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Early Results Show Sanders Leading Nevada; Some People Getting Busy Signals When Trying To Call In Results. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired February 22, 2020 - 18:00   ET

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

[18:00:11]

DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Now, Nevada Democrats did set up these redundancies in case something like this happened and they have the precinct chairs texting in photos of that math worksheet, the paper which shows their work into the party.

And according to not just party officials but also the precinct chairs we talked to, that second redundancy has worked. Stephen Lessler (ph), who is at Sierra Vista High School, a precinct chair there, tells us that he was able to send it in with no problems, got confirmation back that his message had been received.

But, Wolf, again, this was something, as you know, that was a big problem in Iowa, those chairs who eventually gave up after waiting on the phone, that hotline for hours at a time. We're not seeing that type of situation here. There's that second redundancy set in place, but it is something that's starting to percolate here as we're getting those final results in.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Well, let's hope the Nevada Democratic Party fixes that problem, fixes it quickly. Dianne, thank you very much.

So, David Chalian, you're looking closely at these numbers as well.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICS DIRECTOR: That's right, Wolf. We're digging in deeper to this entrance poll, our survey of caucus-goers, as they showed up at the caucus sites this afternoon. Taking a look at both gender and education level, key demographics in American politics today.

So among white, college-educated women, take a look here, they make up about 20 percent of the electorate, Sanders, 22 percent, white, college-educated women. Klobuchar, 19 percent. Warren, 18 percent. Buttigieg, 17 percent. Biden at 13. This is a competitive category, as I said, a 20 percent share, a fifth of the electorate.

Now, look at men without a college education and you are seeing a pattern repeat itself again, one category where Bernie Sanders is competitive with his compatriots in the field and another where he runs away with it. 42 percent of white men in the Nevada Democratic caucus going electorate support Bernie Sanders. That compares to 18 percent for Pete Buttigieg, 11 percent for Both Biden and Klobuchar, eight percent for Warren.

Anderson, over to you.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: David Chalian, fascinating. How do you read those notes (ph), I mean, Van Jones, when you look at those numbers? What are you --

VAN JONES, CNN ANCHOR: Well, I thought it was very interesting that the women fell to the very, very bottom once it went over to the men. But people say that gender has no impact, those numbers would suggest otherwise. But, listen, Bernie Sanders has appeal that is broader than people thought at least in Nevada, one state and at least in Nevada.

The big question with a candidate like him is, great, you've got your camp, you've got your tribe, you've got your following, but can you grow it? Can you expand it? Can you build a coalition that can win? Yes. It's starting to look like he can because he's ahead of Elizabeth Warren, who is a (INAUDIBLE) track candidate who should be dominating, college-educated women, and certainly Klobuchar. He's beaten them on their own turf.

COOPER: Also if you're Donald Trump looking at Sanders' wide appeal among non-college educated men, that's also, I would think, something that the Trump campaign --

JESS MCINTOSH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Non-college educated white men are historically the white whale, no pun intended, for the Democratic Party, but those are not reliable democratic voters. So if they are excited about a candidate, that certainly speaks to an expansion of the Democratic electorate in the general that we could be excited about.

One thing I want to say about Warren is that I think the early voting might have hurt her more. I mean, early voting is good. I'm glad it happened. It might have hurt her more than any other candidate. I'm waiting to see what the split between the early vote versus day of vote because that great debate that she had, where she eviscerated Michael Bloomberg, happened just in time to miss the early vote.

So I think we're going have to wait until we see the numbers from today to see whether she got the bump from that that she got from fundraising.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Klobuchar and Warren split white college graduate women. They had almost the same amount. And then Bernie had more than either one of them. And Biden was behind. And if you're Joe Biden, you're looking at today and saying, okay, this is good. It's good enough. That's what you're saying. I was communicating with some people in the campaign and I think their feeling is this is good enough.

But with numbers like this, it's hard because you don't have young voters. You don't have these women that you thought you were going to get --

JONES: If you're Biden.

BORGER: If you're Biden, yes. So you can look at this and say, okay, I can breathe a little bit now before South Carolina, but Bernie Sanders is a lot to catch up with.

And one thing, I mean, I wanted to ask our ex-candidate here.

[18:05:01]

We were talking before about the moderates. I mean, what's the -- do these people talk to each other about what to do next or how they're going to behave to Bloomberg or could we moderates get together? We were talking about it before, we thought it was foolish.

ANDREW YANG, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: So the way it works between campaigns is like you have the candidate to candidate relationship. And a lot of candidates have each other's cell phones. We were not in the habit of texting each other being like, hey, what do you think, that sort of thing.

BORGER: How are you?

YANG: Yes. So most of the communication happens from team to team, and politics isn't (INAUDIBLE) enough such that everyone on every team knows someone on someone else's team. So if I looked at my team, and I was like, hey, I want to talk to Biden's team, they will be like, oh, yes, I know his ex-ex-ex chief of staff, like this and that.

So the question is whether the staffers on different campaigns are having these conversations. And then after it reaches a certain level then it graduates up to the candidates typically.

BORGER: And what would the conversations be? I guess that's my question at this point.

YANG: So you do have teams talk to each other and then occasionally someone would say to me, like, hey, FYI, Joe wants to call you, and I'm like, sure and then you schedule that call and then you have that convo. So I have a feeling that the campaign to campaign communications are already happening and then the question is whether it reaches the candidates.

COOPER: Do you think they coordinated in advance on the kneecapping of Bloomberg or do you think that was just spontaneous?

YANG: I think that was organic and spontaneous. And I think we may see more of that on Tuesday.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: The one thing I would say about Nevada is that this is one state, right? This is the first of the more diverse states, but it's also the result that relies on a very tiny fraction of voters. The pool of people that we're talking about is probably just over 100,000 people. It's not a lot of people.

So I don't want to extrapolate too, too much from what we're seeing in these numbers, but I think the key though that everybody is looking for is what is the combination of groups that you can put together to be a successful candidate in a general election? I think Bernie Sanders is making a lot of significant progress. The white college-educated women number is very important to Democrats because if they look back at 2018 and they look back at what happened in the suburbs, they're seeing a lot of those women in the suburbs turning on the Republican Party, turning on Trump and coming out to basically say, healthcare is the most important issue to me and I'm sick and tired of what we're seeing at Washington and I want to change. If Sanders is doing well with those voters, it's really good for him.

Looking though over at the black vote in Nevada, again, a small -- this is a small group of voters that we're talking about, but Biden retains his strength there. It's not as big as it has been in the past but he has retained his strength. And that's why, to the earlier conversation, his people are feeling pretty good. Because from a narrative perspective, what they wanted to be able to say leaving Nevada is Joe Biden's base is the base of the Democratic Party. It is African-American voters. And going into South Carolina, they are hoping to be able build on that.

But I think Sanders is giving him a bit of a row for his party (ph). I mean, we are getting to the point now where Sanders is running in a lot of polls, even to Biden with the black vote. That is incredibly important, and I think we need to look at the whole picture but not put too much on this place, 100,000 voters.

JONES: Bernie is running away with stuff in his own lane and grabbing other people's stuff and Biden is holding on to his little core.

MCINTOSH: We're not talking about who gets to be a kingmaker at a convention. I think Biden is sort of best positioned to be in that role.

BORGER: He wants to be king though, right?

MCINTOSH: I mean, I think he wants to be the king. But I think he understands that he's going to come in with a really powerful role if he's not on top. I think it's not so much that he needs a second to get a massive boost and be right back in the race, comeback kid-style. I think he needs second to still be viable and still possibly be that kingmaker. If he takes second today and then comes in strong in South Carolina, he is pretty well positioned.

ALEXANDRA ROJAS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, JUSTICE DEMOCRATS: I mean, I still think when you -- this is sort of the problem when you base your entire argument on electability, right, is that you actually have to win. And so even though he's going to be coming in second place, he's coming in second place, and that support amongst African-Americans is starting to really shrink. So that firewall that a lot of people thought that he was going to have is huge.

But one thing that I want to comment on is just how unique it is that you have the Democratic frontrunner right now for the nomination who can capture Joe in a hard hat, the white working class, and I feel like everybody at least in D.C., the punditry world obsesses with, and is building a coalition that is now, yes, with young people. But it's moving across generations, it's moving across race and it's moving across even ideology at least from what we can see here. So we don't want to read too much into it. I totally agree with that. But as we look at the forecast ahead, depending on the results for tonight, there's only one candidate right now that seems to be set at least at the bare minimum have a plurality of the delegates or possibly --

[18:10:08]

BORGER: But organization is so much a part of winning a caucus. And one thing Bernie has shown us is that he can out-organize just anybody. You can do that in a caucus and he has more money than anybody. So the question is, moving on, can you do that in South Carolina the way you did it here in a caucus?

COOPER: We're told official statewide votes from the Nevada Democratic Party could come at any moment. We'll bring you the numbers as soon as we get them. But, first, a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: We've got another key race alert coming in right now. 9 percent of the precincts reporting Bernie Sanders, he remains on top with 5,346 votes. These are the popular votes. He's almost 3,000 votes ahead of Joe Biden in second place with 2,384. Pete Buttigieg in third place, 1,974.

[18:15:01]

Elizabeth Warren, fourth place, 1,393. Amy Klobuchar, 967. Tom Steyer, 539. Tulsi Gabbard, eight. Remember, this is 9 percent of the precincts that are reporting with key precincts reporting, I should say. These are the numbers that are coming in so far.

David Chalian, still, we don't any have official numbers coming in from the Nevada Democratic State Party. They're supposed to be giving us some numbers about county delegates, the all-important county delegates, and that will determine the winner of this state.

CHALINA: It will. They're going to give all three metrics, that first round, that final round in county delegates. I keep refreshing their website here, Wolf, I don't see any yet. But we do have these early numbers from select precincts.

And Gloria Borger was just talking about some Sanders organizational strength. And I think this is a really good way to look at it, because I just want to remind people how the caucuses work. You could see here on this chart. Let me just try to focus in.

There is the first round of voting that happens when people show up to their caucus site and they align themselves with their candidate of choice, then there is the final round -- well, that did not work. Let me try to -- there you go. Then there's the final round of voting. This is after it's determined which candidates hit that 15 percent threshold in most precincts. That's the number you need to hit to be viable. This is then the final round. And if you look at this last column here over on the right, it shows you the growth or loss a candidate had between the two rounds. So let's take a look at Bernie Sanders, who's the leader right now. First round, 4,557, second round, 5,346. He gained 789 votes between that first round and that final round.

And by far, he is doing that more so than any of his competitors. Look on the next line, you'll see Joe Biden, he gained 195 between the first round and the final round. If you look at Pete Buttigieg, he gained only nine from 1,965 to 1,974. He only gained nine votes between the first round and the final round.

And then you start to see candidates who lost vote between the first round and the final round. Elizabeth Warren, she lost 316. Amy Klobuchar, she went from 1,324 in the first round, 977, she lost 347. And look at Tom Steyer, Wolf. He went from 1,196 in the first round, 564 in the final round to six. That is a loss of 632 votes. That is because he wasn't viable in a lot of places. He wasn't hitting that 15 percent threshold that you need to be viable. He has lost more votes between the two rounds than any of the other candidates.

BLITZER: And explain to our viewers, David, who are waiting for these county delegates, the state Democratic Party, they have to release those numbers. We're still waiting at least to start getting some of them.

CHALIAN: Yes. As you know, the two rounds of voting actually helped determine is that through a formula, they come up with these county delegates percentages that that will determine who wins the Nevada caucuses tonight and it also help determine going on to their national convention delegates in Milwaukee.

That is the key metric that determines the winner. So what they're doing now is, of course, checking and double-checking the numbers that have come in, applying that mathematical formula precinct by precinct to figure out that county delegate percentage. And then they're going to report all of that out officially from the Nevada State Party.

BLITZER: And we'll, of course, report to our viewers as soon as they report all those numbers to us. Stand by. Much more of our coverage coming up right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:20:00]

COOPER: And welcome back. We are covering the caucus in Nevada. Bernie Sanders, the early leader based on just initial votes as we wait for more results to come in. The contest comes just a day after, we're learning, that U.S. officials told Sanders that Russia is attempting to help his campaign as well as President Trump's.

Back now with the panel. Andrew, do you think that this impacts Bernie Sanders one way or another? Mayor Buttigieg is already fundraising off this notion of the Russians supporting Sanders or trying to get him elected. YANG: I don't think anyone believes for a moment that Bernie is somehow courting that kind of help. It just speaks to the need that we have to secure our social media and our election infrastructure from Russian interference.

I just want to make a note on these vote totals. I keep an eye on Pete Buttigieg because his campaign has a knack for getting extra delegates in the rural counties. They did it in Iowa to great effect. And so since the delegate count is going to be the final count here, I have a feeling that they may overperform the popular vote a bit because that strategy worked for them in Iowa.

We tried to do the same thing in Iowa with my campaign and we did not do it as effectively as Pete. Pete's campaign is very, very good at maximizing delegate returns --

COOPER: How do you go about doing that? I mean, what's the way?

YANG: What you do is you go to the less trotted paths in rural counties where they have slightly disproportionate delegate output based upon the number of humans you get to show up to the caucuses. So what that means in practice is that Pete organized, advertised and appeared more in rural parts of Nevada that you get a better bang to for your buck than Vegas and Reno.

MCINTOSH: Can I make a point on the Russian front before we move off of it entirely? When Russia engages with the Trump campaign, they are doing so to help Trump win. When Russia gets involved on the Democrats, they are doing it to divide Democrats and help Trump win. So I think it's a very key difference in terms of a motivating factor there. They did this in 2016. They, quote, unquote, helped Bernie's campaign. But it wasn't really helping his campaign.

[18:25:01]

It was sowing dissent among Democrats. It was trying to drive a wedge, taking what animosity already existed and amplifying it. That seems to be the way that they're getting in this time also. So I just don't want to wind up saying they're for Bernie and they're for Trump because that's just not true.

ROJAS: I think that's totally right and I think that it's really, really critical that Democrats across progressives and moderates don't take the bait here and focus on the issues. Because the press coverage that this has gotten is exactly what Russia wants --

COOPER: Well, yes, but, I mean, you can't say for sure the motivation of what's in Vladimir Putin's head. I mean, you could just as easily argue, and I don't know what the motivation of Russia is, but you could easily argue if it's not going to be Trump, they might think Sanders, for some reason, would be not as strong on foreign policy.

MCINTOSH: Our intelligence agency is saying that they are in for helping Trump. I think that it makes sense that they would be pursuing a similar tactic this election, that they did last election, which was to use the animosity between Hillary and Bernie to drive Democrats. COOPER: Bernie Sanders has disavowed this in a way that the Trump campaign never --

BORGER: Well, the reaction with Trump was so startling.

MCINTOSH: Yes.

COOPER: Yes.

BORGER: But the one thing I must say I did not like about the way Bernie Sanders responded to this because I thought he was pitch perfect, at first, in talking about the Russians. But then he started blaming the media.

MCINTOSH: That was deeply troubling.

BORGER: Yes. Blaming the media for this, blaming The Washington Post, trying to sort of say who the sources were and why this came out the day before the primary. And then as if The Washington Post, if it had the story, should not have reported it or should have -- the sources --

MCINTOSH: I think the question of the timing is a good one but it's not about The Washington Post. It's about the story.

YANG: It's news. It's genuinely newsworthy.

PHILLIP: Ultimately, that's what's going to be problematic for Bernie Sanders, as we discussed this further is that, for a lot of Democrats, what this episode has really shown is that Sanders has some instincts that they're uncomfortable with, this idea of pivoting to blaming "The Washington Post" has really set some people off and it's really alarmed some Democrats who frankly are already uncomfortable with Bernie Sanders into thinking, you know, yes, he's right about the Russian interference part, but there are other elements of this that they're not comfortable with, pivoting and saying that "The Washington Post" is trying to harm them because of who it owns "The Washington Post," Jeff Bezos, which is literally exactly what Donald Trump says. I think that's a real problem for him and how he handles it.

ROJAS: Yes. I think that I would offer the perspective of this, which is that I am a relatively new person here at CNN. There are not a ton of people that are my age or that look like me. Most of the people that sit in a lot of the most powerful rooms in the country, you know, pushing forward our news are very, very -- are not the same sort of level of class or a lot less wealthy than the folks that are sitting there.

So I think that even though it might not be literally some person pulling the strings there, there is a world view that is vastly different from the everyday voter to who our D.C. pundits and folks that are in the newsroom. And I think that's where a lot of everyday Americans --

BORGER: A lot of us don't understand what Bernie Sanders was saying. That's the question. Is he saying that Jeff Bezos was somehow behind this?

PHILLIP: Anything to do with the underlying issue.

ROJAS: It's a nuance conversation.

PHILLIP: It is news worthy that Russia is trying to row discord in the U.S. election.

COOPER: We are learning more about the logjams in reporting caucus results. The Nevada Democratic Party officials are getting busy signals as they try to phone in votes. We're going to have more details on that ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:32:44]

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: And welcome back. We're waiting official results in Nevada. We expect those to start to come any moment. I want to check with Dianne Gallagher who is at Democratic Party headquarters in Las Vegas.

What are you hearing about problems that some are having getting through to give vote results?

GALLAGHER: Yes, Anderson. We've heard from several precinct captains at this point who said that they have had difficulty getting through those hotlines to report those results are getting a busy signal. One of those precinct chairs, Chris Erbe, at the West Career tech academy site says that he actually was texted a different phone number to call by his site lead. When he called that, he got a recording that basically said you've reached the Nevada Democratic Party, your hold time is more than 30 minutes.

Erbe tells me that he is going to call back later, but he's already done the redundancy here. And this is what we're seeing happen. He's texted in a picture of that math worksheet and he plans to help drive those materials over to the party, so they can have them officially in.

Even though we are getting reports of these busy hotlines, the redundancy, that backup plan of texting the photo to the party seems to be working in each case of these precinct chairs who were getting this busy hotline. So that built in backup plan, again, appearing to be working at least in the cases.

We have talked to you at this point, Anderson, the party says that they are working diligently to make sure that as the caucuses closed, everything is relayed to them in a timely manner. But they do acknowledge they're getting those backup text as a result.

COOPER: And do we have any sense of how widespread? I mean, I think, you said you talked to a couple of people.

GALLAGHER: We've actually talked to several of them. Even several who, Anderson, have had different times of reporting, so maybe who finished up far before some of the other ones.

So this appears to be something that is spread out. Again, Chris Erbe, getting texted that different phone number to call in. He had tried calling this but of almost every precinct chair that we had been in touched with has dealt with a busy signal at least once. And so some of them were able to get through and report, others went ahead, did what they were told to do, which is text that picture in and then try back on the phone afterward.

COOPER: All right. Dianne Gallagher, we'll continue to check in with you at Democratic Party headquarters in Las Vegas.

Back now with the panel. Does this sounds serious to you, Gloria?

BORGER: I don't know. Compared to Iowa --

(CROSSTALK)

JONES: Yes, about three days.

BORGER: -- compare it to, not so much compared to Iowa. So it's hard to judge at this point.

[18:35:10]

I was just looking at our numbers up there on the screen and I think maybe we ought to talk about Tom Steyer, though, how about that? He spent a lot of money in Nevada. And if you look at Tom Steyer spending a lot of money, it hasn't gotten him a lot of love. They didn't buy him love and the question that I have then is what happens for Mike Bloomberg, for example, can Mike Bloomberg take a lesson from this.

But I don't know where Steyer is going to end up or whether he's going to end up out after this and maybe Andrew, you could talk about that. But he has been spending a lot of money in South Carolina and he spent a bunch of money in Nevada.

YANG: Yes. The thing to look out for is whether Tom gets a qualifying poll tomorrow in South Carolina.

BORGER: Yes.

YANG: If he does, then he'll be on the debate stage the following day. And South Carolina is his strongest state. If he doesn't get a poll, then he won't be on the debate stage and that's going to be a source of great frustration for him and his campaign, because they've been putting a lot of resources into South Carolina, particularly.

JONES: Yes, a lot of people kind of think of Tom as the guy like Mr. Impeachment early on, that kind of stuff. He has a much longer history, actually, with the black community, with poor communities, especially in California on the climate issue. And so he's always believed this kind of people power stuff, he's willing to write the check, but he wants to see real people out there doing the organizing.

So if he's not able to do well here with that model, his money and real people organizing, he doesn't do well with that in South Carolina where he should have a shot of the black vote given Biden's collapse, then I think he's got real problems.

PHILLIP: Yes. I mean, the question is, obviously, is this a little bit of like a balloon filled with air where just a little prick will cause the whole thing to collapse. He has a lot of name idea, especially in South Carolina, but all over the country, frankly, because of how pervasive his ads are.

This is a warning sign. Could it be a lot softer than we think? And for Tom Steyer, what does that mean? For Michael Bloomberg, what does that mean? What happens when the candidates with a lot of money, a lot of name idea and a lot of ads don't have the - maybe the organizing strength that they need or the durability of the support, the kind of movement support that you need to survive as we go further along in the contest.

COOPER: Yes. We are about to get official results from the Democratic Party in Nevada, we're told. We'll have new vote tallies ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:41:52]

COOPER: And we're back with our Nevada caucus coverage. Bernie Sanders is leading. We stand by for major round of votes that we anticipate coming in at some point soon.

Tonight, Sanders is facing fallout for a tweet he sent that is really alienating some fellow Democrats. It reads, "I've got news for the Republican establishment. I've got news for the Democratic establishment. They can't stop us."

I'm not sure why anyone would be surprised by anything in this --

JONES: I'm shocked.

COOPER: -- he has been saying in rallies --

JONES: Who is this guy?

COOPER: -- for making a lot of people nervous, for making Wall Street nervous, big pharma nervous. He said this in Tacoma, Washington, in front of - it was, what, was it 16,000, 17,000 people and he said, we're making Democratic establishment numbers --

JONES: And he is.

COOPER: -- and he is.

JONES: And by the way, he is.

COOPER: And he's --

JONES: He is.

COOPER: -- and he's saying it proudly, it's not --

JONES: Yes. And the thing is, look, in 2016 there was a rebellion in both parties and the Republican Party took the form of Donald Trump and Democratic Party to the form of Bernie Sanders.

Bernie Sanders who was written off as sort of like Dennis Kucinich redo, got 47 percent of our vote in 2016. You can't forget that. And so people thought, well, now Hillary can go on and become president. She didn't and Bernie never stopped.

I was in San Francisco like three years ago and Bernie was there talking about Medicare for All with 8,000 people and it wasn't even making the news. So the rebellion never stopped and I think that's what you're seeing and why is it?

I think you made a very good point. There is a lot of pain at the bottom of our party. There's a lot of pain in this country that doesn't get talked about enough and he speaks of that over and over and over again. And I think that there's a power that comes with being witness, being recognized in your pain and then your suffering and to feel like somebody is consistent about that.

So listen, he's not wrong, the establishment is upset of you and there's another station, other channels and other things going on tonight where people are freaking out, melting down all across the country, at least all over the airwaves and (inaudible) --

COOPER: But it's also not just witnessing the pain, it's actually being willing to step into somebody else's pain, which a lot of other politicians that sort of give a glancing reference to it. But this is a consistent refrain from Bernie Sanders. I mean, it's something he has been consistently talking about for a very long time.

ROJAS: Yes. I mean, I think we're in not - aside from Donald Trump being the President of the United States right now, we are facing a number of existential crises. You have 50 percent plus of the American people who are making less than $40,000, a year experiencing a level of income inequality that we've never seen.

You have not just millions of young people like myself, but their parents, that are locked into crushing student debt. You have rent skyrocketing, health care costs going through the roof. And over the past decade wages, not really seeing any real growth for workers.

So that is a base of people out there that are Republican, Democrat, Independent. They don't fall cleanly in this ideological spectrum. They're looking for a Democratic Party that centers the poor and working people of this county in a way that we have.

MCINTOSH: I think progressive values poll so much higher than the Democratic Party does.

[18:45:08]

Like I'm a proud Democrat, so seeing Republican establishment lined up with the Democratic establishment and equated in that way, obviously, I don't love it. But I'm in the minority there.

People like progressive values, people like what the Democratic Party stands for. That doesn't mean that they identify as Democrat even.

ROJAS: Right, (inaudible) --

PHILLIP: And it doesn't mean that they necessarily think that the Democratic Party has been working.

MCINTOSH: Right.

ROJAS: Yes.

PHILLIP: I think one of the really fascinating things as a reporter going out there talking to voters, especially talking to black voters and watching really a complete turnaround in Bernie Sanders' ability to appeal to those voters the cycle compared to the last is that he's really been able to connect his message on income inequality and all those other issues to the simmering feeling that has always existed, especially among communities of color, frankly.

And it's easier for younger people to give voice to this, the younger African-American voters in particular, that the system is not working for them. They do not believe that the Democratic Party as a party is always functioning with their best interests in mind.

And so when you're Bernie Sanders and you're trying to run an insurgency campaign, you have to leave the party behind in order to do that. You cannot run with the party if you are going to --

(CROSSTALK)

BORGER: Well, but at some point he's going to unite the party. Look, I know he's trying to win the nomination, I get it. So he's saying the Democratic establishment, sorry, I'm going to win this with you or without you, so goodbye.

But what I don't like to hear in that is what you were saying, Jess, is this division among Democrats if they're going to try and beat Donald Trump. And remember, one thing everybody criticizes Trump about is not unifying the Republican Party, only playing to his base.

And the question that you can raise and I can raise is, is this going to be a candidate who only plays to his base or becomes more inclusive. Now, maybe too early because he's trying to win, but at a certain point, Bernie Sanders is going to have to do sort of a more of (inaudible) --

COOPER: Andrew, how do you see that?

YANG: Well, first, I agree with everything that that you said, Van. This is why I ran and when I went around to Democrats - actually no, not Democrats, working class Americans around the country. If you have a D next to your name, it's like a scarlet letter.

Like they do not think Democrats speak to them and I was talking to truck drivers and waitresses, and I was like, theoretically, "Aren't you who the democratic party should be speaking to and standing up for?" But they thought that the Democratic Party wanted nothing to do with them.

And that is, to me, a real problem with the Democratic Party. You have to do some soul searching and working class Americans think that your party is not their party. That's why I ran. I ran to say, "Look, we have to solve these underlying economic issues that have been festering and building up in our communities for years and decades that got Donald Trump elected."

And to me, the Democratic Party never really reckoned with how the heck do you lose to Donald Trump.

BORGER: Yes.

YANG: And then you just blame everything under the sun like --

BORGER: On the establishment, this so called establishment --

PHILLIP: But just keep in mind Donald Trump has unified the Republican Party.

JONES: He pulled it off.

PHILLIP: He has actually brought his party to where he is. So I just think we have to keep in mind that sometimes you and the party can start in different places. But I think what Bernie Sanders is banking on is that he is going to bring the party to where he is at the end of the day.

And frankly, if you look at the results that we've seen, 60 percent of people say --

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Right. He's already done it. I mean, yes.

PHILLIP: -- health care. It's already happening.

COOPER: Yes. We got to a break and we'll continue this discussion. We're standing by for some more votes. We're going to hear from some of the Democratic candidates live. Back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:52:37]

BLITZER: All right. We got a key race alert right now. This is the first time we've gotten actual county delegate numbers coming in from the Nevada Democratic Party. Only 1 percent of the precincts reporting right now, but look at this, Bernie Sanders 29.3 percent, Elizabeth Warren 18.7 percent, Biden 17.3 percent, Buttigieg 17.3 percent, Klobuchar 9.3 percent and Steyer and Tulsi Gabbard follow up.

Remember, the county delegates will determine the winner of the Nevada caucuses. Let's take a look at the popular vote that's coming in right now. This is 10 percent a lot more. These are the numbers that we've obtained. Bernie Sanders, he's still ahead with 6,048, about 3,300 votes ahead of Joe Biden's in second place, 2,707, Buttigieg 2,449, Warren 1,575, Klobuchar 1,068, Steyer and Tulsi Gabbard follow up.

Let's go over to David Chalian. So finally, we're getting some official numbers, county delegates from the Nevada Democratic Party. The popular vote though, well, we got a lot more in so far.

CHALIAN: And as you know, the popular vote comes to us in two different rounds. That first round of voting and the final round. So take a look at this chart, Wolf.

Here is that first round of voting. People show up to the caucuses. They go into the room. They short themselves to their candidate preference corner and then the counting begins who's viable, who's not, who meets that 15 percent threshold, who doesn't. Then the caucus is moving to a final round of voting. Once it is determined who's viable, who's not.

And then take a look at this third column. We are able to see here, Wolf, who is gaining votes between that first round and final round and who is losing votes, who's better organized, they're there, they're viable and they bring people to increase their numbers between the two rounds.

Right now, take a look at Bernie Sanders. He is atop of the field here as you noticed. His first round number was 5,132. His final round, as you just noted, 6,048. He gained 916 votes between the two rounds of voting. Let's look at Joe Biden, 2,496 in the first round, 2,707 in the final round. He gained 211.

[18:55:01]

You have Pete Buttigieg here, hang on, sorry. Pete Buttigieg 2,302 in the first round, 2,449 in the final round. He gained 147. So Buttigieg, Biden and Sanders are the ones that gained. They were viable and they brought more people in, OK?

Now, let's look at the other side of the ledger, Elizabeth Warren there at the bottom. She went from 1,921 to 1,575. She lost 346. On this side, you see Amy Klobuchar. She went from 1,449 to 1,068. She lost 381 votes, Wolf. This is largely because she wasn't viable in a lot of places. She wasn't hitting that 15 percent threshold.

And Tom Steyer that happened to him more than anyone. He started in the first round with 1,331 votes. In the final round, but again, this is only 10 percent of the precincts reporting. We have a lot of vote counting to view, but at this snapshot in time, in the final round Steyer is at 627. He lost 704 votes between the two rounds. He's losing the most. He's not viable in a lot of these places.

BLITZER: All right. We're about to get some more numbers, we're told. We'll check in on the campaigns as well as they wait for more results. So we'll also get an update on the lag in reporting some votes. Are the phone lines still jammed? We'll find out just ahead. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)