have disagreements with how Roy Neel does things? I mean, is that why you feel like two captains wouldn't work?

TRIPPI: No, not at all. I have a lot of respect for him, a lot of respect for the governor. I think that they've got a sound strategy to continue on. I just think you can't have -- a lot of the staff up there were used to reporting to me. Once you put someone else in, they're confused. I just really thought, look, I have done what I could do. I have done the best I could. Some people call me a mad scientist. Others -- you know, we did do a lot of bold things that I think really helped put the campaign on the map. I intend to keep fighting. I have said I'm out of the campaign, but I'm not out of the fight. I have got some ideas and I'm going keep trying to change this party, keep trying to make it stronger, try to make it more competitive.

O'BRIEN: Are you on board as a sort of unofficial adviser. Do you call in when you want to make your voice heard?

TRIPPI: No, I have given up on that.

O'BRIEN: There's some other question, too. Are you finding that other people, the ones who reported to you, the ones who felt very strongly, emotionally tied to you, want to leave as well? I mean, and certainly you have some questions about finances and some anger about lot of the money being spent very early on.

TRIPPI: You know, I have urged everybody to stay involved and make their own decision about whether it's officially in the campaign or at the grassroots level. I mean, what a lot of the -- lot of us have tried to do is really try to energize the grassroots. The Dean campaign has done that in a way that I don't think any campaign has done in decades. I think we really revolutionized how politics will be done in the future.

This isn't a dot.com crash. I mean, this campaign raised more money in history and. That was because of the grassroots. It continues to do that.

And yes, we spent money, but the things people need to remember is, we had every campaign attacking us, not just that, but paid ads from Republican committees, paid ads attacking us from independent committees. That's the first time that's ever happened really in history. And we had to respond to those attacks in Iowa.

So I think the campaign has the resources it needs. I think Roy Neel is a strong leader. I think the governor has a strong message of change. I think when you look at what's happening with special interest money in this country and the governor's strong stand against it, and Kerry now being sort caught up, as "The Washington Post" said over the weekend, he's the Senator that took more paid lobbyist money than any senator in the last 15 years.

I think the race is still very much up for grabs, and that not just Governor Dean, but any of the other candidates could emerge, and I think Governor Dean will.

O'BRIEN: Joe Trippi, thanks a lot. Nice to see you, as always.

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 February 2, 2004 - 09:17   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Dean is looking beyond tomorrow for help from delegate-rich states like Michigan. Is that a sound strategy?
Joining us this morning from Washington is Joe Trippi, who until last week, was running Dean's campaign.

Nice to see you, Mr. Trippi. Thanks for being with us.

JOE TRIPPI, FMR. DEAN CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Howard Dean said you were not fired, that he'd love to have you stay with the campaign. You were invited to stay, but chose not to. Why did you decide in the end that you had to leave?

TRIPPI: Well, you know, I'm proud of what I did in terms of trying to come up with new ways to get people involved in politics. All the people who campaigned in Burlington, who fought so hard to put that together. I think the Dean campaign has done an amazing thing and deserves credit for really giving the party back its voice and moving things forward.

But when the governor decided he wanted to bring someone else up to manage it, Roy Neel, someone I respect a lot, I just decided that you can't have two captains, and the best thing for me to do was leave to campaign and keep trying to change the country. Had a crazy idea about a year ago the use the Internet to try to get peopled involved. I'm just going to go out and try to do it differently and be a citizen soldier for the Dean campaign.

O'BRIEN: Do you inherently have disagreements with how Roy Neel does things? I mean, is that why you feel like two captains wouldn't work?

TRIPPI: No, not at all. I have a lot of respect for him, a lot of respect for the governor. I think that they've got a sound strategy to continue on. I just think you can't have -- a lot of the staff up there were used to reporting to me. Once you put someone else in, they're confused. I just really thought, look, I have done what I could do. I have done the best I could. Some people call me a mad scientist. Others -- you know, we did do a lot of bold things that I think really helped put the campaign on the map. I intend to keep fighting. I have said I'm out of the campaign, but I'm not out of the fight. I have got some ideas and I'm going keep trying to change this party, keep trying to make it stronger, try to make it more competitive.

O'BRIEN: Are you on board as a sort of unofficial adviser. Do you call in when you want to make your voice heard?

TRIPPI: No, I have given up on that.

O'BRIEN: There's some other question, too. Are you finding that other people, the ones who reported to you, the ones who felt very strongly, emotionally tied to you, want to leave as well? I mean, and certainly you have some questions about finances and some anger about lot of the money being spent very early on.

TRIPPI: You know, I have urged everybody to stay involved and make their own decision about whether it's officially in the campaign or at the grassroots level. I mean, what a lot of the -- lot of us have tried to do is really try to energize the grassroots. The Dean campaign has done that in a way that I don't think any campaign has done in decades. I think we really revolutionized how politics will be done in the future.

This isn't a dot.com crash. I mean, this campaign raised more money in history and. That was because of the grassroots. It continues to do that.

And yes, we spent money, but the things people need to remember is, we had every campaign attacking us, not just that, but paid ads from Republican committees, paid ads attacking us from independent committees. That's the first time that's ever happened really in history. And we had to respond to those attacks in Iowa.

So I think the campaign has the resources it needs. I think Roy Neel is a strong leader. I think the governor has a strong message of change. I think when you look at what's happening with special interest money in this country and the governor's strong stand against it, and Kerry now being sort caught up, as "The Washington Post" said over the weekend, he's the Senator that took more paid lobbyist money than any senator in the last 15 years.

I think the race is still very much up for grabs, and that not just Governor Dean, but any of the other candidates could emerge, and I think Governor Dean will.

O'BRIEN: Joe Trippi, thanks a lot. Nice to see you, as always.

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