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Harris to Make Case Against Trump in Speech at His Jan. 6 Rally Site; Hundreds of Ballots Destroyed in Ballot Box Fires; Sean Diddy Combs Faces Two New Sexual Assault Lawsuits. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired October 29, 2024 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: One week to the day to Election Day. Kamala Harris is set to give her closing argument today at the very same site Donald Trump held his January 6th rally and Trump's campaign is battling against what could become their unintended closing argument.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Hundreds of ballots destroyed after ballot boxes go up in flames in two states. Federal authorities now trying to track down who deliberately set these fires in what one official is calling a direct attack on democracy.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And disturbing new details in two new civil lawsuits filed against Sean Combs, now accused of sexually assaulting a Making the Band contestant and a ten-year-old boy.

I'm John Berman with Sara Sidner and Kate Bolduan. This is CNN News Central.

BOLDUAN: One more week. That is all there is until votes start being counted. And today, Kamala Harris is ready to lay out her closing argument. And for this one, the setting is the message. Harris will speak from The Ellipse, the very spot that Donald Trump told his supporters on January 6th to fight like hell, setting in motion the attack on the U.S. Capitol that followed.

Now, almost four years later, the Harris campaign says they expect a crowd of 20,000 people at that same spot. The split screen, entirely intentional. As for Donald Trump, he's headed to Allentown, Pennsylvania today, a majority Latino city with a sizable Puerto Rican population, noteworthy because his campaign is struggling to contain the anger sparked by so-called jokes about Puerto Ricans told by a warm up act at his rally Sunday. And last night, he had this new message for his supporters. Quote, I'm the opposite of a Nazi.

Let's start with Kevin Liptak, who's at The Ellipse for us this morning. Kevin, what are you hearing from the Harris campaign about what's going to happen there today?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes. The words that they're using to describe this speech are hopeful, optimistic, not necessarily the words that we were expecting the vice president to use in this speech from The Ellipse. I think when we first heard that she was going to deliver her closing argument speech from here outside the White House on The Ellipse, the first image that came to mind was January 6th, that dark speech that Donald Trump delivered on that day before his supporters went to the Capitol.

But this is not going to be a treaties (ph) on democracy. This is not going to be a dissertation necessarily about the threats that Donald Trump poses to the American republic. Certainly, that will be an aspect of what the vice president speaks about tonight from The Ellipse.

But aides are envisioning a much broader message from the vice president. They say they want her to contrast the presidency that she would uphold if she were elected and compare it to the vision of the presidency that Donald Trump is espousing on the campaign trail.

And the choice of The Ellipse is very purposeful. Aides really did need to check a few different boxes as they were selecting the venue for this speech. One is able to warn about the threats that Donald Trump is posing and, certainly, we understand why the ellipse would do that. But the other is to try and present this vision of the president that Kamala Harris would be.

And you know, behind me, The Ellipse is only about 500 yards from the Oval Office. That will allow the vice president to detail some of her plans if she were to be elected when it comes to the economy, when it comes to reproductive rights. And so that is kind of the balance that the Harris campaign views this speech as striking.

And certainly, they do believe that this is one of the last moments that she'll have to convince what they call the conflicted voters, people who aren't necessarily sure about Donald Trump, maybe turned off by some of what he's saying on the campaign trail, but aren't necessarily convinced about Kamala Harris as their candidate. This could be the last tent pole moment that she has to convince those voters in the seven battleground states that she's the candidate for them.

[07:05:01]

Now, we did hear a little bit of a preview of the speech from the candidate herself yesterday. Listen to what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT, DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: As I've said many times, I'll say tomorrow night in my speech, there's a big difference between me and I. If he were elected on day one, he's going to be sitting in the Oval Office working on his enemies list. On day one, if I'm elected president of the United States, which I fully intend to be. I will be working on behalf of the American people on my to-do list.

(END VIDEO CLIP) LIPTAK: Now, of course, it's hard to imagine any one speech will be able to convince all of the undecided voters to turn over to Kamala Harris's camp but that is certainly the hope that at least some voters who are tuning in will see the vice president and determine that they will cast their votes for her.

Now, I should say that security is very tight around The Ellipse this morning. They have erected a tall, unscalable black fence all around the park, The Ellipse Park. And so, certainly, security also a big concern as they await these 20,000 supporters that they're expecting on The Ellipse tonight.

BOLDUAN: Kevin, thanks for being there. It's good to see you, good reporting. Thank you. Sara?

SIDNER: All right. This morning, Donald Trump will speak at Mar-a- Lago before heading to Pennsylvania, but the campaign still trying to clean up the potential political mess after the racist, vulgar, misogynistic rally in Madison Square Garden. His allies worrying that the comments made at the rally could hurt them in key battleground states, such as Pennsylvania, where he's heading today.

CNN's Steve Contorno joins me now. Steve, what do we expect to hear from Trump when he speaks from Mar-a-Lago today?

STEVE CONTORNO, CNN REPORTER: Well, Sara, this was a last minute schedule edition from Donald Trump. And we are told that the purpose of this is to sort of preempt Vice President Harris' remarks later today in Washington, D.C. We saw him do something similar last week when she held her rally in Houston. He decided at the last minute to hold a remarks to the press is what they called it in the city of Austin, and that's what we are expecting today.

So, we're not necessarily anticipating any questions, him taking any questions, so we might not even get him addressing the elephant in the room, what happened at Madison Square Garden. But we do know that there are people behind the scenes within his orbit who are very concerned about what transpired on Sunday, mostly because they think that it might overshadow his campaign's closing message to voters. And there could be potentially political fallouts in a key battleground state like Pennsylvania. It has a sizable Puerto Rican population and then there is concern that Democrats could mobilize even just a fraction of that support to help Vice President Harris and hurt Donald Trump.

Now, I will say, I cover Florida politics. Democrats have tried this here before. Donald Trump has had a long record of disparaging Puerto Rico. You remember the videos of him tossing paper towels to Hurricane Maria survivors. They tried to use that to mobilize voters, Puerto Rican voters, in 2020. And it did not go necessarily as planned. In fact, in the county with the highest Puerto Rican population, Donald Trump won -- or, excuse me, performed seven points better than he did in 2016. So, you know, there's a lot of conventional wisdom about how this could hurt Donald Trump. That might not actually come to pass despite what happened on Sunday night.

Now, Trump also continues to push back against this rhetoric that he is a fascist. We saw him do that yesterday in Georgia. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: The newest line from Kamala and her campaign is that everyone who isn't voting for her is a Nazi.

I had a great father. He's a tough guy. He used to always say, never use the word, Nazi, never used that word. And he said, never used the word Hitler. Don't use that word. And yet they use that word freely, both words. They use it. He's Hitler. And then they say, he's a Nazi. I'm not a Nazi. I'm the opposite of a Nazi.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CONTORNO: Trump will be in Pennsylvania today. As you said, we'll see if he can avoid or if he addresses what happened on Sunday night in that off color remark about Puerto Rico. Sara?

SIDNER: All right, Steve Contorno. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. John?

BERMAN: All right. New this morning, a federal investigation is underway after fires at ballot boxes in two states destroyed hundreds of ballast.

Breaking overnight, Trump loyalist Steve Bannon just relief released from prison and set to host his first podcast episode this morning as a now former inmate.

And this morning, a new federal rule is now in effect requiring airlines to give cash refunds if your flight is canceled or delayed.

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[07:10:00]

BERMAN: All right, happening now, federal authorities are searching for who is behind three ballot box fires that destroyed or damaged hundreds of ballots at the most recent in Vancouver, Washington. First responders, they had to pull ballots out of the fire. You can see it right there.

CNN's Marshall Cohen joins us with the details on this. Marshall, good morning.

MARSHALL COHEN, CNN REPORTER: Hey, John. The investigation is underway into an incident that some folks have called an attack against our democracy, three incidents, two yesterday morning in Portland, Oregon and nearby Vancouver, Washington. And then authorities said that a third incident earlier this month is connected.

[07:15:01]

You see the footage there. It's kind of tough to watch. That's our democracy right there. Those are actual people's ballots in flames.

So, look, there is no suspect right now. There is no motive, but authorities have said this is an apparent arson, obviously a deliberate incident. They have surveillance footage of what they've described as a suspect vehicle. It's a black or dark colored, early 2000s Volvo S60. It doesn't have a front plate. The police want to find out more information about whoever owns that vehicle because they think it is connected to the incident.

Most important question here, John, what about the ballots? It's a good news-bad news situation. In Oregon, there was a fire suppressive material in the ballot box there that protected most of the materials. Only a couple of ballots destroyed. But in Vancouver, Washington, authorities say hundreds of ballots were damaged and they are now racing to get in touch with those voters to let them know that this incident happened and give them an opportunity to recast a ballot or possibly go in person to make their voice heard.

I should note, Oregon and Washington are two states that are almost universal vote by mail. They've been doing it that way for a while. Every registered voter has mailed a ballot. It's a system that they like very much up there, but obviously no one expects something like this to happen.

Reaction has been swift and very strong condemnations. I want to play a clip for you from Congresswoman Marie Glusenkamp Perez. She is a Democrat, she represents that district in Washington State. It's one of the most competitive races in the country. It was super tight two years ago in the midterms. It's expected to be very close again. It's a closely watched race.

Here was the reaction from the congresswoman.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MARIE GLUSENKAMP PEREZ (D-WA): I don't think anyone's more pissed about this than I am, but I'm not pissed about it because I'm thinking about it from a partisan perspective. I'm mad because I'm an American who sees the corrosive and toxic environment that we've seen across the country come home,

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: John, I want to say once again, no suspect, no motive at this time, but the Department of Homeland Security has issued warnings before this incident happened, that there are dangers out there from folks within our nation who have been radicalized by the election lies of 2020 and could turn that into violent action, including the warning said potentially at drop boxes like these.

BERMAN: As you said, those pictures, that is an attack on democracy. Marshall Cohen, thank you very much for that reporting. Kate?

BOLDUAN: Breaking overnight, Sean Diddy Combs now facing two more sexual assault civil lawsuits, one person claiming in one of these new civil suits that he was only ten years old at the time of the assault. And high gas prices have long been a potent political issue in any presidential election. With the price of gas plunging right now in battleground states, what does that mean for that attack line?

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[07:20:00]

SIDNER: This morning, Sean Diddy Combs is facing two new lawsuits accusing him of sexual assault. In one, the accuser says it happened when he was a 17-year-old contestant on the MTV show, Making the Band. Then in another suit, the accuser says combs assaulted him when he was just ten years old. Combs is denying the new allegations.

Defense Attorney Misty Marris is joining me now. First of all, can you walk us through what is being said in these two new civil lawsuits?

MISTY MARRIS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Yes. So, two new civil lawsuits, and, Sara, a disturbing pattern emerging in these most recent lawsuits relating to the sexual exploitation of children. So, one, allegations dating back to 2005, the alleged victim only ten years old, allegations of the promise of fame in exchange for essentially sexual acts, again, another 2008 lawsuit with a 17-year-old alleged contestant on Making the Band, the same idea, leveraging the prospect of fame and power in order to engage in these acts.

So, again, this is a bit different than what we had seen in the criminal indictment, nothing relating to minors. But now we've seen a pattern of new civil lawsuits coming out where minors are actually at issue in these cases.

SIDNER: Can these new civil lawsuits turn into indictments if prosecutors take a look at them and are able to try to corroborate some of the information?

MARRIS: Yes, exactly. Because we're not going to be looking at all of this in a vacuum, right? We know that there's a federal prosecution that's moving forward. Prosecutors have made it very clear, if there are other victims out there, please come to us because we have an open door to engage with any victims and to make a determination about whether or not there should be additional allegations added or additional charges brought in a superseding indictment.

These are all, Sara, we've seen, you know, just over a dozen cases filed by a lawyer in Texas named Tony Buzbee, and he had said there were 120 victims that had reached out to him with allegations spanning over 30 years. 25 of those individuals were minors.

Now, he's not filed that many cases. He said that he's betting each and every one.

Now, to that point, prosecutors are definitely looking at the new allegations and to the extent there's more to pursue from an investigation standpoint, they're absolutely going to do that.

[07:25:02] That could potentially lead to additional charges.

SIDNER: Misty Marris, thank you very much on this very, very serious case. I appreciate you this morning. John?

BERMAN: All right. This morning, Donald Trump set to speak in a largely Puerto Rican neighborhood in a county with one of the highest Puerto Rican populations in the country. New reports that he's in for a less than warm welcome after the racist remarks by one of his rally speakers.

And with a week left to win over holdouts, Kamala Harris addresses protesters directly at a rally.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: And, listen, hey, on the subject of Gaza, hey guys, I hear you, on the subject of Gaza, we all want this war to end as soon as possible and get the hostages out. And I will do everything in my power to make it so.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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[07:30:00]

BERMAN: All right.