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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Trump Falsely Claims Photos Of Harris' Crowds Created With A.I.; Tonight: Elon Musk Interviews Trump On X As WSJ Report Details His Hands-On Push To Re-Elect Trump; Trump Campaign Claims It Was Hacked By Iran; GOP Nominee To Run NC Schools Advocated Pro-Trump Military Coup In January 6 Video; Pennsylvania Voters Weigh Options: Trump, Harris Or Neither. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired August 12, 2024 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: The Instagram account for McDonald's France, feel a little saucy. They took a not so thinly veiled shot at Steph Curry, who hit eight amazing three-pointers to seal the win. So this is what McDonald's France posted.

Jess, how's your French?

JESSICA DEAN, CNN HOST: Not great, (INAUDIBLE) for us.

So for obvious reasons, we are considering removing this sauce and it included a picture of the chain's classic curry dipping sauce.

A spokesperson for McDonald's France went on to clarify, it's a joke. No one freak out.

Wait. Okay. But everyone wants to know if I can make a basket.

KEILAR: You can do it. THE LEAD -- oh, look at that. One more -- THE LEAD starts now. Oh!

(MUSIC)

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN HOST: Kevin McCarthy has a message for Donald Trump, size doesn't matter.

THE LEAD starts right now.

Donald Trump called out as he falsely accuses Kamala Harris of cheating by faking images of rally crowds. How Harris is responding as her campaign tries to pivot policy.

And the influence of Elon Musk in the 2024 presidential race. What a brand new report reveals about the billionaire's hands-on plan to win over voters for Trump.

Plus, a Republican running to lead North Carolina state schools, will voters tolerate her talk of a military coup on January 6? We're asking the Democrat running against her after CNN's KFILE found the video.

(MUSIC)

MATTINGLY: Welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Phil Mattingly, in for Jake Tapper.

We start today with our 2024 lead because one week from now, we will be live from Chicago as the Democratic National Convention officially kicks off with, I think its fair to say, a wildly different program than was planned, less than a month ago.

Today, Vice President Kamala Harris is meeting behind closed doors with their campaign team fresh off that battleground tour with her running mate, Governor Tim Walz, and as they work to fend off questions about her agenda and why it hasn't really been made public yet. Harris says she plans to roll out her economic policy this week.

Donald Trump, also off the trail today, but we will hear from him in just a few hours in a live conversation with Elon Musk on X, formerly known as Twitter, which Musk says is, quote, unscripted with no limits on subject matter.

But a quick look at Trump's Truth Social page gives you an idea of what subjects just make come up tonight with Trump going after Harris for flip-flopping on issues such as the border and fracking and bizarrely and quite falsely claiming that the Harris campaign is using A.I. to generate pictures of full campaign rallies.

CNN's Kristen Holmes is batting lead off for us today with new details on how both campaigns are planning to spend the next few days.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): As momentum around Kamala Harris continues to build --

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Hey, Nevada!

HOLMES: -- Donald Trump promoting far-right conspiracy theories around his Democratic challenger, claiming on social media that the crowd size of Harris's Detroit rally was A.I. generated, writing, quote: This is the way Democrats win elections by cheating and they're even worse at the ballot box. Adding that anyone who is willing to fake their crowd size, quote, will cheat at anything.

Trump's allies imploring the former president to focus on policy, not personal attacks.

KEVIN MCCARTHY, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER: You've got to make this race not on personalities. Stop questioning this size of her crowds and start questioning her position when it comes to what did she do as attorney general on crime.

HOLMES: Recent polling showing Harris improving on President Joe Biden standing in several battles rounds, with a close race in the critical states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT & 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: And I will never, ever let you down.

Trump releasing a series of videos on X, returning to the platform ahead of an interview Monday night with its owner, Elon Musk. The interview comes as Trump's campaign is working to reach potential first-time voters who are less likely to engage in politics, nontraditional media avenues.

The former president also expected to hit the campaign trail Wednesday with what's being billed as an economy focused speech in the crucial state of North Carolina.

While Harris has promised to put up details about her economics policies this week as Republicans hammer away at the lack of details around your policy plans.

Over the weekend, Republican VP nominee J.D. Vance taking on the role of attack dog, sitting for interviews as Trump campaign aims to highlight Harris's decision so far not to take a lot of questions from the press.

SEN. J.D. VANCE (R-OH), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think that what is is two people, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz who are comfortable in their own skin because they're uncomfortable with their policy positions for the American people. And so, they're name-calling instead of actually telling in the American people how they're going to make their lives better. I think that's weird, Dana. But look, they can call me whatever they want to.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES (on camera): Now, we're also going to see Kamala Harris on the campaign trail this week. On Thursday, she's going to be in Maryland with President Joe Biden. And this is their first joint appearance since Joe Biden dropped out of the race.

And, Phil, it's going to be really interesting to see how she navigates this kind of fine line.

[16:05:02]

One, bringing on the man who is the reason that she's at the top of the ticket right now, the reason that she was the vice president, but also trying to stay a little bit away from his policies that were so unpopular.

And that's what Republicans want to do. They want to focus on the link between them. So, Kamala Harris, she's going to have to try to really navigate, thread that needle on having relationship in public with President Joe Biden, while also saying she is her own candidate.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, a careful balancing act, no question about it.

Kristen Holmes, thanks so much.

I want to discuss now with my panel. Matt, let's start with you. You heard what the former Speaker Kevin McCarthy said seemingly directly to Trump. I think he knows how to reach him oftentimes to the cell phone or on Fox News. Focus on the policies, not on crowd size.

And what's fascinating me is you'll see Trump do that. On Truth Social, he had a post that said Kamala Harris is strong for years on open-borders, no fracking, defund the police, and more, let's see her flip-flop on those little lines lifelong policies of her. It's a completely fraudulent campaign.

And I think it's one of the things where he can -- he can do it. If you look at the ads that the campaign and their outside groups are running, they're all about that. The advisors saying it's all about that.

But the former president, just -- is he board with it?

MATT GORMAN, FORMER SENIOR ADVISER, TIM SCOTT PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN: I think, you have Republicans, not just Kevin McCarthy, desperately want to hear more of what J.D. Vance said on the Sunday shows, that sort of messaging.

The messaging you saw in that Truth Social post, I think keeping it focused on that, there's -- look, there's a plethora of stuff, not just running the race we expected to run on June 26, the day before the debate, immigration crime, the economy, but also taking Kamala on the task under numerous flip-flops that she has not answered for, Republicans would love that race.

MATTINGLY: They are flipped -- I mean, from the 2019 campaign version of then candidate and Senator Kamala Harris to now, there have been a series of issues, whether it's on fracking, whether it's on immigration where the campaign has said that's not what she thinks anymore. She's in line with the current administration, but she hasn't come out and said.

How sustainable is that posture?

MEGHAN HAYS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I mean, she's in the race for three weeks. So I think that we're giving her a little time. She -- you know, she announced her VP. They are out on the road.

I think that she needs to announce and policies this week, which they're planning on doing. But I think that she also needs to find out where she stands and what her North Star is. She has been -- Joe Biden has been her North Star and that's been the guiding light for her policies.

Now, she needs to figure out where she is, what she is going to do. And then he will let the American people know and then they can judge whether or not they think their flip-flops or the discrepancies here.

EVA MCKEND, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: All indications are though that she is going to lean into the most popular policies of the Biden-Harris administration. As much as they try to saddle her with policy views that she espoused, you know, four, five years ago, the most relevant things is what she has done recently and I think we've seen that a little bit on the campaign trail. You have a bevy of elected officials that speak before she comes on stage.

But perhaps the most instructive are the real people that come up been speak at her Las Vegas rally. It was an educator who talked about her student loan debt, a life-changing amount of student loan debt been cleared.

So that is going to be the position shoe runs on, the popular positions of the administration.

MATTINGLY: Right. And popular positions from an agenda that mostly got passed into law, but some pieces of it didn't. And those barriers where she cared a lot about in terms of childcare, paid family leave, things like that.

What also happened in Nevada was Harris endorsing no tax on tips, which is -- I think this whole thing is fascinating and look, credit to Trump, which he's desperate for people to give him. He was out first on this issue, it has stuck. Harris has co-opted it. He's pissed because she's apparently not giving him adequate credit.

What's your read on it?

GORMAN: I mean, it's not just a copy. It's a flip flop, right? Because she was the deciding vote in a piece of legislation that brought more IRA, IRS agents to focus on many things, including specifically tips of workers. So it's a flip-flop, too, and I think, look, you know, she wasn't sitting home for the last four years. She was vice president.

So, she has policy. She owns the Biden mantle, not just the popular policies. And again, I think those policies that differ very widely from where she was in 2019 are also fair game.

But, you know, it's right. She hasn't addressed the scenes and anonymous aide has. She hasn't.

MCKEND: I just think its going to be hard for them, though, to focus so intently on the flip-flopping because the former president is not known for policy consistencies either. So how much of a runway do they have with that? I wonder.

GORMAN: I mean, he's at least addressed it. So is J.D. Vance, she hasn't.

HAYS: But also, some of the policies that people are saying she flip- flopped on are not policies that are going to move these independent voters in these battleground states. So I think that she needs to focus on the economy. She needs to focus on those policies and laying that out and then reaching people where they are.

The fracking issue -- I mean, maybe -- she flip-flopped, she didn't flip flop, but those are -- those are not issues that are going to affect every person or be really groundbreaking policy changes to the people in these battleground states.

MATTINGLY: Right. I think the bigger question though, and again, showing my age here, you kind of go back to the Kerry years, of like if she is viewed as somebody who doesn't have consistency, if she is viewed as a, quote/unquote, flip-flopper, Eva's point is spot on. The former president is here trying to form policy, but is that problematic as the race actually settles in?

[16:10:00]

HAYS: It doesn't seem to be impacting her right now, with all the momentum. It's not impacting her crowd, at her momentum, her fundraising.

So -- I mean, we'll have to see when she starts announcing her own policies, and how much that actually moves the needle.

MATTINGLY: The -- you mentioned, J.D. Vance and I think he seems to have from a -- what the campaign wants him to do, found his footing clearly at been on the attack. It was striking, though, when he was asked about the issue of name-calling, when he said this.

We don't have the sound, but he basically said like he was opposed to name-calling on some level, bullies in the schoolyard, and all that type of stuff. And if you remember what the former president has campaigned on for the better part of -- I guess the question I have for you is, how is that like a sustainable line of attack? Well, they can call me weird, but like we don't play that game. We're not bullies in the schoolyard and the foreign president is like, here's my latest nickname for you.

GORMAN: Yes.

MATTINGLY: And it's 17 different pejoratives that I can come up with in the last four years.

GORMAN: That's a fair point right now. No one wants to be the one holding -- holding the bag of being aggressor on the name-calling. They all want to be the other person, right?

And I think, you know, look, J.D. makes a good point when he talks about, look, it was Tim Walz, the one who was making couch jokes during his first speech as a vice presidential nominee, right? And so, you're going to always have kind of finger-pointing thing.

But I got to say either was a very effective performance with J.D. over the weekend and I'm glad, he was the best communicator, that the whole VP process, I'm glad he's out there and get out there more.

MATTINGLY: He did make this point about kind of the policy issues which we've been talking about. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VANCE: If you go to Kamala Harris's campaign page right now, they still don't have a policy -- DANA BASH, CNN HOST: Well, let's talk about policy versus --

VANCE: -- policy positions about what they're going to do. I think that's really insulting to Americans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: I mean, it's true. I mean --

HAYS: Totally, but she's also been in the race for three weeks, like let's give the woman a break here, like she's -- I understand that she's the vice president, all the things. She was not planning on being the candidate three weeks ago.

So I think that they -- that takes time. She needs to do her research. We don't want her to put forth half-baked ideas either. That's also insulting.

So I think this week, moving into the convention, I think you'll see a lot more policies from her. If we're in September and she's still haven't given us any policies, then I think we can all have a moment. But until then, like's let's --

MATTINGLY: No, no, I totally understand the point. And, Eva, I mean, I think if you're talking to -- if you're a campaign strategist and you're watching what's happened the last three-and-a-half weeks, you're saying, we're not going to do anything to ruffle feathers of what has been as good three weeks as Democrats have had quite a long time. When you talk to campaign advisors, though, they have a lot of policy people in that world, either former White House officials are people who have been with Harris for a long time.

How are they viewing kind of the balancing act that Kristen was talking about?

MCKEND: Well, I think they're slow rolling some of these ideas, right? She talks about raising the minimum wage. She talks about going after corporate landlords. So she's really speaking to this widespread concern about the cost of living, the cost of rent.

It is not a robust policy vision or robust outline of those policies yet, but they're kind of sort of testing out things you can see clearly on the campaign trail. And for what it's worth, the former president, you know, he does talk about certain policies, but it's not like he's out there giving some esoteric academic policy vision either. Like there's a way to have this conversation with voters.

MATTINGLY: It would be a fascinating thing to watch though, if he did.

More broadly, and I hate even asking this because I love the policies spaces, I'm sure I annoyed Meghan plenty of times at the White House asking questions about, but does it matter? I mean, like, it seems like this is such a personality-driven moment. This is such a partisan driven moment. Like that the depth of policies that we have.

Trump's brilliance on some level is he identifies taxes, no taxes on tips that works, that's not Republican orthodoxy at all.

GORMAN: Yeah. I mean, policies matter to an extent, but, look, if policies truly matter hundred percent, my old boss Jeb Bush be president of the United States. He was a policy-focused guy. In many ways, it's personality. It's -- can you take control of the news cycle, create content. It's so many things more at play in this just even predates Trump that was coming for a long time before Trump, though, upended it in a massive way.

MATTINGLY: It'll be fascinating to watch that speech with the current president and Vice President together for the first time will also be fascinating.

Guys, you're not going anywhere. We've got a lot more to talk about, stick around.

Coming up, the reported plans by Elon Musk and how the billionaire could be trying to have a heavier hand in the 2024 race.

Plus, a new lawsuit against Donald Trump from the family, longtime soul singer Isaac Hayes. And that's not the only intention over music played at Trump's rally.

Stick with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:18:14]

MATTINGLY: Trump's interview with Elon Musk tonight on X, we're learning that Musk's role in the 2024 election has been even bigger than he initially wanted the public to realize, and that is according to "The Wall Street Journal", which has new reporting on his hands-on push to turn out 800,000 voters for Trump.

Musk quietly funded a super PAC back in the spring. But, now, with less than 90 days until the election, musk has overhauled, the groups leadership after a series of early stumbles.

Let's discuss with Dana Mattioli, the lead reporter behind this "Wall Street Journal" story and so many others, in the text space and in specific to Elon Musk.

But, first, Dana, explain why he had scorched-earth on the super PAC leadership. There's still the expectations of that initial very big goal of turning out 800,000 voters.

DANA MATTIOLI, REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Yeah, they have a very ambitious goal. They want to get 800,000 low propensity voters in these swing states to show up for Donald Trump.

But there's a big shake-up of PAC leadership. In July, some operatives from Governor Ron DeSantis's failed presidential bid came in to be involved with the pack and the vendors or changed out, and that has had some resulting chaos. They're having to start from scratch less than 90 days before the election. MATTINGLY: It's striking, one, because it sounds a lot like how he's operated in some of his business adventures up to this point as well. So, on brand, on some level, your reporting make clear that Musk emphasized to the super PAC and to its leadership a desire for privacy. He'd been upset, I think, by previous reporting from you and your team that revealed he told people he plan to commit about $45 million a month to the group.

He was asked about that at one point and said this I don't want to go that fiction made up my question is less about that comment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELON MUSK, BILLIONAIRE BUSINESSMAN: At no point did I say I was donating $45 million a month to Trump. That was a fiction made up by "The Wall Street Journal".

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: My question is less about that comment, you guys have done plenty of reporting around both before and after.

[16:20:03]

But more -- why did he want to keep his extent -- the extent of his involvement quiet?

MATTIOLI: He did not want to be the face of this PAC. He actually went to lengths to hide his involvement. So, for instance, when you look at the first federal filings from the PAC, he's not listed as a donor and that was by design. He didn't want to make his first donation to the PAC until after July 1st, so it wouldn't appear until the October filings. In the interim, he lined up friends and other Republican donors to fill the void of funding so that they could -- the PAC could pay its expenses and that first-quarter.

MATTINGLY: You know, today has been fascinated. One obviously, we're all waiting for the conversation that he has with Elon musk tonight, actually, before I get to another question, there, are they going to be able to pull this off? Like I'm old enough to remember the Ron DeSantis conversation campaign launch, which didn't go great by -- by anyone's standards.

Do they feel comfortable they'll be able to do this today?

MATTIOLI: You know, it's a really big haul, so they want -- they had ambitions of hiring 6,000 people to go out and canvas in these battleground states, and then they fired the people doing that. So they have to hire and retrain those people. Their political ads have stopped since firing the other vendors.

They've had glitches on their web site, which hasn't been maintained since firing the other vendors and? There had 8,500 new voter registrations that were signed up through their website that they didn't mail out the forms because the vendor was fired. So there are definitely things they have to patch up in the interim

and they have to get the new vendors up and running. And, you know, some of the Republican operatives we spoke to were a little bit worried about that because early voting starts as soon as a month from now. So there's a really big time crunch elements to this.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, a tight turnaround time. The new team that he has -- that he brought in are pros by every stretch of the word, but it's going to be a definitely a push for them.

You know, Trump was famously kicked off of X, then it was called Twitter, after his tweets during the January 6 Capitol attack. What's been fascinating today is he's back for the first time in over a year, posting a video or two, I will show you some of it right now.

I think this dynamic here, you know, Trump has his own social media company. It's Truth Social. He benefits from it financially as well.

Is the relationship here, is that part of why he's back on X?

MATTIOLI: You know, I think it speaks to this broader rallying cry from conservative groups around the Twitter takeover by Elon. They viewed the prior company before Elon bought it as, you know, really suppressing conservative views. So that community has really rallied around Elon and free speech and they feel like its a welcoming place now. So I think that might be part of Trump's desire to reach those crowds and be part of this platform where it's been viewed as more Republican friendly.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, it certainly tracks with the low propensity voters who maybe might be in the kind of space that they're trying to reach. There's no question about that.

Dana Mattioli, the articles in "The Wall Street Journal", it's fascinating to read, one of many that you've done over the course of the last couple of months. Thanks so much for your time.

MATTIOLI: Thanks for having me.

MATTINGLY: And coming up, the Trump campaign claims it was hacked. Hear from a "New York Times" reporter after the outlet was apparently given the data involved in this alleged breach.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:27:35]

MATTINGLY: We're back with our 2024 lead. Former President Donald Trump's campaign is blaming Iran for hacking and leaking internal information, including emails and documents about Trump's running mate, Senator J.D. Vance. "Politico" and "The New York Times" say they were anonymous -- anonymously sent documents from inside Trump's campaign operation. Joining us now is "New York Times" journalist David Sanger. He's the author of the very good book, "New Cold Wars: China's Rise, Russia's Invasion, and America's Struggle to Defend the West".

David, I want to start with -- there are elements here that imply that Iran was behind the attack. The campaign has said it explicitly. Law enforcement has not said it explicitly.

Do we know -- do we have proof at this point that it was Iran who, quote, hacked the Trump campaign and has been disseminating this information?

DAVID SANGER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY AND POLITICAL ANALYST: We don't, Phil. What we've got is some disparate pieces of information that may add up to that, but may not, so walk through it.

We know that on Friday, Microsoft, which has got great visibility through all kinds of networks thanks to the people who use Microsoft products, warned that an Iranian hacking group that is linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Iranian military, and their intelligence unit, got into a former campaign adviser's email and use that to send phishing email.

So, in other words, pretending to be that former campaign adviser. They didn't say who the former campaign adviser worked for. And that from that there was an effort to go get into campaigning else. Again, they didn't say who.

And then President Trump -- former President Trump said over the weekend that they've been formed by Microsoft that it was there campaign. Separately, we then began to get the leakage through an anonymous email account of some of these documents from the campaign. But it's not at all clear that those two are linked.

In other words, it could have been that those documents had another source.

MATTINGLY: Yes. I think that's an important point as we continue to find out new information and kind of report out where this is going. That link has not been made explicitly by anybody except for the Trump campaign.

Can you tell us more broadly, though, you've done so much work in the space, so much reporting in this space, what were Iran have to gain in a hacking scheme like this?

[16:30:12]

SANGER: It was a really interesting question. So, first of all, they've done this before. They did it in 2020, in the 2020 cycle. Sometimes, they're looking for intelligence. Sometimes, they're looking for intelligence, sometimes they're looking for embarrassment. We know that other parts of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, not the hacking units, were the ones who were believed to be part of these plots to conduct assassinations of former Trump administration officials. And there was an arrest by the FBI of the Pakistani man about a week ago, who had been in Iran and who came back to hire a hitman. But it wasn't entirely clear who it was that that hit man was going after. It was the implication that it might have been a former President Trump, but the FBI never quite said.

So we know that there is great animus by the Iranians, in part because it was President Trump who ordered the killing of Qasem Soleimani in 2020, in January of 2020, who was the Quds force leader? And that's a leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

But, you know, the documents that were sent around, it don't look particularly embarrassing. They look like sort of standard kind of vetting documents you'd see in a in a campaign.

MATTINGLY: Yeah. It's -- my understanding, much of its kind of open- source public material on some level.

SANGER: Yeah.

MATTINGLY: The response -- the responses we've seen from the Trump campaign they were very clear cut about that. This is something that should not be utilized media should not be reporting it, which is striking for those of us who covered 2016, because you may remember this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT & 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: David, look, to be clear of Trump said he was kidding about that, and they tried to walk back those comments on some level. But the shift here -- what do you describe it to?

SANGER: So, you know, so President Trump is situational transaction kind of guy in the best of times, during the WikiLeaks leaks that were happening in 2016, he declared, we love WikiLeaks and didn't seem to have a particular difficulty with the fact that material was being released and that time relevant to his opponent, Hillary Clinton.

Later on, his own administration, his own secretary of state basically described WikiLeaks as a -- as a -- the equivalent to a foreign intelligence operation, and wanted prosecution of them. So they've moved, you know, back-and-forth on this.

In this particular case, I have no doubt that the Iranians are hacking into the campaigns and we've already heard from American intelligence that Russia, which clearly favors president, foreign President Trump, is hacking or attempting to hack in to some of the campaigns are run disinformation operations and try into this as well. They're not all on the same side. You know, the Iranians, I think, if they did get involved, would get involved against Mr. Trump and the Russians if they get involved more deeply, are going to be in, in his favor.

But that's the oddity of watching cyber, which is just another tool of influence, and disruption.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, and something for everybody to be cognizant of in the weeks and months ahead as David, I know, you always are. It is a serious and significant issue as the intelligence community has made very clear, still the hypocrisy on some level from the Trump campaign, tough to overlook. I would --

SANGER: It -- it is -- it is notable.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, "New York Times'" David Sanger, as always, my friend, appreciate your time.

SANGER: Great to be with you, Phil.

Well, coming up, the talk of a military coup by a candidate in North Carolina raise, could it illustrate the state of politics in America, at least that state right now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:38:51]

MATTINGLY: In our politics lead, a North Carolina race making national news because of some of the controversial past comments made by Republican candidate running to oversee the state's public schools.

Friday, CNN's KFILE uncovered a now deleted Facebook livestream posted by Michele Morrow after shed been outside in the crowd of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.

In the video, Morrow urges then-President Donald Trump to, quote, put the Constitution to the side to stay in power. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHELE MORROW, GOP NOMINEE TO RUN NC SCHOOLS: And if the police won't do it, and the Department of Justice won't do it, then he will have to enact the Insurrection Act, in which case the insurrection act completely puts the Constitution to the side and says now, the military rules all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Now this weekend, Morrow responded to CNN's report on X, posting, quote, the liberal media is at it again. Just like they have done with Donald Trump, they will make up and twist anything to stop our momentum on the campaign.

You saw the video.

But this follows another social media post the KFILE found from Morrow back in 2020, including a fake time magazine cover of former President Obama in an electric chair saying, quote, death to all traitors. [16:40:09]

Joining us now is Morrow's Democratic challenger, Mo Green.

I appreciate your time.

I can't imagine this was what you expected to be talking about given the actual position that you are running for here. I want to talk about education policy in a moment, but just to start with, what's your reaction when you see some of the comments that your opponents made?

MO GREEN (D), NC SUPT. OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION CANDIDATE: Thanks so much for having me on.

So my reaction are -- is the following: number one, I think this is deeply disturbing. Number two, I think it's incredibly dangerous. And number three, I think there's calls into question whether my opponent can even uphold the U.S. Constitution as she would be required to do if she's elected.

Let me go into those in a little bit more detail. Number one, the deeply disturbing piece, this occurs right after the violent insurrection, which she took her own children to and as it -- she says in her own words, going to put the constitution to the side, and essentially call for a military coup in our own country and call for mass arrest, if you will, of everyone who helped certify the 2020 election.

I think it's incredibly dangerous because this is part of a pattern. You see this is the very same person who has called for the executions of many, including President Biden, President Obama, in fact, call for the public execution on pay-for-view of President Obama, and many, many other elected officials, including our own Governor Cooper.

It's also then calls into question whether she can uphold the Constitution. Anytime you're saying were going to push it aside to try to do what we want to do, this office is one where you have to take an oath to uphold the United States Constitution.

This is also particularly troubling because this is the position that will oversee more than 1.3 million students across our state. And we have to be sure that our students are safe and secure and this type of video coupled with all else that she has said calls that into deep, deep question.

MATTINGLY: Can I ask you -- given the position that you mentioned, kind of the scale and scope of the responsibilities at this position? When you look at what you would do in the role, North Carolina ranks near the bottom nationally in K-through-12 funding. I think its 5,000 less -- $5,000 less per student than the national average, 48th in the nation, 46th in teacher pay.

When you look at the budget you would have or the budget that exists and where you think resources should be focused, where do you see the most critical needs in the public school system? GREEN: Great. So this position is the chief administrative officer, and then I also argue would be the chief advocacy the officer. So one of the main things that I think we have to advocate for is for us to get back to a place where we revere our educators and pay them substantially more. You know, we find ourselves being woefully underfunded overall if you compare us to the rest of the nation, were 48th if you compare us to even our border states, we are $3,000 to $4,000 less per child in what we fund our public schools. And you times that times 1.3 million. That's real money.

In that then is what we could do if we had that kind of money to really increase the compensation for our teachers. So that they would have the respect from that vantage point, as well as doing many, many other things to uplift and get to a place where we're back to revering our educators and understanding that this is indeed a noble profession.

MATTINGLY: We've only got about 30 seconds left. But I do want to ask you, when you look at kind of the state of politics in the state of North Carolina, writ large, so lieutenant governor has also been criticized was now running for governor for inflammatory remarks, and rhetoric, is this just -- when you look at the Republican Party, do you think this is representative of North Carolina Republicans or is this just a few people?

GREEN: My deep hope is that this is not representative of the Republican Party of North Carolina at all. This is a place though where I say that the very soul of public education is on the ballot, and it is going to take champions of public education to meet this moment. So we need folks regardless of political affiliation, regardless of anything else to be supportive of public education.

[16:45:08]

And in this instance, vote for me. You can learn more about me at mogreenfornc.com,

It is definitely a political battle has broken out and education has been a central issue with the legislature and the governor for the last couple of years for sure.

Mo Green, appreciate your time. Thanks so much.

GREEN: Thank you.

MATTINGLY: Well, coming up, how the 2024 presidential race has left many conservatives torn. Hear from two women in battleground Pennsylvania, what troubles them about Donald Trump as this race gets even closer to Election Day.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MATTINGLY: We're back with the 2024 lead and a return to battleground Pennsylvania.

CNN's John King revisited voters who were all in for Nikki Haley during the Republican presidential primaries. But with the race now firmly between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, what are their loyalties actually stand now?

[16:50:01]

Here he is, new installment of "All Over the Map".

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Berks County is more rural and more Trumpy, just outside the suburban collar, but margins matter everywhere in the battlegrounds.

Joan London is an attorney for local governments.

JOAN LONDON, PENNSYLVANIA VOTER: Bloom farm zoning permit status. We had a meeting this morning, very productive meeting.

KING: London cast a primary vote for Haley, then switched her registration to independent. She worries about Trump's course tone and what she sees as angry populism. A new worry since her last visit in May, Trump running mate J.D. Vance. No cats, but married and childless, now, even more proud she left the GOP.

LONDON: I've led a very full life that way, and to say, I don't have a stake in the future of the country, I had -- I had some difficulty with that, and all I could think of, Senator Vance, are you going to tell Ann Coulter or Condoleezza Rice or Elizabeth Dole, they're miserable cat ladies? I don't -- I don't think so.

KING: London plans to write in a conservative, but she leaves the Harris window open just a crack.

LONDON: If Donald Trump or J.D. Vance really says something so outrageously offensive, that could drive me to vote for Vice President Harris, but it's -- it's highly unlikely. She just doesn't -- she doesn't represent my values, my beliefs about policy.

KING: Media is in Delaware County. Cynthia Sabatini knows a lot about the change here.

CYNTHIA SABATINI, PENNYSLVANIA VOTER: My street was rock-ribbed Republican. Now, you have to shake a stick to find the Republican.

KING: Sabatini is also never Trump.

SABATINI: And I watch his campaign rallies, it's all about him. It's not about the country.

KING: This is now the third campaign in which these never Trump voters hold significant sway. In 2016, Sabatini wrote in a Republican senator, Trump narrowly won Pennsylvania. In 2020, she voted for Biden.

Was that hard?

SABATINI: No, because I didn't want to see Trump elected after the chaos of the prior four years.

KING: Sabatini says she's read things that worry her about Harris, about immigration policy, and about being tough on her staff. Probably another write in this November. But the 2016 result, it still stings.

SABATINI: I'm trying to keep an open mind about Harris, if the wrap on her as I read is correct.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MATTINGLY: John King joins me now.

You have the best beat at CNN because you're actually talking to voters on a regular basis. Some of them, these spoke to -- they're leading toward not voting for Harris or Trump.

What -- what kind of impact would that have on the commonwealth?

KING: Well, if you have Republicans who stay home, obviously, you could say that's subtraction from Trump, but, but, Kamala Harris needs what Joe Biden got, which is a lot of moderate Republicans in the Philadelphia suburbs and in suburbs around America, that's how he won Arizona, that's how he won Georgia, that's how he won Wisconsin. That's how he won Michigan.

Suburban voters, a lot of whom have voted Republican, at least in the past, that I can't do Donald Trump. A lot of these voters, they say they're never Trumpers. They're -- Biden, they viewed in 2020 as a moderate, all of them now said they couldn't vote for him because they think he's too old after the debate performance. So they're glad there is a change.

Harris has filled this enormous opportunity to seize them. They do not want to vote for Donald Trump. The challenge is to convince them and there's going to be a lot of ad money dumped on her, calling her a radical liberal, things like that.

She has to convince them, which is why her convention next week, I would argue the next several weeks, who can define Harris? Can she do it before Trump does it? That's the test in the suburbs where she can win.

MATTINGLY: Yeah. That's such a huge test.

And, John King, as always, my friend, thank you so much.

You, of course, can watch John's full "All Over the Map" report tonight on "ANDERSON COOPER 360" at 8:00 Eastern. Don't want to miss that.

Well, hold on. Why the family of soul singer Isaac Hayes is coming for Trump.

Plus, see the power of a earthquake as one rattled the L.A. area just a few hours ago.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:55:45]

MATTINGLY: In our last lead today, lawyers for former President Donald Trump have filed a $100 million claim against the Justice Department, alleging the 2022 search of Mar-a-Lago was inappropriate and hurt Trump's reputation. The claim is unlikely to gain any traction since the search was approved by a federal judge. After months of investigation and negotiations with Trump's attorneys, the claim is filed under the Federal Tort Claims Act, which allows people wronged by the government to seek compensation.

Also, the family of Isaac Hayes has joined the long list of musicians review getting the Trump campaign this time for using the late singer song, "Hold On, I'm Coming". That followed Celine Dion, who took issue with the Trump campaign playing this song at his rally in Bozeman, Montana. It's "My Heart Will Go On", the theme, of course, from "Titanic".

The singer and her team released a statement saying, quote, in no way is the use -- this use authorized and Celine Dion does not endorse this or any other similar use, and really that song. It's a statement.

To stay on theme, borrow a lyric from Elvis, much of Los Angeles today, it's all shook up.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Over the Midwest --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, maybe the Chicago that though, with the pickle spear and the peppers and tomatoes -- that's earthquake. That's an earthquake.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That is a --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa, whoa, that is a real one, guys.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: So impressed by the seamless transition there. That's what a magnitude 4.4 earthquake this morning looked like at the ESPN Radio studios in L.A. The U.S. Geological Survey says the quake, which was centered near Pasadena, was fairly shallow, only about 12 kilometers deep, which means it was likely felt widely in densely populated Los Angeles. There are no reports of major damage.

But you can follow the show on X @TheLeadCNN. If you ever miss an episode of THE LEAD, you can listen to the show wherever you get your podcast.

The news continues on CNN with Wolf Blitzer reporting live from Tel Aviv and "THE SITUATION ROOM".