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CNN Live Event/Special

Voting Underway In Unprecedented Presidential Election; Trump: I Will Be "First One To Acknowledge" A Loss, If It's Fair; GA Secretary Of State: Bomb Threats Were "Russian In Origin"; Michigan: Detroit On Track To Have Ballot Counts By Midnight. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired November 05, 2024 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

TIM PAWLENTY (R), 2012 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know, why does it have to take days? It doesn't need to.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN ANCHOR: These days, hell is not really a bad word. I mean, we've all gone a lot further than that. But we saw the MetLife building projected last night.

ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: We'll just leave that there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) at 12:30.

BURNETT: All right, are you -- I know. Let's just contextualize this. Governor, Ashley, said on the town hall night when Anderson was talking to Kamala Harris, at that point, you felt that Kamala Harris is going to win. Went out on a limb (ph) then. But are you feeling what the governor said he is sort of seeing, which is that optimism rise among Harris teams today?

ALLISON: I think that folks are still feeling cautiously optimistic for a couple of reasons. We've had a lot of conversations about early vote. When you look at the numbers from early vote, Democrats are doing better than they did in 2020.

It's one-tenth of a point better, but it's still better. And so, if they are able to activate the ground game that they have been working on --

BURNETT: Yes.

ALLISON: -- they could probably pull this out. I feel confident. And it's not just the Harris campaign. There are independent groups. The labor unions knocking millions of doors. Groups like Black Voters Matter, who have been on the ground when Joe Biden was at the top of the ticket, as well as now.

And then the final thing I'll say is that a lot of folks have said that the cake is baked, or it's baked in, or whatever that saying is. I think that it might be baked, but the cake is going to fall in the oven. And they might have put one too many eggs in the ingredients and note that egg is, you know, it was probably rotten from the language that they use at MSG or Madison Square Garden for the non-New Yorkers.

But I think that there is something about the cake might have been baking, but there were some ingredients thrown (ph) in late that could mess up the recipe for Trump.

BURNETT: All right. What are you hearing?

ADAM KINZINGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, I mean, look, my feeling is that a couple weeks ago, Trump was kind of in the catbird seat. And I think the last two weeks, it looks like that support has fallen out. Partially the Madison Square Garden. He's kind of melted down.

I mean, instead of kind of a mature ending thing, it's just been a lot of anger. The other big question, I mean, if Tim Pawlenty was running, I think he'd run away with it right now because he's an old school Republican. The question is, how many Republicans are going to vote for Kamala?

And I think it's going --

BURNETT: And we just saw Chuck from Texas.

KINZINGER: Right. Chuck's my guy, by the way. Me and Chuck now. I haven't met him but, you know, we're both Houstonians now. And -- but I think that's going to actually surprise people, the number of Republicans that end up going for Kamala. I just hear it anecdotally, but it's a lot of people and Kamala has made a real effort to reach out to them.

Biden, it was more kind of perfunctory. Kamala, I mean, look, I spoke right before her at the DNC. That sends a message that they are serious about Republicans joining this coalition. I think they'll be rewarded of it.

BURNETT: Right. They'll put you in that and talk about catbird seat.

KINZINGER: Yes.

BURNETT: Matt, can I ask you, you know, Trump talking about all of this, whether the results, obviously -- I understand your point, right? If Florida can do it, why can't others? I heard the governor DeSantis making that point last night. Trump has been talking about the results during the day.

MATT MOWERS, FORMER TRUMP ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Yes.

BURNETT: So far he said he doesn't really see any issues out there. He hasn't been stirring the pot as much as he has other times, Matt. Here's what he said just a little bit ago, though, in West Palm Beach.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: If I lose an election, if it's a fair election, I'm going to -- I'd be the first one to acknowledge it. And I think it's -- well, so far, I think it's been fair. I think there's been a lot of court cases. Both sides are lawyered up.

Thousands of lawyers are involved in, thousands. Can you imagine? And part of that is because we have too complicated a process.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

BURNETT: That's pretty tame (ph).

MOWERS: Yes.

BURNETT: I mean, that's pretty --

MOWERS: Yes. Look, I take some hope in those comments, right? That we are at a point now where both sides can recognize the validity of election results. That's where we need to get to, to remain a great democratic republic that has lasted as long as it has and can continue moving forward.

Not to mention, I think, in addition to being good for the system, probably also doesn't hurt them politically in the final few hours. And if you've been talking like this for the last few weeks --

BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes.

MOWERS: -- maybe in a stronger place than I think he's going into Election Day. I will say, I've been hearing, you know, we've talked about folks we're talking to. Every -- I cannot find a Republican in a battleground state, particularly Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, who does not feel good about Donald Trump's numbers right now going into Election Day.

And part of that's because of the early vote. Part of that's because of traditionally where Republicans are vis-a-vis Democrats showing up on Election Day. I mean, Pennsylvania, for example. You know, often Democrats are walking in with six, seven -- like four years ago it was over 1 million vote advantage going into Election Day.

Today it's about 400,000 going into Election Day today. They're very optimistic about the turnout they're seeing. Not to mention the fact that overall high turnout may help Trump. I mean, all the polls we've seen the last few weeks and really the last few months, show that Trump does better with registered voters than he does with likely voters.

It means that the voters who are most engaged have an opinion of them, and they don't necessarily like him. It's a little closer. It's those infrequent voters that if they can get them out to the polls, he wins. So, high turnout, that's good for Donald Trump.

SELLERS: Yes, no, I've seen a lot and I understand your argument. I've seen a lot of those arguments from the Mark Halperins of the world and everybody who now has this new --

BURNETT: (INAUDIBLE) yes.

SELLERS: -- Twitter personality because everybody now is a political expert. The difference though is in 2020, we had something going on in this country, it was COVID. And so what it did was, it threw off voting patterns. And let's take --

BURNETT: Yes.

SELLERS: -- Clark County for example, where you see --

BURNETT: In Nevada.

SELLERS: In Nevada, Las Vegas, Nevada. Where you see Democrats actually on a path to beat Republicans on Election Day. That's two things.

[12:35:12]

One, that's wild because we never actually show up on Election Day in numbers that consume or beat out Republicans. So keep going, keep voting in Las Vegas. Number two, it shows that the early voting numbers you're talking about were a lot of their voters anyway, and so you're seeing the cannibalization happen before your eyes in real time. So that's first.

The second thing, which is equally as important is, there was this long month -- months long narrative built about Donald Trump somehow getting black voters because he had like Antonio Brown and Le'Veon Bell and was giving us gold shoes and he had a mug shot.

Not only was that narrative, and premise asinine, but it's not bearing fruit. And you're seeing in Fulton County, you're seeing in North Carolina all throughout Georgia. And you're seeing these lines in Pennsylvania of black voters, particularly black women who are over indexing. I mean, they carry democracy all the time.

But you're also seeing black men come out and vote in numbers. And that's what the Harris campaign looks at. And they're excited about it.

BURNETT: Right. And I should say, as we hit pause, of course, that everybody, you know, it's public information. You can find out who voted, right? You don't know how they voted, but you know who voted. So if they are someone who's voted before and voted a certain way, the campaigns know a whole lot about who has already voted coming into Election Day.

All right. Much more with our panel as our special election day in America coverage continues. Next, bomb threats forcing two Georgia polling locations to temporarily close. Turns out it was a false alarm. We'll explain with the latest next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:40:24]

BURNETT: And welcome back to our special coverage of Election Day in America. We are just learning that several voting locations in Georgia may be staying open later. The reason for this is non-credible bomb threats were actually made at two polling locations.

So let's go to Sara Murray. Sara, what have you learned about these specific bomb threats? Where they were? And, obviously, to emphasize, it turns out they were not credible.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Right. There were a handful of non-credible threats today against pulling locations. In two of those instances, pulling precincts actually had to close for about 30 minutes to an hour while security did a sweep, confirm that they were non-credible.

We should note that all 177 polling places across Fulton County, which is where I am, though this was not one of the places affected today, there are police officers there to help address these threats. Now, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger held a news conference earlier where he said their understanding is the threats were of Russian origin.

Take a listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

BRAD RAFFENSPERGER, GEORGIA SECRETARY OF STATE: We've heard some threats that were of Russian origin. And so I don't know how to describe if that's viable. We don't think they are, but in the interest of public safety, you always check that out. And, you know, we will just continue to be very responsive when we hear about stuff like that. We identified the source and it was from Russia.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

MURRAY: Now, the FBI is working with state and local officials to investigate this. And again, these are non-credible threats. And as I was talking to voting rights activists today, they said they don't want this to dissuade people from showing up to vote.

They said it is safe for you to turn out. It is safe for you to cast your ballots. This should not disrupt folks in Fulton County from showing up and voting today, guys.

BURNETT: All right, Sara, thank you very much. And, of course, important to follow all of this and to emphasize how crucial that communication has been from the Secretary of State in Georgia, who Wolf has said he anticipates the possibility they can call Georgia tonight.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: We shall see. Let's see what happens.

Erin, thank you very much.

I want to get to our political team right now, CNN's Manu Raju, Jamie Gangel, and Nia-Malika Henderson. And Jamie, you're very well plugged in. What are your sources inside the Harris campaign telling you right now? How do they feel?

JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: So they are -- the words are, cautiously optimistic. How many times are we going to hear that today? Look, they feel very good about the gender gap, reproductive rights, their ground game. There is some anxiety about Pennsylvania. That is the state that they are watching closely about voter turnout.

They feel that they have done enough to compensate by getting out older voters, by getting out women. And a senior Republican actually just texted me about something that everyone needs to remember, which is Republicans who may vote for Harris in Pennsylvania.

Let's remember that Nikki Haley, who is out of the race, got 16 percent of the vote in the Pennsylvania primary, those are registered Republicans, 150,000 votes. If that was a protest vote against Trump, there may be -- I mean Nikki Haley has said she's voting for Trump, but there may be 149,000 extras who might consider voting for Harris.

BLITZER: Manu, as far as turnout is concerned, what tea leaves are you seeing?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Democrats need a significant Election Day turnout, particularly as we've seen Republicans do better in the early voting than we saw in the last election cycle, particularly in a state like Nevada.

The question, though, is that if they did have -- Republicans have had some success, they've not been demonizing the mail-in voting. Trump has done a little bit of that still, but they've emphasized that more. But the question is, are those new voters Republicans have, have they added to it? Are those People that actually wouldn't come out --

GANGEL: Yes.

RAJU: -- on Election Day anyways. Now, the Harris team has spent, the Democrats have spent so much time building this turnout operation, actually putting, investing money. They've knocked on more doors than like Trump has relied on these outside groups to turn out voters. Is that going to be a successful tactic to try to bring in these new voters? That's a big question.

Also abortion in some of these key states, referenda that's in Nevada, Arizona, two of the seven critical battleground states. Does that impact the ultimate turnout today? That's going to be one of the big questions tonight, Wolf.

BLACKWELL: Nia, as far as early voting is concerned, Republicans voted in bigger numbers --

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

BLITZER: -- this time than they did four years ago. So what's the expectation now?

HENDERSON: Listen, Republicans feel good about that. But to Manu's point, are those voters that we're going to vote anyway, are these new voters sort of the Joe Rogan vote. That is the vote that Donald Trump is really relying on.

[12:45:08]

These are low propensity male voters across all, you know, socioeconomic and racial and ethnic backgrounds. Do they actually show up? You know, listen, I think if you are the Harris campaign, you feel a little bit better about the coalition you want to put together.

These are older voters in some cases. White voters as well. Women who make up a larger share of the electorate as well. And you have an issue, abortion, which has proved to be an activating and energizing issue.

You saw the woman Savannah in Pennsylvania, who said this is the first time that she's voting in a presidential election. And for her, it's all about women's rights and reproductive freedom. So in that way, you're -- you feel good about that.

One of the other dynamics as well, as I've heard anecdotally from a lot of black and brown voters and women as well, that they wanted to wait to vote until Election Day to kind of be a part of the crowd and be a part of this historic moment in a way that they didn't feel like they could do that with a mail-in ballot or even an early ballot. So that could be something that's going on as well in terms of the dynamics on Election Day for Democrats.

BLITZER: Everybody's continuing to read in all the explanations potentially for what's going on. Guys, thank you very much. Don't go too far away. We have a lot more to assess.

Our election day in America coverage continues in just a moment. Millions heading to the polls today. Up next, a live report from battleground Michigan. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:50:49]

BURNETT: ?And welcome back to our special coverage of Election Day in America. Millions of Americans right now going to the polls, waiting in line at the polls. We have seen long lines in the key battleground states. This is in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Tempe, Arizona and Atlanta, Georgia on your screen. All of them lines throughout the day. In Detroit, people waiting to cast their ballot.

So let's go to Michigan now where Kylie Atwood is. She is in Grand Rapids. And Kylie, obviously, Michigan crucial. Trump just talking saying he feels optimistic. Harris campaign also feels optimistic. What are officials saying there about how fast they will be able to count the votes?

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, the secretary of state just today expressed optimism that they will have the unofficial statewide results here in Michigan by midday tomorrow, if not sooner. One of the main reasons for that is because they're able to pre-process mail-in ballots before Election Day that started on October 28th. So they've been able to do a lot of the work ahead of time with the secretary of state saying today that puts them in an extremely good position to handle those late incoming ballots that they'll see later on today.

And I want to show you just what we're seeing here at a church just 8 miles south of Grand Rapids. When folks come in, they fill out this Election Day application to vote piece of paper. Then they move over here, they check that information with the clerks over -- who are over here.

It's quiet now. I just asked people why they think that's the case, maybe because people are out eating lunch. But there has been a consistent flow of people through here throughout the day. Then they take their ballots, what they get over here. They go right over here and they cast the ballots.

They pick who they're voting for and then they put it through that tabulator. You can see that black position right back there. This is a process that's moving incredibly swiftly here at this church in Kent County, Michigan.

Now, Kent County, I just want to remind folks, is a critical county for both of these contenders, for both Trump and Harris. Why is that? Because in 2016, Trump won it. In 2020, Biden won it. So both the campaigns, Harris and Trump, are eyeing this county as a pivotal county.

Now, I do want to know, when it comes to the election results that we are expecting to see here in Michigan later tonight, maybe early tomorrow, maybe midday tomorrow, there have been Republicans who have seized on the possibility that, you know, later results are reasons for questioning the process.

But folks that we have talked to here, even those who are supporting former President Trump cast their ballot for him said that they're not worried about that. They're going to trust the integrity of the process and what the results say at the end of the process.

BURNETT: All right. Well, Kylie, thank you very much. Maybe result of all these questions is everyone has learned a lot about how they're counted and what ballots and what order information that, you know, prior to four years ago pretty much no one knew.

So let's get straight to CNN Political Director David Chalian. He has been looking at the early votes cast in Michigan, which could be a pivotal state. Any one of these could be the one that determines it, David.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: That is for sure, Erin. Yes, we were looking at the pre-election vote in Michigan. More than 3 million people, 3.3 million votes were cast prior to Election Day. I'll say that that makes up about 60 percent of what the total presidential vote in Michigan was in 2020.

We don't know what the total vote will be this time, and that's what's key when you're looking at this pre-election vote. We need to learn about the Election Day vote to get the whole picture. But of this 3.3 million, we do see a gender divide. There's no doubt about it.

Women participated at a greater rate than men did in the pre-election vote. 55 percent of the pre-election ballots cast in Michigan were cast by female voters. 45 percent by male voters. That's a 10-point advantage there for women in terms of casting a ballot.

But compare that to four years ago, Erin, it's slightly a narrower gap than we saw four years ago in the pre-election vote in Michigan. That was a 12-point advantage towards women, 56 percent to 44 percent. So as more Republicans and clearly more men have participated in pre- election voting in a place like Michigan, you see that margin narrow a little bit, which gives each side information about what kind of voters they need to turn out on Election Day itself, Erin.

[12:55:16]

BURNETT: All right, David, thank you very much. Wolf?

CHALIAN: Sure.

BLITZER: Erin, thank you very much.

Phil Mattingly is over here at the Magic Wall with me. Let's take a little closer look at Michigan right now. What else are you seeing?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR & CHIEF DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: It was a state Donald Trump won it in 2016. Joe Biden flipped it back into Democratic hands in 2020 by 154,000 votes. Let's start with where Kylie Attwood was. This is Kent County. This is the home of Grand Rapids. This was traditional establishment Republican inside the state of Michigan.

This is where Gerald Ford was born. It's where his presidential library is. It's where the DeVos family comes from, the Meyer (ph) family as well. It has shifted fairly dramatically over the course of the last couple cycles.

The question will be, can Kamala Harris match or do better than what Joe Biden did in 2020? The other big question in why places like Kent County are so critical is Wayne County. Obviously it's the home of Detroit. It's not unlike Milwaukee or Philadelphia place. Democrats expect to run up huge vote.

Concern about whether or not Donald Trump has made some inroads in the more urban areas, particularly with black men, Bakari was addressing that earlier. But also the second largest city in Wayne County, which is the largest county in the whole state. 70 percent of the voting population is Dearborn and Dearborn is home to a significant population of Arab Americans.

We've been very concerned about what's been happening over in Israel and Gaza. Whether or not that has an effect, we'll be able to see it right here, Wolf. BLITZER: We'll be watching that vote very closely. A lot of these votes coming in. Thanks very, very much, Phil Mattingly, here at the Magic Wall.

And we'll be right back. Much more of our special Election Day in America coverage will continue.

Up next, we'll take you back to the ground as tens of millions of Americans are casting their ballots on this truly historic Election Day.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)