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Trump Leans into Hateful Rhetoric on Immigration at Madison Square Garden Rally; Interview with Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) about Trump's Rally; Melania Trump Makes Surprise Appearance at MSG Rally; Flashback to Election Night 2020. Aired 8-9p ET

Aired October 27, 2024 - 20:00   ET

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

[20:00:00]

JESSICA DEAN, CNN ANCHOR: Island of garbage. What else have you been tracking from there, and as you go through what we've heard, what is sticking out to you?

ALEX THOMPSON, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, AXIOS: Yes, there are also a number of sexist comments made by some of the speakers as well, including saying that Kamala Harris had pimps that were controlling her. We also heard insinuations from Hulk Hogan and others that I can't even repeat on this network. That being said, you know, you can hear it in the crowd.

This is one of the, you know, most vibrant and ruckus crowds that I have not only heard at a Trump rally, but any political rally I have covered. The president, the former president has sold out Madison Square Garden and is putting on a spectacle. But the real question is, does this spectacle, given that they are preaching to the converted as Elon Musk noted, do people that are tuning in to this message, are they going to remember that bad things that they didn't like about Donald Trump, or are they going to remember the things they liked about him? And that's unclear.

DEAN: And you are, Alex, I understand, in the crowd right now, right? You are there.

THOMPSON: Yes. I just took a step outside so I can hear you.

DEAN: And I know you were -- when you were answering the first question you've got at this, but please give us a feeling of the crowd because it does sound, I mean, it is ruckus applause for all of these things, but what was your sense also just being among all the people there?

THOMPSON: Yes. I mean, it alternates from, you know, angry and, you know, aggressive, sort of rah-rah Americana. One really notable line was when Donald Trump promised -- pledged the death penalty to any undocumented person that killed an American citizen and the crowd burst out in spontaneous loud USA chants. At the same time what's also interesting is they're being able to flip back and forth between that sort of anger and then also laughter. You know, when Trump is joking on stage, he has the crowd almost as if

they're at a comedy show, too, and going back and forth between that darkness and that lightness is really sort of a strange to watch.

DEAN: It's very, very jarring, and just comparing, I know Kristen talked a little bit about this. You've covered a number of Trump rallies. Give people a sense and context about how this one fits into what would be a normal Trump rally.

THOMPSON: Well, this is a very normal Trump rally in terms of his rhetoric. Obviously, the fact that it's over six and a half, seven hours at Madison Square Garden, you know, in some ways, it is a normal Trump rally, but now it is the ultimate Trump rally. Donald Trump has said this would be his last campaign. This is sort of the one rally that he has always wanted to do.

Having some of the guests like Elon Musk and other notable people does make it distinct, but really in some ways if an American voter has never gone to a Trump rally, this is what many of the Trump rallies are really like. It's just boosted.

DEAN: All right, Alex, stand by.

Again, if you're just tuning in, we have been watching former president Donald Trump, who is speaking at a rally in Madison Square Garden in New York City. Thousands and thousands of people there. We have heard by all accounts from our reporters who cover Trump rallies day in, day out, that this is the darkest rhetoric they have heard coming from this event tonight.

Trump, who we have just gone through with Kristen Holmes and Alex Thompson, fact-checking a number of falsehoods that he has centered around immigration. And we also have heard from people who came before him on the stage and were cheered by that crowd. They called Vice President Harris the anti-Christ, the devil. They railed against what they called effing illegals.

This is some of what we have heard out of Madison Square Garden tonight. And of course, the former president is still going.

I want to go back to Kristen Holmes, who's inside.

Kristen, we dipped out of the speech for a little bit. What more has he been saying?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Look, right now he's giving his general talking points and a lot of it is -- I'm just only hearing he's using the word nasty so I'm trying to figure out what he's talking about because I wanted to hear what he -- if he was referring to Kamala Harris or not because that's not a word he often uses but it does sound like it.

He has been using the same rhetoric that he often does. As you noted, there is a very heavy focus on immigration, unsurprisingly, Donald Trump believes that dark fear-based rhetoric around immigration is what helps get him into the White House in 2016. And he believes that it could help him again in 2024. Now, right now, he is talking about former first lady Melania Trump. He is giving her a shoutout.

Just a reminder, she spoke tonight. This is the first time she has gotten up on the stage in any campaign event this cycle and actually spoken. She didn't attend either of the debates that he was at. She attended the RNC, but did not speak.

[20:05:02]

And the only other campaign event she has spoken been at was at Mar-a- Lago, which is her home when he announced his candidacy back in November of 2022. So she has been barely visible this campaign cycle, but she was on the stage again tonight.

But overall, what we're hearing is a reprise of all of his greatest hits. He talks about the economy, he talks about tariffs. We fact- check that. We talk about immigration. He clearly is doubling down on that fear-based dark rhetoric. This is something he believes is going to help him, propel him to the White House again in November.

This is him on display. I think Alex said this, he is putting on a show right now, and one of the things I had heard before he came here was that he wanted to give the people a show, that that's part of his idea for Madison Square Garden. One of the things that his team was saying was that Donald Trump is playing the garden, which is a typical, you know, colloquial way of saying someone is at that Madison Square Garden, but they're treating him like he's the celebrity and this is his big performance.

He's clearly now talking about his family, talking about how they're all involved in politics, talking about how helpful they've been. But most of this is a normal campaign speech for him, just ramped up on steroids, given the fact that he is here taking this stage at this giant venue. And again, I just really can't stress enough that even though we are talking thinking about how dark, how divisive, how polarizing these comments can be, and fear-based, the crowd is loving it.

They are standing up. They are giving him different applause lines at various times, standing ovations at various times. They are receiving the information that he is putting out there and as Alex said, we don't know if is going to go further than just his base, but it does feel to the Trump team who I've talked to on the ground here, that they are gaining some momentum.

While Donald Trump continues to use this kind of rhetoric on the campaign trail, it doesn't seem as though he's going to dial it back or change any of his messaging in these final days before the campaign.

DEAN: Yes, and what's amazing, too, Kristen, is that, you know, we've fact-checked a number of things that he has said. But if you're an America and your media diet is very narrow and you don't seek out the fact check, you don't seek out the truth, then this worldview can feel very real and clearly there's so many in that -- in Madison Square Garden right now who feel that way and who only know what they are being told. I also thought it was interesting, he did touch when we were listening

in on General John Kelly and Milley, Mattis. He called them stupid and weak. Of course, Kelly and Milley just this week, you know, were talking about how they believe Trump is a fascist. What more have you heard about that?

HOLMES: Yes. And Mattis agreed with -- said he would agree with anything that John Kelly said. This is clearly three people who have spoken out against Donald Trump. It's unsurprising that he would call them stupid. He has named-called them before. He has been increasingly angry particularly General Milley and General Kelly. John Kelly, I mean, this is something we have seen now for several months.

The campaign doesn't believe that this is going to impact them at all. They don't believe these kind of comments have impacted them. They'd say that John Kelly has already spoken out against Donald Trump. You can tell that it's gotten underneath Donald Trump's skin. The fact that he's bringing it up at this rally, the fact that he's bringing up the two of them saying that they were stupid, that they made bad decisions.

It clearly goes to show that the fact that they had spoken out against him is getting underneath his skin here. It's something that's not that surprising given the fact that we are -- Donald Trump is known to have thin skin.

DEAN: Right. All right. Kristen, I want you to stand by. We do have Priscilla Alvarez, who is joining us by phone. And Priscilla has been with Vice President Kamala Harris all day in Philadelphia, in Pennsylvania.

Priscilla, are you there?

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via phone): I am. Hi, Jessica.

DEAN: Hi. I just want to get your sense from what you're hearing from the Harris campaign as this is unfolding because clearly they are watching this to see what happens and Harris will say, often, I invite you to watch Donald Trump's rallies and see what he says. And we have, as Kristen just described, a rally that has his rhetoric, in this dark, dark rhetoric that we hear. But it is on steroids. So what is the Harris campaign seeing and what are they taking away from this?

ALVAREZ: Well, and it's not only that the vice president has told people to watch the former president's rallies to see what he's about. But rather, I have been to a rally of hers rather recently where she played clips of the former president talking about, for example, his enemy from within comments. So she has invited them in her own rallies to make her point that it is the former president using what she has described as the same tired playbook.

Now, that is much of the response that we are getting tonight as well from campaign officials, from Democratic officials who are watching this and they are seeing it as fearmongering.

[20:10:06] They're seeing it as the former president using again the playbook that he has used before when running back in 2016 or in 2020. But this is also part of the strategy that is starting to come together in the closing days of the vice president's campaign. For example, the vice president has recently been using a line where she says that the former president is consumed by what she has called as the, quote, "enemies list' versus her to-do list.

So they are casting a picture of the former president obsessed with revenge, plotting revenge in the Oval Office, and rallies like tonight and the former president rhetoric tonight play into what the vice president and her campaign have been saying that he is consumed by his own troubles or issues with, for example, some of his former officials, be it John Kelly who called him a fascist. Now, in terms of immigration, that has been a political vulnerability for the vice president and for the president for some time now.

In fact, it was political vulnerability with Republicans who had attacked the administration repeatedly over the last several years. But it also became an issue with Democrats amid the record number of people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border and then going to these Democratic cities. It also raised alarm among people within the Democratic Party, so not only became a Republican issue, but a Democratic issue as well. And that has been something that they have had to navigate.

Now, the vice president, when again presented with this, has called for two things, border security. In fact, she has leaned even harder on that as of late, while also saying there should be, for example, a pathway to citizenship for immigrants, trying to strike a balance here. And so this dark rhetoric from the former president is in some ways a problem for this administration and this campaign, knowing of course that there have been border crises over the last three years and that they have struggled to grapple with those crises.

But when pressed on this, the campaign will often say that this is just the former president resorting to his fearmongering. So certainly they are seeing it that way and we have to keep an eye out now for these next several days, including Tuesday, where we anticipate the vice president's closing arguments at the Ellipse, and that is where I'm told we'll see more of this dark or rather we will see more from the vice president on this stark contrast between her and the former president, notably with the White House behind her.

And notably, of course, where the former president delivered his speech on January 6th, that then led to the attack on the Capitol. So all of this to say is that they are watching this closely. This is the type of rhetoric that they warned about when the vice president talks about the stakes of the election.

And Jessica, as we talked about earlier today, what was also interesting about the vice president's remarks here in crucial battleground Pennsylvania, is that she didn't mention the former president, but she talked about the broader tent that they are building because of what they're seeing and what their hope is, is that there are Republicans who are watching tonight, who are turned off by what the former president is saying. And that those are the votes that they can try to peel off from the former president.

So certainly, all of this expected to certainly be featured or at least accounted for as the vice president closes out this presidential election.

DEAN: All right. Priscilla Alvarez, thank you very much for that reporting. And as you were speaking, Priscilla, we've been seeing -- we're taking live pictures right now from Madison Square Garden that appear to show some people leaving their seats and kind of wandering around. While this is happening, the former president, you see him right there, still speaking at Madison Square Garden.

I want to go to Dana Bash and she of course has been talking to sources.

Dana, just kind of zooming out from like a 30,000 foot view on this, you know, Kristen Holmes, our colleague, reporting that a lot of this rhetoric and a lot of the themes he's hitting are familiar from his rallies. But this feels like it's on steroids and we went through and fact-checked a number of things on immigration specifically. There's actually a great fact check on CNN.com if anyone wants to check that out for themselves.

But, Dana, what are you hearing from your sources?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (via phone): You know, I heard Priscilla talking about the fact that the Harris campaign and Kamala Harris herself, I mean, she said it at the one and only debate that she had with Donald Trump, have been saying you've got to listen for yourself. You've got to hear what happens when Donald Trump speaks to his supporters.

And this is, I think the way you just put it is perfect. Jessica, this is that on steroids.

[20:15:09]

Donald Trump has always wanted to, quote-unquote, "play" Madison Square Garden. That's what he's doing right now but he's doing it as somebody who is continuing to stoke the fears, play on the anger and just flat-out lie over and over and over again in order to whip up people, who he, first of all, needs to vote. But also people just feel obviously that they are entertained by this kind of rhetoric.

I mean, let's just be blunt about it. And you have an entire iconic arena, Madison Square Garden, that is filled with people there to listen to this kind of thing.

I just want to give one example of something that fell flat, that this is not something that he said, but this is part of the opening acts. There was a comedian who said, and I know you have been talking about this in your coverage, Jess, about the comedian who completely denigrated all Puerto Ricans and the island of Puerto Rico.

I mean, you are seeing clean-up by Republicans or at least attempt at clean up by Republicans who are relying on big portions of the -- who have big portions of Puerto Rican voters who they rely on. Like, for example, Rick Scott, Republican senator from Florida. He released -- excuse me, tweeted something, trying to separate himself, but suggested that that was joked that didn't land. I don't see any evidence that the joke didn't land. I think that there was there was a lot of laughter sadly to that horrible, horrible joke.

On the Democratic side John Fetterman tweeted, from the very important state of Pennsylvania, that there are half a million Puerto Rican voters, three-quarters of whom are able to vote, and that's not going to land well with them. So listen, I mean, I think that the most important thing to understand is that, as Kristen has been saying, as you have said, as we have told our viewers over and over again, this is not the kind of rhetoric that is new for him.

DEAN: Right.

BASH: It is just amplified in a way and it is darker and more intense and for a lot of people more frightening than we have seen particularly because of where we are on the calendar.

DEAN: Yes, and on the calendar with just nine days until election night in America.

Dana Bash, it is always great to get your perspective on this. Thank you so much. We really appreciate it.

All right. We're going to take a quick break. We're going to pick this back up on the other side.

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[20:22:36]

DEAN: And joining me now is Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland. We are talking with the congressman as the former president Donald Trump is here in New York City at Madison Square Garden, where he has really leaned in to dark, dark rhetoric at a rally in front of thousands of people.

Congressman, thanks so much for being here with us. I first just want to get your take on what we have heard from the former president tonight and what we've heard from that rally.

REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): I mean, it's a horror show where they're trying to invoke all of the racist and misogynistic and anti-immigrant themes that they've run their utterly content list campaign on. There are no issues. There's no policies being advanced. It's all about scapegoating people and so it's fitting that they would end up there, what, 85 years after, you know, the last group of authoritarian anti- democratic, you know, fascistic people gathered there.

So -- but I think it will backfire. I mean, you know, he seems blissfully unaware when they start off with a comedian calling Puerto Rico a floating pile of garbage that there are more than a million Puerto Ricans just in the New York area alone. And Puerto Ricans are part of our country but of course I think it's a major affront. Hispanic Americans, generally, I mean, if you think the people laughing and cheering about that kind of racist statement distinguished between Puerto Ricans and Venezuelans and Mexicans and Dominicans. Obviously, they don't, you know. So, you know --

DEAN: And -- go ahead.

RASKIN: The Democrats are horrified by what's -- we're horrified as Americans by what's taking place there. It's just an absolute scandal and, you know, it makes everybody that much more determined to deliver a massive historic repudiation of this kind of politics in a week's time.

DEAN: Well, and it comes, you know, there's a couple of things here. That comes in a week where we have heard from the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley and John Kelly, his former chief of staff, who was also a general, who say, who have said they think he is a fascist. And then we have heard from not just them, but other Republicans who serve for him and with him including his own vice president, who don't think he is fit to hold office again.

[20:25:08]

RASKIN: Yes, I mean, that's an important theme in the closing of the Democratic campaign that it is Republicans like John Kelly, who was Trump's chief of staff, it was the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Milley, who are saying that he is fascist to his core and the only thing that's deceptive is that like a lot of fascists, he's also clownish and he's a grifter and he's a con man and he's a charlatan but his politics are essentially fascist.

It's all about dividing the world into friends and enemies. And then attacking and denouncing the enemies and trying to polarize life and society as much as possible.

DEAN: And so, Congressman, America is going to vote in nine days and we will see how long it takes to declare a winner. Last time it took several days. It wasn't until Saturday that we know. There is a good chance it might -- we may not know the result on election night. This go around as well. In the interim, I know you are concerned both about the transition, the presidential transition for -- if Donald Trump wins this race, but also I'm curious what you are thinking about if there is that interim time between voting and when the winner is declared.

There is a high chance for disinformation to spread, for misinformation to spread, for lies to spread.

RASKIN: Right, and we know that, you know, all of the autocrats and the theocrats and the dictators and the despots on earth like, you know, Trump's close buddies, Vladimir Putin, who he takes orders from, and Kim Jong-un and President Xi and Viktor Orban are going to be doing everything in their power undermine democracy in America. And so we want the democracies of the world to stand up for democracy in America.

We have a fair constitutional process and we are going to stand by the constitutional process and we have a real election with real election results and we are not going to allow them to throw chaos into our system again with propaganda disinformation and violence.

DEAN: And so what about, just looking ahead, a couple of steps ahead here, because I know this is something you're focused on that some House members, bipartisan, by the way, are focused on making sure that that election can be certified, that there is not a repeat of what happened in 2020.

What are you doing and how do you think that can best be handled?

RASKIN: Well, the first thing people need to understand is that we are going to have a physically secure joint session of Congress called for under the 12th Amendment on January 6th. I know a lot of people are afraid, but remember, it was Donald Trump who was presiding over the federal government and over the National Guard. Now we have President Biden.

And so if there is attempted, a violent attack on the Capitol, on members of Congress, on the vice president, the National Guard and the National Security Agencies will be there without any interference by an anti-democracy president like Donald Trump. So I'm much more concerned about what's going to take place earlier in the process. Trump's team has already brought more than 100 lawsuits, dozens of them have already been thrown out, but they're looking for some reason to try to get a case up to the Supreme Court where Trump is evidently convinced that the justices we put into place to overturn Roe versus Wade and destroy the right to abortion in America, will be there in order to just hand him the presidency.

And, you know, we have hundreds of lawyers who are working to defend the election on the Democratic side. We understand we have two goals here. One is to win the election, fair and square, and then two is to defend the election against every effort to overturn the election and to spread propaganda and disinformation to undermine it. That is, obviously Donald Trump's MO here. He continues to claim falsely that he won in 2020 when in fact he was defeated by more than seven million votes, 306 to 232 in the electoral college.

And 60 different federal and state courts, including eight of them with judges he appointed to the bench, presiding, rejected every single claim of electoral fraud and corruption that they alleged, and yet still, he and his pet chameleon, J.D. Vance are out there alleging that there was something wrong with the 2020 election. That is a fascistic tactic because authoritarian political parties do not accept the results of democratic elections that don't go their way.

[20:30:06]

And they also embrace or refuse to disavow political violence as an instrument for obtaining power. And now you've got Donald Trump running around the country saying he's going to pardon hundreds of people convicted of violently assaulting federal and local and local police officers on January 6th. And also, he wants to pardon people who were convicted of seditious conspiracy, which means conspiracy to overthrow the government of the United States. DEAN: All right. Well, we have nine days until election day. We are

going to see what the voters say.

Congressman Jamie Raskin, thank you so much for your time tonight. We appreciate it.

RASKIN: You bet. Thanks for having me.

DEAN: Thank you. We're going to take a break. We'll be right back

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[20:35:28]

DEAN: A surprise appearance tonight from former first lady, Melania Trump.

CNN senior political analyst Mark Preston is here to talk a little bit more about this.

Mark, there were so many facets to tonight's rally to talk about. Melania Trump has barely been seen since Trump announced he was running this cycle. This was her first speech of the year. She came out to introduce her husband at a rally where we saw incredibly dark rhetoric and the kind of people that were going before Trump, the opening act as it were. calling Puerto Rico a floating island of garbage and Harris the anti-Christ.

So what do you make of seeing Melania Trump there tonight?

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST (via phone): Well, a couple of things. What's interesting is that Melania Trump, if you go back to 2020, Jessica, she was on the campaign trail onetime basically, and that was about one week before election day. She did it up right outside of Philadelphia. You know, in talking to our good friend, Kate Bennett, at the time, she spent a lot of time covering Melania Trump, but I remember talking to her and her just talking to me about how Melania Trump really wouldn't spend a whole lot of time on the campaign trail.

Well, we've seen certainly in this election and you could even argue actually that she's not on the campaign trail. I mean, she went right down the street maybe 20 blocks or so, you know, to do the speech. But she's only done a couple of fundraisers. And other than that, she has been absolutely -- she's been absent but again, not totally surprising given that she is a very private person and the president himself, you know, when asked about this, has noted that she would prefer to stay private as opposed to being in the public eye, which, you know, in this day and age is kind of interesting given the fact that if you're going to run for president United States, you are going to be in the public guy.

DEAN: Right. And it is just one of those other things that is -- you know, so much is not normal or typical about how former president Trump runs his campaigns, et cetera, et cetera, but did not have a spouse that's actively participating, is not what we're accustomed to seeing in modern-day politics.

PRESTON: No, certainly not. But when she is out there, she is very supportive, you know, of him. I mean, we saw her at the convention, you know, obviously, I mean, she would be there, but, you know, she's not somebody who prefers being in the public life.

Look, in politics, we do know, Jessica, I mean, you and I have spent a lot of time on the campaign trail. We've seen a lot of different, you know, dynamics amongst spouses on the campaign trail. Sometimes, you know, spouses just love it. You know, they're in it together. You know the husband is in it, the wife is in it, you know, regardless of, you know, who's running. I think we're seeing that on the Democratic side with Kamala Harris and with Doug Emhoff.

I mean, he's, you know, on the campaign trail. He's pretty active. He seems to be into it. You know, in this case with Melania Trump, somebody who would prefer to stay private? And you know, and honestly, in this day in politics, I don't blame her necessarily because it is so divisive.

DEAN: It is, and you do become, of course, just to sit over for so many attacks.

All right, Mark Preston, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it.

And we're going to take a break. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:42:32]

DEAN: Joining us now Republican strategist Katie Frost and CNN political commentator and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona.

Thanks to both of you for being here tonight. We appreciate it.

Maria, let's start first with you. Of course all of our eyes tonight have been on this rally at Madison Square Garden where we heard a lot of the rhetoric and the same stories from Trump that we've heard. But really on steroids. And then the opening act from people talking before him, we heard things like one guy called Puerto Rico, which is a U.S. territory, a floating island of garbage. What is your takeaway from tonight?

MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Look, Jessica, you know, you and everyone who has been talking about this have it right. This is the dark dystopian, Donald Trump on steroids. And as a Latina raised in Puerto Rico, I found this deeply, deeply offensive as so many Puerto Ricans, not just on the island, but the hundreds of thousands of voters in Pennsylvania that are of Puerto Rican descent. Also found it deeply, deeply offensive and disturbing.

But this is actually bigger than that, Jessica, and I think what it does is it allows Americans to see the stark contrast that is exactly what Vice President Kamala Harris has been talking about these last couple of weeks and what she is going to close on. So I kind of have to thank Donald Trump and all of the misogynistic, racist xenophobic, white supremacist speakers that he had at his rally because they are underscoring that Vice President Kamala Harris is going to be focused on the future, is going to be focused on solutions, is going to be focused on her to do list for Americans while Donald Trump, if he gets to the Oval Office, he's going to be focused on retribution.

He's going to be focused on vengeance. He's going to be slumped over on the Resolute Desk, working on his enemies list. She wants to get to work. Donald Trump wants to get even. And I think that stark contrast is going to show independent voters, moderate Republicans, those people who already understand and have seen that Donald Trump is completely unfit. I think a rally like today is an in-kind contribution to the Hamala Harris-Tim Walz campaign.

[20:45:09]

DEAN: Katie, I want to ask you because Democrats like Maria, but Jamie Raskin, who we just talked to, Democrats, of course, are speaking out against that particular comment. But it's not just Democrats. It's also Republicans. Maria Elvira Salazar, who is a congresswoman from South Florida, she tweeted and said that this is -- condemning this. She said the rhetoric does not reflect GOP values.

What's your reaction to that?

KATIE FROST, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: You know, my reaction to this as we -- I do agree with Maria, that we have two starkly different closing arguments but I view them a little differently. I see Vice President Harris going out there and making all of these very dark accusations against President Trump and failing to communicate what she's actually going to do for the American people.

She says that, you know, she always wants to make it about she's not Donald Trump, but she can't tell the American people what she's actually going to do for them. And then on the contrast, you have President Trump, who's closing argument is Kamala broke it and he will fix it. And that is something that resonates with the American people.

When the vast majority of the American people don't believe that we are moving in the right direction, why would they want to vote to continue the same failed policies we've had for the last few years? And that is why we're seeing President Trump is doing so well in all polling, in the early vote numbers. They look excellent for him because Americans are answering the question that he asked at the beginning of every single rally, are you better off now than you were when I was president?

And the overwhelming answer is no. The American people were much better off when President Trump was in office. And that's why he is doing so well. That's why we're seeing a lot of flailing on the Democratic side candidly, messaging is all over the place. President Trump is going to get reelected. He's going to focus on the economy. He's going to focus on immigration and look at the coalition he has built. He has former Democrats. There were people speaking at that rally,

African-Americans, Jewish Americans, Hindu Americans. These are a diverse group of people who were united around the concept of we are going to get our country back on the right track. And that's what I think we saw tonight. And that's what we're going to see over the last couple of days of his campaign.

DEAN: Yes. I just -- thank you to both of you. I do want to close with this. We got to get to a break, but I do want to read everyone the quote from comedian Tony Hinchliffe. This is about a U.S. territory. It is part of America, and I just want to underscore that there were thousands of people cheering for this, which shows there's a lot going on like I don't know if you know this, but there's literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. Yes, I think it's called Puerto Rico.

And that's about an American territory --

CARDONA: And if Katie -- if Katie and Republicans want to brace that, Jessica, be my guest because that is going to give us hundreds of thousands of more votes. So thank you.

DEAN: All right. OK. We got --

FROST: You know, Maria, I'm from the south.

DEAN: Quickly, Katie.

FROST: We're used to being the butt of every single joke that comes out of a Democrat's mouth. So, I mean, come on, this happens all the time.

DEAN: All right.

CARDONA: There's facts and then there's racism. So we're on the factual side.

DEAN: OK. We got to go, guys. I'm so sorry.

CARDONA: It's on the racism side.

DEAN: I'm so sorry. All right. Thanks to both of you for joining us.

CARDONA: Thanks, Jessica.

DEAN: We're going to take a break. Thank you.

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[20:52:03]

DEAN: So let's flashback to election night 2020. Remember the so- called red mirage or the blue shift? Because of the pandemic we saw an unusually high amount of mail-in voting that year. And that in turn caused the lag in results from several key states. Now this was CNN's Phil Mattingly watching counties across Georgia

start turning blue as those votes were tallied.

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PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CHIEF DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: Take a look at this map, this whole southeast has been red. This whole southeast has been red. It was red and back in 2016. For Democrats, Georgia has been out of reach in the presidential level since 1992. Before that, just Jimmy Carter. Georgia is blue. Georgia is blue. We'll see if it holds. We'll see if it holds. Let's dig in for one quick second and then we'll kind of go back out and explain why it's so important for the bigger picture.

What just happened is we saw vote come in from Clayton County. Clayton County is a Democratic county. You can look at the margin right there. Obviously, Joe Biden leads the county pretty handily, and over the course of the night, they have been the county that has been reporting. Hats off to them for working through the night and continuously churning out votes. And as they have continuously churned out votes, batch after batch after batch, even if it was only 200 votes, we're going to Joe Biden by a rate of about 84 percent, 85 percent.

That was what he -- that was above what he needed. He's been overperforming. The reason why, Democratic county, reason why, mail-in vote. It's what we've seen across several states. And that put Joe Biden over the top.

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DEAN: And you might also remember it took four days before we had a winner. So what should we expect things to be like this year? That's a question a lot of people are asking.

CNN's Zachary Wolf, author of CNN's "What Matters" newsletter, has been looking into that question. He joins us now in Washington.

Zachary, what have you found?

ZACHARY WOLF, CNN POLITICS SENIOR WRITER: First of all, watching that Phil Mattingly video was giving me some flashbacks --

DEAN: I know.

WOLF: They weren't exactly pleasant.

DEAN: No.

WOLF: But maybe it's going to be a little bit better this year for a couple of reasons. Number one, there's fewer people voting by mail. A lot of the election -- a lot of people are voting early in-person, specifically in Georgia, in North Carolina. These are places where without the pandemic, there's just kind of this return. We think, we'll have to see exactly what happens. But this sort of return to voting in-person. It just takes longer to take a mail-in ballot out of an envelope. The

verification process is a little bit different. You don't have somebody standing there with an I.D. card. So it just takes a little bit longer and if there's less mail-in ballot, less mail-in voting, which is what we think, then that should speed things up.

And the other element is that most states have changed their laws so that election officials can start to pre-process them, which is basically taking them out of their ballots, or out of their envelopes, before election day. Georgia, they're allowed to do that. Now there are some hiccups because in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, two of the tightest states, according to pre-election polling, they haven't made some of these changes.

[20:55:00]

So if it comes down to those two states, you could still see a real change in the makeup of ballots that are counted over the course of a night that could look like a shift towards Democrats. All the votes were cast in the same time before the end of election day. But just when they're counted can create this impression and that is where misinformation really feeds. So hopefully that is not the case this year, but, you know, we'll just have to see what happens.

DEAN: Yes. We certainly will. And I know you mentioned a couple of states, but any key states that could be especially slow going?

WOLF: There is some concern in Arizona that there could be a lot of votes dropped off. You know, dropped in these drop-off ballot boxes that you've probably heard about if you paid some attention to this. Pennsylvania, they can't pre-process the mail-in votes. Wisconsin, they can't process the mail-in votes. Georgia's, you know, secretary of state was talking about how he expects most of the votes to be counted by 8:00 p.m. on election night.

So that's a lot faster, but if it's close, then they'll start looking to overseas ballots, to absentee ballots, to people who, you know, cast provisional ballots. It all comes down to how close things are. If it's too hard to project, it could be a long time.

DEAN: All right. Zachary Wolf, with answers to questions everybody is asking right now. Thank you so much for that. We really appreciate it.

WOLF: Thanks.

DEAN: And I want to thank you for joining me this evening. I'm Jessica Dean. I'm going to see you again next weekend right here. The CNN Film "CARVILLE WINNING IS EVERYTHING, STUPID," airs next right here on CNN. Thanks for being with us tonight. Have a great night.

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