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New Day
Trump Prepares to Unveil Immigration Plan Tomorrow; Remembering Gene Wilder; Trump and Clinton Gearing Up For First Debate. Aired 6- 6:30a ET
Aired August 30, 2016 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[05:59:53] JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And what a morning, good morning to you, Chris. You know, that black face cartoon of Hillary Clinton is sure to complicate Trump's attempt to court African-American voters, some of whom are still uncomfortable with the rhetoric in the campaign. All this as Trump has set to deliver that immigration policy speech the campaign is hoping will finally clear the air on where Trump stands on key points involving illegal immigration.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARROLL (voice-over): Accusations of racism leading to more personal attacks on the campaign trail.
KELLYANNE CONWAY, DONALD TRUMP CAMPAIGN MANAGER: People will look at that and say, you seem desperate.
CARROLL: Donald Trump's campaign manager hitting back at Hillary Clinton's running-mate for remarks he made last week, linking Trump to former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke.
SEN. TIM KAINE (D), VICE PRESIDENT CANDIDATE: Donald Trump is pushing their values, Ku Klux Klan values, David Duke values.
CONWAY: In the case of Tim Kaine, I mean, we expect the rough and tumble politics, the lies from Hillary Clinton, her folks. But Tim Kaine, you've been a mayor, a senator, a governor, you're running for vice president, Harvard Law degree and you stoop so low that you are making these allegations. And I think it is going to backfire.
CARROLL: But Duke, who is running for a Senate seat in Louisiana is promoting Trump in robo-calls for his Louisiana Senate campaign.
DAVID DUKE, FORMER IMPERIAL WIZARD OF THE KU KLUX KLAN: It's time to stand up and vote for Donald Trump for president and vote for me, David Duke for the U.S. Senate.
CARROLL: Trump had been criticized for not disavowing Duke's endorsement quickly enough during the primary. Trump's campaign did quickly disavow the robo-calls in a statement and on CNN.
KATRINA PIERSON, NATIONAL SPOKESPERSON, TRUMP CAMPAIGN: It's absolutely disturbing the Trump campaign has no knowledge of the campaign that David Duke is running and we have disavowed David Duke and don't condone any of the activities that he's doing.
CARROLL: At a fundraise in the Hamptons, Clinton saying Duke Senate bid is a by-product of Trump dog whistles to racist voters.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nobody knows how well he is going and how his embrace of Trump and Trump's acceptance of him could out that man, that despicable man, in the Senate of the United States.
CARROLL: This is as Trump supporter Pastor Mark Burns apologized after tweeting this photo of Hillary Clinton in black face, mocking her outreach to black voters.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The last thing I want to do is to offend people.
CARROLL: Meanwhile, the Republican nominee seizing on the latest sexting scandal surrounding the husband of long-time Hillary Clinton adviser Huma Abedin.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: She is married to a guy that is uncontrolled and uncontrollable.
CARROLL: Abedin announcing her separation from disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner after The New York Post published suggested pictures he allegedly sent to another woman with his child lying next to him. Something people close to the family tells CNN left Abedin furious and sickened. Trump using the opportunity to slam Clinton's quote, "bad judgment."
TRUMP: He's a sick person and, you know, she has access to classified information. To think that is very likely that much of this information Anthony Weiner would know about. And I think it's something that was terrible.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CARROLL: Well, Trump's highly anticipated speech on immigration comes tomorrow from Phoenix. Trump has been criticized for not being consistent or clear on the issue. His hardline supporters were hoping they will finally get some clarification about that deportation force he promised he would put into place to deport an estimated 11 million undocumented people living here in the United States -- Chris, Alisyn.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: All right. I appreciate it, Jason. Thank you for setting the table for us. Let's discuss with CNN political commentator and political anchor of Time Warner Cable News Errol Louis. And we have CNN political analyst and Washington Bureau Chief for "The Daily Beast," Jackie Kucinich. Where to begin? Where to begin?
Let's start with, Errol, the policy implications of tomorrow, OK? Let's keep it clean on the first beat here. Jason teed up the desire to find out for clarity on the deportation force. Now, if that's the bar for success, he's walking into trouble tomorrow. Do you think he'll try to redefine priorities to get away from that?
ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think he'll skip around that particular issue, by the way. Because we already have a deportation force. You know, I mean, we have a pretty robust border enforcement unit that has been funded by Congress, you know, at the insistence of Border States, by the way, like Arizona.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Trump says it's not working and that's why -- the thing that they keep citing is the 20,000 criminals who were released and not deported. So he says that deportation force is not working, he's going to fix it.
LOUIS: Well, if that's where he goes, I mean, I wish him the best of luck with that. I mean, that will play well by the way in Arizona where there's a hotly contested primary that's going to happen just next Tuesday, so that will get him through that room. That will get him through that speech. On the other hand, these larger questions that everybody else is watching, the whole rest of the country that's going to vote on November 8th, deportation force saying that he is going to do better is a promise. It's not a policy. So if he's asked or if he chooses to actually detail a policy, then we'll have a better sense.
And he and all of his surrogates can maybe finally get it straight and talk about where he wants to go. The reality is, though, as we've seen from the polls and you guys reported this yesterday, he has quite a lot of wiggle room on this.
CUOMO: Right.
[06:05:21] LOUIS: The most of the country although they want better border enforcement, although they want an answer to immigration, they do not want to see 11 million people deported. So, he can really go pretty light on how big this deportation force is how active there going to be or in what order they'll going to sort of find and implement this promise that he's made to deport 11 million people.
CUOMO: All right. Jackie, we started with talking about the policy, you know, situation here because we are hoping that that's what election was about, but of course it isn't. It's about the ugly tactics of politics. And now we have the black face cartoon of Clinton in these bizarre remarks of Trump of all people saying that Clinton had bad judgment by keeping Huma Abedin close given what Anthony Weiner is dealing with in his own personal life. What's your take on this?
JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: You know, Trump has never been someone who has a whole lot of self-awareness. Him going after Anthony Weiner when he surrounded himself with people like Steve Bannon and Roger Ailes and maybe some people that a lot of people wouldn't be really comfortable with having so many access to classified information is curious for sure.
And, you know, he also kind of jumped the shark. He started talking about some of the crazy conspiracy rumors about Huma Abedin and the Muslim brotherhood. He said that on a radio show yesterday. So it's the old Donald Trump that we talk about rather than new and improved Kellyanne Conway Donald Trump that sort of took the reins yesterday. And we saw going out a little bit too far. CAMEROTA: And Errol, he is not just talking about sort of the morals
of Anthony Weiner in this latest sexting scandal. He is basically saying that Anthony Weiner is dangerous to national security because he may have had access to classified information. Let me read you the Trump statement about that. "Hillary Clinton was careless and negligent in allowing Weiner to have such close proximity to highly classified information. Who knows what he learned and who he told? It's just another example of Hillary Clinton's bad judgment. It is possible that our country and its security have been greatly compromised by this." What do you think of that linkage?
LOUIS: I think, you know, one of the things is Donald Trump goes through what is his first time running for any public office, he's got to learn that that's for the surrogates to do. That's for somebody else to do. It's not for the candidate to get out and just kind of blindly speculate. Because he's really talking about sort of a triple jump. You know, was classified information given to Huma Abedin? Did she then give it to her husband? Was it information that would actually harm the security of the United States? All of that stuff are things he doesn't have any kind of grasp of any real factual information about it.
And so it becomes just a distraction and accusation. It's not like you can't have distractions and accusations in a campaign, but it's not for the candidate to do. Let somebody else speculate or ask serious questions. I mean, look, it wasn't that long ago that Anthony Weiner was a congressman. He had access to all kinds of important information back then. It's not as if he is supposed to be kept away from anything that might sound like it's sort of important to the national security. And as you suggested before, you know, if you start looking at some of the people around Donald Trump, they're not people of the highest sort of ethical and moral purity, if you want to use Anthony Weiner as a standard.
You know? I mean, there are scandals that have involved people like Roger Stone. We've got these questions that are swirling around Paul Manafort.
CAMEROTA: Right.
LOUIS: What did they hear? Do they get access to any briefings? You know, I mean, there's no point going down that rabbit hole. And here again, it's not for the candidate to do that. Let somebody else go out there and try to chop off heads. What many of us would like to hear is for the candidate to talk about policy details. Talk about a direction for the country.
CAMEROTA: Right. Yes.
LOUIS: Not getting into the back and forth.
CUOMO: Except that that's hard and this is easier, especially for Trump, he loves this. The question is, Jackie, is there enough depth to plum where you can make advantage with these kinds of attacks. Let's put up these numbers in context to my question. We have opinion polls of registered voters for both of these candidates. With Trump, you have got 57 percent unfavorable, 26 percent favorable. And, you know, you don't have to be a seasoned pollster to know, that means the negative is kind of baked in.
And similarly, with Clinton, you've got 34/51. Now, just to state the obvious of what people should know by now, we've never had candidates at this stage of the race who are upside down positive to negative. As deep as I go, you don't see it. So, Jackie, is it worth the time to talk about this stuff? How much higher can you take her negative?
KUCINICH: Well, I mean, this has been a race to the bottom since the very beginning. Another thing in the poll that was really interesting, only two percent of people said that they had nice things to say about both of the candidates. Two percent. I mean, that's not even immediate family at that point.
(LAUGHTER)
So, I mean, really? So, you're right where, you know, are these negative attacks actually bringing their numbers down? Donald Trump hasn't really even had any attack ads run against him. I'm sorry, Hillary Clinton really hasn't had any attack ads run against her yet. Donald Trump certainly has in the primary, which may be why his numbers are a little lower, but it seems like maybe these candidates should start talking about themselves and what they're going to do rather than tearing the other down. Because it's very clear in these opinion polls the American people are kind of sick of both of them. Yes. Already. And it's only August.
[06:10:42] CAMEROTA: Except in that way, Errol, it levels the playing field. I mean, since they both have high negatives, they both have unfavorables, and then they can just both keep doing what they're doing because there's a parody on some level.
LOUIS: Well, that's right. And look, it also suggests that both of them have what the political strategists will tell them is a clearer path to success by driving up the other person's negatives. Unfortunately that amounts to a kind of low level voter suppression tactic. You know, the reality is --
CAMEROTA: Yes.
LOUIS: What we know is that when unfavorables is this high, when the disgust level of the voting public is this high, people just decide to stay home. And, you know, it's not illegal to try to get the other people's supporters to stay home, but it's really unpleasant not good for democracy, not good for the system, raises the level of overall cynicism and sets the stage for some real problems down the road. What does the next presidential candidate do?
CAMEROTA: Great point. Thank you for making that insight both of you.
Stick around, we have much more to talk about.
Also the FBI revealing that hackers breached voter data bases in Illinois and Arizona earlier this year. In Illinois, hackers are believed to have assessed up to 200,000 personal voter records. Election officials say they're highly confident the hackers did not change anything. In the Arizona breech, officials shut down the state's voter registration system for about a week and stole one election official's username and password.
CUOMO: Breaking overnight, the American Embassy in Kurdistan, the capital evacuated after a bomb attack near the compound, a suicide bomber ran the gates of the Chinese Embassy. The blast injured three people inside the diplomatic post. So far no identity on the attacker, no claim of responsibility.
CAMEROTA: Well, actor, screen writer, author, director, Gene Wilder did it all and he did it with his own inimitable style. He died Monday at 83-years-old. Wilder was a legend, of course, in the world of comedy and perhaps never better than when teaming up with Mel Brooks on some laugh out loud masterpieces.
CNN's Brynn Gingras has more on his life and legacy. It was a full life.
BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Can't help but smile thinking about him, right? You know, fans, friends and fellow actors will continue to pay tribute this morning to Wilder. He is known for his neurotic performances, his energy, and it's humor but maybe most notably his role as that quirky candy tycoon.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GINGRAS (voice-over): Willy Wonka has left this world.
(MUSIC PLAYING)
GINGRAS: But actor Gene Wilder leaves it changed with his performances, from his Oscar nominated role in "The Producers" --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Under the right circumstances a producer could make more money with a flop than he could with a hit.
GINGRAS: -- to his other Oscar nominated role in "Young Frankenstein."
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: Frankenstein?
GENE WILDER, ACTOR: Frankenstein, you must be Egor.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: Now, it's pronounced I-gor.
GINGRAS: Wilder died at the age of 83 from complications from Alzheimer's though his nephew said it never stole his ability to recognize those closest to him. He was an actor who painted water colors, married four times, including to SNL great Gilda Radner. Wilder's last wife Karen survives him. Legendary Director Mel Brooks tweeting, "One of the truly great talents of our time. He blessed every film we did with his magic and he blessed me with his friendship." Wilder blazed his way through three Brooks' comedies, multiple films with Richard Pryor and countless other projects, but he'll always remain the ultimate candy man. (MUSIC PLAYING)
A toast to your imagination, Gene Wilder, you'll live in ours.
WILDER: Don't forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he always wanted.
UNIDENTIFIED BOY: What happened?
WILDER: He lived happily ever after.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GINGRAS: So he actually kept his illness a secret, but I'm more fascinated that Chris actually knew him.
CAMEROTA: Yes. There was your mom in one of those videos.
CUOMO: He was a very early pioneer for cancer research. Obviously he was married to SNL great Gilda Radner. Cancer took her. He was one of the sweetest people in the eye that especially of the comedic varieties. He was a sweet guy of tremendous personal depth and people you would talk to in Hollywood would say, and Broadway that this man had it all. He could do everything.
[06:15:17] CAMEROTA: And he was so beguiling to watch.
GINGRAS: Right.
CAMEROTA: I mean, just watching and particularly in "Willy Wonka," you know, just watching his facial expression, his movements, you can see the actors around him sort of don't know what he is going to do at any given moment. And wow! I mean, just what a talent.
GINGRAS: That's why I love Gene Wilder, he's the nicest man, like you just described. That's what we've heard from all the actors.
CUOMO: You had it perfectly at the beginning, you can't think of him and not laugh.
CAMEROTA: Brynn, thank you.
GINGRAS: All right.
(LAUGHTER)
CUOMO: And he would want us laughing, I guarantee you that.
Up next, the art of the debate prep. We have new details on how the Clinton team is working versus the Trump team. And guess what, you'll be shocked at how different they are. Next.
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[06:20:04] CAMEROTA: Well, the first presidential debate is now less than a months away. We'll be there, of course. CUOMO: What?
CAMEROTA: Yes. They haven't told you that, your schedule yet. Both candidates though are preparing in very different ways.
Let's bring back our panel, Jackie Kucinich and Errol Louis. Jackie, I'll start with you. "The New York Times" has some fascinating reporting this morning about how each camp is preparing. Let me read for you what they said about Hillary Clinton's camp. Because they have enlisted the ghost writer of the Donald Trump biography, "The Art of the Deal." Here's what the New York Times report.
Hillary Clinton's advisers are talking to Donald J. Trump's ghost writer of "The Art of the Deal" seeking insights about Mr. Trump's deepest insecurities as they devise strategies to needle and undermine him. That's pretty fascinating about how that might look on the debate stage.
KUCINICH: Yes. I mean, this is going to be a debate like we haven't seen before. I think it's fair to say that. And what the Clinton campaign needs to do is they need to make Donald Trump look as unpresidential and unhinged as they have been saying. So, one of the ways to do that, to set him off. Start, you know, needling him as it said in that story and really set him off kilter. And if they can do that, you know, it will -- that will be very much to their benefit. And reiterate the message that they've been putting out there.
CUOMO: The trick will be to find ways to diffuse his tactics without disrespecting the premise of some of the criticism. Because a lot of the criticism that he levels, he does it in his own way but it's coming from a base of group think about Hillary Clinton. So, she doesn't want to disrespect that. My favorite line from the piece is Mr. Trump said in the interview that he would rather not attack Mrs. Clinton on personal grounds, including Bill Clinton's extramarital affairs. If she hits me, though, you have to see what happens. I like that Clinton's affairs came up even in the context of what he doesn't want to talk about.
CAMEROTA: What I'm not going to mention.
CUOMO: What's the chance that he doesn't go personal when he gets up on the debate?
LOUIS: On a zero chance. I mean, this is something that he has promised to do. He promised it all throughout the primary season. Remember, he would tell the Republican faithful. He said Hillary Clinton can be easy. You know, she's not going to get away with anything. I'm going to, you know, I am going to nail her on, you know, white water. I'm going back 20 years. You know, elections are supposed to be about the future. Donald Trump has said that he is going to bring up issues about her that he thinks she somehow got a free pass on.
Now, the rest of us remember that, you know, Whitewater and the presidential scandals were litigated. The impeachment, you know, ad nauseam, but Donald Trump thinks there's still some juice to get out of that. So, that there's something important and relevant to bring up about that. So, I would expect to hear something about it.
CAMEROTA: Jackie, "The New York Times" apparently found some sources that are involved in these debate preps and they have been at Mr. Trump's club, golf club in New Jersey planning. They say that Roger Ailes, formerly of FOX News, of course, who left amid sexual harassment allegations is involved. Laura Ingraham, the radio talk show host involved. Let me tell you what they say about how Donald Trump has been somewhat resistant to any conventional debate prep.
Here is what "The New York Times" writes. "Donald Trump has been especially resistant to his advisers' suggestions that he take part in mock debates with a Clinton stand-in. Instead, Mr. Trump asked a battery of questions about debate topics. Mrs. Clinton's skills and possible moderators, but people close to him said relatively little had been accomplished."
Hmm. That must worry some on his team.
KUCINICH: Well, right. And particularly because on contrast, Hillary Clinton is going to be talking about policy when she is not needling Donald Trump. So, we'll have to see -- and even when he communicates policy, it tends to be sort of in a stilted way as we've seen some of these teleprompter speeches. It's going to be really interesting. This is a different format than he is used to. Even the Republican debates all last year they had -- there were breaks. There were commercial breaks. You're not going to see that in this debate, so it's certainly going to be new terrain for both of them.
And one of the most interesting things in that story and I believe "The Washington Post" story is both campaigns are trying to settle on who to play their opponents. I feel like in years past it was on the Republican side any way, it was Rob Portman was always the stand-in. And you're just not seeing those, you know, the conventional stand-ins that we've seen in years past. So, we'll see who they end up getting.
CUOMO: It's interesting in that, it seems to be a little bit of a role shift here. You know, Trump has been in the role in this election of the aggressor. You know, he's coming in. He's a brawler. He wants to get it on. He is different from these other people. And now it seems like he is trying to stay away from the importance of exactly what's going to happen on that stage. Sometimes, you know, surprise, the media can overhype things in an election. This cannot be overhyped, Errol. This will be the first time they're standing next to each other and the one who wins convincingly out of the box has a huge advantage.
LOUIS: A huge advantage we note from past election cycles that, this is one of the things that can and will move the numbers. In 1976, we saw the 1980 in a big, big way, even in 2012, actually the first one where President Obama kind of screwed up, it really sort of set things off. I think one of the things that the Trump's team is going to have to be really careful about is that he may not feel like he needs to prep to deal with Hillary Clinton. He may feel like he's kind of got her number, can get inside her head and can go toe-to-toe with her, but there's that third voice on stage. [06:25:24] There's the debate moderators whoever they are and in
whatever format. And they always have the option as we know from having worked on these debates of really drilling down and doing insisting on an answer to certain kind of questions. Where it won't be enough to sort of, you know, flip it off with an insult. You know? I mean, you know, you can turn around and try and, you know, accuse the press of bias and so forth, but this is really where the format and the prep -- if the debate moderator is better prepped than Donald Trump is, he might have a really hard time getting around some of the issues he would rather not talk about.
CAMEROTA: Do we have any idea, Jackie who the debate moderator will be? I mean, that's one of Donald Trump's big questions?
KUCINICH: I mean, maybe it could be you or Chris. We really don't know at this point.
CAMEROTA: Maybe it will be.
KUCINICH: Maybe it will.
CUOMO: No one.
KUCINICH: But to Errol's point, attacking the debate moderator is something that I'm sure Donald Trump will do, but that only plays -- that plays to his base. That plays to a lot of Republicans who thinks the press is biased any way. So that's something that won't really get him the votes that he needs if that's a tactic that he employs over and over again. But to your question, it really seems like it's up in the air. There's been a lot of names thrown around and you have to imagine that there's a lot of debate going on within the campaigns as to who would be an acceptable choice as a debate moderator.
CUOMO: Well, look, one thing cannot be underestimated. There's no question that Trump is a feel guy and he feels that he knows who he is, he knows who she is, he doesn't want to come off too polish and practiced --
CAMEROTA: Right.
CUOMO: -- and she has a completely 180 degree feel. The Clinton team beliefs that the result on game day is a result from practice.
CAMEROTA: Right.
CUOMO: And she needs to be where she needs to be that way. So they couldn't be more contrasting scandals and they both have the same -- absolutely. And they both can't avoid the inevitable. That night is going to be the biggest event in this election. I don't think there will be a bigger one after it until Election Day.
CAMEROTA: I wish I were a month away. Panel, thank you very much. Great to talk to you both.
KUCINICH: Thank you. CUOMO: All right. Having entered into the news cycle in a way that I'm sure he does not want, Anthony Weiner is back. Apparently his latest deal online is the last straw for his wife, Huma Abedin. Why didn't she leave him earlier? How could this affect her role at the top of Clinton's organization and campaign? These are questions that have been asked before and they'll going to be asked again now. Next.
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