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CNN Live Event/Special
President Trump to Make Remarks at 6:30 P.M. ET. Aired 6-7p ET
Aired November 05, 2020 - 18:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:00:00]
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: As election night in America continues races in two presidential battlegrounds, they keep tightening. I'm Wolf Blitzer.
Former Vice President Joe Biden has been making significant gains in both Pennsylvania and Georgia as more ballots are counted tonight. He's shrinking the president's lead in contests that are absolutely must-wins for President Trump. We're going to hear from the president at the White House later this hour. You see the briefing room getting ready for the president of the United States.
Six states in all are still too early to call in this nail-biter of an election. We're watching Arizona and Nevada very closely, as well as states that also have the power to decide the election. We expect an update from Arizona tonight as we await new vote totals in these key races.
It's all about the numbers right now as Biden looks to increase his electoral vote count from the current 253 to the 270 necessary to win. The president trails with only 213 electoral votes right now the math clearly working against him. All that coming up.
Let's get a key race alert first though, right now Pennsylvania, right now, the president's lead is shrinking and shrinking, it's now 78,314. 50 percent compared to Joe Biden's 48.8 percent. 93 percent of the estimated vote is in. But 8 percent of the estimated vote is out, more than enough potentially for Biden to take over.
Let's go to Jim Acosta over at the White House. So we just heard moments ago that the president will go into the briefing room, make a statement, maybe answer reporters' questions.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Wolf. And as you know, what's been on the president -- what's been on his mind, and that has been, he is very upset with the way things are going right now. He has been watching tweets, putting out statements, calling into question the legitimacy of the election, accusing Democrats are stealing this election from him. Obviously, there is no evidence of that.
But the president has been seeing his surrogates and his allies and aides going out there and making all sorts of statements while he has been sitting silently inside the White House. He wants to get in on the act.
And so as we watch these vote totals shrink I can tell you talking to Trump advisers they're getting very concerned we are watching an incredibly shrinking lead from the president over Joe Biden right now in both Pennsylvania and Georgia.
And I talked to his adviser just a short time ago, and the picture is bleak, the picture that's being painted is bleak. According to an adviser I spoke with earlier this evening, quote, math is not on our side. We need an act of God to alter the course, this adviser said. We need an act of God to alter the course. That is the concern right now because they are watching this lead shrink in Pennsylvania.
And if Joe Biden overtakes Donald Trump, in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, it is the belief inside the Trump campaign, they won't say it outwardly but they will say privately, that Joe Biden will become the next president of the United States.
Now, obviously we'll going to hear a different message from the president when the president comes out. He's going to call into question what is going on in Pennsylvania and what is happening in these other remaining states.
You know, he is also, Wolf, we should point out, and so are some of his family members, white hot about what they see as a sort of lack of praise coming from other Republican leaders and lawmakers. They have been -- the president's family has been complaining about this on social media all afternoon, wondering where are some of the 2024 so- called candidates and why aren't they praising the presidents for what he did in this in this 2020 campaign? Some of those 2024 hopefuls or suspected hopefuls have responded with their own tweets praising the president. I suspect some of that is on his mind.
And keep in mind, Wolf, and we've reported this before this before, and we'll report it again, they are apoplectic about what has occurred over at Fox in terms of some of the calls that they have made. The president has been nursing that grudge privately behind the scenes, telling aides and allies that he is very upset with what has been a very friendly network to the president. And I suspect you may hear some of that as well.
We'll see if the president takes questions but he obviously has a lot on his mind. He's been watching Joe Biden make these statements over the last couple of days, calling for patience, calling for calm. This is a president who is doing the exact opposite. He wants to slam the brakes on what is taking place right now to save his presidency because, right now, it is the incredible shrinking presidency of Donald Trump that we're watching, we're witnessing in real-time right now, Wolf.
BLITZER: Yes, those tweets that the president has leveled over the past couple days, totally, totally inappropriate.
Let's talk a little bit about Pennsylvania right now. It's a -- the lead that Trump has over Biden is shrinking, 78,000 right now but it is clearly doable for Biden to take over and win the state. [18:05:05]
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's absolutely doable, the lead that was above a half million votes, if you go back 24 to 30 hour ago, is now 78,000 votes. Just a half an hour ago, Wolf, when you were last over here, it was at 91,000 votes. And so we said then, if Joe Biden gets 70 percent of the remaining vote, he will win Pennsylvania by about 40,000 votes.
If you look at this, you say, well, Joe Biden is not going to get 70 percent of the remaining vote, but remember, but remember, they're counting now vote by mail. They've already counted the people who voted on Election Day. That is the big Trump surge. The president did a great job. But they're counting vote by mail right now.
And let me give you an example. What got us from 91,000 to where we are now, that smaller Trump lead, was the vote count here in Cumberland County. President Trump is winning this county by 11 points. This is Trump country in Pennsylvania. But some votes came in a short time ago and Joe Biden got 20,000 of the votes that came in in Cumberland County. Donald Trump got 9,000 of the votes that came in in Cumberland County.
We told you if Joe Biden wins 70 percent of the remaining votes, he will carry Pennsylvania by about 40,000 votes. He won 69 percent of the new votes that came in in a Trump county. And we know there are a lot of votes still out in blue counties. So you get 20,000 votes for Joe Biden, 9,000 votes for the president of the United States in a county that the president otherwise is carrying quite convincingly. Again, why is that? Because the mail-in ballots are disproportionately Democratic, because that's how Democrats decided to vote.
So Joe Biden making gains in a Trump county. If he's making gains in a very solid Trump county, you can guess what is going to happen when they start counting the votes in Philadelphia and in the counties around it all the way up to places like Lehigh County, where they still have votes to count, and over here in Northampton County, where they still have a few votes to count. And you see Biden on top there. That was a county Trump actually won four years ago.
But in a county like this, Cumberland County, where the president is winning, when they count the mail-in ballots, Joe Biden is coming out on top in the ballots that are remaining, which is why that lead went from 91,000 to 78,000, votes counted in a Trump county did that.
So Joe Biden is winning in the mail in votes everywhere across Pennsylvania disproportionately so, on track right now as we count them, to not only overcome that but to pull ahead. That's why the president of the United States is angry. But what he's angry at, let's be clear about this, despite what he says, he's angry at counting legally cast votes.
BLITZER: Show us Erie County right now in Pennsylvania. Pamela Brown is getting new information. Take a look at how close it is right there with 90 percent of the estimated reporting in, 90 -- 49.5 percent for Trump, 49.1 percent for Biden. Pamela, what are you learning? PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, actually, I just got off the phone with the chairman of the board of elections there in Erie, Wolf. And I'm told by Carl Anderson, that actually Biden is now ahead of Trump. He just pulled ahead of Trump there in Erie by 48 votes, okay? So we just pulled ahead there, 48 votes.
I'm just going to pull up the numbers here as I give the context around this. This is a big blow for President Trump. This was a county that he flipped in 2016. He thought he had this county in the bag. He was going to win it again, but then he went back to campaign there in late October and he admitted to the crowd he didn't think he would have to. He thought he had it but then COVID hit and now he's having to work for their votes. And now we're seeing Biden just pull ahead there.
There are 3,000 votes left to count in Erie County. And I'm told by Carl Anderson there in the county that it's been four to one.
And as I am talking to sources close to the campaign, they are telling me that, basically, they see where the story is headed there in Pennsylvania, that, you know, it's -- that the lead is shrinking, the (INAUDIBLE) are over but the lead is shrinking.
And as we look at these numbers more closely in Erie, this is what we have. We have Biden at 64,576 and Trump, 64,528. So, again, narrow lead there by Biden, flipping Erie blue as of now but. But, again, 3,000 more, those mail-in ballots votes that they have left to count four to one for Biden, again, big blow for Donald Trump.
BLITZER: It certainly is. It's awkward for him in Erie County, John.
KING: Right. And so this is the value of good reporting. Pam is getting these numbers before they're updated. So we'll drop out of this map, we'll come back. They'll be updated pretty quickly, I'm sure, from the local election officials.
But, again -- and so, again, just think about -- A, you see the numbers. Joe Biden has now pulled ahead in this county, Erie County, a critical swing county, blue collar county in Northwestern Pennsylvania, but 48 votes, we'll see what happens. But, again, it's the same dynamic we just talked about in Cumberland County, the county that was shaded red as they count the mail-in ballots, Joe Biden is winning them disproportionately because Democrats chose to vote by mail.
And we've talked about this before the election and now we're talking about it two days after the election, three ways to vote, vote by mail, get in line vote early or show up on Election Day and vote early. And when you look at Pennsylvania, again, tip your hat to the president, he turned out his people with his rallies on the Election Day vote.
But now, what is left to count are those mail-in ballots and Joe Biden is winning disproportionately somewhere in the ballpark of 76 percent of the ballots that have been counted in Pennsylvania today have gone to Joe Biden. 76 percent have gone to Joe Biden so far today. [18:10:00]
And if he gets 70 percent, he will pull out to a 40,000 vote lead in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
So the trend line is clear, the snowball is coming down the hill. We just showed you two counties where President Trump was leading. We expect that to turn blue soon. This one down here, he will continue to lead. You see, he has an 11-point lead, there still, still, but the mail ballots are coming in, even in Republican areas, the mail ballots are coming in disproportionately Democratic which is the engine right now powering Joe Biden as he shrinks the Trump lead down to 78,000.
And, again, if you go back to late Tuesday night into the early morning hours Wednesday, it was above a half million votes. Now it is down to 78,000.
BLITZER: And if Biden were to win Pennsylvania and its 20 electoral votes, the 253 would be 273, he would be president of the United States even if he didn't win any other states.
We're standing by to hear from the president of the United States as he watches, watches his lead slipping in both Georgia and Pennsylvania. Looking at live pictures coming in from the briefing room over in the west wing of the White House, we'll have live coverage. That is coming up soon.
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[18:15:26]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: And we are anticipating here hearing from the President Trump, very shortly.
And, David Axelrod, what would you expect the president to say (ph)?
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: You know, I don't imagine that Donald Trump at this stage of the game is going to be a different Donald Trump. He's a -- you know, he's a contentious combative person, he is not clearly coming out to give up, nor should he, the votes are not counted and I expect that he is -- we're going to see him say some of the things that we have read in his tweets, raising questions about the propriety of the process, saying that there are legal avenues that they're going to pursue and expressing confidence that if there are all counted appropriately that he will win.
I think this is a place holder to keep this thing going for a while.
RICK SANTORUM, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yeah, I don't think he's going to raise questions about the process, I think he will make accusations about the process. And he will battle, he will fight.
And I think his people expect him to, they want him to. If you follow what's going around on -- social media is not a good representation right now, but from what I'm hearing from people, they are concerned, they want to fight, they want to make sure this is fair.
And, you know, the idea that they want every vote counted, we want every vote counted, but we want every ballot counted.
GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: No, he doesn't want the vote counted. He wants to stop the counting.
SANTORUM: Every valid vote counted. That's --
VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: The definition of ballot --
(CROSSTALK)
SANTORUM: I'm just telling you, that's what we are feeling, if it's a legal vote, fine, but we don't want votes that are illegitimate.
BORGER: But he wants -- the president has said, stop the counting.
(CROSSTALK)
SANTORUM: You didn't count my horse whisper last time, the Trump whisper.
BORGER: You're going to have to do the Trump translation tonight.
SANTORUM: I don't think he's going to say stop the counting right now,
JONES: So far, there have been two cases of voter fraud and they are both Republican. In the entire country, they are both.
SANTORUM: The attorney general of Texas prosecuted over 100 voter fraud cases, so --
JONES: Not today.
SANTORUM: Not today, but I'm saying --
COOPER: Out of how?
SANTORUM: Just in the last few years.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Right, in the last few years. Out of how many votes that were cast, millions of votes.
SANTORUM: I understand, but don't say it doesn't exist, it exists.
COOPER: Statistically and insignificantly.
SANTORUM: It maybe.
JONES: I'll tell you something about this, I do you think what I'm hearing over and over again, our votes are feeling that there are a lot of voter suppression, we feel like you guys don't want us to vote, and there's a bunch of voter fraud and there's a bunch of cheating going on.
SANTORUM: Well, if we're in the voter suppression, we did a lousy job because there's a record turnout.
AXELROD: But some people had to wait nine --
JONES: People have to wait in line for nine hours, that is voter suppression.
But I do want to say something else, you're speaking for your folks, let me speak for mine. Part of the reason it's so insulting to have him come out here and talk about fraud, fraud, fraud is because of the work that it is being ignored and being defamed. A lot of work was done by African-Americans.
Black Lives Matter has gone, nobody has talked about this, has gone from being a moment to a movement to being a machine. You now have organizations where you're talking about Color of Change, whether talking about Movement for Black Lives, Black Futures Lab, these are organizations that now have their own polling, they have their own voter turnout, they do their own ads, the Black Lives Matter movement has become an electoral force.
And the reason why you're going to win in Pennsylvania, because the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Michigan, because of Detroit. Georgia because of Atlanta, Wisconsin because of Milwaukee. African-Americans have gone out here and fought and brought home a victory, and they are going to be accused of cheating and fraud by the same president that is accused of everything else. And so, this rubs a lot of people raw, this holds a lot of people raw.
(CROSSTALK)
SANTORUM: Trump is not accusing voters of cheating, he is looking at people within -- he's talking about people who are counting the votes. That's not all of these organizations you mentioned. He's talking about the people who are in there, doing -- you know, not applying the law the way they should. I'm not saying it's right or wrong. That's what he's talking about.
JONES: You're trying to polish this --
SANTORUM: This is not polish --
(CROSSTALK)
JONES: This is an insult to the people who have done the work.
SANTORUM: No, it's not. That's not what it's about
BORGER: You don't insight people and say, this is a fraud and his son --
(CROSSTALK)
SANTORUM: I'm not saying that you should do it, I'm just telling you what he's doing.
BORGER: -- has tweeted we have to go to war, we're having an election here, we're not having a war. We're having democracy.
And, you know, as I said earlier, you want to make legal challenges, absolutely go ahead. Make your legal challenges, but the votes are being counted.
[18:20:03]
And there is a great piece and "The New York Times" by Peter Baker right now.
The White House said -- you know, Jared Kushner said, you know, we ought -- what we need is our James Baker who lead the fight for the Republicans and the recount in 2000. So, Peter Baker who's just written a book about James Baker, went to him and said, why would you do? And he said, I would count the votes, this is different from 2000.
I would say, you need to count the vote. And by the way, James Baker did not vote for Joe Biden.
AXELROD: Listen, for the whole four years, would concern me as someone who has worked in the White House, and I think I share this concern with people who worked in Republican White Houses, that presidents words matters, and especially this president because he has such a zealous devoted following.
When the president says we are being cheated, when he says we are being defrauded, that the presidency is being stolen from us, that is incitement, if not warranted by the facts. He is inciting people. Now, maybe he will say something different tonight then he has said right all along, but if there is a real consequence to what he says today.
JONES: I want to add to that -- I want to add to that, because the other thing that you are saying is armed protesters going to disrupt, going to challenge people who are counting the votes. Now, I cannot imagine --
(CROSSTALK)
JONES: I'm going to talk and you are going to talk. I am going to finish my comment and --
SANTORUM: People are actually storming those places, they're not. They're standing outside peacefully protesting.
JONES: I didn't interrupt you, and you don't have to interrupt me. I'm going to finish.
SANTORUM: You characterize it wrongly.
JONES: And then you are going to talk.
SANTORUM: All right, fine. Go ahead. JONES: Now, listen, you have armed protesters, they are going to
disrupt, going to challenge, you just heard elected officials in America say they are concerned for their safety. That was just on our air. They had to bring security there.
Not for Biden, not for Black Lives Matter, but for Trump supporters. If you don't want to listen to what I'm saying, I'm telling you that lands badly in our community. What say you?
SANTORUM: You are characterizing people who are standing there, chanting peace -- as you would call it, because you've been calling it for the last six months, peacefully protesting, who actually are peaceful protesting. They're not throwing rocks. They're not shooting at anybody. They're not breaking windows. They're standing there saying count the votes. That's what they're saying.
JONES: Come up there with guns (ph).
COOPER: Why are they armed?
SANTORUM: Because people have a right to carry firearms.
COOPER: They have a right to be, what, what's the threat?
SANTORUM: Because people have a right to carry arms to protect themselves.
(CROSSTALK)
JONES: If the shoe is in the other foot, a black lives -- a Black Lives Matter short of with guns, to wear white people were counting votes, I think you would understand a level of concern.
(CROSSTALK)
JONES: Donald Trump is handling the situation, number one --
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Do you remember when for Black Panther showed up a couple years ago at a polling place and Fox News lost their freaking minds for years. Those weren't armed people, they were just --
(CROSSTALK)
SANTORUM: People are losing their mind here when conservatives were showing up. The point is, I agree it shouldn't happen.
(CROSSTALK)
BORGER: But these are people that are counting votes, they are doing their jobs, they are your neighbors, they are poll workers, and now they have security and they are afraid, they are afraid to go do their jobs, which is to count the votes. They are being observed, they understand the stakes here just like all Americans do, if they are afraid to go to work to count votes of all Americans, what is does that say, if then the president -- we know what he's going to say later, and we will make you the translator here for Donald Trump, which is a hard job, but if the president then comes down and says this election ends up being stolen from me, and they are cheating, what do you think will happen? Will they get better?
SANTORUM: So I agree with you that number one, what happened with Bush v. Gore didn't happen while the votes were being counted. The activity of fighting for the election happens after the votes are counted and you have proof of people doing things that they shouldn't. You asked for a recount or you file suits, you go through the process of looking and collecting information, doing the forensics to find out if there were votes that were fraudulent cast or if there was illegal activity and that's when you fight. You don't find because people do the process of counting the ballots.
BORGER: But they are now.
SANTORUM: Unless you feel that those ballots are being counted wrongly, I know in the case of the city of Philadelphia, who again, probably wouldn't have people screaming and shouting if they didn't -- if they follow the law and actually let people observe, they didn't put boards up for people can see.
JONES: All that's been cured and corrected.
[18:25:01]
SANTORUM: But it happened in the first place, that's a problem.
JONES: I agree with you. Any shenanigans, anything that looks bad, I don't like it because it takes away from the victory of the people, and people -- but I think we're a little bit in the weeds, in a moment right now of real polarization, and when you and I yelling to national TV, that's real polarization.
I think it's a credibly irresponsible for the president of the United States, when he says things are being stolen, you saw what happened. He said liberate Michigan. They are going to kidnap the governor just because of a tweet that says liberate Michigan.
When he's saying our democracy is being stolen, we don't know who's listening what they're going to do. When those people show up, they have a right to bring those arms but is it right to bring those arms? It puts -- it holds a whole pall over the country. I'm afraid is going to make it worse. That's my fear.
SANTORUM: As I said at 3:00 in the morning on Wednesday morning, when Donald Trump came out and said, use the word fraud. I condemn that, it was wrong to do it and as far as I know, every Republican from folks like Ben Shapiro, who condemned it, to Mitch McConnell.
But it wasn't just me and Chris Christie, I mean, it was everybody condemned it. And if he goes out tonight and says this election is being stolen, I think you are going to see a chorus of condemnation. If he says, I think there are problems here, we're going to investigated, we will do everything we can to track it down and make sure that only valid votes are counted. I will raise my hand and say yes.
BORGER: Do you think he'll do that? I mean, that wouldn't be the Donald Trump we know.
AXELORD: I think the idea of the president of the United States with the seal of the presidency on the podium in front of him telling the country that there is something fundamentally unfair and corrupt about the voting process is a historic -- would be a historically horrible thing, and will see I hope he doesn't do that. This is a freighted moment for our history and he will be remembered for what he does in these hours.
COOPER: Jim Acosta standing by in the briefing room. Jim, talk about what's going on.
ACOSTA: Anderson, there is a scramble in here right now because this press conference was called so side and we and now we're just trying to get in place, our viewers need to be reminded that in addition to everything else going on in the election, there are some COVID restrictions in the White House briefing room that's why when you look at the picture in here, you're seeing a lot more look fewer journalists for this upcoming statement from the president, hopefully some questions from the president about what's happening right now.
I'll tell you, I talked to a Trump advisor is just a short time ago and in addition to some of the gloom and doom that they're feeling inside the campaign, looking at Joe Biden catching up quickly in Pennsylvania. They're looking at Joe Biden catching up quickly in Georgia.
There is also the prospect of a legal challenge, of this campaign mounting legal challenges and multiple states across the country to try to stop this Biden victory and in the words of this Trump advisor, not the way I want to win. So, there are some inside the campaign that would like to win this the old-fashioned way, by tallying up the votes and seeing who wins. See who has the most votes.
Obviously, there are some people inside the campaign and the president may be leading the charge on this, who feels that he is being robbed and so therefore, he has to do what he has to do in court.
Now obviously, that is not in line with the facts. We heard the Pennsylvania secretary of state just a short while ago, saying that she has not seeing any instances of voter fraud, we know historically, there is no widespread voter fraud in the U.S. But the president is going to try to bend reality, bend the facts, bend the truth in his direction in the hopes of trying to make something happen on the legal front.
The other -- the other thing that is confounding his campaign and it's going to be a problem for them when they get into court, that they are arguing for a stoppage of counting in some states and arguing for the continuing of counting in other states. That's obviously something that is going to be a giant red flag, pointed out by any judge when the Trump lawyers going to court. So, I suspect, Anderson, when the president comes in here, he's going to want to make a statement, he's going to want to make sure that he is in charge, he's been watching Joe Biden go out there and make these statements over the last couple of days, and the president wants, I think, to reclaim the mantle, reclaimed the Oval Office to some extent here, and we will wait to see and if the president wants to take any questions.
There's obviously a lot on our minds, in terms of what we want to ask the president, such as, for example, why not continue to count the votes? That's what we do in this country, and so will have to see what the president has to say about that -- Anderson.
COOPER: Is it clear to you exactly what the president his current position is, because he has tweeted out in all caps, stop the count. Which is just, stop the count of votes. In some states, that would not be good for him. Is it clear to you what -- I mean, is he going to repeat that?
ACOSTA: I think so, yes, Anderson. They do not have a consistent position.
They want to continue counting in states where perhaps he might be able to eke out a win And they want to stop counting in states where he is in trouble.
And that -- you know, I think most Americans will look at that and just see that as being something that just doesn't stand up. And -- but the president is watching the lights go out on his presidency right now. That is what we're witnessing in real time.
As these votes are being tabulated, and Joe Biden is catching up in Pennsylvania and in Georgia, the presidency of Donald J. Trump is vanishing before our eyes.
And there are limited options left for this campaign, limited options left for this president. We haven't seen a one-term president in some 28 years. George H.W. Bush, when he lost the presidency to Bill Clinton, went out gracefully, became friends with Bill Clinton. They almost had sort of a father-son relationship.
Donald Trump is not wired that way. He is not going to go down without a fight. And that is what we're hearing from Trump campaign advisers, that he is going to fight this out to the end, that their -- the endgame is to win the presidency. hand he is going to do it by hook or by crook.
And if that means flooding lawyers into the states all over the country and dragging this out, like Florida on steroids, that's what they're going to do.
Now, I suspect, Anderson, if we watch these votes get tabulated over the next several days and it looks like a Biden blowout, that may limit the president's options politically, and he may have Republicans like Mitch McConnell and so on tapping him on the shoulder and saying, that's it, the jig is up, time to go. But at this point, the president still has options. The networks have
not declared things for Joe Biden yet. They want to stop that freight train from coming into the station. And I suspect that is going to be the mind-set of the president when he walks into this room shortly.
COOPER: Are they still talking -- initially, when the news was -- when Wisconsin was in the headlines, they were saying they were demanding a recount. It takes 10 days, I think, to officially demand a recount after votes are in. Are they still talking about Wisconsin?
ACOSTA: They are still talking about Wisconsin.
I have talked to a couple Trump advisers who acknowledge that this is -- Wisconsin is not going to work out, that that margin in Wisconsin is larger than what is realistic in terms of a recount.
But, as we have been talking about, Anderson, if you -- the standard sort of varies state by state. The strategy varies state by state. There were talks -- there was some talk of stopping the votes in Michigan. Joe Biden is way ahead in Michigan now. That doesn't work anymore.
And so they are, I think, reacting minute by minute, as we are reacting minute by minute, to what is a Biden presidency that is starting to come into shape, that is starting to come into the picture.
And the president, I suspect, is very frustrated about this. We have been seeing the tweets, some in all caps all day long, some being labeled by Twitter as being false and misleading.
And the president, he hates that. He wants to get around that. Coming out to the podium and having us take this on live television gives him a way of getting around those types of restrictions.
And so I suppose, in addition to the presidential seal being slapped on that lectern behind me, there probably ought to be a surgeon general warning. What you are about to hear from the president of the United States may not be in line with the facts, may be hazardous to your democracy, may be hazardous to the counting of the votes.
And I suspect that, when the president comes out here, we're going to see a fair amount of bending of the truth. And I think we just all have to be prepared for that.
We can tiptoe through the tulips and dance around the truth here, Anderson, or we can just say what we have seen over the last four years. This president will lie and lie and lie when it suits his purposes.
And I suspect we're going to be seeing more of that when he comes out here.
COOPER: Jim Acosta at the White House, thanks.
Let's go back to Jake -- Jake. JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Thanks, Anderson.
And, yes, as we prepare for President Trump to come out, it is interesting how much of the material that is coming from Trump land is being labeled as deceitful or untrue or at least premature by social media companies.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: I was just noticing that.
TAPPER: Whether it's YouTube taking down videos that are promoting violence or Twitter and Facebook weighing in on all these false claims of election fraud.
And yet the man leading the charge, President Trump, is still the president of the United States, and he gets to speak to the world.
BASH: He does.
One of the things I'm going to be interested to see is whether or not the president repeats what his all-caps press release said today, which is stop the count.
[18:35:00]
We were talking during one of the breaks about what would happen if, let's just say in fantasy world, all of the votes, they stopped counting them right now. You know who would be president?
TAPPER: Joe Biden.
BASH: Not Donald Trump. Joe Biden.
So imagine if he got what he wanted. It just -- and the reason I bring that up isn't because that would ever happen. It's just to point out the absurdity of it, because it's not really what he means. What it means is stop counting in the places where my lead is shrinking and continue counting where -- in the places where I think I could potentially make up the difference.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
And I think we should point out the absurdity of the whole idea that I suspect we will hear from the president, because we have been hearing it from his children and from his allies, that there is some sort of widespread fraud.
There would have to be widespread fraud all across the country in all the states where he wanted to win, in Wisconsin and Michigan and Pennsylvania and Georgia, in Arizona, in Nevada. And it's improbable that that would happen. And we know that it's not true.
But even if it were -- I mean, even if it were true, would Democrats have then lost the Senate, if they could -- or if they could orchestrate a massive fraud on that scale?
TAPPER: And lost seats in the House?
PHILLIP: And lost seats in the House?
TAPPER: Not flip one legislature.
PHILLIP: It does not make any sense.
But we're in a position now where that's where -- their back is up against the wall. And if we do hear that from President Trump tonight, I think people understand that that's not the case, but that he would be making that argument because he's worried that this is not going to go his way.
(CROSSTALK)
TAPPER: I was just going to say, about your point about stopping the votes from being counted...
BASH: Yes.
TAPPER: ... in Arizona right now, they continue to count the votes. There are tens of thousands left, and Donald Trump is picking up net votes.
BASH: Exactly.
TAPPER: He is narrowing the margin. Joe Biden has a small lead right now. And Donald Trump -- the counting is going on in this Republican state with a Republican governor.
And Donald Trump is narrowing. And it's possible -- again, I don't know what's going to happen with any of these states -- it's possible that Donald Trump will end up winning Arizona. The counting is helping him in Arizona.
BASH: That's right.
TAPPER: So not only is it anti-democratic, and not only is it against how we do elections in this country. It's also stupid, because he might be able to win Arizona because they're counting.
BASH: That's exactly right. But that was the point about the statement not making any sense and being inconsistent and not real.
The other question that I have, as we wait for the president to come at any moment, is what his posture is going to be just broadly about whether or not he really thinks he can win. The last time, the only time we have heard from him since Election Day began, he says, I won.
He said, I won, which was, of course, not true. The sense that I'm getting from sources in and around the Trump campaign is that they do not think that that is going to happen. They're seeing the numbers and the data kind of slip away from them.
And what I don't know is whether or not that's been communicated to the president in a very real way. PHILLIP: I have questions about that, too, because, in some ways, it
seems like the legal strategy is designed to show the president that people are fighting for him, not necessarily being -- leveling with him about the uphill road that they face.
So, I mean, I do question whether people who are close to the president, like his senior adviser Jared Kushner, who's deeply involved in the campaign, and others are leveling with him about what he would need to do to turn around the sort of trend that we seem to be heading toward, especially in two states that he has to win, Pennsylvania and Georgia.
TAPPER: And what's also odd -- and you and I were talking about this earlier -- and you're just alluding into it -- is that one of the president's offspring was out there on Twitter saying, where are all the 2024 Republicans, all the people who are going to run for president next time? They're not defending me.
And they're starting to attack each other, going after Senator Lindsey Graham for not saying anything, going after others. And I get that they want to fight. But there has to be something that they have to fight for.
PHILLIP: Right.
I mean, there has to be something real there. And, so far, it doesn't seem like there is. There's a lot of noise about the potential for fraud, but no actual proof of any of those things. And...
TAPPER: No, they most they could come up with is that, in Philadelphia, there were some questions about one particular Convention Center area, whether or not they can have observers there.
I just went online, and there's a livestream of it.
(CROSSTALK)
PHILLIP: Not even whether they can have observers there, but how close the observers can be to the actual vote counting.
Look, you just spoke to a Republican senator from Pennsylvania, and that's kind of all he could come up with in terms of pushing back on what Republicans are trying to say -- Wolf.
[18:40:01]
BLITZER: All right, Jake, thanks very much.
You know, John, we're waiting to hear from the president of the United States. He is going to be going into the White House Briefing Room making a statement.
We will see if he answers reporters' questions.
Before we hear that, let's do a reality check, where things stand right now. He's not doing very well. Biden seems to be doing a whole lot better, getting closer and closer to the 270 electoral votes he needs to be elected president of the United States.
KING: Right.
States are counting legally cast ballots. It's trending against the president, and the president is mad. He's tweeting fraud. We will see if he repeats that when he comes into the Briefing Room. Perhaps we will see a different tone. But if you read his tweets, he says the election is being stolen from him.
No, they're counting legally cast ballots and the election is trending away from him. He could still win the presidency. The trend line is going the other way right now, but he is complaining because of this. His lead in Pennsylvania is down to 75,427 votes.
It was once above a half-million votes. So, how is that happening? Because they're counting the votes in different process. First, they counted ballots cast on Election Day. The president pulled out to a big lead because Republicans voted overwhelmingly on Election Day.
Now they're counting ballots cast by mail. Democrats disproportionately voted by mail. We showed you a short time ago -- I want to remind you -- Cumberland County, the president is carrying this county. It went -- right after the secretary of state spoke, they counted nearly 30,000 votes here.
Joe Biden won 20,000 of them. Donald Trump won 9,000, so a net for Joe Biden of 11,000 votes in a Republican county. All of the mail-in ballots, even in Republican communities, are disproportionately Democratic. So, Joe Biden got a net gain there.
Now we will come down to Philadelphia. We just got some more votes out of Philadelphia. I will put these up on the board for you. There were all the ballots cast. There were more a little more than 4,000 ballots cast, 3,629 ballots for Joe Biden, 742 for Donald Trump. That is above 80 percent, above 80 percent. It's about 82, 83 percent in Philadelphia.
So, you see, as these ballots are coming in, this is what's happening. You count a few thousand ballots. Joe Biden gets 3,629. Donald Trump gets 742. Then you come out to the state. That lead keeps shrinking.
So that is what is happening as they count legally cast ballots in Pennsylvania and in Georgia. The president leads in both states now, Wolf, but now it's down to this.
BLITZER: Let's talk about Georgia right now. I suspect he's going to mention Georgia, because look at that lead.
The president had -- at one point, he had a hundreds-of-thousands-of- vote lead. Now it's down to 9,426.
KING: Right, and they're still counting the ballots here. And we know there are more enough ballots for Donald Trump to come -- I mean, for Joe Biden to come back.
In fact, there are more than enough ballots right here in this one county, Chatham, Savannah. And they expect -- we checked in on this just a short time ago. They expect to have this up tonight.
So just this one county alone, if Joe Biden keeps winning the mail-in ballots at the rate he has been, this is enough to either overtake or at least put him right back into contention. It's only 9,426 votes now. And we know there are still some ballots left here in Fulton County.
And we know there are still some ballots out here in Gwinnett County. This is Atlanta and the suburbs around it. And, again, we have seen counties come in, in Georgia as well. You see counties come in. And these are counties that the president is winning. But when they count the mail-in ballots, even Democrats in these communities are voting overwhelmingly for Joe Biden.
So, Donald Trump still carries the red communities, but the late ballots are going for Joe Biden.
Wolf, this is what the president is mad about, because either he just won't respect or he's not paying attention to the process here. Let's go to Georgia and just look at an example.
This is as we went. Tuesday night, election night, into Wednesday morning, the president is ahead by 372,000 votes. That looks like a big lead. Those are ballots cast on Election Day. The state told us, we're going to count mail-in ballots later. It goes down Wednesday morning to 109,000. By Wednesday afternoon, it's down to 79,000 and change.
By Thursday morning, it's down to 31,000. Then you come up, Thursday morning, a little bit later, it's down to 18,000. Then you get to 12,000. Now you come out in real time. It's down to 9,000. I can show you the same thing in Pennsylvania. I can show you the same thing in most other states.
That is what's happening. Now, that looks stunning, right, when you see that lead drop so much. In a normal election, that would be, wow. In this election, we knew this would happen. They counted Election Day ballots first. Then they went back and counted the mail-in ballots. That is what's taking more time. That's why we're here on a Thursday still talking about an election that was on Tuesday, because they're overwhelmed in the coronavirus pandemic.
But they're doing their jobs, counting legally cast ballots.
BLITZER: This is democracy in action, legally counting the ballots. That's what the people want. They want the vote to go to the winner of the ballots, who gets the most vote.
The president comes out and starts saying, they're cheating or this is fraud, that is totally unfounded. And it's very, very disturbing in our democracy. It's ridiculous.
KING: Well, he will be standing in the White House when he says it as well.
Look, if he wants to send his -- Rudy Giuliani or his family members around the country to say things, that is his right. It's not responsible. It's not respectful of the process. He's going to do this standing in the White House, saying that, in the American -- in essentially the beacon of America's democracy, the White House, he's going to say he's being cheated in America's democracy.
[18:45:02]
Again, this state has a Republican governor, a Trump-like Republican governor, a Republican governor who listened to him when he said reopen, please, during the coronavirus, who did just what the president wanted.
They're counting votes legally. Now, again, if the president's attorney see -- and the other thing about this, transparently, there are Democrats and Republicans in every room where these ballots are being counted in this state and other states. There are eyes on this from everybody.
If they see something really wrong, they can raise their hand. We have heard nothing.
BLITZER: We're told he's about to walk out.
You and I were both White House correspondents, spent a lot of time in that Briefing Room. I can't remember a time when I'm bracing for what I'm about to hear from a sitting president of the United States speaking from the West Wing of the White House.
KING: If you read his tweets -- and we have known this for four years -- the president has a very casual relationship with the truth. And he likes to think he can bully and tweet people into doing his way.
The leader of the United States cannot say, stop the vote. I said this the other night. I will say it again. We are not in Belarus. We count the votes. And the states are responsible for the administration of the vote, and the states, run by Democrats, run by Republicans, a lot of volunteers in these counties, are counting the votes.
They're doing the job. And, so far, we have heard minimal complaints of what is happening. And, again, the transparency of this is full and open.
And the president has every right to send people to watch. And if he had a case to really make, he would make it in court, not at press conferences, complaining about something that, at least so far, they have absolutely no evidence to prove.
BLITZER: These poll workers all over the country, they're working so hard. They don't work for the president. They work for the American people, because they want our democracy -- here he comes.
Here comes the president of the United States.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you very much. Thank you.
Good evening.
I'd like to provide the American people with an update on our efforts to protect the integrity of our very important 2020 election.
If you count the legal votes, I easily win. If you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election from us. If you count the votes that came in late -- we're looking at them very strongly. A lot of votes came in late.
I have already decisively won many critical states, including massive victories in Florida, Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, to name just a few. We won these and many other victories, despite historic election interference from big media, big money, and big tech. As everybody saw, we won by historic numbers.
And the pollsters got it knowingly wrong. They got it knowingly wrong.
We had polls that were so ridiculous, and everybody knew it at the time. There was no blue wave that they predicted. They thought there was going to be a big blue wave. That was false. That was done for suppression reasons.
But, instead, there was a big red wave. And it's been properly acknowledged, actually, by the media. They were, I think, very impressed, but that was after the fact. That doesn't do us any good.
We kept the Senate, despite having twice as many seats to defend as Democrats. And in a -- really much more competitive states, we have -- we did a fantastic job with the Senate. I think we are very proud of what's happened there, and many more seats to defend.
They spent almost $200 million on Senate races in South Carolina and Kentucky alone, two races, and hundreds of millions of dollars overall against us.
At the national level, our opponent's major donors were Wall Street bankers and special interests. Our major donors were police officers, farmers, everyday citizens.
Yet, for the first time ever, we lost zero races in the House. I was talking to Kevin McCarthy today. He said he couldn't believe it, zero races, very unusual thing, zero, and actually won many new seats, with, I think, many more on the way.
This was also the year of the Republican woman. More Republican women were elected to Congress than ever before. That is a great achievement. I won the largest share of nonwhite voters of any Republican in 60 years, including historic numbers of Latino, African- American, Asian American, and Native American voters, the largest ever in our history.
We grew our party by four million voters, the greatest turnout in Republican Party history.
Democrats are the party of the big donors, the big media, the big tech, it seems. And Republicans have become the party of the American worker. And that's what's happened. And we're also, I believe, the party of inclusion.
As everyone now recognizes, media polling was election interference, in the truest sense of that word, by powerful special interests. These really phony polls -- I have to call them phony polls, fake polls -- were designed to keep our voters at home, create the illusion of momentum for Mr. Biden, and diminish Republicans' ability to raise funds.
[18:50:15]
They were what's called suppression polls. Everyone knows that now.
And it's never been used to the extent that it's been used on this last election.
To highlight just a few examples, the day before election, Quinnipiac, which was wrong on every occasion that I know of, had Joe Biden up by five points in Florida, and they were off by 8.4 points. And I won Florida easily, easily. So, they had me losing Florida by a lot, and I ended up winning Florida by a lot. Other than that, they were very accurate.
They had him up four points in Ohio. And they were off by 12.2 points. And I also won Ohio, the great state of Ohio, very easily.
"The Washington Post" had Biden up 17 points in Wisconsin, and it was basically even. They were off by about 17 points. And they knew that. They're not stupid people. They knew that. Suppression.
There are now only a few states yet to be decided in the presidential race. The voting apparatus of those states are run in all cases by Democrats. We were winning in all the key locations by a lot, actually. And then our numbers started miraculously getting whittled away in secret, and they wouldn't allow legally permissible observers.
We went to court in a couple of instances, and we were able to get the observers put in. And when the observers got there, they wanted them 60, 70 feet away, 80 feet, 100 feet away, or outside the building to observe people inside the building.
And we won a case, a big case. And we have others happening. There are a lot of -- lots of litigation, even beyond our litigation. There's tremendous amount of litigation generally because of how unfair this process was.
And I predicted that. I have been talking about mail-in voting for a long time. It's really destroyed our system. It's a corrupt system. And it makes people corrupt, even if they aren't by nature, but they become corrupt. It's too easy.
They want to find out how many votes they need, and then they seem to be able to find them. They wait and wait, and then they find them. And you see that on election night. We were ahead in vote in North Carolina by a lot, a tremendous number of votes, and we're still ahead by a lot, but not as many, because they're finding ballots all of a sudden. Oh, we have some mail-in ballots. It's amazing how those mail-in
ballots are so one-sided too. I know that it's supposed to be to the advantage of the Democrats. But, in all cases, they're so one-sided.
We were up by nearly 700,000 votes in Pennsylvania. I won Pennsylvania by a lot. And that gets whittled down to, I think they said now we're up by 90,000 votes. And they will keep coming and coming and coming. They find them all over. And they don't want us to have any observers, although we won a court case. The judge said you have to have observers.
Likewise, in Georgia -- and they're appealing. Actually, they're appealing. We won a case that we want people to watch, and we want observers. And they're actually appealing, which is sort of interesting. I wonder why they would appeal. All we want to do is have people watch as they do the vote tabulations.
Likewise, in Georgia, I won by a lot, a lot, with a lead of over getting close to 300,000 votes on election night in Georgia. And by, the way, it got whittled down. And now it's getting to be to a point where I will go from winning by a lot to perhaps being even down a little bit.
In Georgia, a pipe burst in a faraway location, totally unrelated to the location of what was happening. And they stopped counting for four hours. And a lot of things happened. The election apparatus in Georgia is run by Democrats.
We also had margins of 300,000 in Michigan. We were way up in Michigan, won the state. And, in Wisconsin, we did, likewise, fantastically well, and that got whittled down. Every -- in every case, they got whittled down.
Today, we're on track to win Arizona. We only need to carry, I guess, 55 percent of the remaining vote, 55 percent margins. And that's a margin that we have significantly exceeded. So, we will see what happens with that, but we're on track to do OK in Arizona.
[18:55:04]
Our goal is to defend the integrity of the election. We will not allow the corruption to steal such an important election, or any election, for that matter. And we can't allow silence -- of anybody to silence our voters and manufacture results.
I have never had -- I have been doing a lot of public things for a long time. I have never done anything that's been as inspirational, by people calling, talking, sending things to us. I have never seen such love and such affection and such spirit as I have seen for this.
People know what's happening. And they see what's happening. And it's before their eyes. And there are many instances which will be reported very shortly. There's tremendous litigation going on. And this is a case where they're trying to steal an election. They're trying to rig an election. And we can't let that happen. Detroit and Philadelphia, known as two of the most corrupt political places anywhere in our country, easily, cannot be responsible for engineering the outcome of a presidential race, a very important presidential race.
In Pennsylvania, Democrats have gone to the state Supreme Court to try and ban our election observers, and very strongly. Now, we won the case, but they're going forward. They don't want anybody in there. They don't want anybody watching them as they count the ballots.
And I can't imagine why. There's absolutely no legitimate reason why they would not want to have people watching this process, because, if it's straight, they would be -- they should be proud of it. Instead, they're trying, obviously, to commit fraud. There's no question about that.
In Philadelphia, observers have been kept far away, very far away, so far that people are using binoculars to try and see. And there's been tremendous problems caused. They put paper on all of the windows, so you can't see in.
And the people that are banned are very unhappy and become somewhat violent.
The 11th Circuit ruled that, in Georgia, the votes have been in by Election Day, that they should be in by Election Day, and they weren't. Votes are coming in after Election Day. And they had a ruling already that you have to have the votes in by Election Day.
To the best of my knowledge, votes should be in by Election Day. And they didn't do that.
Democrat officials never believed they could win this election honestly. I really believe that. That's why they did the mail-in ballots, where there's tremendous corruption and fraud going on. That's why they mailed out tens of millions of unsolicited ballots without any verification measures whatsoever.
And I have told everybody that these things would happen, because I have seen it happen. I watched a lot of different elections before they decided to go with this big, massive election, with tens of millions of ballots going out to everybody, in many cases totally unsolicited.
This was unprecedented in American history. This was by design. Despite years of claiming to care about the election security, they refused to include any requirement to verify signatures, identities or even determine whether they're eligible or ineligible to vote.
People are walking in there. They have no idea. They're just taking numbers. They're writing down things, the workers, and doing a lot of bad things. And we have a lot of information coming and litigation that you will see that will shake even you people up. And you have seen it all.
The officials overseeing the counting in Pennsylvania and other key states are all part of a corrupt Democrat machine that you have written about. And, for a long time, you have been writing about the corrupt Democrat machine.
I went to school there, and I know a lot about it. It has not changed since a long time ago. It hasn't changed. It's gotten worse.
In Pennsylvania, partisan Democrats have allowed ballots in the state to be received three days after the election, and we think much more than that, and they are counting those without even postmarks or any identification whatsoever.
So, you don't have postmarks. You don't have identification. There have been a number of disturbing irregularities across the nation. Our campaign has been denied access to observe any counting in Detroit. Detroit is another place, and I wouldn't say has the best reputation for election integrity.
Poll workers in Michigan were duplicating ballots. But, when our observers attempted to challenge the activity, those poll workers jumped in front of the volunteers to block their view, so that they couldn't see what they were doing. And it became a little bit dangerous.
[19:00:07]
One major hub for counting ballots in Detroit covered up the windows, again, with large pieces of cardboard.
