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Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) is Interviewed About his Presidential Run; Trump Touts Tanks at Fourth of July Celebration; Joe Biden Loses Ground in Recent Polling; Pitcher Tyler Skaggs Found Dead. Aired 8- 8:30a ET

Aired July 02, 2019 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This race is resetting. All images of Joe Biden being the frontrunner are now reshaping this summer.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You talk to black voters, and they still feel like he's a winner.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I am absolutely 100 percent behind Senator Kamala Harris.

CHUCK SCHUMER, (D) SENATE MINORITY LEADER: This was one of the worst few days in American foreign policy and American diplomatic history.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They know what they're playing with. They're playing with fire.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: North Korea got nuclear weapons. Iran at the same time is being chastised by Trump for trying to move frankly with a nuclear program.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: And good morning, everyone. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, July 2nd, 8:00 now in the east. And debates really matter, John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: It turns out.

CAMEROTA: I don't care what you see, debates really matter.

(LAUGHTER)

CAMEROTA: That's what we've learned this morning. The 2020 Democratic frontrunner Joe Biden sees his commanding lead over the crowded field plummet in this new CNN poll, and two female senators, Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren are surging after their debate showings. I don't know why we have to say they're female, but they are. The poll was taken entirely after last week's Democratic debates. Kamala Harris' big bounce reflects what so many pundits felt was a very strong performance on her part, and that electric moment where she challenges Joe Biden.

BERMAN: We do have some breaking 2020 news. The Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee just announced their fundraising haul for the second quarter. A lot of money, $105 million combined that adds to the president's and RNC's already very big war chest.

CAMEROTA: We have so much to discuss and break down the numbers. Joining us now are Errol Louis, CNN political commentator, David Chalian, CNN political director, and CNN contributor Bianna Golodyrga. Great to have all of you. David, you've been crunching the numbers. Tell us what your big takeaways are from this new poll?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: First, just that breaking news John reported on the other kind of number, money. This incumbent president is going to be well funded. He has $100 million in the bank. This is part of the advantage of incumbency, especially one without a primary challenge. So that is no small thing for Donald Trump there, Alisyn.

Inside these numbers, who will be the nominee? We've got a long way to go, but what we do know, as you noted, is Joe Biden's massive lead in this race has significantly narrowed. He has a narrow lead in this race. He has been on the decline since he's gotten in this race, and obviously his debate performance did not help. You see 10 points just last month there he's down, while Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren, they each doubled their support basically in the last month.

BERMAN: Really interesting to see those numbers there. And we talked a lot about Kamala Harris and her debate performance. But Elizabeth Warren gained almost just as much, Bianna. So her number is very much on the rise. And you can see her now very firmly just behind the leader tier.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Right. And she won the first night one can say, and one can say the second night sort of eclipsed the first night. But clearly she was watching Kamala Harris' performance as well and will come prepared for this next debate later this month here on CNN.

And she, unlike Kamala Harris, seems to have finetuned multiple issues and her take on multiple issues. We see Kamala Harris wavering on issues such as health care. In particular, I think, look, from a Biden perspective, this was his night to lose coming in. He did not perform well. His camp will tell you that they always anticipated that his approval numbers would go down, but I think if you want to give it a different spin, they should be more worried had he done well. Given that he did not perform well, one can anticipate his numbers going down. Everybody can have a bad night. The question is, will he recover and come to the next debate better prepared?

CAMEROTA: Errol, do you think this is just sort of the laws of gravity taking hold as John Avlon said in our 6:00 hour, or do you think that this spell a real problem for --

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It is a real problem. The laws of gravity don't seem to apply to some candidates. It's hard to avoid the conclusion Kamala Harris took those 10 points out of Joe Biden's high. That's what it looks like. He goes down 10, she goes up nine, and the whole nation watched what happened, and really provides something of an explanation of why it might have happened.

I think there's a level of preparedness that some of these candidates who are not Joe Biden have that he's going to have to catch up with. He's been thinking about it his whole adult life. This is his third time making this run. He's used to having a whole lot of people around him who prepare all of his papers and really get him prepped.

These other folks are kind of living off the land. It's important to keep in mind for Elizabeth Warren, it's not just her debate performance, it's her website performance. It's those Medium, these long posts where she goes into extraordinary detail. There's a segment of the populace that likes that. And I think the polls reflect that. People who see that she's got a plan on affordable housing, which none of the other candidates have really talked much about, that's a real advantage for her.

[08:05:01] BERMAN: You're talking about the why it happened. How about the with whom. Let's look at the racial breakdown of this right now. Among white voters, Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren right up close to Joe Biden. Joe Biden still maintains a lead among black voters. However, it is a smaller lead, so you can see there how Kamala Harris has made real gains on Joe Biden among black voters. Still more voters to be had there. If you're Joe Biden, you're like, look, I'm still leading among them, that's a good sign. Another good sign for him, David, that you pointed out all morning long in terms of who the best candidate is to beat Donald Trump, and that's something Democratic voters say is very important. Still overwhelmingly they say that's Joe Biden. That's P107, he's at 43 percent, and then everyone else is some 30 points behind him on electability basically.

CHALIAN: Yes, no one even comes close on this score. And as you noted more than six in 10 Democrats say it is much more important for them that a candidate who can beat Trump than it is to have a candidate who agrees with them on the issues. In fact, only in our poll, John, only Bernie Sanders supporters think the reverse. Only Bernie Sanders supporters believe that it's more important to have a candidate that agrees with you on the issues than has the ability to beat Trump. But overwhelmingly Democrats want that Trump slayer, if you will, and they see that at this moment still with Joe Biden.

But that's why I think, as Bianna was saying, the recovery for Biden in the next debate before that next large audience that they'll have is so critical because if he doesn't show that he can actually perform on that stage, those numbers may change. That could be a piercing of what is basically his strongest suit.

GOLODRYGA: And what could work in his favor is where he stands right now, and that is viewed as a centrist. Many see that all of these Democratic candidates, the others, have shifted further left than even the Democratic Party is nationwide as a whole, specifically on issues like health care, Medicare for all.

CAMEROTA: He did raise his hand on giving health care to undocumented immigrants.

GOLODRYGA: And one will see whether going forward whether he will continue to do that and feel pressure to move further to the left, or hold center and even support President Obama in his record when it comes to Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act.

CAMEROTA: Because that one is out of step with the general populous.

LOUIS: On this electability question, it's a real mistake to think that that is going to trump everything else. If you go back to 2016, the closing argument by Hillary Clinton which turned out not to be a winning closing argument was to say Trump is unacceptable, he's unfit, he's not right, he's too vulgar, he's to childish and on and on and on. It just didn't work, it didn't hold. If the Democrats do that again, I think they'll be exposing themselves.

BERMAN: You think electability is a hard message to send if you're losing debates. If you're Joe Biden, that's your message. If you're not winning these debates with Democratic candidates it's hard to send the message that you're most electable in a general election.

Another really interesting number has to do with Pete Buttigieg. He raised $24 million, a lot of money, yet in the brand new CNN poll he's at four percent, David Chalian, in the polls right there, which is tick lower. Not only lower than where he was, he doesn't appear to be making vast gains among voters there. And if you can go back to P- 103, the black voters, he's at zero percent among black voters.

CHALIAN: Which helps explain why he's only at four percent in the national poll overall. And by the way, zero percent meaning zero respondents, zero African-American respondents offered up Pete Buttigieg's name. he's going to be at Rainbow Push coalition in Chicago today talking to Jesse Jackson's convention there. This is something that Pete Buttigieg knows is his mission critical here to invest some of that money into an organization that can do real outreach and get his message out there to appeal not just to African- American voters, to the electorate more broadly, but also specifically to African-American voters.

CAMEROTA: Errol, do you think that this new poll causes any of the candidates to do a really hard look at their campaign today? Does anybody exit at this point?

LOUIS: I don't know if anybody exits, but certainly they're taking a hard look at their campaign. We know that Governor Hickenlooper, many of his top staffers have decided to depart. And they've pretty much acknowledged that they've got a real serious problem there, that they're not connecting.

I think when the money bite is really going to be felt in the fall. The next round after the CNN debates, the fall debates, you have to have 130,000 donors, you have to still be hanging in there in the polls. In order to get those numbers, you must have been traveling around the country. It starts to become a very expensive proposition if the fundraising is not following. And without some good news and some good poll numbers, it's very hard to do the fundraising. So yes, a number of candidates I think are going to start to really seriously assess where they're at, but I don't think that comes until late in the summer.

GOLODRYGA: And we shouldn't overlook the huge numbers that President Trump and the RNC just came out with as well, $105 million gives them opportunity not only to take TV ads out, social media as well, and of course he's going to be attacking every single and what he views as socialist or liberal issue that's being promoted now by a lot of these candidates.

[08:10:13] BERMAN: Bianna, David, Errol, thank you very, very much.

CAMEROTA: Major League Baseball is trying to come to grips with the shocking death of Los Angeles Pitcher Tyler Skaggs. The 27-year-old was found unresponsive in his Texas hotel room yesterday. Police say they're ruling out suicide and foul play. Sara Sidner is live in Los Angeles with more. And so what's left, Sara?

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. It leaves a lot of questions, and that is what investigators are going to be trying to figure out now. But the world of baseball, his family, obviously, and fan are really mourning the death of this 27-year-old who was well liked across the board.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tyler Skaggs taking the mound for the Angels.

SIDNER: Lefty Tyler Skaggs on the mound against the Oakland A's. The 27-year-old athlete one of the Los Angeles Angels most reliable pitchers. Less than 48 hours later police find Skaggs dead in a Texas hotel room, his body found just hours before he and teammates were to begin the opening game of a series against the Texas Rangers, their game postponed as shock and grief set in from Texas to his home field in Anaheim.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For him to pass away at such a young age, it's hard.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just honoring him. He earned our respect pitching.

SIDNER: Major League Baseball, his team, those he played against, and those he never knew took to social media to express their sorrow for number 45. His teammate and all-star Mike Trout "Remembering him as a great teammate, friend and person who will forever remain in our hearts. We love you, 45," he tweeted. All-star pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays Marcus Stroman tweeted, "RIP Tyler Skaggs. Heartbreaking, man. Makes me sick to my stomach. Prayers for his entire family and friends."

The reason for Skaggs' death is still a mystery. Police reportedly ruling out foul play or suicide. He had so much to live for. The Los Angeles born athlete was playing profession baseball for team in his home state, and he had just gotten married last year. He appeared happy and ready to take on the Texas Rangers, donning his Texas duds in this Instagram photo shared by his wife Carli. That was Sunday. By Monday afternoon, a Las Angeles born angel would never alight on the mound again.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SIDNER: He died just ten 10 or 11 days from his birthday on July 13th. And again, a lot of questions as to what happened here. Everyone in the world of baseball is really shocked that this person is gone just 27 years old, just about to turn 28.

BERMAN: Married just within the last year. As of now the game between the Rangers and Angels is on tonight. That has to be so emotional for both of those teams. Sara Sidner for us, thank you very, very much

The brand new CNN poll shakes up the Democratic race. One of the candidates who, shall we say, has some room to grow joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:17:25] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: This morning, the brand new CNN poll shows where the 2020 Democratic race stands after the first debates.

Joining us now, one of the candidates who was there, Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell from California.

Congressman, thank you very much for being with us this morning.

REP. ERIC SWALWELL (D-CA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Good morning, John.

BERMAN: Let's get the uncomfortable stuff out of the way if we can. The new CNN poll --

SWALWELL: There will be uncomfortable stuff?

BERMAN: The new CNN poll I want to put it up right now, you are at an asterisk in the new CNN poll. I guess that means you have room to grow. My question to you is, how much time are you giving yourself to grow, if that doesn't move, when do you get out?

SWALWELL: So, it's early as you know, just under 500 days until the next election. But also what's interesting in that poll is that 57 percent of the people polled did not watch the debate.

BERMAN: That is true. That is true. Forty-three percent did. You know, your numbers among -- I don't have them in front of me right now, but the numbers of those who did watch the debate, you know, you didn't win those either.

SWALWELL: Yes, it's early. You know, I got about 4 minutes total to talk. Others like the vice president and, you know, people who are polling higher right now talked for about 12 to 13 minutes.

My goal, frankly, John was to introduce myself as someone who's been in Congress for seven years, who's been on the Intelligence Committee, trying to shake things up by leading new members of Congress to Washington, and that we have a new moment to seize by putting a generational leader in the White House.

BERMAN: The generational leader part I want to pick up on, because you are someone who did confront the former Vice President Joe Biden. Why do you think that generational change argument for you might be fruitful?

SWALWELL: Because of the urgency of issues and most importantly, you know, on health care, you know, this is an issue that's just really shaking so many young families who have become a GoFundMe generation for so many of us, that's our health care plan. And I just don't think we can count on people who have been in public service for decades to solve a problem that continues to get worse.

Now, it's time for this generation that's most effective by it, and we'll have to live with the failures of the past to address it.

BERMAN: A simple yes or no on this because I want to move onto other issues. Do you think the candidates who say they want to get rid of private insurance are wrong?

SWALWELL: Yes.

BERMAN: I want to move onto something you put on Twitter yesterday. The president just returned from the G-20 summit. He had a series of meetings some with autocrats and dictators and his daughter, Ivanka Trump who's an advisor at the White House went along.

There are pictures of Ivanka Trump, you can see her there with the world leaders.

[08:20:02] There are other pictures and video of her talking to some of the world leaders.

You put out a tweet saying this is a reminder Ivanka Trump has no foreign policy or diplomacy experience. The American people deserve to be represented by a qualified diplomat, not the president's daughter.

You don't believe she's qualified.

SWALWELL: Absolutely not. And I don't think we can ever accept this is normal.

I'll tell you, I was checking in to a hotel room in New Hampshire a couple of weeks ago and a Romanian immigrant whose become a U.S. citizen told me that for years, he would go home as he was going through the process of becoming a citizen, and he'd just wave his finger he told me at his family members about the corruption in his country. And he'd always hold up, you know, just our values in the United States.

He said since Donald Trump has been elected when he goes home now they wave their fingers at him. And he said that one thing they point out is this guy has his family in office. And that exactly what you were so upset about in our country.

So, that just really bothers me, John. That's not the United States. We don't put family members in positions of power especially when they're wholly unqualified. This isn't Robert Kennedy as the attorney general who was a lawyer. I mean, this is, you know, a family member with no foreign policy experience.

BERMAN: And what message do you think that sends to the rest of the world?

SWALWELL: That we're not serious about, you know, taking on North Korea. We're not serious about being a partner as we prosecute the cases against China for their trade practices. We're not serious about trying to get Iran to the table and truly denuclearize.

BERMAN: I want to ask you about something that will be taking place in Washington. I hope for your sake you're not staying in Washington for the holiday. You're getting a chance to go home.

I like parades. Do you like parades?

SWALWELL: I love parades. I'll be in a parade in New Hampshire on Fourth of July for my family.

BERMAN: New Hampshire, a great -- I've been to New Hampshire for the Fourth. It's a great place to be.

In Washington, D.C., there will be a salute to heroes, the president is calling it on the National Mall. The president will speak, military jets will be flying overhead, tanks will be parked nearby.

Do you think this kind of Fourth of July celebration is appropriate?

SWALWELL: No, and again, it's just not who we are as Americans. We don't thump our chest, put tanks in the streets, fly jets over the Mall to prove our strength. Our strength with is in our values and right now when you look at our values, we're way behind to take care of the people who need it the most particularly health care.

A friend of mine who was leading the charge, it's called I am ALS, he's a 37-year-old with ALS, he tweeted a good point yesterday. He said, Mr. President, why don't we devote the millions of dollars you're spending on this to try to find cures and expand access to cures for more people? There's so many better places this money could be spent.

BERMAN: You are the only presidential candidate who will get to ask Robert Mueller questions when it comes to testify before the House Judiciary Committee.

What do you intend to ask him?

SWALWELL: You know, I don't want to show my cards yet, but one thing that did jump out for me in the report 200 pages of context between the Russians and Trump campaign said a lot about what was going on but it never said anything these contacts stopped or these relationships ceased. So, I'm mostly concerned about the future. Are we still at risk because of what this president and his team did with the Russians?

BERMAN: There are some rumblings from members on your committee they intend to be tough on Robert Mueller and go after him on the origin of the investigation and things like that. What's your opinion of perhaps their methods?

SWALWELL: Robert Mueller is a big boy, he's a marine, he's a Republican. So bring it, just do it in a respectful way.

But our job here is to test theories, to test evidence. And I don't think, you know, Robert Mueller's going to have any problem you know parrying their questions and defending his work.

BERMAN: Congressman Eric Swalwell, presidential candidate, have fun up in New Hampshire on Fourth of July.

SWALWELL: Thanks, John. Happy Fourth.

BERMAN: Appreciate you being with us. Thank you.

Alisyn?

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, John.

President Trump's children, Ivanka Trump, and Donald Trump, Jr., both under scrutiny for conducting themselves unlike any other children in a first family. We discuss what they're doing, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[8:28:06] BERMAN: Just a couple days away from what could be a Fourth of July celebration, the likes of which Washington really has never seen, largely planned we are told by the president himself.

Now, tanks will not parade down Pennsylvania Avenue because of the need to protect roads and bridges, but they will be there. And this comes as the costs continue to rise.

Our Ryan Browne live at the Pentagon with the very latest.

What are we going to see?

RYAN BROWNE, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, we're being told a wide range of military assets are going to be participating in this Fourth of July celebration. And everything ranging from M1 Abrams tanks to Bradley fighter vehicles but will be stationary as you said. And the advance F-22 fighter jet and B-2 bomber.

And President Trump talked about some of the assets that would be participating in comments in the Oval Office yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're going to have planes going overhead, the best fighter jets in the world and other planes, too. And we're going to have some tanks stationed outside. We've got to be pretty careful with the tanks because the roads have the tendency not to like to carry heavy tanks. So, we have to put them in certain areas, but we have the brand new Sherman tanks and we have the brand new Abrams tanks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWNE: Now, President Trump talking about the Sherman tanks there. Now, those haven't been used since the 1950s, so unsure what he's referring to. But a wide range of military assets but some are expensive to operate, particularly the F-22 jets and B-2 bombers.

So, some of the questions about costs are beginning to emerge. And remember a previous military parade President Trump had intended to hold on Veterans Day was scrapped after the cost of that parade ballooned into the tens of millions of dollars. So, something to see whether that same criticism about cost comes back to bother the president's new parade -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Ryan, tanks a lot.

Moving on, Ivanka Trump -- I can't believe you didn't laugh at that one.

BERMAN: But why?

CAMEROTA: Just for fun.

BERMAN: Just for fun?

CAMEROTA: Yes.

BERMAN: OK, I'm laughing.

CAMEROTA: Ivanka Trump played an unusually.

END