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Trump Targets Cruz in Indiana; Clinton & Sanders Locked in Tight Race in Indiana. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired May 03, 2016 - 06:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know, if we win, it's over.

[05:58:46] SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Nobody will get to 1,237.

TRUMP: I've got this guy, Cruz, Lyin' Ted. I think he's crazy.

CRUZ: You don't just get to slap an "R" on your jersey and lead the Republican Party.

TRUMP: She fell off the stage, and Cruz didn't do anything. Even I would have helped her. OK?

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm going to tell you what I can do so you can hold me accountable.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT), DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Our ideas are the future of America.

CLINTON: We're going to give it all we've got, 100 percent effort.

SANDERS: It would be a tragedy for this country if we end up with a Republican in the White House.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're going do have, small groups, lone actors, who find this averted ideology appealing. We have to be prepared for that. Groups like this.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo and Alisyn Camerota.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, May 3, 6 a.m. in the east.

Up first, the moment of truth is here for Senator Ted Cruz in Indiana, as voters in the Hoosier state head to the polls. Today could be the senator's last chance to stop Donald Trump. So how will the GOP race change after Indiana? We will ask Trump's campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski. He joins us live next hour.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: On the Democratic side, a very different dynamic. The race is closer overall and certainly in Indiana. Senator Sanders is looking for an upset tonight to reverse momentum, but he also has a new super delegate strategy that he says will lead to a contested convention.

Clinton is trying to balance finishing Sanders with looking ahead to the general election but also with worrying about a bad twist here near the end. We've got the Indiana primary covered the way only CNN can. Let's begin with Sara Murray. She's live in Indianapolis.

Sara, what's the story from there?

SARA MURRAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris.

Well, Ted Cruz has brought out basically every high-profile backer he's got in a late-state push here in Indiana to try to get him over the top, but Donald Trump has been sounding awfully confident on the campaign trail, saying he is going to lock this down in Indiana and, even if he doesn't, he'll have it locked down in the next couple of weeks, anyway.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TRUMP (voice-over): If we win in Indiana, it's over with, folks. It's over with.

MURRAY: For Donald Trump, today's primary is pivotal for knocking rival Ted Cruz out of the race.

TRUMP: If we win, it's over, and then I can focus -- then I don't have to worry about Lyin' Ted Cruz.

MURRAY: And redirecting his attacks on his potential general election opponent, Hillary Clinton.

TRUMP: E-mails, bad judgment. Iraq, voted yes, bad judgment. Libya, bad judgment.

MURRAY: On the trail Monday, Trump even sat down to lunch with the author of several highly critical and loosely sourced books about the Clintons.

CRUZ: The entire country is depending on the state of Indiana.

MURRAY: But Cruz is still racing to overtake the front-runner, knowing if Trump wins here, he's on track to clinch the nomination. Cruz, touting his newly-appointed running mate, Carly Fiorina.

CRUZ: Carly Fiorina is someone who stands up to bullies, whether they are Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton.

MURRAY: And putting her directly in Trump's line of fire.

The billionaire seizing on Fiorina's fall at a campaign event Sunday.

TRUMP: They just showed it to me, and I said, "Wow, that's really cruel." She went down right in front of him, and he kept talking. He kept talking. Didn't even look like -- that was a weird deal.

MURRAY: Cruz spent the day before this crucial contest zigzagging throughout the Hoosier State and even confronting Trump supporters face to face.

CRUZ: Most candidates would have just let the protestors go do their thing. I made a different decision. I walked across the street to engage with them.

Sir, America is a better country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Without you.

CRUZ: The senator sparring with the fired-up crowd over five minutes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Trump, he's the only one that's going to put us where we need to be. What are you going to do about the Second Amendment?

CRUZ: This man is lying to you, and he's taking advantage of you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY: Now, Ted Cruz is insisting that, no matter what happens here today, he is staying in the race until Cleveland. Of course, it's much harder to make that pitch to donors, both for Ted Cruz and for the "stop Trump" movement if they can't actually stop him here today -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Sara, thanks so much for all of that. Well, Democratic rivals Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders locked in a very tight race in Indiana. Sanders looking to regain his momentum. Meanwhile, Clinton apologizing for comments that she made about the coal industry.

CNN's Chris Frates is live in Indiana with more. Hi, Chris.

CHRIS FRATES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Alisyn.

The voters are already starting to go to the polls behind me in Indiana, and the Clinton campaign bracing for a possible loss here. A Clinton campaign official telling me they wouldn't be surprised if Bernie Sanders can pull off an upset tonight.

And there's two reasons for that. One is money. Bernie Sanders has spent about $2 million in advertising here. The Clinton folks have spent virtually nothing.

Two is demographics. Indiana is a whiter state than some of the states Hillary Clinton has won. And Bernie Sanders tends to outperform with those white voters, but the Clinton folks told me they're not super concerned because of the math. Bernie Sanders would have to win by huge margins here to cut into her delegate lead and they don't see that happening.

The Sanders folks tell me they're feeling good coming into today. They're picking up the endorsement of the United Steel Workers. That's huge in a manufacturing state like Indiana. And he's going to sit down with the head of the local union at Carrier, which of course, has made some news for sending jobs to Mexico.

Hillary Clinton hasn't even been campaigning here in Indiana. In fact, she was in West Virginia yesterday, where she apologized for a remark she made back in March at a CNN town hall, where she said she would put a lot of coal miners and companies out of business. She said that remark was taken out of context.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It was a misstatement, because what I was saying is that the way things are going now, we will continue to lose jobs. I do feel a little bit sad and sorry that I gave folks the reason or the excuse to be so upset with me, because that is not what I intended at all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FRATES: So it's a big apology from Hillary Clinton ahead of West Virginia's big primary in next week. We'll keep an eye on that and on Indiana to see if Bernie Sanders can pull off the upset. There are 92 counties in Indiana. Polls open in all but 12. Turnout is key for both parties. The GOP has been drawing more traffic at the polls. Will it again today?

CNN national correspondent Jason Carroll live at a polling site in Terre Haute, Indiana. How you doing, Jason?

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And also in Vigo County, where they really like to vote. It's already 6 a.m. The polls barely opened just a few minutes ago. They're already here, some of the voters, lining up here, as well.

You know, some 78,445 registered voters here in the county. Chris, here's what you need to know about here. Sixty percent voted early, voting starting on April 5. We can tell you that so far, of that percentage, about twice as many Republicans have voted versus Democrats.

You hear so much about bellwether counties throughout the country. This really is a bellwether county, when you consider this one fact: they have picked the winning presidential candidate nearly every single time since 1888. They only missed it twice. Once in 1908, the other time in 1952 when they picked Stephenson over Dwight D. Eisenhower. So we're definitely going to be watching this -- this race very, very carefully.

Again, this is a primary. This isn't a presidential general election, but having said that, going to be watching what happens here in this county very, very closely -- Chris, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: We will as well, Jason. Thanks so much for that.

Here to discuss what's happening today, Washington bureau chief for the "Daily Beast," Jackie Kucinich; CNN political analyst and host of "The David Gregory Show" podcast, David Gregory; and CNN national political reporter, Maeve Reston.

Great to have you ladies here in studio with us. Very nice. Indiana is critical, we've been saying. If Ted Cruz wins there tonight he can justify staying in. If he doesn't win, what happens tomorrow, Jackie?

JACKIE KUCINICH, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, "DAILY BEAST": I don't think we see Ted Cruz dropping out by any stretch of the imagination. But it is going to become -- I mean, it's already mathematically impossible for him to win, and he's going to have less of a case to be made that he could essentially be a nominee.

And what we've seen is his delegates are softer. The ones that he's courted, made a big deal about. It's softer support than he may like. And so you might see some of those people going to Trump at a convention at the end of the day, if he's too weak to solidify his support.

CUOMO: Nobody's dropping out, period. You're not going to see anybody leaving this race on either side. There is all this talk -- absolutely. Maeve Reston, are you taking the other side? Are you saying someone's going to drop out before we get to convention?

MAEVE RESTON, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: I don't know.

CUOMO: But you have to know. That's how this game is played.

Why do I say that? Because we don't see any motivation to consolidate on either side. Bernie Sanders will talk about the Democratic side a little bit later in the show. But, you know, this super delegate strategy, he's finding a way to game the convention.

Kasich, we're all working the phones. Kasich's people believe there's a road at the convention. Cruz's people believe that there's a chance that Trump could stumble. Probably not tonight, but they believe it's there.

So what do you think -- this is an important day, no question, but is it still long game, all across the board?

RESTON: I mean, I think that there is still a shot, potentially. It depends on how close results look tonight, but it's absolutely a money game tonight.

I mean, that's the big problem, is that Ted Cruz needs advertising dollars to go into these other states, Nebraska, where Donald Trump has already laid some money down for ads. And that's going to be the big question, is whether donors think that he really realistically has a path to keep him in it and whether the anti-Trump forces, their donors say, "OK, well, it's been a total waste of money. It's done."

CAMEROTA: Well, David, Cruz thinks he has a path. In fact, he laid that out with Dana Bash in her interview with him. So listen to his math.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Will you support his candidacy, if he, Donald Trump, gets the delegates before Cleveland?

CRUZ: Dana, nobody's going to get to 1,237. I'm not going to get to it, but neither is Donald Trump.

BASH: what makes you so sure he won't get the delegates? I mean, getting 47 percent of the remaining delegates isn't inconceivable at all.

CRUZ: Well, he hasn't gotten 47 percent to date. That's better than he's done, and I'll tell you...

BASH: But he sure did well last week.

CRUZ: You're right. He did well in his home state, and he did well in the adjoining states. He won five states last week, but I'll tell you. In the three weeks that preceded that, I won five states in a row, starting with Utah, then North Dakota, then Wisconsin, then Colorado, then Wyoming. One point three million people voted in those states.

And by the way, you know, I earned more votes in Wisconsin than Donald Trump did in New York.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: So, David, what about that logic?

DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Look, he makes a very good argument. He just has to be able to back it up. He actually has to put the numbers on the board. That's the bottom line.

One of the things that I'm picking up as I talk to Republican officials is there's more Republican donors who just don't think that Cruz has a path. They just don't believe that he is the alternative, and there's more of a movement toward Trump, feeling like, "Hey, look, high-risk, but also high-reward with Trump." And that's what I think is starting to coalesce here.

It's certainly possible that Trump could stumble, certainly possible he could get shy of 1,237, but I think that the narrative starts to collapse.

[06:10:06] And if Trump wins big tonight in Indiana, I think it is effectively over, because you can even have some other Cruz states like Nebraska that fall then for Trump, and then he's polling well in California.

So this argument that somehow he can be stopped when it hasn't happened becomes a lot thinner I think, if he wins tonight.

CUOMO: Here's the plus/minus, it seems, for him. The minus side, Ted Cruz has been blaming us, right? He's been saying the media is the one driving the narrative of Trump. It's really insiders there are starting to do exactly what David Gregory says, which is started to think less -- we cannot do Clinton anymore favors, because they believe she's going to be the nominee. So he has a problem in-house.

His, plus, though, is the man standing next to him in Indiana, Mike Pence. This state runs on principles as much as any in that region. Does he win, Cruz, when you get Republicans thinking about what matters to them on a policy position?

KUCINICH: In Indiana, I mean, here's the problem. Pence kind of knee-capped him also by that endorsement. Because it was sort of a -- yes.

CUOMO: You're buying the Trump spin on that?

KUCINICH: No. He did endorse him, you're absolutely right, but like, yes, Ted Cruz is great. It wasn't as bold throated as, I think, you expected, from someone like Mike Pence. Well, you're right, it's very ideologically aligned with Ted Cruz and very little daylight there. So I mean, I think there was a little bit more of an expectation of you need to vote for this person instead of, "I like him. You should, too."

RESTON: You haven't seen the sort of chips line up the way that Ted Cruz wanted them to in Indiana. The evangelical vote has not coalesced completely around him. Talk radio is not 100 percent on his side the way that they were in other states, and that's really hurt him, along with Donald Trump's momentum.

I do think that there's a shot that we're still going to have a feisty California primary, in my home state, but -- and that's very complicated terrain. Ted Cruz has been organized there for a year. So if he can eke out at least a closer contest tonight, then maybe he can make it that far and bet on his organization to keep Trump from that 1,237 number.

GREGORY: Can I just say, I think the big test tonight is whether that conservative voter, the one who buys the Cruz argument that Trump is a phony, that he's not a real conservative and that he won't deliver on some of the promises, that's the test tonight. Are there enough of those conservative voters who come out in bigger numbers? Or has Trump completely stomped over traditional ideology in that race?

Because Indiana, I think, is a good testing ground for that -- for that dichotomy.

CAMEROTA: There was an interesting exchange that we should play for you yesterday between a Trump supporter and Ted Cruz, who got into what some say was an ill-advised exchange with this Trump supporter where they just went back and forth. So watch a moment of this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CRUZ: Sir, America, is a better country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Without you. CRUZ: Thank you for those kind sentiments. Let me point out I

treated you respectfully the entire time, and a question that everyone here should ask.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you Canadian?

CRUZ: Do you want your...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you Canadian?

CRUZ: Do you want your kids repeating the words of Donald Trump?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: OK. The Trump supporter has impeccable comedic timing. Truly.

CUOMO: I think it was more than one. I mean, but he -- that one -- they had, like, an eight-minute exchange. Is that a good use of Ted Cruz's time?

KUCINICH: No, especially -- no. I don't think so. I understand that he wants to engage the Trump supporters, and you know, have an intelligent dialogue. That same supporter asked him, "What are you going to do about the Second Amendment?"

Ted Cruz, that's one place where Ted Cruz has absolutely no problem when it comes to Republican voters. So I don't know that that did Ted Cruz, kind of made him look silly.

CUOMO: What about the metaphors? When you're going to somebody who has nothing to lose, it's always a fight that you want to think twice about. But Ted Cruz, one, is a masterful litigator. He is fearless in that regard. We see it with Dana Bash, too. Dana Bash has no jokes. She has the facts on her side. He will make the case for why Trump won't get to 1,237. That's what he does, did it to the highest court in the land.

But to the voter who's not quite sure yet, you're a real Republican, you always have been. You're watching that Trump supporter and where he's coming from, the kind of things he says and the way that Ted Cruz responds to the ugliness, responds to the insults to his face, I don't know that it looks so bad for Ted Cruz.

RESTON: Well, it shows that he's willing to do the fight.

CUOMO: He's above it, a true believer, and he's not going to be cheap.

RESTON: But there was a little bit of condescension there that, you know, that maybe wouldn't -- if he went on to talk about this exchange later and said, you know, where we see civility on our side where the Trump side is all about fighting.

CUOMO: I'm getting ganged up on. David Gregory, do you agree with me or Maeve Reston and everybody else? GREGORY: You know, I think Maeve Reston and this whole West Coast

bias is getting hold.

CUOMO: That's what I'm talking about.

GREGORY: No. I do tend to agree with you, Chris, because I mean, I might have pulled Cruz aside if I was advisor and said, "Sir, just as -- just to say, probably not a persuadable voter here."

But I think he makes an argument that others might hear as an effective argument against Trump.

[06:15:05] CAMEROTA: All right. Panel, thank you very much. Stick around. We have to talk about the Democratic side, as well.

Coming up in our next hour, Donald Trump's campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, will join us live on NEW DAY.

CUOMO: Gregory would be full sideways on this.

CAMEROTA: Hard to tell. He seemed to be with the West Coast vibe.

CUOMO: A little switch -- a little switch in there for Gregory.

All right. Bernie Sanders is not backing down. The senator insists that he is a better candidate than Hillary Clinton to take on a Republican nominee, period. But can he beat the former secretary of state in today's pivotal Indiana primary? Big questions. Answers, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: Senator Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton locked in a tight race in today's primary in the Hoosier State. No question about it. Big question for Sanders is whether or not he does well in Indiana and gets the momentum. But there's a lot more at play right now in that party.

So let's bring back the panel: Jackie Kucinich, David "On the Fence" Gregory and Maeve Reston. It's good to have all three of you. Talking about Sanders and the impact, but he is largely a product of what happens with Clinton tonight and going forward.

[06:20:10] Let's play some sound that Hillary Clinton is dealing with. It's not in Indiana. It was in West Virginia. It's about coal miners. But it could have metaphor effect for Hillary Clinton, making the case now and going forward. It's about how she feels about coal and the coal industry and what she's going to do. This is before and then when she's face-to-face with a West Virginia coal family.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: Well, I'm the only candidate which has a policy about how to bring economic opportunity, using clean renewable energy as the key, into coal country, because we're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just want to know how you can say you're going

to put a lot of coal miners out of -- out of jobs, and then come in here and tell us how you're going to be our friend?

CLINTON: You know, because I don't know how to explain it other than what I said was totally out of context from what I meant. Because I have been talking about helping coal country for a very long time, and I did put out a plan last summer, and it was a misstatement.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Now, Jackie, her people will tell you all day long, you know, she was saying because of this renewable energy stuff, you're going to wind up killing these coal places. You'd better have a plan for them, too, that she was being supportive in both instances. It did not play that. Even she called it a misstatement. Is there a metaphor effect here for Clinton in going forward? Will she be attacked because of this type of negotiating of response?

KUCINICH: Hillary Clinton's biggest problem throughout this whole race has been that people think they can't trust her. This does not help that narrative. Doesn't also help she was in Columbus, Ohio. Ohio is a natural gas state, and it is increasingly a natural gas state.

So it really does, if you put those two together, does look like, has the appearance of the fact that, you know, she's saying one thing here and saying another thing in West Virginia.

CAMEROTA: She was trying to be honest in that town hall. She was trying to be honest. Like, "Hey, things are transitioning to renewable energy. Fracking is coming onboard. We have to figure out what we're going to do about the coal miner." She was trying to be honest.

And it's so interesting to see her then try to clarify her response, because it's so un-Trump-like. You know, Trump would have said, "I'm telling the truth. Deal with it. This is what you have to accept." And she didn't do that, but was she was telling the truth the first time.

RESTON: Yes, and she -- you know, to back off those remarks, it's almost worse. I mean, if she had just found a way to own it and talk about it, because this is really potentially where the general election is going to be fought, is in places like coal country.

The west potentially, if it's Donald Trump is the nominee and Hillary Clinton, maybe not as much in play, and he's going to go into these Rust Belt states and use those remarks against her. And you can just see that appearing in an ad over and over again.

And Jackie's exactly right. That it just hits that trust issue for her very hard.

CUOMO: And trust, a nicer way of saying trust is principle versus pragmatism, David. She's dealing with it with Sanders. He's the purist. He's about the dream. She has to answer with reality. Not as enticing. Against Trump, if he's the nominee, the ultimate -- this is what I think, this is how it is, every time out of the box, versus someone who says, you know, things aren't that easy. It's subtle. How does that play?

GREGORY: You know, I think Trump's going to play on such a big canvas in the general election. And I think the risk here for Clinton is there's, you know, big, bold strokes. And then there's the more nuanced, you know, brushstrokes, where she's doing a lot of explaining and he's offering big principles. So an issue like this looks clumsy for Clinton.

Take something else. Imagine a debate where you're talking about foreign policy. Sara Murray in her piece a few minutes ago, you had Trump saying, "Look, Hillary Clinton equals bad judgment. Think Iraq, think e-mails, think Libya." You know, that's a bite-sized argument, and it's a compelling argument. You've got to really get into the detail to really deconstruct those three things.

That's a -- a dynamic that I don't think always works well for Clinton, and I think you saw that here in this coal explanation, as well.

CAMEROTA: Yes. If we've learned one thing from this particular election year, it's that voters don't want nuance right now. They like slogans. They like big promises. They like bite-sized philosophies.

RESTON: Right.

GREGORY: And it's also the personal characteristics versus policy. I mean, I think that Trump is campaigning on the idea of strength. A projection of strength at a time when America seems on its heels. That's his argument, and she's going to have to make something that's similarly concise.

CAMEROTA: So can she pivot to a less nuanced position and sort of make bolder proclamations, or is that just not her style?

KUCINICH: Sure, she can, but it's going to take some work. Because as we know, Hillary Clinton is a policy wonk. That is her strength. She likes getting down in the gritty details. So, you know, she's going to have to learn to do that.

But we saw a little bit with the women card. I think that was something raised her a lot of money. And that's an area where it is bite-sliced; it's slogan area.

[06:25:08] CAMEROTA: She said, "If that's the woman card, deal me in." That was, like, the best slogan that she could use.

RESTON: She loves playing on that terrain. And that's -- that's the kind of terrain that she will try to be playing on. They had a great fund-raising haul over the last couple of days after those Trump remarks, and so she's just going to try to pivot to turn to those issues that work in her favor. CUOMO: As David said, she did better when it was about who you are,

what you are, you know. Trump moving in that direction didn't seem to get purchase. I don't know. It was the first round of that salvo. We'll see.

But her record is also a plus-minus. "I was secretary of state. Don't tell me that you what I know about foreign policy."

But it's just as easy for him to say what he said to us in an interview yesterday, "She stunk. Everything she did was a mistake. All she got was frequent flyer miles."

Now, you may want to take that on in a written exam all day long, but it sounds good. It's tough to rebut, Maeve.

RESTON: And this is all reminding me of Barack Obama's joke over the weekend, about her slogan being "Trudging up the hill." You know? It's like everything feels like labor. She's really going to have to sort of clean up her act and get a lot more concise about what she wants to say to people and really to bring up her favorable.

CUOMO: The bumper "Sisyphus" has nothing on this.

CAMEROTA: Bring it on, Job.

OK, panel. Thank you very much. We appreciate it. We may have some breaking news for you. Stick around. We'll be right back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)