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LEGAL VIEW WITH ASHLEIGH BANFIELD

$200,000 Reward For Escaped Inmates; CNN Asks 150 People Why They Support Donald Trump; Trump Picks Up Falwell Endorsement; Sanders Visits Obama In The Oval Office. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired January 27, 2016 - 12:30   ET

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


[12:30:03] PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Ashleigh so, they are out here worn out of the country before. He's done it one's before. And he successfully did in Iran for a while. So, he has to be one they're worried about especially with the Mexican border being so close, Ashleigh.

So, they are out here warning people, but right now no significant developments at least none being announced by the Orange County Sheriff.

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Just reminds me of those inmates who escaped from upstate New York and people were really scared that as the days waned, they would be desperate. They needed money, they needed survival, they needed, you know, cars, they needed shelter, and that they would be prepared -- people of their ilk would be prepared to kill for that.

So, why were they together? If they were awaiting trial, and again, some were already convicted on certain things. If they were awaiting trial, why would they house people like these together?

VERCAMMEN: And that is certainly a hot button issue in all of us, and in fact, has divided some prosecutors in this county. As you pointed out, they're in what was being called a tank with 60 other inmates.

The deputy who had not heard (ph) this case, she has since been chastised by the D.A. She openly contested what they were doing in that tank, with an ability to consort with other inmates and plot. And the level of plotting might go beyond just these three, because don't forget, some sort of fight was staged the night they were to have a head check. And this fight allowed them to even delay the head check. That means that the officers were distracted. They're going to have a lot for look at and certainly that's the big question right now. What were they doing in the tank with other inmates, Ashleigh?

BANFIELD: Paul Vercammen, live for us. Thank you for that. Appreciate it.

Coming up next, they come out in droves, standing in line for long hours, in all kinds of weather to cheer for Donald Trump. But just who are these passionate supporters? If you've been confused about the Trump juggernaut, you are about to learn a whole lot about why he is doing so well and what his supporters say is driving them. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:36:11] BANFIELD: We, here at CNN, have just updated our poll of polls where we take the most recently released national polls that meet our standard and then average their results. For now here are the numbers for the -- for just the Republican candidates. One of them is national, and one of them is just for Iowa. But, here's the wider picture nationwide.

Donald Trump leads the GOP candidate 17 points ahead of Senator Cruz. When we look at just Iowa, Trump's lead is not quite as great, but he does get 31 percent of the Republican vote to Ted Cruz's 26 percent. And the Iowa caucuses, I need to remind you, just coming up on Monday as well. Not a lot of time to close any of those numbers.

A timely article that's appearing on CNN.com, in fact, is offering a fascinating snapshot of Donald Trump supporters. Just who are his loudest and most passionate defenders, the people who are showing up in droves, by the hundreds and hundreds, waiting in line for hours in the cold sometimes, just to try to get a seat in those rallies?

They are split evenly among men and women, and they are overwhelmingly white. Many are frustrated with the first ever Black president. And many say they are afraid that minorities and immigrants are pushing them aside, and they say they're also nostalgic for the way America used to be.

Several of our reporters fanned out across 31 American cities interviewing 150 people to boil down the essence of the Trump phenomenon. One of those reporters is M.J Lee., who has been very busy sorting through so many of those interviews.

MJ just give me a feel for other than those broad strokes that i just laid out at the top of this segment. The feel of what you're getting from the people you're talking about. And why it is that so many others don't understand the Trump phenomenon?

MJ LEE, CNN POLITICS AND FINANCE REPORTER: Yeah, Ashleigh, first I want to say, I think the reporters who are closely covering Donald Trump is like they really have a front row seat to what is a pretty remarkable political movement and political phenomenon. This is a candidate, as you know, a while ago, we though that he had no place running for president and now, just a couple of days out from Iowa, he is not only leading national league, it looks like he have a pretty good chance of winning both Iowa and New Hampshire.

So, my colleagues and I wanted to sort of explore the Trump phenomenon and explain it through the voices of the many voters that we have gotten to talk to over the last six months or so. And the one thing that I think is quite striking about the conversations we have had with these voters is that there is a real sense of fear, concern, and anxiety about the direction of the country and where the country is headed, especially in light of the attacks in Paris, the attack in San Bernardino. When people really feel like at any moment the country could really unravel. Now, then when they see Trump on stage saying things like, I would,

you know, bomb the heck out of ISIS, that I'm the most militaristic person that there is. They're finding a lot of reassurance and comfort in that rhetoric, and they don't mind that he has never run for office, that he has never held public office. They think that he really is the candidate that could really bring the change that is needed in this country right now.

BANFIELD: A comfort in the rhetoric. And just M. J, give me a sense. It's a really telling article that you and your colleagues have compiled about who these demos really are -- these demographics. Do you generally get the feeling that the bulk of the supporters are frustrated with the loss that they see with their country. When we say they're majority, that majority of them are anti-immigration. Is it just that they feel like they're losing economic advantages to immigrants, or do they feel something that really sort of dig more into racism?

[12:40:04] LEE: Yeah, no, absolutely, there is no doubt that many of the people who are supporting Trump are supporting Trump precisely because of his stance on immigration, what he had said about wanting to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Those are ideas that many of these people really embrace. And it is precisely because of what you just pointed out.

A lot of these people feel like immigrants that are coming into the country from, the countries maybe in Asia, in the Middle East, they feel like these people are taking away their jobs and their opportunities and that Americans who were born in this country deserve better and deserve the best.

BANFIELD: M.J. Lee doing an incredible job and I really do encourage our viewers to go to CNN.com and check out this extensive piece. It's very, very long very, very compendious as well, MJ thank you, thank you for that.

LEE: Thank you.

BANFIELD: The latest high profile endorsement for Donald Trump is Evangelical leader Jerry Falwell, Jr., the Liberty University president made it official this week. Itwasn't the splash that last week's Sarah Palin's speech made, but it certainly does splinter the deeply religious voter support that Trump's close rival Senator Ted Cruz has been counting on.

David Gergen is here. He has advised four American presidents over the over the years. He's also our senior political analyst.

David Gergen, I want to ask you about the religious issue and the evangelical vote, but before I do that I want to bounce off something that M.J. Lee just said. She said that a lot these Trump voters are seeing a reassurance and comfort in Donald Trump's rhetoric. And I want you o give me your perspective on all the candidates you see come along, and all the elections that you have worked and have covered. Is this any different and if so, how? DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: It is different, but first of all let me congratulate M.J .Lee and her team on doing the survey because, I think, it's so important for one to come together as one country for us to begin listening more to Trump supporters, understanding their frustrations and try to integrate something to some broader effort to bring us together. And so, I think this is very helpful to go out and actually listen. We've spent too much time shouting at each other.

But on the question of, is this different? Yes, this is different. We've seen it before in America when a large numbers of people are economically and, personally and, morally uncomfortable, they're anxious, they're scared. And I think it comes in very large part because of the slowdown in the economy for 50 years after World War II we are growing at about 3.6 percent, 3.7 percent a year. And our growth in recent years has been half of that and wages have been stagnant.

So an awful lot of people -- working people, middle class people are, you know, are trapped. And they watch the politicians arguing and arguing and not accomplishing anything and they get angry. And they've seen the country changed as we go and they feel they are losing their place in society. The system -- the Conservative have tilted the system in favor of the rich and liberal have tilted the system in favor of minorities.

Now, some of those are misplaced ideas, but you can understand where this is going. And I think it's what made this populous movement of supporting Trump and Bernie Sanders, but especially Trump right now. It is what Nixon called, you know, the silent majority. And I'm not sure if it's majority but its -- that they're no longer silent.

BANFIELD: OK, so let me again, MJ's article really again, women and men are split evenly. Overwhelmingly White, many frustrated with the first ever Black president, afraid that minorities and immigrants are pushing them aside.

But then, there's the Evangelical vote and with Jerry Falwell's endorsement. I am so curious as to why someone like Jerry Falwell would get an advantage of endorsing Trump because, look, if you look a t Trump's background it is not the kind of guy that Jerry Falwell would even have lunch with. He has -- I mean honestly, I'm just going to quote him from one of his books.

"I told real stories of my experiences with women often seemingly very happily married and important women. This book would be guaranteed as the best seller." He also said, "That he's been with married women, beautiful, famous, successful -- I've had them all secretly the world's biggest names".

And you know, Falwell is part of the Southern Baptist group and their resolution says that character does count. So for these people that MJ and her team have been interviewed does this other peace just not matter?

GERGEN: I -- listen, no, I think it does matter and I think Jerry Falwell hasn't changed his religious views. There is, after all, in Christianity a view of, you know, redemption. And that one thing come around and that Trump would argue he's living a more moral life today and more of , you know, he's no longer engaging in the kind of activities he was before.

[12:45:03] Having said that the experience we've had with the evangelicals and indeed was starting with Billy Graham, and whom I know. And he's always been for, look, if you're going to be a major leaguer in our country you do need religious counseling, you need someone by your side help you think about what's right and what's wrong. So it's not totally surprising that Jerry Falwell would get relate to Trump in that way.

And maybe he shares a lot of the frustrations that are being expressed by Trump's supporters. I think Falwell's endorsement does matter because there is a fight for this with Ted Cruz. Ted Cruz had seemed almost have a monopoly on the evangelical vote, which is very important in Iowa, and very important in South Carolina which is just around the corner.

So I think that Falwell's endorsement, while as you say it's not Sarah Palin's endorsement, it doesn't have that splash. I think it has significance.

BANFIELD: David Gergen always good to have your perspective, thank you so much.

GERGEN: Thank you Ashleigh, Good talking to you.

BANFIELD: Glad to have you back. Any day, any day, open seat for you on this program.

Coming up on the next hour, on CNN our own chief strategist and communications director for the Republican national committee Sean Spicer is going to join us. But up next, Bernie Sanders face to face with President Obama today at the White House. What do you suppose these two are talking about?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:50:24] BANFIELD: It takes a lot to budge a presidential candidate from Iowa these close to caucus time, but a trip to the Oval Office is kind of hard to turn down. And so came, Bernie Sanders for a closed- door meeting, last hour, to the fellow then that he is hoping to replace.

Our latest poll of polls suggests that it's still an uphill climb, though. Nationwide, Hillary Clinton is backed by 53 percent of Democratic voters to just 36 percent for Senator Sanders and two percent for Martin O'Malley.

Iowa by contrast is very much neck and neck, 46 percent for Sanders, 45 percent for Clinton. And on any given day, they jockey for top place there. In New Hampshire that remains Bernie still work, though. He is now running18 points ahead of the former secretary of state. And CNN, Joe Johns is watching the comings and goings at the White

House. Mark Preston of CNN politics is our man in Des Moines, Iowa. Joe Johns, first to you. Bernie Sanders walked then, has he walked out yet? And is there any news to report?

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Not so far. He did walk in around 11:30 Eastern Time. He was accompanied by his wife, Jane, and he's been in there ever since. It's supposed to be a meeting in the Oval Office with the president of the United States. No stated agenda for this meeting. And you'd certainly want to be a fly on the wall.

The president has not officially endorsed anybody for the Democratic nomination. Though, he has been very complimentary of Hillary Clinton who was his secretary of state. So we're waiting to see Bernie Sanders, come out of there and hope ...

BAN FIELD: Hey, Joe, Joe, yeah. Let me interrupt. Let's listen to him. Let's listen to him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: President Obama, we had a -- what I thought was a very productive and constructive meeting talking about a number of issues. But before I get into anything else, let me just remind the American people of something that, unfortunately, Republican presidential candidates forget, is that seven years ago when President Bush left office, this country was hemorrhaging 800,000 jobs a month.

We were running a $1.4 trillion deficit, largest in our country's history, and by the way, sometimes we forget the world's financial system was on the verge of collapse. So it is absolutely fair to say, and I say it every day, that we have got to do a lot better to protect the middle class and working families. But it also important to remember how far we have come in the last seven years under the leadership of President Obama, and Vice President Biden.

Now the president and I discussed this morning a number of issues, foreign policy issues, and domestic issues, occasionally a little bit of politics. That I enjoyed the meeting, and I thought it was a very positive and constructive meeting.

We are right now, as everybody knows, in a very tough campaign in Iowa, then we're going to New Hampshire. I think what the Iowa campaign ends up being about is one word, and that is turnout. We're feeling really good about where we are, and if there is a large voter turnout -- I'm not saying we could do what Barack Obama did in 2008. I wish we could, but i don't think we can.

But if there is a large turnout, I think we win. If not, I think we're going to be struggling. Then we go to New Hampshire, and we're going to fight as hard as we can for a week in New Hampshire, and I'm thinking we have a pretty good chance there. Then we'll going to the battle in South Carolina. And by the way, I think we're going to do a lot, lot better in those states than people think we are. And then we had a lot to Super Tuesday.

We were just in Minnesota yesterday at a phenomenal turnout in St. Paul. We have 15,000 people out in St. Paul. We had 6,000 people out in Duluth. We are feeling pretty good.

So, I think the American people, working people, young people, want to see real movement in this country, and I think we are tapping into that energy, and I think we stand a very good chance to do well in Iowa and forward.

UNKNOWN MALE: Did you ask the President for an endorsement?

SANDER: No, of course not. What the President has tried to do, what Vice President Biden has tried to do is to be as even-handed as they can be. And I know there was some discussion the other day about a political interview, where he was tipping the scale towards Secretary Clinton, I don't believe that at all. I think he and the Vice President have tried to be fair and even-handed in the process, and I expect they will continue to be that way.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So, did he give you and advice on of how to defeat Hillary Clinton.

SANDERS: No, no.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Were there any points of disagreement with the president's ...

[12:55:22] SANDERS: Look, let me, you know, every -- I think everybody knows that for the last seven years -- well, before that. You know, I -- Barack Obama, when he was a United States senator, was kind enough to come to Vermont and campaign for me, and I've never forgotten that.

All right, in 2008 I did my best to see that he would be elected president. I campaigned hard for him, as I did in 2012. But there's also no secret that we have, as is the case in the Democratic society, we have different sets of opinion. I was on the floor of the senate for 8.5 hours in disagreement with him over taxes. We disagree over TPP.

But by and large over the last seven years on major issue after major issue, I have stood by his side, where he has taken on unprecedented Republican obstructionism. And he has tried to do the right thing for the American people.

UNKNOWN FEMALE: Is your campaign going to go negative against Hillary Clinton?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What did you ask to the president? (That is there any) request or?

SANDERS: No. It was just -- It was just a discussion to just get myself updated on some of the current issues facing us in this country. How we'd most effectively deal with ISIS, his assessment about Iran and how we work with Iran and our relationship with Iran. That was what it was about. (CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How did Hillary Clinton (inaudible)?

SANDERS: I'm sorry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was there anybody else indeed (ph)?

SANDERS: No.

UNKNOWN MALE: Do you think Hillary Clinton has overplayed the closeness with White House, with President Obama?

SANDERS: I think the people of Iowa will make that decision in a few days. I don't ...

(CROSS TALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: With Michigan, sorry.

UNKNOWN WOMEN: How do you tackle the threat of ISIS differently than how the president has (inaudible)?

SANDERS: Look, frankly, and we did talk about this. As you all know, I voted against the war in Iraq. And that's a major point of difference between Secretary Clinton and my self. We both receive the same information, and we came to a different conclusion.

And as I mentioned to the president I, in my small State of Vermont, went to too many funerals of wonderful young people. And I'm very happy to tell you that the last few years I have not gone to funerals of young men or women in our military. I think what the president is trying to do is the right thing. And what he is trying to do is keep our young men and women in the military out of a perpetual war in the quagmire of the Middle East, than what he is trying to do.

And what I will try to do is put together a coalition of the major power with the Muslim people on the ground, the Muslim nations, Muslim troops because at the end of the day, as King Abdullah, recently reminded us, this is a war for the soul of Islam against people like ISIS and their barbarity that has hijacked that religion. And what Abdullah remind us, is that at the end of the day, it must be the Muslim people and their military to destroy ISIS with the support of the major powers in the country. And I think that's what the president is trying to do. OK. We got to got to get going. Thank you very much.

(INAUDIBLE QUESTIONS)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: Senator Bernie Sanders emerging from what seemed like about an hour inside the White House in a special meeting with the president. No endorsement came from that meeting as he was very clear. He didn't ask for one either. But he said it was more an update on the issues, foreign policy, domestic issues. They even talked a little politics. He said it was very positive. Quick question to you, Joe Johns standing outside the white house

right now, is there any meeting for Secretary Clinton on the agenda to come and meet with President Obama?

JOHNS: Well, she's actually already had a meeting with President Obama. Came in. Sort of slipped in much like Bernie Sanders, but my recollection is she didn't come out and talk for the cameras.

Look that was pretty interesting. He handicapped the race a little bit. I thought he was interesting when he said, that there's a large voter turnout in Iowa, I think we can win. If not, we're struggling, New Hampshire, a good chance there. Suggesting that in Nevada and South Carolina, he will do better in those states than people think.

BANFIELD: Yeah.

JOHNS: So interesting stuff.

BANFIELD: Interesting as well Joe, he said I don't expect to get Obama's away turned out but definitely he's do that, as he just emerges from meeting.

[13:04:08] Joe John, thank you for your reporting in snowy D.C, and thank you everyone for joining us to these hours I'm going to turn the mic over to my colleague Wolf Blitzer in Washington right now. So see you again tomorrow.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)