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Trump Speaks to Anti-Abortion Rally in DC; Schumer Going To White House At Trump's Request. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired January 19, 2018 - 12:30   ET

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

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12:30:00] (APPLAUSE)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you very much. That's so nice. Sit, please.

We have tens of thousands of people watching us right down the road, tens of thousands. So I congratulate you. And at least we've picked a beautiful day. You can't get a more beautiful day.

I want to thank our vice president, Mike Pence, for that wonderful introduction. I also want to thank you and Karen for being true champions for life. Thank you and thank you, Karen.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: Today, I'm honored and really proud to be the first president to stand with you here at the White House to address the 45th March for Life. That's very, very special, 45th March for Life. And this is a truly remarkable group.

Today, tens of thousands of families, students, and patriots, and really just great citizens, gather here in our nation's capitol. You come from many backgrounds, many places, but you all come for one beautiful cause, to build a society where life is celebrated, protected and cherished.

The March for Life is a movement born out of love. You love your families. You love your neighbors. You love our nation. And you love every child born and unborn because you believe that every life is sacred, that every child is a precious gift from God.

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TRUMP: We know that life is the greatest miracle of all. We see it in the eyes of every new mother who cradles that wonderful innocent and glorious newborn child in her loving arms. I want to thank every person here today and all across our country who works with such big hearts and tireless devotion to make sure that parents have the care and support they need to choose life.

Because of you, tens of thousands of Americans have been born and reached their full God-given potential. Because of you, you're living witnesses of this year's March for Life theme. And that theme is "Love Saves Lives".

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TRUMP: As you all know, Roe versus Wade has resulted in some of most permissive abortion laws anywhere in the world. For example in the United State, it's one of only seven countries to allow elective late term abortions along with China, North Korea and others.

Right now, in a number of states, the laws allow a baby to be born from his or her mother's womb in the ninth month. It is wrong. It has to change. Americans are more and more pro-life. You see that all the time. In fact, only 12 percent of Americans support abortion on demand at any time.

Under my administration, we will always defend the very first right in the declaration of independence. And that is the right to life.

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TRUMP: Tomorrow, we'll mark exactly one year since I took the oath of office. I will say our country is doing really well. Our economy is perhaps the best it's ever been. If you look at the job numbers, you look at the companies pouring back into our country. You look at the stock market at an all-time high.

Unemployment, 17-year low, unemployment for African-American workers at the lowest mark in the history of our country, unemployment for Hispanic at a record low in history, unemployment for women, think of this, at an 18-year low. We're really proud of what we're doing.

And during my first week in office, I reinstated a policy first put in place by President Ronald Reagan, the Mexico City Policy.

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[12:35:12] TRUMP: I strongly supported the House of Representatives pain-capable bill, which would end painful late-term abortions nationwide. And I call upon the Senate to pass this important law and send it to my desk for signing.

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TRUMP: On the National Day of Prayer, I signed an executive order to protect religious liberty.

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TRUMP: I'm very proud of that.

Today, I'm announcing that we have just issued a new proposal to protect conscious rights and religious freedoms of doctors, nurses and other medical professions, so important.

I have also just reversed the previous administration's policy that restricted states' efforts to direct Medicaid funding away from abortion facilities that violate the law. (APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: We are protecting the sanctity of life and the family as the foundation of our society. But this movement can only succeed with a heart and a soul and a prayer of the people.

Here with us today is Mary Anna Donadio from Greensboro, North Carolina. Where is Mary Anna? Hello. Come on up here Mary Anna. Come. Nice to see you, Mary Anna.

Mary Anna was 17 when she found out she was pregnant. At first she felt like she had no place to turn. But when she told her parents, they responded with total love, total affection, total support. Great parents? Great? I thought you're going to say that. I had to be careful.

Mary Anna, bravely chose life and soon gave birth to her son. She named him Benedict, which means blessing. Mary Anna was so grateful for her parents' love and support that she felt called to serve those who are not as fortunate as her.

She joined with others in her community to start a maternity home to care for homeless women who were pregnant. That's great. They named it "Room At The Inn".

Today Mary Anna and her husband Don are the parents of six beautiful children. And her eldest son Benedict and her daughter Maria join us here today. Where are they? Come on over.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: That's great. Over the last 15 years, "Room At The Inn" has provided housing, child care, counseling, education, and job training to more than 400 women. Even more importantly, it has given them hope. It has shown each woman that she is not forgotten, that she is not alone, and that he really now has a whole family of people who will help her succeed.

That hope is the true gift of this incredible movement that brings us together today. It is the gift of friendship, the gift of mentorship, and the gift of encouragement, love and support. Those are beautiful words and those are beautiful gifts.

And most importantly of all, it is the gift of life itself. That is why we march, that is why we pray, and that is why we declare that America's future will be filled with goodness, peace, joy, dignity, and life for every child of God.

Thank you to the March for Life special, special people, and we are with you all the way. May God bless you and may God bless America. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

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TRUMP: Thank you very much.

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LARRY KING, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump shaking some hands, greeting some of his visitors at the White House after speaking for several minutes to the March for Life rally, just steps away really from the White House on the National Mall, an annual big event for the anti- abortion movement here in Washington.

[12:40:01] And a statement from the Trump administration, Vice President Pence spoke in person at the rally last year. Vice President Pence introducing the president here as, you know, the big event at the White House stating unequivocally his support for a pro- life agenda. Certainly, one of the biggest areas of the president's base here gathered in Washington. A transformation for this president who just factually who was once totally pro-choice in his own words.

But now, this has become number one, an issue in which he has been consistent as president of the United States without a doubt. Number two, this piece of the conservative movement here in Washington today for this March that's critical to them among his most loyal supporters. What struck you most from what you heard from the president there?

ELIANA JOHNSON, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, POLITICO: That was a pretty -- the language in the speech was pretty emotional and heartfelt, which we're not really used to hearing Trump speak with that kind of language.

And, you know, Trump is a strange president. We're used to kind of, you know, he's a rhetorical sledgehammer, and this was him in more emotional tones that are, you know, we hear him in those kinds of terms far less often but it's true.

I think one of the most surprising things to me about the Trump presidency is how faithful and closely he's hued to the promises he made to evangelicals who were tremendously important in getting him elected. It's one of the strangest pairings, I think, in modern politics that we've ever seen. The New York former federal liberal Manhattanite who just, you know, settled -- paid off a porn star for $130,000. But he has returned on their investment.

KING: You can ask Ted Cruz about how surprising it is.

JOHNSON: Right.

KING: Because if you think back to the primaries when Ted Cruz had the map laid out and Donald Trump took the nomination away from him, essentially, in his view.

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: The other quick thing I would just say is that, the last Republican president who was very, very staunchly anti-abortion that we covered, it was George W. Bush. And I don't remember during the March for Life him having an event that was that robust. I mean, he would beam himself in but not in a way that was full of a rally in the Rose Garden and having people to come and to give real- life stories, nothing like that. And I think that really does speak to what you were saying, which is more than any other Republican we've seen in recent history how reliant he is on the base and base management.

CARL HULSE, CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, NEW YORK TIMES: That is the base of the base.

KING: Right.

HULSE: And he has to keep them in line and keep them -- if he were to lose the evangelicals and, you know, you see certain things, you go well, is this going to be the moment that's going to cost him the evangelical support? Well, he hasn't found that. But they are very determined to keep those people behind the president. He really is super reliant on them.

JOHNSON: I think --

HULSE: And you can see from the effort they made there.

JOHNSON: More to that, Trump is a base politics guy. Most presidents come into office and they try to expand their base, move further out from their own political party to govern the entire country. We haven't really seen Trump do that.

He has constantly been somebody who plays to his own base. And in a different sort of way, you know, the White House's response to the president's controversial to say the least from Mark last Thursday about immigrants and immigration was we heard White House keep saying, well, his base will love it. This was a different sort of event that his base will love, and I do think it speaks to just how much of a base political actor this president is.

KING: And as we get to the one year point, and a lot of people say if yo were -- let's say expecting Donald Trump to label China cards a manipulator or rip up the trade deals but those things haven't happened for let's say on this issues. I agree where they put the base of the base. They're happy with the Neil Gorsuch appointment. We'll see one of -- more abortion cases reach our life cases, rich the Supreme Court and specially the lower court justice. The movement is incredibly happy with that.

Religious liberty protections from this administration, including just this week for health care workers who might have had moral objections to certain procedures. The president rescinded the Mexico City language, funding to international groups to abortion counseling or discussing abortion in any way. The Jerusalem decision has set well with evangelicals moving the U.S. embassy.

And, of course, we have Mike Pence there just because if you go back during the convention time when people shut up at the convention, there were still a lot of doubts about Donald Trump. Did he mean it? Was he just talking the talk or he walk the walk. The selection of Mike Pence and Mike Pence has role in these issues has been an important, not only a signal, but a presence for this community.

TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, BLOOMBERG: Yes, and if you look at the poll numbers, the president's poll numbers overall are not very good, but with that specific part of his base, evangelicals, he's doing actually pretty well. They are sticking with him, they support him, and part of that has base played that he is focusing on the things that they have called on him to focus on. He's bringing them into the White House. They feel like they have an ear that someone is listening to them at the White House.

It's not yet clear what that's going to mean for him on a broader political approach when, you know, his numbers having that under 40 percent and we're going to the midterms. We were seeing all these special elections as we get closer to the midterms where the swings are going so far to the left where Democrats are picking up huge margins, swinging from where Trump was during 2016.

[12:45:07] Democrats are picking up a lot of ground. Trump losing a lot of the moderates and the people in the middle in order to keep his base.

KING: And while we were listening to the president's important speech to the rally, they have a rally first on the National Mall and it's a March for Life through Washington and including visits to congressional offices elect. As we were listening to the president, a bit of breaking news on the shutdown question, the government shutdown. You see the clock right there, a little more than 11 hours away. Will the president try to broker our last-minute deal?

Let's get straight to Jeff Zeleny at the White House. Jeff, we know that somebody has just been invited down to see the president so tell us who and tell us if it's just that one-on-one meeting or if we expect more.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: John, it's not just any somebody. It is Senator Chuck Schumer, of course, the leader of the Senate Democrats. And that, of course, would be a key meeting, because Democrats for all the talk in this town usually votes are Republican Majority only. You know, the path to getting 60 votes includes many Democrat as well of course.

So, Senator Schumer, we are told, will be coming here to the White House this afternoon and not too long. We do not know the exact time, but it will be somewhat shortly because time of course is of the essence here. But, John, we do not know who else will be at that meeting, if any one. It certainly would be fascinating if this is just a one-on-one meeting between the president and his old New York friend, if you will, Chuck Schumer. But there are also could be others at the meeting. We're still trying to work to figure that out.

John, it also raises another point here. This is not just the Senate Democrats who were a complication for all this. It's also some Senate Republicans. We are told the president has been working behind the scenes on the phone. His advisers will not say exactly who he is talking to. Probably one of the reasons is because they know that we will reach out to those senators and try and figure out what happened in those conversations.

But again, there are a handful of Senate Republicans, Lindsey Graham, of course, she's among them, who also said that it would be for a short-term deal but not the deal that was passed in the House. All of this, of course very fluent as we're learning the president is not going to Mar-a-Lago as he's planning to today. A government official told me earlier the trip was off for the entire weekend that the White House pushing back on that, if such thing. That's not yet quite decided. But, John, that meeting here this afternoon with Senator Schumer and the president certainly going to be a fascinating one. John.

KING: Jeff Zeleny for the breaking news at the White House. The same message we get from Phil Mattingly at the top of the hour. We're getting more news. Raise your hand. We'll bring you back.

We're going take a quick break, but when we come back, the president inviting the top Democrat from the Senate down to the White House? Are the Republicans coming, too, or are they a little nervous? We'll be right back.

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[12:51:00] KING: It's the final full day of the first day of the Trump presidency, and, yes, unpredictable to the end of that first year. We are now told the Senate Democratic Leader, Chuck Schumer has been invited to the White House to talk to the Republican president, Donald Trump. As we argue, you see the numbers there, 11 hours away from a government shutdown. The Senate Majority leader, Republican Mitch McConnell not invited to that meeting.

So that has to have some Republicans a little bit nervous as the president comes down. But this is, remember, this is one of the reasons Donald Trump got elected.

BASH: Yes.

KING: He said he was going to be different. He said he could cut the deals. Here's the tweet from 2014 from Donald Trump. Deals are my art form. Others people paint beautiful or write poetry, I like making deals, preferably, big deals. That's how I get my kicks.

BASH: Someone argue he writes poetry occasionally on Twitter, but that's different.

JOHNSON: I was going to say (INAUDIBLE) poet, but, yes.

KING: But we are the one-year mark, and this magical deal maker has not made an appearance yet during his presidency.

BASH: That's true.

KING: Is this his moment?

BASH: It could be. I don't have to say that, yes, Republicans are worried on Capitol Hill, and really should be, particularly, the rank and file. Having said that, I cannot imagine -- I haven't had a chance to report, but just like I didn't know what you think since we spend so much time in the House together, that Mitch McConnell wants to be there. He wants to have deniability, same with House Speaker Paul Ryan.

If Donald Trump and Chuck Schumer cut a deal, they want to be able to say that a rank and file in their base, we don't anything to do with it, go ask the president. It's his deal with the Democrats.

JOHNSON: I think this could be potentially the moment that Republicans in Congress washed their hands of the president, depending on what's agreed upon because they truly are incredibly frustrated. And I think you're absolutely right.

KING: What if the president just says, look, you don't trust me. You don't trust me. What I'm saying is you keep the government open now, pass that bill to house pass. Keep the government open, I will convene a meeting at the White House next Monday. Pick your day and we'll have an open discussion about DACA, the DREAMers. We'll get this done. Is that this or they have to do more than that?

HUSLE: I don't think that's going to be enough because they've already have that, they've already have that.

BASH: They had that last time.

HULSE: And it blew up on them. I think is part of the problem here is that the Democrats don't trust the president or, certainly, House --

KING: The Republicans don't trust him, either.

HULSE: Right. And that --

KING: They're just not as public about it. The Republicans don't trust him either.

HUSLE: Right. And I think we'll see a lot of that mistrust this afternoon. But that they just -- this is their moment to get this deal because they're not sure they're going to have another chance. I do think that this meeting actually sounds promising, but they also need to look like they're doing something, right?

Because as we were saying here, you know, everyone around town is just pointing fingers. You have to look like you're doing. But I'm having a hard time seeing what the agreement could be to get Senator Schumer back on.

KING: You've covered the White House. You've watched the president have feuds with the Chiefs of Staff. You've watched the president time and time again. He says he is against things that his administrations are for. Now, he's bringing in the top Democrat at a time when he just had his staff aides go to the White House briefing room and say, this is the Schumer shutdown.

OLORUNNIPA: Right. You did hear from the White House aides talking about the Schumer shutdown and blaming this on the Democrats. But the only -- and he said earlier, there are some things that the White House has put over the last 48 hours to show that they are distancing themselves from Congress more broadly. And the Republicans who lead Congress saying that, you know, they should have had a budget done back in September, they are not doing their job in passing all these CRs.

So we did see this last year when the president met with Schumer and Pelosi, Chuck and Nancy, as he likes to say.

[12:55:02] And he said, you know, Republicans aren't getting the job done so I'm going to the Democrats. And if he does cut a deal with Schumer, that's what you can expect to hear from the White House that Republicans didn't do their job and now he has to be pushed into the arms of Democrats.

KING: Let's flip the coin. Republicans are nervous, the president meeting with the top Senate Democrat. And as you notice sometimes when this has happened in the past, from a conservative point of view, bad things have happened. What about Chuck Schumer? How long of at leash does he have going into a meeting with President Trump?

His base wanted DACA yesterday. His base once you give this man nothing, especially after what happened in the Oval office the other day where he talked about assholes, and I don't want Haitians, I want Norwegians. Does Chuck Schumer have a longer leash to cut a deal?

BASH: That's really good question. Probably, a longer leash than one would imagine, as you just said that obviously that Chuck Schumer is actually now at the White House. He just arrived. So it's happening. But he has to be able to really show that he got something from this.

HULSE: This is their moment of leopard.

KING: It's a fascinating moment. I need to catch there, I'm sorry. It's a fascinating moment. Again, you see the countdown clock of the shutdown right there, the top Democrat from the Senate at the White House with the Republican president of the United States. The clock ticking.

Thanks for joining us in "Inside Politics." Hope to see you here Sunday morning. Government open, government not. We'll be here. Wolf Blitzer will take up the breaking news coverage after a quick break

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