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Trump Blames Media; Boko Haram Video; Harrison Celebrates Gold in Judo. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired August 15, 2016 - 08:30   ET

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

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[08:31:28] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I'm not running against crooked Hillary Clinton. I'm running against the crooked media. That's what I'm running against too.

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ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Oh, I hope we win the presidency if we're running against Donald Trump. Donald Trump -

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, I don't want it.

CAMEROTA: Well, he has also called the media - maybe this will inspire you - the lowest form of life.

CUOMO: That's more spot on.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CUOMO: Unfair, no. Lowest form of life, maybe.

CAMEROTA: The Republican nominee taking the social media and the airwaves to attack what he calls the biased coverage a, quote, "corrupt press." With 85 days to election day, how will this war end?

Let's discuss it with CNN media analyst Bill Carter and CNN's senior media correspondent and host of "Reliable Sources," Brian Stelter.

Gentlemen, thanks so much for being here.

You guys don't seem like the lowest form of life. And, you know, we joke about it because it's obviously laughable on some level.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

CAMEROTA: But I think that there does need to be a distinction drawn between the media, which some people lump all sorts of television shows and reality shows and journalism. And journalism is not supposed to curry favor with any particular candidate. They're supposed to point out hypocrisy and everything else. Do you think the coverage of him has been unfair, Brian? STELTER: Carl Bernstein says journalism is the best obtainable version

of the truth. That line always sticks in my mind when I think about campaign coverage. I think reporters are trying to get to the best version of the truth with Donald Trump. And he's an especially hard candidate to cover. Sometime there are missteps and sometimes it does - I'll be the first to say, sometimes it does feel like there's a pile-on going on because we live in this world

BILL CARTER, CNN MEDIA ANALYST: Right.

STELTER: Of saturation media coverage, where everything gets hammered home ten times again and again.

CARTER: And -

STELTER: That said, there is some serious controversies to cover with this candidate.

CARTER: Right. That's the thing.

STELTER: He's loose with the facts. He has a tendency toward conspiracy theories. And if he doesn't think we're going to hold him accountable, he's got another thing coming.

CARTER: Well, exactly. If you say something outrageous day after day after day, you can't then say, you're not covering my opponent enough. He's making all the reason for us to cover him very, you know, emphatic. We have to do it. What are we supposed to do, not say, oh, that's a pretty outrage thing for that guy to say?

CUOMO: I think that his argument fails on every level of fact that you could apply to it. However, it may succeed because what he's doing is what he does best, he's using a tactic.

CARTER: Well, I - yes, but I don't think it can succeed. He's not running against the media. If he's running against the media, he can't win.

CUOMO: Except this -

CARTER: He's running against another candidate.

CUOMO: Except what he's doing is, he's running against the system. The media is part of the system. It is rigged against him. He is the underdog. They may steal the election from us. Us versus them. The media is a very good pinata for him.

CARTER: It is, but don't you think all the people who think that or agree with him already are going to vote for him. How many more votes do you add by saying the media is against me, instead of going on what - what I'd do, policy -

CUOMO: You do get the attention. You do get the attention off of what's been coming out of his mouth. We're now talking about us, instead of talking about what got him in trouble with us in the first place. CARTER: But I - I understand that (ph).

STELTER: But then this becomes about media literacy. It becomes about the viewers who are watching our program right now. They have to recognize, and I think many - many viewers do recognize - that when Trump does this, he's using a shield. He's putting up a shield to, as you said, distract from the controversies and the stories and the questions about his staff and things like that. It's almost like a vaccine, right? When he complains about the media, he's giving himself a vaccine -

CARTER: He's trying to give -

STELTER: So that we - we won't be - so people won't take seriously the tough coverage of him.

CARTER: The - I think the one advantage it might give him is it does maybe make some of the media say, well, we do have to maybe cover her, go after her a little bit, if it seems overwhelming because they're going at him.

CUOMO: We asked for her to come on this show on a daily if not weekly basis.

CARTER: Right.

CUOMO: She doesn't want to put surrogates on. She doesn't want to come on. She doesn't want to give press conferences. These are her decisions.

CARTER: Right.

[08:35:00] STELTER: And I think we should give the Trump campaign some credit. Yesterday, Paul Manafort on "State of the Union," Jason Miller on my program, Katrina Pierson on "Newsroom" in the afternoon. Campaign representatives are going on CNN programs. Clinton spokespeople, at least when I asked from over the weekend, said no. I believe you all have been asking. They've been saying no.

CAMEROTA: I mean, yes. So shouldn't we make more of that? As the press, shouldn't we trumpet that -

CARTER: Yes.

CAMEROTA: No pun intended, more -

CARTER: Yes.

CAMEROTA: And tell people. And that's not fair that we just have access to him more, which we appreciate -

CARTER: Right.

CAMEROTA: And not access to Hillary Clinton. So isn't that by definition sort of making the - it not a level playing field? CARTER: Yes, but how many times can you say that? You just said they didn't come on. Well, what else, then, do you say? It's an effective strategy for - if you're ahead, it's the oldest rule in the playbook, you don't then make mistakes. They're like sitting on the ball when you're away ahead, that's what they're trying to do.

CUOMO: Both strategies do a disservice to the voter.

STELTER: Yes.

CUOMO: Donald Trump is wasting precious time -

CARTER: Right.

CUOMO: Talking about something that shouldn't matter, when he should be putting on a premium for what matters to the American people -

CARTER: Right.

CUOMO: Like he's supposedly going to do in this speech today. Hillary Clinton, she's limiting exposure to her because she doesn't like a bit part of what's in the news about her and she's hoping to stall. Both of those things arguably - you know, objectively, do a disservice to the voter.

CARTER: I agree with that. I think both of them are making mistakes for the voters. But if you're Clinton, you can understand it. I don't understand his strategy entirely of saying, I'm against the media. It just don't think it add votes for him.

CUOMO: He told me he likes to whine. That whining gets him what he wants. He said - he said it to us on air.

STELTER: Even in "The Art of the Deal," he talks about the value of the media, the value of publicity. He knows how important the media is to his campaign. After all, he's out done when it comes to TV advertising and other issues. But it is unprecedented to have a - to have a candidate, a presidential nominee, attacking the media the way he is. I do think there's a good - a lot of good reasons for freedom of speech advocates to be concerned about the chilling effect these kind of comments are having.

CARTER: Right.

STELTER: I don't want to - you know, I don't want to take it too seriously and overstate it, but -

CARTER: Especially with him saying he's going to cut people off. He - how many presidents - and say we're not going to give press credentials to all these really legitimate organizations.

STELTER: Right, "The Washington Post," Politico, "The Huffington Post," "Daily Beast," all denied press credentials (INAUDIBLE).

CARTER: And the - threatening the -

CUOMO: (INAUDIBLE) reporter, forced her to be escorted to her car by the Secret Service -

CARTER: Exactly.

CUOMO: Because of the concern of the crowd.

CARTER: Yes.

STELTER: And this is unusual. You know, certainly Republicans especially, but many politicians campaign regularly about the media. Thomas Jefferson said in 1807, nothing can be believed which is read in a newspaper.

CARTER: Right. Yes.

STELTER: There's nothing necessarily new about bashing the press -

CARTER: Nothing. Yes.

STELTER: But Trump is taking it to a whole new level. I would say to a new low.

CAMEROTA: And, Bill, I - the same question that I started with, with Brian, do you think that the press has been fair or unfair to him in chasing everything that he says and parsing his every word to within an inch of his life and to making it sound - to questioning his sanity? Do you think that they've been fair?

CARTER: Yes, because he has never done this before. He is - he's a new thing for most people. They're examining every aspect of him and I think some of it is coming negatively because it appears that way.

CAMEROTA: Brian, Bill, thank you. Great to talk to you guys.

STELTER: Thanks.

CAMEROTA: What's your take on all of this. You can tweet us @newday, or you can post your comments on facebook.com/newday.

CUOMO: All right, there is some horror for families from the Nigerian school that had their girls kidnapped more than two years ago by Boko Haram. You remember this. But there is a new video the group just put out and what the terrorists want in exchange for the girls' release, two years this has been going on for these families. Stay with us.

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[08:42:08] CAMEROTA: We have a grim update for you now. The terror group Boko Haram releasing a disturbing video that appears to show the bodies of some of the kidnapped Chibok school girls. The masked fighter in the video claims that they were killed in a Nigerian military air strike. Dozens of other girls are still alive, but they appear weak and, of course, hopeless.

CNN's senior international correspondent Nima Elbagir, who has covered this story from the very beginning, joins us now from London with an update. What do we know, Nima?

NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Alisyn, this was an extraordinarily difficult watch. And one could only imagine how heartbreaking this was for the parents to watch their daughters, who were falling apart behind this one girl who had been chosen to speak on behalf of the whole group. You could see these girls, one by one, start covering their faces, beginning to cry. One girl appeared to be holding a very small baby.

And then those horrifying pictures of the aftermath of what Boko Haram claim is a Nigerian government air strike. The kind the Nigerian government denies. And in this video, which we can't show you the specific fames because they are just too horrifying, in this video they are turning over the dead bodies of what appear to be young girls so that the camera can capture that these do indeed look like teenage girls. And one can only assume to give those who might have known these girls the opportunity to recognize them.

It is really an escalation on behalf of this terror group. They are now ratcheting up the stakes for the Nigerian government. They're asking for the release of the Boko Haram militants that are currently in Nigerian custody, and they actually force one of the imprisoned school girls to make that demand on their behalf, as her - her fellow abductees unravel behind her, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Nima, help us understand this. Why is it taking so long to find these girls?

ELBAGIR: That is the question that I know from so many of the parents, they ask themselves almost every day, Alisyn, why has it taken so long? And the reality is that we know from the FBI, we know from law enforcement agencies that deal with abduction cases, let alone abduction cases on this scale around the world, that those first few hours, those first few days, are extraordinarily crucial. And in those first few hours, in those first few days, the then Nigerian government did not move. They did not prioritize these girls and their families.

So now two - almost two and a half years later, this trail is very, very cold. But also, and this is a lot of the concern that the families have, the Nigerian government, while it says it has been continuing a negotiated settlement, like many governments around the world, is very concerned about the kind of message this sends and negotiating with terror groups. So they have been really pushing forward on a military solution, and that military solution has not delivered.

[08:45:12] CAMEROTA: And -

ELBAGIR: And for the parents that we've spoken to today - sorry, please, go ahead, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Well, Nima, what about the U.S.? Is the U.S. offering any sort of significant help?

ELBAGIR: A lot of the fly over, the intelligence gathering has been American. But the realities of the terrain on the ground, are realities that Nigerian forces say that they know better than anyone else and quite possibly they do. So while the Americans have been able to help with intelligence gathering, acting on the intelligence has been left in the hands of the Nigerian government. And, again, when the U.S. and other countries, France, the U.K., Israel, when they initially made those offers of help, the Nigerian government didn't accept them. But, realistically now, more needs to be done and the Nigerians are finally admitting over the last few months that they need more help and they want more help. And this now is the opportunity for the U.S. to perhaps step in with a greater offer of help, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Let's hope that this video does get the attention of all of the leaders and decision makers and that they can find these girls. Nima, thank you very much for the update.

Let's get to Chris.

CUOMO: All right, we're going to take a break. A judo master who makes history in Rio. Olympic gold medalist Kayla Harrison joins us to chat about her big victory and how her incredible story is helping people all over the world.

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[08:50:10] CUOMO: Kala Harrison making judo history, and this is for the second time. So, Kayla is now the only American to take home back- to-back Olympic gold in judo. She joins us now to talk about what's next for her and her tremendous win.

Hello, champ. How do you feel to be a back-to-back golden judo artist?

KAYLA HARRISON, U.S. WOMEN'S JUDO OLYMPIC GOLD MEDALIST: Good morning. It feels pretty good. I don't think it's - I don't think it's sunk in yet, to be honest, though.

CUOMO: How did you feel coming into this one, and what do you believe set you apart?

HARRISON: I felt really good coming into the games. I mean it's been a long four years. It's been a hard four years since London. But I think really what set me apart is my coaches made me train as if I wasn't a reigning Olympic champion. You know, they made me fight when I didn't want to fight. They made me go on trips I didn't want to go on. I fought in places that I don't even know how to pronounce. If you look at the stats, I fought twice as much as probably any girl in my division. And it's because of that and because of going through the grind, I showed up here and I knew that I didn't want to lose because I had been through too much.

CUOMO: Well, let's talk about that. You know, a lot of people who don't under martial arts, a lot of people come to it to deal with what else is going on in their life. A lot of people come to it for family, for structure, for discipline. What role did it play in your life?

HARRISON: Oh, certainly. CUOMO: What did it help you get through?

HARRISON: Well, absolutely. Judo, I think, is - has something to offer for everyone. But especially for me, you know, I was sexually abused by my first coach and judo saved my life. Judo changed my life. It was something that I was able to - to do and wake up every day and have a goal and have something to wake up for. And I was able to be surrounded by people who are so positive and so strong, mentally and physically, who raised me to new levels.

CUOMO: What is your message to victims, when young women hear your story and they come to you and they say, I can't say anything, or I was a victim of it, what do you tell them?

HARRISON: Yes, I think whenever I talk to victims, I just, you know, my message is always that, I know it's really hard right now and I - I know that you feel completely alone and isolated and completely hopeless, but I promise you that if you have - if you can find the courage to say something to anyone, and you can find the courage to find someone who will believe in you, then, you know, there is hope and there is some light at the end of the tunnel. There is a shiny gold medal, maybe even two.

CUOMO: Maybe even two. Well, we've only seen one person do that in judo, and I'm talking to her right now. So what do you do now?

HARRISON: Go to the beach.

CUOMO: Go to the beach.

HARRISON: No, I'm going to - I'm - yes. I'm really looking forward to working on my foundation and I'm - you know, I have the rights to this year national championships for judo, so I'm going to help promote the sport of judo in the United States, get - get it some attention that I think it really deserves. And as for what else, we'll see.

CUOMO: All right. The foundation work is most important to you, obviously, and you want to maintain high profile for it. I will, for full disclosure, I'm a huge MMA fan. I know they're offering you contracts. They have never seen a female fighter of your caliber come into that game. Are you considering that?

HARRISON: I mean I - it's something that I'm definitely going to consider. You know I have - I'm still in Rio mode. I'm still in Olympic champion mode. But when I go home, I'm going to sit down with my manager and my coaches and we're going to make the best decisions for Kayla and the Fearless Foundation and everything that I want to try to accomplish in my life. And if that means getting in a cage, we'll see what happens. But, for right now, I'm just going to live in the moment.

CUOMO: Well, I'll tell you what, the concern will be for the other competitor in terms of how they get out of the cage if you're on the inside of it. Congratulations on doing something we have not seen before. The country you've made proud and hopefully you've made yourself proud as well. HARRISON: Thank you.

CUOMO: Kayla Harrison, we look forward to hearing from you in the future.

HARRISON: Thank you so much.

CUOMO: Thank you, champ.

Well, again, it doesn't get any better than that, right? But, guess what, we've got more "Good Stuff" coming up for you, next.

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[08:58:41] CUOMO: Today's "Good Stuff" comes from Hartford, Connecticut, where 911 dispatcher Katherine Grady got a very unusual call for help. Listen to this.

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KATHERINE GRADY, 911 OPERATOR: They're calling 911, it's an emergency to them, so it doesn't matter if it's small or big.

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CUOMO: All right, so what was it? Well, on the other end of the line was 86-year-old Francis Royer. Her request was not typical for Katherine.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CALLER: I just wanted to know - to know if somebody could take my garbage out tomorrow. It's been there two weeks and it's overloaded. I'm 86 years old, I'm handicapped, and I got a heart condition. I have nobody.

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CUOMO: Now, as heartbreaking as this is, it's not what 911 is supposed to be about. But Katherine saw it differently. She went above and beyond.

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GRADY: Well, I'm not a police officer, Ms. Royer, but I do have tomorrow off and I can drag your barrel down to the end of your driveway if you'd like?

CALLER: You can?

GRADY: Yes.

CALLER: But where are you?

GRADY: At the police department.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: And she didn't stop there. After she took out the trash, she helped Francis with some other chores around the house. It's just -

CAMEROTA: Oh, my God.

CUOMO: You know, some perspective of not just what our first responders do, but what people can do. People can do beautiful things.

CAMEROTA: I know. We've seen great examples of that today, particularly the guy who rescued the woman and her dog in Louisiana, and now this wonderful dispatcher. They are an inspiration to all of us.

[09:00:07] Thanks for watching today. Time now for "Newsroom" with Carol Costello.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: They are an inspiration.

Thank you so much. Have a great day.

NEWSROOM starts now.