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Convention Attendees Speak Out On Trump; Cleveland Police: Scene Has Been Peaceful; Melania Trump Delivers Speech with Striking Similarities To Michelle Obama's 2008 Speech; Turkish President Speaks Exclusively To CNN About Failed Coup; How Will Failed Coup In Turkey Affect War On Terror? Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired July 19, 2016 - 05:30   ET

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

[05:31:00] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: There's a lot of excitement here in Cleveland for the convention. Thousands of people flocking here as the RNC kicks off and there's some colorful characters. I don't know if you've noticed.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Literally.

CAMEROTA: Yes, literally. So we hit the streets to find out what people are doing here and what they think of Donald Trump, and just to take their temperature, and we came across some surprises.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: Have you been concerned about some of the things that you've heard Trump say?

MIKE, ATTENDING RNC: I think Trump is a different kind of guy, and I say that because he's not a politician. You see, when he's saying things is what the American voter is saying and I think that's encouraging because politicians -- I've lived -- I'm 87, I don't know if you realize it.

CAMEROTA: Are you kidding me?

MIKE: But I've seen at lot --

CAMEROTA: That's not possible. That is not possible that you're 87. You've seen a lot of elections.

MIKE: So I've seen a lot of elections and I'm tired of politicians. I'm tired of promises that they haven't ever been able to make. And I just kind of think we're in a little revolution, and I'm kind of a revolutionary guy.

CAMEROTA: What are you doing here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE DRESSED AS POLAR BEAR: We are here going to vote conventions trying to remind the human species that our species, the polar bear --

CAMEROTA: The talking polar bear.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (Dressed as polar bear): -- is in dire need of help.

CAMEROTA: Do you feel like you're being heard by the candidates?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (Dressed as polar bear): We need to be heard more by all candidates.

CAMEROTA: What do you want to stay to Donald Trump here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (Dressed as polar bear): Save me.

CAMEROTA: How's it going here so far?

DENNIS HILL, DISTRICT COMMANDER, CLEVELAND POLICE DEPARTMENT: So far, so good. A lot of energy. We've seen our delegates from all over the country come in and everyone's greeting. People are thanking the police for their support, thanking us for being out here. I've had nothing but kind words and hugs, and it's been a great morning, it really has.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (Barking).

CAMEROTA: I don't get the message. What's your message? What's your message?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (Holding leash with man on all fours): This dog has been acting up a little bit, OK?

CAMEROTA: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And his name is "Little Trump".

CAMEROTA: But are you angry at Trump or do support Trump? I don't get it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I love Donald Trump. I know, without a doubt, he is the next best president and I think the only way that we can prove that is by teaching my dog, "Little Trump", a lesson that insubordination is never the answer.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's great, he's huge.

CAMEROTA: What do you think so far?

NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER: I think it's moving in the right direction. It'll be -- we'll be pretty unified by the end of the week and I think there's generally a pretty positive spirit here. And I think, unfortunately, the tragedies in Nice and in Turkey, and in Baton Rouge and Dallas have all heightened the importance of this election in a way that I suspect will turn out to be very positive for Trump.

CAMEROTA: Any security concerns here?

GINGRICH: Any what?

CAMEROTA: Security -- GINGRICH: No.

CAMEROTA: No?

GINGRICH: Not -- basically, you've got so many police here that as long they pay attention we're fine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: A lot happening on that street. It's right across from the convention center and there are people with signs and in costumes. It was a little bit Mardi Gra-ish yesterday.

CUOMO: Yes. I mean look, I think the good news for Trump in all of this is that that's the scene that happens outside conventions, you know. You've probably done that piece seven times. And that's good for him that there's --

CAMEROTA: Not with a polar bear.

CUOMO: The talking polar bear, which people were calling a panda when I walked by yesterday. They were like, look, a panda. I was like, really, a panda? But, you know, Newt's words are so true for him. Who would have thought Newt Gingrich, at this stage of the game for him, considered as V.P., so relevant. Very interesting.

CAMEROTA: Indeed.

CUOMO: The dog thing -- explain it to me in the break.

CAMEROTA: Oh, I will.

CUOMO: So, while we try and all collectively figure out --

CAMEROTA: If I can.

CUOMO: -- what was going on with that situation. How you handle a crisis is a big part of politics, certainly a big part of being president. So, what happened with Melania's speech last night and whether or not you care that it sounded a heck of a lot like Michelle Obama's. It's really about how the campaign is dealing with it. That may be a legit criticism and concern. We discuss, next.

[05:35:20] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:39:30] CAMEROTA: The Trump campaign doing some damage control today after Melania Trump's keynote speech last night appeared to have been plagiarized from Michelle Obama's speech at the Democratic National Convention in 2008. Here is a comparison of both speeches.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHELLE OBAMA, FIRST LADY: Barack and I were raised with so many of the same values.

MELANIA TRUMP, WIFE OF DONALD M. TRUMP: From a young age, my parents impressed on me the values --

OBAMA: You work hard for what you want in life.

M. TRUMP: -- that you work hard for what you want in life.

OBAMA: That your word is your bond. That you do what you say you're going to do.

M. TRUMP: That your word is your bond and you do what you say, and keep your promise.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[05:40:00] CAMEROTA: So let's discuss all of this with our CNN political commentator and talk radio host for KABC, John Phillips. He's a Donald Trump supporter. And, CNN political commentator and former communications director for Sen. Ted Cruz, Amanda Carpenter. Great to have both you here.

JOHN PHILLIPS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, TALK RADIO HOST, KABC: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Amanda, I want to start with you because you are a former speech writer for politicians. How does this happen?

AMANDA CARPENTER, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, FORMER COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR FOR SEN. TED CRUZ: Well, this is someone's worst nightmare. I mean, it can happen, usually not at a speech for this level, but I could imagine that maybe someone said let's take a look at Michelle Obama's speech that she gave at the convention. It was a really nice one and maybe taking notes --

CAMEROTA: But why would they look at -- I'm sorry to interrupt you but that's the part that confuses me.

CARPENTER: Yes.

CAMEROTA: They don't like the Obamas. They have made a campaign based on how wrong the Obamas are. Why would they look at Michelle Obama's?

CARPENTER: It's an admission she gave a really good speech at the Democratic Convention, which she did. I mean, it wasn't a political speech. She just talked about the positive attributes of her husband and they were looking for inspiration, most likely.

And I could see how you would pull a graft (ph) like that, maybe leave it on a draft, and if you're circulating it amongst many staffers someone leaves it on, incorporates it, forgets to attribute it, or change it, or something. Clearly a mistake was made. This is why I say they should just own up to it, acknowledge the fact that Michelle Obama gave a very nice speech, and move on.

CAMEROTA: All right, where here's the statement from the Trump campaign that I'll read for you, John, and for our viewers. They said last night at 1:48 a.m., "In writing her beautiful speech, Melania's team of writers took notes on her life's inspirations, and in some instances included fragments that reflected her own thinking. Melania's immigrant experience and love for America shone through in her speech, which made it such a success."

That's not acknowledging that they took fragments from Michelle Obama's speech. Should they have gone that far?

PHILLIPS: Well, I love the fact that Trump is tight with the dollar but I think he needs to sell some of those gold-plated chairs and hire a speechwriters because that's where the problem is. Maybe the whole living room set and hire Amanda, here, because all she had to do was go out there and show the world that she loves her husband, that she supports his candidacy. It was a really low bar. That's all that needed to be done.

And I still think, even with the controversy, she came off as likeable. This isn't going to last very long. She's not the candidate. Her name isn't on the ballot. We'll move on from here.

CAMEROTA: Is it a big deal?

CARPENTER: Well, if they keep going like this. It's never the mistake that becomes a big deal, it's the cover-up, and it seems like they're trying to cover it up. And it plays into the narrative that Donald Trump never admits failure, can never say he was wrong, can never recalibrate.

Instead, he doubles down on things that are really quite silly, that shouldn't be a big deal, because people will give Melania a pass because they recognize that she's not a politician. They would forgive her if she owns up to the mistake.

But, if people are going to say that's not plagiarism when everybody can look at those places, those speeches and see with their very own two eyes that they're seeing the same words, it's going to backfire.

CAMEROTA: Here's how Melania explained it to Matt Lauer about her process of writing it and getting familiar with it. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MATT LAUER, HOST, "THE TODAY SHOW": Has she gone over the speech with you? Did you practice it on the plane?

M. TRUMP: I read once over it and that's all because I wrote it and with as little help as possible.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: So she says she wrote it with as little help as possible.

PHILLIPS: I suspect Hillary Clinton isn't going to stir the pot on candidate's spouses causing problems on airplanes.

CAMEROTA: I mean, good point. Look, to your point, yes, of course this will blow over. Does plagiarism rise to the level of terrorism? Of course not. However, let's just dive in a little bit deeper to the speech because you were saying that it was a low bar and all she had to do was talk about sort of how great her husband was and their connection. Do you think it was personal enough? Did she share enough personal anecdotes? Do you have a better sense of Donald Trump from the rest of her speech?

PHILLIPS: Yes, I do, because I think it was honest. There are people that are warm and fuzzy that like to talk about their relationship with the public and really want to put a lot of what goes on behind closed doors out in the public sphere. I take it, from Donald Trump and Melania, they don't have a relationship that's conducive to that -- that's like that. So, what she gave us last night, I think, was authentic and authenticity is really what they should have done.

CARPENTER: Here's the problem.

CAMEROTA: Go ahead.

CARPENTER: That the part that was plagiarized, where she talked about their family's value, the value of keeping your word. And if you're going to go and lie about the plagiarism on that exact excerpt it just looks really bad. And she was missing the personal anecdotes. They should talk about what they do for their anniversaries.

And I think the best way for the Trump campaign to move on is to put Melania out there for some more interviews to show that she does have a voice, she can speak to those things because the children are speaking tonight. They are going to be under a very intense spotlight and they need to make this go away for the family.

CAMEROTA: John, Amanda, thank you.

PHILLIPS: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Great to talk to you guys. All right, overseas, that failed coup attempt in Turkey is raising, of course, many concerns about terrorism here in the U.S. Could the chaos there trigger trouble in the war on terror? We'll take a closer look at all that when NEW DAY returns.

[05:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:49:30] CUOMO: Turkey's president, speaking exclusively with CNN, says the U.S. fight against terror could be at risk because of the failed coup there. Turkish president Recep Erdogan is asking the U.S. to extradite a key cleric living in the Poconos region of Pennsylvania. Listen to what he told CNN's Becky Anderson.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RECEP ERDOGAN, TURKISH PRESIDENT (through translator): And when the U.S. asks for the extradition of a terrorist, if Turkey doesn't have that individual on the terror list, what do we say? What do we respond?

[05:50:00] Now, the individual might not be on your terror list -- or terrorist list -- but if he is on my list and if we have an agreement on the extradition of criminals, if I make the request then, well, you should extradite that person.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: There's President Erdogan. What is really going on in Turkey and what's going to happen next? CNN national security commentator Mike Rogers, the former Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, joins us now. Good to have you. No better man to talk to about this.

MIKE ROGERS (R), CNN NATIONAL SECURITY COMMENTATOR, FORMER CHAIRMAN, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: Thank you.

CUOMO: So, there is Erdogan. Let's take one step back. What happened and who made it happen?

ROGERS: Yes. Well, this is something Erdogan has been trying to do. He's tried to purge the senior military leadership in Turkey for some years. He understood if he was going to move toward a more Islamic state, in the constitution in Turkey they put the army in charge of keeping it secular. So think about that. That means they're engaged in politics, watching the kinds of decisions he had made.

CUOMO: So this wasn't the military just seizing its own initiative, having its own agenda, and going at the democratic nature of Turkish society.

ROGERS: No, and I think that got missed in a lot of the dialogue here, and this has been going on for some years. In 2011, Erdogan had a pretty good sized purge. In April of this year, 275 military officers were acquitted of a coup attempt. And what I think happened is they knew that there was another purge coming so pressure is building on these --

CUOMO: Is purge a nice word? Is it going to be done through the formal process of justice and litigation or are you afraid that there's going to be a bloodletting?

ROGERS: I think there's going to be a bloodletting. He's arrested some 20,000 -- I'm suspect that 20,000 people were engaged. He arrested judges -- everybody that was in opposition to Erdogan's --

CUOMO: The pictures of those guys in the airport and in the courthouse not good, where they had all those guys shirtless and tied up. It was a very disturbing image.

ROGERS: I think this the beginning of what's going to -- to be the Erdoganization of Turkey and that means less secular, more authoritarian. Remember, he -- they've been calling him the "Little Putin". He was elected as prime minister, then he got -- he changed -- he ran for president. He's changed the constitution to give him more power as president. This is his way of solidifying that. And just the fact that he's asked for Gulen, the cleric that's living in the Poconos in Pennsylvania --

CUOMO: Do you buy the significance of Gulen?

ROGERS: I wouldn't underestimate the significance of his influence. I doubt that he had anything to do with this. From what I understand, these folks were under a lot of pressure -- the military coup folks. They understood that there was going to be this other purge. They were going to take out a whole bunch of new round of military officers. They were going to round them up, fire them, and I think they felt this pressure.

Then they heard that they were under surveillance and said if we don't act now, we are going to be taken out in the next few months. So there's a lot more to this story than I think meets the eye.

CUOMO: Well, let's discuss. So, you believe and accept that what's going on here is the military wants to keep Turkey what it should be, from the U.S. perspective, which is a secular state. You know, a lot of people being introduced to Turkey right now because of this situation. It was the cosmopolitan gateway from east to west there. It was an espionage center, you know, in romantic circles.

But it was -- you would go there and it looked like you could be in Paris. That's changed, you know. Istanbul is now the minaret city a different way, once again. It just doesn't have the most mosques, it has the most extremism that's growing within its ranks there. You believe that's on the growth theory.

ROGERS: I do, and I think Erdogan wanted to move. I don't think he had this wholly totalitarian state in mind when he started this, but I think he certainly has an authoritarian mind now.

CUOMO: So what does that mean for us with using the Incirlik -- you know, the airbase -- and then being a real hub for the fight against terror if he goes more Islamic?

ROGERS: Well, he understands that they're a threat to his rule, as well.

CUOMO: ISIS.

ROGERS: Absolutely, ISIS. So I think that there -- he's inclined to make sure that we're still a good partner. He is now threatening -- because of this he wants to extradite the cleric, Gulen, who's in Pennsylvania, back to Turkey. This is going to get very dicey very soon because he's already saying well, maybe we can't be as good a partner in the fight against ISIS if we don't -- you don't get this cooperation.

CUOMO: You think the U.S. gives it to him?

ROGERS: I surely hope not, unless they show up with a mound of evidence that he was planning, coordinating, and I don't think they have that. I think when you -- he's just taking out every opponent that was on the list. Probably people who got phone calls from these other generals that may or may not have been engaged in the coup, he's arresting them as well. So when talk about taking 20,000 people -- judges, clerics, military officers -- this spells trouble for Turkey. CUOMO: Mike Rogers, thank you for clearing the clouds over this situation.

ROGERS: Thanks.

CUOMO: Appreciate it, as always. So, we're talking from Turkey, now we're going to talk turkey about politics -- Melania Trump's speech. There are allegations in the air now that parts were borrowed from what we heard in 2008 from Michelle Obama. And, the way the campaign handled it is getting just as much scrutiny. We have new information on this developing story next.

[05:55:15] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

M. TRUMP: Everyone wants change. Donald is the only one that can deliver it.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESUMPTIVE REPUBLICAN NOMINEE: We're going to win. We're going to win so big.

SCOTT BAIO, ACTOR: Is Donald Trump a Messiah? No, he's just a man.

PATRICIA SMITH, MOTHER OF BENGHAZI VICTIM, SEAN SMITH: I blame Hillary Clinton personally for the death of my son.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Lock her up, that's right.

RUDY GIULIANI, FORMER MAYOR, NEW YORK CITY: There's no black America, there is just America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I would like to make something very clear. Blue lives matter in America.