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AT THIS HOUR WITH BERMAN AND MICHAELA

Trump, Clinton Target Each Others Health Records; Trump Promises Major Speech on Immigration; Trump to Speak to African- American Voters; Backlash to Colin Kaepernick Refusing to Stand for National Anthem. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired August 29, 2016 - 11:00   ET

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


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[11:00:16] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Donald Trump announced he's going to do what he calls a major speech about his immigration policy.

DONALD TRUMP, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We are going to get rid of the criminals within one hour after I take office, believe me.

MIKE PENCE, (R), INDIANA GOVERNOR & VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We're going to secure the border. We're going to build a wall.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We all learned in kindergarten to stand in line and wait our turn.

HILLARY CLINTON, (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: His real message seems to be "make America hate" again.

TRUMP: You can't walk down the street and not be killed and not be shot and not be mugged.

DONNA BRAZILE, CHAIRWOMAN, DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE: Donald Trump has not held an event in the black community.

TRUMP: It can't get any worse. What do you have to lose?

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BERMAN: Hello, everyone. I'm John Berman. Kate Bolduan is off.

If you want to skip gym class, you get a note from your doctor. The question is, "If you want to be president, should it take more than that?" So this morning, Donald Trump is challenging Hillary Clinton. He put out a tweet. He said, "I think that both candidates should release detailed medical records. I have no problem in doing so. Hillary"

As for the Clinton campaign, they're essentially saying medical game on. They're picking apart a letter from Donald Trump's personal physician who declared that, "If elected, Mr. Trump would be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency." That line raised some questions when it came out. Mostly because no one remembers John Madison's doctor's letter.

Want to bring in CNN national political reporter, Mark Preston, for this.

Mark, talk about this Clinton campaign response, this surgical takedown of that doctor's letter.

MARK PRESTON, CNN POLITICS EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: John, what we're talking about is letter that Donald Trump's was called into question because of the flourishing language this doctor used, as well as the fact we've come to find out the doctor had wrote it rather quickly.

Let's take a look at this blog posting put on Hillary Clinton's website last night. They go line by line. They knock out 11 different things they see as interesting or questionable.

Let me read you a couple of them. One is they note that the website listed at the top of the letter doesn't even exist. If you go to that website, it doesn't take you to the right place. They note in the salutation, "to whom may concern," there was actually a typo in there. It should say, "to whom it may concern." Again, calling into question really the doctors focusing in on the details of Donald Trump's health. They go on to say, Dr. Bornstein, who is Trump's doctor, says Trump's lab results are "astonishingly excellent." As the Clinton campaign notes, that isn't a real medical description. They go on to what you said, "If elected, Mr. Trump, I can state unequivocally, will be the healthiest individual ever to serve in the presidency." There's just no way they could ever make that claim because he would have had to then check every other person who ran for president.

This is a statement from the Clinton campaign as they put out that takedown, "Donald Trump has put forward a laughable letter that admits health information, including date of his exam, his family medical history, his heart rate, his respiratory rate, his EKG or his cholesterol level. Instead of continuing to push to spread conspiracy theories, Donald Trump needs to produce a real doctor's letter written by a credible doctor that he details the state of health for voters."

John, we talked about this being about a candidates' health. I just got off the phone with someone in the Clinton campaign and they said it's really not about his health. For him, it's about accountability, the fact that he has not put out a detailed letter. And they're also trying to tie this to the fact he won't release his taxes. For Donald Trump, it looks like it's a play on health but it's really a play on transparency.

BERMAN: They're both engaged in this fully.

We should note that we did hear from this Trump doctor. NBC News caught up with him, and he admitted to them that he wrote this letter in about five minutes while a limo driver waited in front of his office. Then he had this to say.

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DR. HAROLD BORNSTEIN, PHYSICIAN TO DONALD TRUMP: His health is excellent, particularly his mental health. He thinks he's the best.

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BERMAN: You were talking about how the Clinton campaign now intends to engage on this subject. But Trump is not going to let this go away either.

PRESTON: Absolutely, we've heard from his surrogates. Rudy Giuliani, calling into question Hillary Clinton's health, the fact that she had a fainting spell a couple years back, she wasn't able to testify before Congress. And there was a conspiracy theory that, in fact, she is not healthy enough to serve in office. But as Donald Trump put out that tweet, expect to see more of that. And, John, as we head into really the closing months of the

campaign, it's going to get dirtier and dirtier and this is certainly one of the issues both candidates will try to expose.

BERMAN: So we have that to look forward to.

PRESTON: Yes.

BERMAN: Mark Preston, the healthiest political editor CNN has ever had, thank you.

PRESTON: Thank you.

[11:05:03] BERMAN: New this morning, Donald Trump announced he has an immigration plan and he's going to explain it all to us, possibly. He tweeted this, he said, "I will be making a major speech on illegal immigration on Wednesday in the great state of Arizona."

Why wait? He still has 10 weeks until Election Day. This follows a week of Trump really waffling on this issue, which has been central to this campaign. He was sort of giving a different answer depending on the day over the last 10 days.

Donald Trump will also follow up this immigration speech with something he really hasn't done very much in this campaign. He will take his pitch to African-American voters to an actual African- American audience. He will speak at an inner city church. He'll do an interview there.

CNN national correspondent, Jason Carroll, is outside Trump Tower in New York.

A lot going on this morning, Jason.

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Let's start with immigration. As you just said, finally Donald Trump expected to deliver that immigration policy speech. A lot of people looking forward to that, as you can imagine, a lot of his supporters who I've spoken to are looking for some clarification here. Is he going to use a deportation force? What specifically is going to happen to the 11 million undocumented people living in the United States? Hopefully some answers coming. One point where Donald Trump has been clear, and that's his point of

trying to reach African-American and Latino voters. He's talked about it many times rallies. He said, look, under a Trump administration, "you'll be able to walk down the street without getting shot." These are Trump's words.

He's also talked about Hillary Clinton and the Democrats, how he says Hillary Clinton and the Democrats have failed communities of color. And, of course, John, he's been tweeting about it, and tweeting a lot. Just this morning, he tweeted this at 9:02 a.m., "Look how bad it is getting, how much more crime. How many more shootings will it take for African-Americans and Latinos?" And this, "Now that African- Americans are seeing what a bad job Hillary-type policies and management has done to the inner cities, they want Trump."

Well, that's not entirely true. Polls showing just the opposite. As you know, John, he is really doing very poorly among African-Americans and Latinos.

Having said that, some of the criticism he's been facing is that he's been giving these speeches about reaching out to these communities, but doing them and giving these speeches in communities that are overwhelmingly white. Well, he is expected to visit a predominantly African-American church. That's going to happen in Detroit next weekend. Expected to address issues facing African-American and Latino communities so that will finally be happening next weekend -- John?

BERMAN: All right, Jason Carroll for us in front of a busy Trump Tower this morning, in front of busy campaign action for the Trump campaign. Thanks so much, Jason.

I want to bring in our panel. Joining us this morning, CNN political commentators, Kayleigh McEnany, Angela Rye, Alice Stewart, and Errol Louis.

We'll start with the medical records. Let's start a show of hands. Who thinks this will sway votes before November 8th? Raise your hands if you think this will be a voting issue.

Why are we talking about it then Errol? Why are both campaigns arguing about it?

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: In the case of the Trump campaign, they're trying to explore. Maybe we can eliminate you as a candidate in many people's eyes. You can't fault them for trying. I think going back the other way, trying to link it to taxes and other transparency issues. This is one more issue that's going to get thrown into the meat grinder. I think what really makes it kind of silly, everybody can see them. You can see them go bounding up the stairs and keep their schedule and shake hands and do rope lines and give speeches, and everybody knows how to assess that.

BERMAN: Alice, it's a good point. I've covered a bunch of campaigns beginning to end. By this point in every campaign I've covered, I was a wreck, like sick, back hurt, couldn't take a step. They look good to me.

ALICE STEWART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Not to mention sleep deprived --

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BERMAN: You obviously knew me during those campaigns.

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STEWART: No, no, I mean me. They're exhausting. They're grueling. No matter what side of the aisle you're on, if you're a reporter or one of the candidates. The fact the two of them are still able to put together a coherent sentence is hats off to them. There's no questioning the health of either of the two of these. They're both certainly displaying their stamina at this point. To the degree that they want to continue to talk about this, I agree, it's not going to change any votes. If Donald Trump is going to question her health, he does need to produce something much more than what he has produced. And this is -- granted, you know, it's good fodder for conversation but it's not going to change votes. We need to get back on the issues that people are concerned with. You want to talk about health? How you can improve health care for everyday Americans?

[11:10:22] BERMAN: We like every record we can get, we'll take them all.

Let's move on to immigration.

Donald Trump is giving a speech on Wednesday in Arizona about the issue of illegal immigration, which has been a centerpiece of his campaign for more than 14 months now. The last eight days. it's been called into question. His aides, his surrogates, his running mates, they had this to say about his plan, listen.

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PENCE: His position and his principles has been absolutely consistent.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What he has said has been very consistent.

CHRIS CHRISTIE, (R), NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR: This is a guy who's been very consistent.

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BERMAN: Right. Since the show of hands worked so well last time, on the issue of what to do with 11 million undocumented illegal immigrants in this country, I'll have a show of hands. Who here on this panel thinks Donald Trump's position has been consistent? Raise your hand.

I thought you might raise your hand, Kayleigh McEnany. I'm glad you did. What do you think he wants to do with the 11 million undocumented illegal immigrants?

KAYLEIGH MCENANY, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: This to me was really a contrived inconsistency controversy. Because Donald Trump mentioned wanting to soften his position to Sean Hannity. He also mentioned he's listening to voters. Voters are telling him they don't like this aspect of his plan. What he is doing is signaling priorities to the American people. He's saying, look, priority one, putting up the wall. Mexico's paying for it. Priority two, people have to obey the law to come back in. Priority three, e-verify. These are priorities. And getting the criminals out of the country which, by the way, Barack Obama, just last year, released 20,000 illegal immigrants with criminal records into society, 200 of which had murder convictions.

BERMAN: Just to be clear, up until a week and a half ago, you agree, he did say the 11 million undocumented illegal immigrants, he said they have to go, he said that clearly, they have to go.

MCENANY: Yes, and now they --

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BERMAN: He's saying get the criminal ones out first. He's not really saying he's going to do anything to remove the ones who have committed crimes while they're here, right?

MCENANY: He has priorities. You're not going to get the entirety of your agenda done. He's signaling priority one are criminals.

BERMAN: The other big thing, we learned, and Jason talked about it, Donald Trump is going to speak to an African-American audience to talk about African-American issues.

Angela Rye, you were the executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus. Outreach to these voters was something I imagine you worked on quite a bit, you know, with the Congressional Black Caucus. Does Donald Trump get credit for, at this point, going to Detroit to do this?

ANGELA RYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think you just mentioned something very key. You said at this point. Donald Trump has run a campaign that has been rooted in bigotry and racism. Whether we're talking about immigration and him softening a position, originally wanting to get them out of here, criminal background or not this is more of the same. Donald Trump does not have any real desire to tap into the needs and the actual desires and policy prescriptions that would help to strengthen the African-American community. He sees a gaping hole between a win to 270 electoral votes and where he is right now not only with black people but also with brown people.

BERMAN: Something interesting happened that didn't have anything to do with the campaign per se, but Colin Kaepernick didn't stand up for the national anthem, but, in the process of being interviewed, he did say he had great criticism for Donald. But he also noted that Hillary Clinton had used the word "super predator" in the 1990s. An African- American athlete concerned about the fact Hillary Clinton used that word. It's been the subject now of a Donald Trump video. I'm wondering if his discussion over the last 10 days has helped put that back into the national dialogue.

LOUIS: Well, it will. There are some people, many of whom Bernie Sanders supporters, who really bristled at the actions she took and her advocacy for the 1994 Crime Reform Bill and her use of the term "super predator." If you extrapolated what was happening with kids, with so-called "crack baby," kids born addicted, and the rising crime rates going on, and people thought, if that goes on an uninterrupted trajectory, we'll have complete mayhem. And that's where the phrase "super predators" came from. It was discredited. She has backed away from it. Any time you bring it up, there are some people who will really, really bristle and try and tie that around her neck. That is entirely fair. If you want her to apologize, you can ask her 10 times and that's what you'll get.

STEWART: In regard to the outreach, I think it's good he is finally going to the African-American community, but I think at this stage, if we minimize the conversation to what he said or she said in years past, we take away from the real issue here, is what can the do of them do for the African-American community moving forward, who has the policies that will help them economically, with education, with health care. And I firmly believe that Donald Trump's policies will be more Beneficial to the community. It's a way o how he articulates that is the question. I think he can also incorporate some of Jack Kemp's policies of empowerment, providing ladder to opportunity for them to lift themselves up out of their situation. He needs to work on the tone --

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[11:15:42] RYE: That's part of the problem. The fact African- Americans are talked about as monolithic entities. We all need to pull ourselves up from our boot straps when we were barefoot on plantations building this country for free is highly problematic to me. John, it's not about us all needing to be lifted out of poverty. I'm not impoverished and I have several middle class friends that are doing very well in this country. So I reject the notion we constantly need to talk about --

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STEWART: I'm not --

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RYE: I'm almost done. I'm just saying that particular point strikes a chord with me. And your candidate more often than not going to that refrain is highly problematic so I'm cautioning to get some other --

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MCENANY: It is a fact that --

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RYE: I'm not talking about fact. I'm talking about tone --

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MCENANY: -- a very unfortunate one. Donald Trump articulated this that someone who looks like me makes on average 142,000 but someone of African-American heritage, they make 11,000. That's a problematic figure. It's problematic an African-American male is six to eight times more likely to be killed than a white person. Donald Trump addressing them and trying to reach out --

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RYE: Kayleigh, that's not --

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MCENANY: -- what he's doing is saying there are people in inner cities and I want to reach out because I care about them.

RYE: That's not true. We know that Donald Trump has done to people in inner cities for years. While you may not want to talk about wt's happened in the past, you have to look at where people are going in the future so I think we would be remiss if we ignored the discrimination housing cases which there was a tremendous expose in "The New York Times" this weekend. None of the surrogates want to address the fact he's never apologized to these people. In 2013, got right about his position again --

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RYE: Robert Byrd actually apologized for and requested funding for the --

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: -- if Donald Trump wants to turn to his racist pace --

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MCENANY: This is exactly what happened. You try to yell over --

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: Kayleigh, I was in the middle of my --

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: Kayleigh? Kayleigh?

MCENANY: -- Arkansas. These are facts, these are inconvenient for you guys --

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: I don't mind inconvenient --

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MCENANY: For the Clinton team, because here --

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: I'm just a black Democrat who disagrees with racism.

MCENANY: I agree with Alice. I'd rather talk about issues --

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: That is an issue.

MCENANY: But when you have a V.P. coming out and saying Donald Trump has KKK values, we can do the same for your candidate --

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RYE: We can't though.

MCENANY: We can talk about Robert Byrd --

(CROSSTALK)

RYE: Robert Byrd actually had -- you guys like to talk about black staffers. Robert Byrd had black staffers. He apologized for his participation in the KKK. He requested funding --

(CROSSTALK)

MCENANY: -- and Hillary --

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RYE: I agree, it's horrible. He requested funding for the MLK memorial. We can go on and on about comparisons to David Duke struggling to disavow the KKK and David Duke.

BERMAN: All right.

RYE: We can talk about his father being involved --

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: Hang on one second.

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: Saturday, Donald Trump will give this speech, this interview in Detroit, so it gives us five days to talk about this a lot more, and we have the election in November.

Guys, come back. I do appreciate it.

Coming up, a star NFL quarterback defending his refusal to stand during the national anthem. Hear his brand-new comments about why he did this and how also he's calling out Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Plus, a mother of four shot to death in Chicago while pushing her

infant in a stroller, killed for really no reason. She also happens to be Dwyane Wade's cousin. And now her mother is speaking out.

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DIANE ALDRIDGE, MOTHER OF NYKEA ALDRIDGE: They want their -- their mom. It just hurts to hear kids saying they want their mom and their mom won't be in their lives anymore.

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[11:23:16] BERMAN: Football season already smack in the middle of a national debate. San Francisco quarterback, Colin Kaepernick, calls his refusal to stand for the national anthem an act of protest against racial injustice in this country. Listen.

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COLIN KAEPERNICK, SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS QUARTERBACK: I stand up for the oppressed. When there's significant change and I feel like that flag represents what it's supposed to represent in this country, representing people the way it's supposed to, I'll stand.

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BERMAN: All right, the move obviously receiving some backlash, including from several 49er fans who responded by setting Kaepernick Jerseys on fire.

Here to discuss is NFL writer for "USA Today," Jared Bell.

Jared, you wrote an interesting column. You said, "More power to Colin Kaepernick for this statement." You said, "Somewhere Muhammad Ali is smiling." Explain.

JARED BELL, NFL WRITER, USA TODAY: Just think, we spend time this summer really celebrating Muhammad Ali's life, the ideas, the values he stood for. And now, he's in a situation where an athlete uses his stage, his very profound stage in the NFL. Now, granted, he wasn't winning a gold medal when he made the stand, but really made a bold statement. And in the spirit of Ali, in the spirit of John Carlos and Tommy Smith, to really bring attention and awareness to something that is on the minds of a lot of our citizens, particularly African- Americans. And so that's why I applauded Colin Kaepernick for taking the stand, although, as you mentioned, it definitely was a lot of backlash. Sometimes when you make a statement, you have to be willing to accept that.

[11:25:10] BERMAN: And he knew no doubt he'd receive some backlash here.

Victor Cruz, New York Giants' wide receiver, he was asked, he said, "I think personally the flag is a flag, regardless of why you feel things are going on in America today and around the world with gun violence and things like that. You've got to respect the flag and stand up with your teammates. It's bigger than just you in my opinion."

What do you say to Victor Cruz?

BELL: I think there's a lot of different ways you can interpret this. A lot of people look at the flag symbol of the United States military. And that's something that Colin Kaepernick addressed yesterday. I give him some credit, too, for talking for about 20 minutes in the locker room, which in NFL locker rooms is an eternity for talking to the media, but, you know, facing the heat, answering the questions, explaining himself. Ways you can take this. Colin Kaepernick basically, as he explained it yesterday, was not making a statement against the U.S. military. And, in fact, he said that, you know, he thinks on a certain level that military people who are sacrificed their lives and their livelihoods have really been disrespected in a sense that the United States as a society hasn't always lived up to the ideas that, you know, it stands for and the principles it stands for. So, you know, that's the spirit that I kind of accept this protest with. And other people are going to look at it different ways. Again, being American, that's one of the rights you have. You have the First Amendment right to express yourself and freedom of speech.

BERMAN: There's another criticism when it compares to Kaepernick, essentially he's not the right person to do this, or a person in his position shouldn't be doing this. Brian Smith from the "Houston Chronicle" sports column writes, "It must be too deep, complex and multilayered for Kaepernick to comprehend the fact the only reason he's allowed to be a lifetime mega millionaire continually say stupid things and freely express his inherent and unalienable rights is because of the flag and country he proclaims to hate."

That's a different criticism here.

BELL: Yeah, well, guess what, it doesn't really matter how much money you make in terms of whether or not you have the right to express yourself, OK. I think we all understand that this is a great country in terms of the freedoms it has afforded its citizens and free dopes that allow you to express yourself. That's what we can't miss with this opportunity for Colin Kaepernick to bring attention and awareness to something that he is obviously passionate about. And one of the things I think that's really come through in listening to him is we're talking about a guy who has become educated on some of these issues and it's not easy to put your hands around a lot of these situations and, you know, basically he talked about police brutality as the single most pressing issue that he wanted to bring awareness to. I think we can take that and go even further in some of the systemic issues in our nation, pertain to African-Americans and other minorities. So the point he should not say anything because he makes money, no. I hope this really compels other people who may not make the money Kaepernick makes, citizens who may not have the platform Kaepernick has. People who are in positions of power who can do things from a business standpoint, an economic development standpoint, you know, all sorts of ways in our society that people can be inspired to do something and not just be silent.

BERMAN: He is certainly -- (CROSSTALK)

BELL: I think that's part of the message I take away from Colin Kaepernick.

BERMAN: He has certainly reignited this discuss to say the least.

All right, Jared Bell, thanks for coming in. Really appreciate it.

All right, we have breaking news now involving former Congressman, Anthony Weiner, and his wife, Hillary Clinton's closest aide, Huma Abedin. News about their marriage. This is after new reports emerged about Weiner and accusations of sexting. We'll have that right after the break.

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