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Clinton: FBI Chief's Actions "Pretty Strange"; Why Did FBI Agents Wait Weeks To Tell Director About Emails?; Dozens Of Former Federal Prosecutors Blast James Comey In Letter; Washington Post Investigates Trump Foundation; Oklahoma Fugitive Killed In Shootout With Police; Powerful Earthquake Rocks Central Italy. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired October 31, 2016 - 05:00   ET

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

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: -- prosecutors are blasting the FBI chief. Why? Because they are saying this seems politically motivated and breaches protocol, but remember what happened initially when the FBI director came out and said there was no case to prosecute also breached protocol.

So where does it all stand? So much as stake just eight days left until Election Day. We have it all covered for you. Let's begin with senior political correspondent, Brianna Keilar. Scary mask.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Happy Halloween to you, Chris. The Clinton campaign is concerned about this. There's never been a major party nominee facing an FBI investigation into the lead-up to Election Day. It is really unprecedented and this is very, very worrying to the Clinton campaign in Brooklyn.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's pretty strange to put something like that out with such little information right before an election.

KEILAR: Shockwaves through Hillary Clinton's campaign following a surprise letter Friday from FBI Director James Comey.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is the biggest political scandal since Watergate.

KEILAR: Comey notifying members of Congress that the bureau discovered e-mails that appeared to be pertinent to the now closed Clinton server investigation. Those e-mails found on a laptop belonging to Anthony Weiner, the husband of Clinton's long-time aide, Huma Abedin, currently under investigation for sexting with a purportedly underage girl.

Comey can't say if the e-mails are significant. They could be duplicates of those already reviewed. Now Democrats and some Republicans are criticizing Comey's decision to go public as political, worrying it could tip the scales in Trump's favor.

SENATOR TIM KAINE (D), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is an unprecedented move as your folks were describing earlier because it happens close to an election, which is in violation of normal Justice Department protocol. It involves talking about an ongoing investigation, which also violates the protocol.

KEILAR: Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid panning a damning letter to Comey alleging that he, quote, "may have broken the law violating the Hatch Act," a law that prohibits federal employees from engaging in partisan political activity.

As 100 former federal prosecutors and high-ranking Justice Department officials, Democrats and Republicans, signed a letter criticizing Comey's actions.

TRUMP: Hillary has nobody to blame but herself. Her criminal action was willful, deliberate, intentional, and purposeful.

KEILAR: But Trump's campaign hoping to capitalize on the issue.

GOVERNOR MIKE PENCE (R), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We commend the FBI and the director on their decision to keep their word to the Congress and move forward.

KEILAR: House Speaker Paul Ryan called Comey's move, quote, "long overdue" and he's renewing his call to suspend all classified briefings for Secretary Clinton until this matter is fully resolved. Clinton remaining confident that she is in the clear.

CLINTON: We've called on Director Comey to explain everything right away. Put it all out on the table. Of course, Donald Trump is already making up lies about this.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KEILAR: Now Hillary Clinton's campaign is getting an assist from a number of former Justice Department officials including former AG, Eric Holder. He is planning an op-ed that appears in today's "Washington Post." It's pretty strong. He says he is deeply concerned by what describes Comey's vague letter to Congress.

He says the decision was incorrect. He echoes what Tim Kaine said, saying that Comey broke with regulations and rules that he had put in place including you don't talk about an investigation as it is ongoing.

You don't take unnecessary action close to an election day. Unnecessary action that may be the question here -- Chris and Alisyn.

CUOMO: I was joking about the mask thing.

KEILAR: Yes, you need to take that back, all right.

CUOMO: I do. Your looks are not your problem. What are you going as for Halloween?

KEILAR: I don't have time for Halloween. Maybe next year.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: She's working hard.

CUOMO: Is she? Why? What's going on? Let's bring our political panel in. CNN political analyst and Washington bureau chief for "The Daily Beast," Jackie Kucinich, CNN Politics executive editor, Mark Preston, and CNN political commentator and senior contributor for "The Daily Caller," Matt Lewis.

Everybody so serious this morning. Jackie, we use it all day. This is TV, Jackie. You're looking for originality, you're going to have to go back into radio.

Let's look at this from 10,000 feet. We start with timing. Timing is a big issue here. Why they waited, OK. Do you buy that as a concern? Do you believe timing is a real issue here?

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Absolutely. I think timing is the issue here for a lot of the facts, but 11 days into the election. Every single statement you've seen coming out from the Clinton campaign and people who don't like this decision. They say why would you do this now --

[05:05:07]CUOMO: What if he didn't do it?

KUCINICH: What do you mean?

CUOMO: What if he didn't come out and say anything about this and then people later learned that they were sifting through thousands and thousands of e-mails?

KUCINICH: So there are two schools of thought here. That he was bad that it came out now or it would have been worse if it came out later. Because if we had gone through an election, didn't know this, but also here's the thing, we still don't have all of the facts of what is in the computer. What is in the e-mails? There is a debate over whether this was good or bad.

CAMEROTA: So Matt, I mean, what some of the sources are saying is the reason that James Comey did it now is because he feared it would be leaked. He feared that somebody inside the FBI was going to leak that they were sitting on this laptop and what may be on the laptop. It is better to air it out in the sunlight. What do you think of that excuse?

MATT LEWIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think it is valid. Hillary Clinton created this mess by creating a private server and e-mailing classified or confidential information and lying about it. Director Comey goes before Congress and says he will not prosecute her.

But he essentially makes a pledge to them that if more information comes to light, he will notify them as I think is appropriate. Chris made a really valid point. Right now, the American people do not trust institutions.

They do not trust the media. They do not trust their own government. If it came out after the election, which it certainly would have, that they were looking into these e-mails. Oh, and by the way, speaking of Hillary bringing this on herself, she has a top aide whose husband is engaged in sexting underage women.

This is not Director Comey's like invention. He did not cause Anthony Weiner to do that. He did not cause Hillary Clinton to set this up. If this had come out, and it would have come out, it would have further undermined the trust that we have in our government. I think he was really put in a bind, but it is not his fault.

CUOMO: Matt is leaving out a couple of factors that we will put in front of you, Mr. Preston. First of all, Comey certainly created this situation because he breached protocol when he came out in the first place. Talking about why he would not bring forward a case. Talking as if he were the attorney general instead of just the fact finder.

So there was already something done here that was a perversion of it. The other overlay is why is there so much paranoia right now? Certainly one name pop out into your head, which is Donald Trump, saying this is worse than Watergate. So what are the politics at play right now?

MARK PRESTON, CNN POLITICS EXECUTIVE EDITOR: So a couple of things. One is what Donald Trump is saying before these crowds should be -- you shouldn't listen to what he has to say basically. I mean, what he is saying is that taking little iotas of facts and blowing them up and saying that it's all true.

The bottom line is what Donald Trump says to try to gin up his crowds and get poll numbers up should be discounted. To Matt's point though about Comey, I do agree the FBI director has put in a very difficult situation.

Chris, you are right. He came out and did a news conference and he said that he wasn't going to file charges this summer. I think when this information was presented to him, he felt that he could not do anything else, but except come out and tell Congress what he had.

Imagine as Matt said that if this had gotten out afterwards, which has certainly would have, what people would think about the FBI and our law enforcement divisions right now. I mean, given the fact that people have no trust in government.

It is a terrible development for the Clinton campaign. We'll see if they could weather it, but the bottom line is, is that I do believe the FBI was put in a terrible situation.

CAMEROTA: Jackie, though, there is this letter from nearly 100 former federal prosecutors and high ranking DOJ officials, who don't like what Comey did. They say we cannot recall a prior instance where a senior Justice Department official, Republican or Democrat -- has on the eve of a major election issued a public statement where the mere disclosure of information may impact the election's outcome.

Yet the official acknowledges the information to be examined may not be significant or new. So he may have been in a bind, James Comey, but people who had that job or around that job think he could have handled it differently. KUCINICH: Right. But then you saw "The Wall Street Journal" report yesterday that there was a lot of internal friction between the FBI, the DOJ and so he was getting a lot of pressure internally from people who are currently at these agencies let alone people who are out and looking back in.

He really was as Preston said, in a really tough spot at this point. That is something that is continued to be debated. It is a bipartisan letter. Officials from both parties signed on.

CUOMO: Here is what I know and what some 20 years dealing with the FBI. I have never, ever, ever heard agents talking about a case like this openly where they didn't know anything.

[05:10:07]And that's what everybody keep saying that. Well, we don't know yet. If truth, we haven't been able to review these. It was the metadata that was so shocking that her name popped up so often in the laptop with her own unique e-mail.

So we felt we had to go to Comey. It couldn't wait anymore because we didn't have the right legal authority to look through these ourselves. Now here we are.

Let's look at how this resonates in the election because frankly that's the biggest impact at this point, 34 percent say less likely. The headline will be, Matt, 63 percent say no difference, 34 percent a week out from an election that matters also.

LEWIS: Absolutely. Look, you know, elections are won often times and the margins especially when you get down to states. Who wins Ohio? Who wins Pennsylvania? We don't know how close this election may be. So 30 percent changing their mind could be a huge swing.

Look, though, I think that this will probably have more impact down ballot. You know, in terms of the U.S. Senate, I think it's sort of baked into the cake. People know that Hillary Clinton is untruthful. People know that Hillary Clinton lacks transparency.

That's what you sign up for if you vote for her. Yes, this changes the subject which helps Trump with late undeciders. Not a lot of them left in America today. This may be more likely to help Republicans keep the Senate as a check and balance on Hillary Clinton.

The other asterisk here is unfortunately we have early voting. I don't like early voting. This is one of the big reasons, but there are some states now half the people have already voted before they have this information. So you know, again, I think maybe the Senate is where this has the biggest impact.

CUOMO: Good thing for them is that there is no new information. All they know is that they are e-mails. They don't even know what they are about yet so it's a big question mark.

CAMEROTA: All right, panel, stick around. We have many more questions for you. The race is tightening. Donald Trump within striking distance of Hillary Clinton in the latest national polls. We will look at all of the polls with our political experts next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:16:12]

CAMEROTA: The race for president is tightening just eight days before Election Day. There is this new ABC News/"Washington Post" poll and it shows Hillary Clinton with just a single-point lead ahead of Donald Trump, 46 percent to 45 percent.

Our CNN poll of polls, which is an average of the last five national polls has Clinton with a 5-point lead over Trump's. So let's bring back our panel to discuss all of this. You have Jackie Kucinich, Mark Preston, and Matt Lewis.

So Jackie, what do you think about that new ABC poll that shows them neck and neck?

KUCINICH: I mean, we are getting down to the wire here and because there are less persuadable voters, we will see that getting closer, but I want to talk about the e-mail part of the poll. It was instructive.

The biggest danger to Hillary Clinton is not people saying OK. I'll vote for Donald Trump. I think it is more than that her people getting discouraged and not going out. His people emboldened by this and wanting to run out and vote for Donald Trump.

So it seems like a lot -- I mean, we are talking fractions of people. At this point, we are talking persuadable voters, but it is people who stay home versus go to the polls that will be effected. I think for the most part here.

CUOMO: The Matt Lewis' of the world, the die-hard conservatives who feel they can't accept Trump. A few numbers to throw up here that are more battleground specific, the Florida and North Carolina numbers. Let's put those up, 46 percent to 42 percent, Trump to Clinton.

There is a secondary number there. We have "New York Times"/CNN, and NBC/"Wall Street Journal," both putting -- very tight with the margin of error here. They are good swings in Florida. The first time that "The Times" has Trump. That plays into a bias he's created.

We also have North Carolina numbers here that are relevant especially for Clinton. That seems to be locked fairly in, in terms of the polling. As Jackie said turn out will be important so speak to those numbers and the coming home scenario that Jackie just outlined. Conservatives like you who say Trump's not one of us.

Could this information even though it's really a big question mark, could it trigger something in voters like you?

LEWIS: Absolutely. I think Jackie hit the nail on the head. If we're talking about Hillary Clinton, she's losing. If we're talking about Trump, he's losing. Most of this election we've been talking about Trump. When we are talking about Trump, people like me are less likely to vote and less likely to vote for Trump. When we talk about Hillary Clinton, a lot of people have a really visceral disdain for her.

In the last couple weeks we talked about Evan McMullen possibly winning Utah. I think this makes it less likely that he does. I think that people in Utah now say I have to vote for Donald Trump to stop Hillary Clinton.

I think this story does matter and I think Jackie is exactly right as to what it does. One big thing it may do is bring Trump voters and Republicans back home.

CAMEROTA: Mark, there continues to be stories that come out about Donald Trump as well. "The Washington Post" has devoted a lot of time into look into Donald Trump's charitable giving. We don't know much about it because he hasn't released his tax returns.

What David (inaudible) finds out is that it is not as much as Donald Trump has claimed. In fact, for years, there may have been zilch that he has given. Also, he claims to have given things when in fact there's no evidence he ever did.

Here's what "The Washington Post" found yesterday, "Throughout his life in the spotlight, whether as a businessman or television star or presidential candidate, "The Post" found that Trump has sought credit for charity he has not given or claimed other people's giving as his.

[05:20:04]We will have David Fahrenhald on, but does this sway voters?

PRESTON: I don't think so. Look, I think it's baked into the cake. David has done fantastic work over at "The Washington Post" looking into Trump's charitable giving and should be credited for doing that.

I do think at this point, if you are supporting Donald Trump, you are supporting Donald Trump. If you are against Donald Trump, you are against Donald Trump. To button up what Matt and Jackie said about the e-mail controversy, this is so much bigger.

This is what's going to eclipse stories like this such as the charitable giving. It is going to convince Republicans who are on the fence about Donald Trump, who might not have voted at all to perhaps vote for Donald Trump specifically in two states, Florida and Pennsylvania.

These are two states right now that Donald Trump has to win if he is going to win. It could depress a little bit of the Hillary Clinton vote quite frankly who were on the fence about her as well.

They may not support Donald Trump, but specifically in the state of the Pennsylvania and counties around Philadelphia, they may not come out. While this is excellent reporting, it is baked into the cake that Donald Trump is boastful and dare I say, lies often.

CUOMO: Four hundred plus inquiries that he made into different accounting ledger entries in order to get this reporting. This is a lot of work. The reality, Jackie, this e-mail effect to it because again, I could not find a guy this weekend who worked in the agency who currently there who knows anything about what's in these e-mails or had any confidence that they will advance understanding in any way of what is going on and everybody is talking about the politics of the situation.

It doesn't seem to matter. As soon as Comey said there is more to look at, it was as if he had found a smoking gun or a video of her saying I always meant to do this and wanted to commit a crime.

KUCINICH: And you cannot undo it now. It's done. It will be different, either way and that is the consternation of the Clinton campaign. They were put in an impossible position. They did not know what they were responding to on Friday or over the weekend. On the Sunday shows, you saw them trying to figure out what was the right thing to say because they even don't know what the FBI --

CAMEROTA: She could have said, look, everybody. Take a deep breath. I assure you there is nothing diabolical.

KUCINICH: No one is going to believe her.

CAMEROTA: I don't know, but it doesn't direct speak still work on voters?

CUOMO: She doesn't know what's in the e-mails either so let's say --

CAMEROTA: Shouldn't she just say I can unequivocally say there is nothing diabolical between Huma and me going on --

CUOMO: One, nobody would know what she's talking about with diabolical. Second, let's say comes out that is mildly suggestive of something that we didn't know before. Now she is really shot and she doesn't really have that.

CAMEROTA: All you can do is assure voters. They will not have that. There's so much. Jackie, hold your thought. We are seeing you for the next three and a half hours.

CUOMO: Pace yourself.

CAMEROTA: All right.

CUOMO: Other news for you this morning, there is a search for a suspected killer in Oklahoma. It ended overnight. Police say he did not go down without a fight. How did the police finally stop this alleged crime spree? We have the answer next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:27:51]

CAMEROTA: The manhunt for an Oklahoma fugitive, who police say shot two officers and killed two of his relatives is now over. Michael Vance Jr. killed in a shootout with police overnight after eight days on the run. Vance is taunting investigators to catch him on social media. A Dewey County sheriff was shot in the arm during this chase, but a local station reports his injuries are not life threatening.

CUOMO: Two trials involving deadly police shootings get underway this week. One is in South Carolina with a jury selection beginning today in the case of Michael Slager. He is charged with murder in the death of Walter Scott. You'll remember the horrible cell phone video captured that shooting, Scott running away.

Then in Ohio, former University of Cincinnati Officer Ray Tensing is accused of murdering Sam Dubose during a traffic stop. Opening statements in that case could begin Tuesday.

CAMEROTA: Another devastating earthquake rocking Central Italy, this is the third one in a week. The 6.6 magnitude quake that struck on Sunday is the most powerful to hit the country in decades. CNN's Barbie Nadeau is in Rome with the latest. Barbie, tell us what happened?

BARBIE NADEAU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's a devastating earthquake, as you say, the only reason no one lost their life is because people evacuated last week. This all follows a very deadly earthquake killing 300 people in August.

But when we talk about the damage in the area, at least 5,000 churches and monuments in that area near the epicenter have been damaged or completely destroyed. Homes flattened. Villages no longer there. Wiped off the map.

The aftershocks are still coming. Seismologists do not exclude there could be an even stronger aftershocks sometimes in the next 48 hours after that first hit on Sunday morning. It is a nervous time and the damage keeps coming.

CUOMO: Barbie, as taught us before about this area. Hard to get help. Hard to replace what's there right now not just architecturally, but the lives and livelihoods for these people. We will stay on it and we'll report the need as it develops. Thank you very much.

The Chicago Cubs, it could have been all over, but guess what, it's not. The Cubs beat the Indians 3-2 Sunday night in game five at Wrigley Field. Now the series goes back to Cleveland for Game 6. Cubs nation hoping their team can win another and force a seventh --