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EARLY START

Trump Pledges Allegiance to Republican Party; Biden Talks 2016 Presidential Race; Clerk Jailed for Refusing Gay Marriages; Migrant Crisis Overwhelms Europe. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired September 4, 2015 - 04:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:30:49] CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Donald Trump pledges his a allegiance to the Republican Party and the conservative principle for which it stands. Why he says now is the time.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN ANCHOR: Joe Biden at his most candid yet over whether or not he will join the race for president.

ROMANS: This Kentucky clerk lands in jail for refusing gay couples to marry. The new support she is getting from some of the presidential candidates.

Welcome back to EARLY START, this Friday morning. I'm Christine Romans.

KOSIK: And I'm Alison Kosik. It's half past the hour.

Donald Trump declaring his allegiance to the Republican Party and pulling further ahead in the polls. After declaring he would not sign a GOP loyalty pledge, the front running Trump did exactly that. So, why the sudden about face?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), 2016 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The best way forward for the Republicans to win is if I win the nomination and go directly against whoever they happen to put up. And for that reason, I have signed the pledge.

(CHEERS)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSIK: Look at this. Look at the latest Monmouth University poll, 30 percent is a new high for Trump.

For more on his decision to embrace the Republican Party, we turn to CNN's chief congressional Dana Bash.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I covered politics for some time. And I've never quite seen an event like what happened at Trump Tower, and that is the chairman of the party flying from Washington to go to the home turf of a candidate for president to convince him to sign a pledge to be a member of that party.

But this is the world of Donald Trump. And, of course, all of this is happening because Trump is relatively new to the GOP. He is doing extremely well. He's got his highest poll ratings nationally so far. And Republicans have been very worried that if he doesn't get the nomination that he could take the supporters he has, bolt the GOP, run as an independent and hand the White House to the Democrats.

So, the Republicans have been quietly trying to talk to Trump and try to convince him, to cajole him to get him to stay in the GOP, different from last month where he would not make that pledge. So, I asked, what changed? What makes him sign it now, when he didn't do it just a few weeks ago? Listen.

What changed over the last several weeks since you didn't want to raise your hand?

TRUMP: Well, I think the big thing, Dana, that's changed -- and it's been obvious to all. Number one, after I announced, we went up like a rocket ship. I think the thing that changed is the thing I went to the number one place quickly after I signed.

So, I think the biggest thing is that I went early to number one and the RNC has treated me with great respect.

BASH: Just to be clear, this pledge is not legally binding at all. He doesn't have to stick to it. But still, he said, he doesn't see a circumstance where he would tear up the pledge.

But Donald Trump, of all people, knows how unpredictable politics is and we know how unpredictable Donald Trump is.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: Yes, we do. Dana Bash, thank you for that, Dana.

Trump got testy on Thursday after being tripped up by Hugh Hewitt. Foreign policy was the topic. He confused the Kurds with the Middle Eastern force. He admitted he did not know the difference between Hamas and Hezbollah.

Listen to some of the exchange.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

HUGH HEWITT, RADIO HOST: On the front of the Islamist terrorism, I'm looking for the next commander-in-chief to know who Hasan Nasrallah is, and Zawahiri, and al-Julani and al-Baghdadi. Do you know the players with that scorecard, yet, Donald Trump?

TRUMP: No, you know, I'll tell you, honestly, by the time we get to office, they will all change. They'll be all gone. I knew you were going to ask me things like this and there's no reason because I'll find -- I will hopefully find General Douglas McArthur in the pack. I will find whoever it is that I find. And we'll -- but they're all, Hugh. You know, those are history questions. Do you know this one, do you know that one?

HEWITT: I don't believe in gotcha questions. I'm not trying to quiz you on who the worse guy in the world is?

[04:35:01] TRUMP: Well, that is a gotcha question. First day in office, or before then, right at the day after the election, I'll know more about it than you will ever know. That I can tell you.

HEWITT: I hope so. Last question, so the difference between Hezbollah and Hamas does not matter to you yet, but it will.

TRUMP: It will when it is appropriate. I will know more about it than you know, and believe me, it won't take me long.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

KOSIK: Jeb Bush talking tough about Donald Trump. He claims Trump is too pessimistic to lead the country, insisting Republicans will lose the 2016 election if wins the nomination. And Bush says he is not going to stand idly by when Trump attacks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEB BUSH (R), 2016 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm going to push back when he says things that are ugly that I think will damage our brand, damage our ability to be successful. I'm sure he's going to when he attacks me personally or disparages my family, damn right, I want to fight back.

No, I'm not going to participate in some reality TV show. I'm going to stay true to my beliefs.

(APPLAUSE)

Look, just -- I'm not personalizing this. I'm not personalizing. It doesn't have anything to do with him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSIK: Bush claims Trump is trying to insult his way to the White House and preying on people's angst and fears.

ROMANS: Vice President Joe Biden says he will not hesitate to run for president, but there are two factors that could stop him. Biden speaking at a synagogue in Atlanta saying he has to be confident that he can build a strong campaign that can raise enough money and he has to be sure he and his family are up to the challenge.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSEPH BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The most relevant factor in my decision is whether my family and I have the emotional energy to run. But unless I can go to my party and the American people and say that I am able to devote my whole heart and my whole soul to this endeavor, it would not be appropriate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSIK: Hillary Clinton's former deputy chief of staff at the State Department is set to face the House Select Committee on Benghazi today. Jake Sullivan is now the foreign policy adviser for Clinton's campaign. He is expected to be questioned behind closed doors about the 2012 attack in U.S. mission in Libya and Clinton's use of a private e-mail server.

On Thursday, Cheryl Mills appeared before that committee. The former State Department chief of staff reportedly told lawmakers no work-related e-mails have been withheld or destroyed to keep them from the public eye.

Clinton and Republican Marco Rubio will both be campaigning in Puerto Rico today. Puerto Rico does not vote for president, but whoever wins primaries is likely to gain support among Puerto Rican voters in places like New York and Florida.

ROMANS: Some other candidates are rallying behind embattled Kentucky clerk Kim Davis. She was ordered to jail. She is behind bars now for failing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Presidential candidates Rand Paul and Ted Cruz calling her imprisonment criminal.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX), 2016 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I stand with her and anyone else that the government is trying to persecute for standing up for their faith. This is fundamentally wrong and inconsistent with the First Amendment of the Constitution.

SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY), 2016 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think what's going to happen as a result of this is states and locations will opt out of the marriage business completely. Her heartfelt religious conviction is that this isn't kind of marriage that she approves of.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: This is the tweet from Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, asking voters to sign a free Kim Davis petition, insisting religious liberty should never be a crime in America.

And this from Rick Santorum, the former Pennsylvania governor or senator, rather, tweeting, "We should not have to choose between keeping our job and practicing our faith. Congress and states must pass First Amendment defense act now."

At least three GOP candidates, Chris Christie, Lindsey Graham, Carly Fiorina, they say Davis is obligated to carry out the law as a government employee despite her personal religious convictions.

KOSIK: So, it turns out Kim Davis could have stayed out of jail. The judge in her case told her she could go free if she gave her deputy clerks permission to issue same sex wedding licenses. Davis consulted with her attorneys and then refused.

We get more from CNN's Alexandra Field in Ashland, Kentucky.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kim Davis has been refusing to issue marriage licenses ever since the Supreme Court of the United States made a ruling earlier this summer, making same sex marriage part of the law of the land. Davis was forced to appear in a federal court here in Kentucky earlier this summer where she was ordered by a judge to issue those marriage licenses. But she has not complied. She is appealing the case.

In the meantime, she continued to refuse the issue licenses. Brought back to the same federal courthouse in Kentucky, a judge ruled she was in contempt of court.

[04:40:00] And then he ordered her remanded to the custody of the U.S. marshal. That decision surprising many in the courtroom who expected that Davis would simply be fined.

But the judge said that would not be enough to compel her to follow his orders which are to issue marriage licenses. While Davis is now in jail, the judge called six of her deputies to the stand. Five of them have now agreed to issue marriage licenses for Rowan County. An attorney representing Kim Davis was also brought back into the courtroom. However, he said that Davis would not authorize the clerks to do that.

Given that, the judge said the Kim Davis will have to remain in jail, but those deputy clerks can begin to issue those licenses to all couples, same sex and different sex couples as early as this morning.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Alexandra Field, thanks for that.

Time for an early start on your money this Friday morning. Looks like a tough end to the week for stocks. European stocks much lower. U.S. stock futures are down. That could change, of course, with the august jobs report due out later this morning.

That report could sway or influence the fed's decision on raising interest rates later this month. Jobs market in this country is changing. According to a new survey, 31 percent of workers consider themselves free agents. That includes contractors, freelancers, small business owners, temps, even moonlighters, 31 percent. A surprising majority said they chose this form of work. Only 10 percent said they were forced into it because of the economy.

We have seen a lot of changes over the last ten years. Some changes have been a couple decades in the making, but really interesting to see so many people in the gig economy, really.

KOSIKS: That's a good way to call it.

Significant new evidence in the search of three men suspected of killing an Illinois police officer. The new leads, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:45:17] ROMANS: Sacramento police searching for a gunman who opened fire at Sacramento City College, killing one person, badly wounding another, grazing a third person, all three were students at the college. The gunman fleeing on foot. Police say they believe the attack was an isolated incident, not a campus shooting spree.

KOSIK: Authorities in Illinois say they are making significant progress in the hunt for three suspected cop killers. They are now looking at footage from a nearby home security system looking for fresh leads in the case.

We get the latest from CNN's Ryan Young in Chicago.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The outpouring of emotion is still going on here in Fox Lake, but investigators are working around the clock. In fact, the commander tells us he has to tell the investigators to go home. One woman has been charged with the idea that she falsified a police report saying that she saw two suspects.

Now, police cleared that up, they did get a piece of solid information. They do believe there is home surveillance that may have cause three suspects running nearby. That video has been turned over to homeland security. More than 100 tips have come in to tip line, and two investigators are working just on emails and tip line phone calls. All this they believe will help them maybe catch the people involved in the vicious killing.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Ryan Young, thank you for that.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell would normally attend the Super Bowl champs first game of the season. But he won't be at the season opener for the Patriots next week in Foxboro. Quarterback Tom Brady will be. He scored a huge win over Goodell and the league after a federal judge vacated the four-game suspension over the deflategate scandal. The judge took issue with several ways Goodell handled the investigation and Patriot Nation is celebrating.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I said from the beginning it was a witch hunt against Brady. And I think the outcome is more than fair. I'm happy and I'm glad the judge put Goodell in his place a little bit.

UNIDENTIFIED BOY: So happy that Brady's free.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The NFL will try to have the decision overturned, but it will not keep Brady off the field during the appeals process.

KOSIK: A migrant crisis exploding in Europe. Leaders unable to agree how to solve it, leaving thousands homeless and stranded in the streets this morning. We are live with the new developments next.

(COMMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:51:12] KOSIK: A migrant crisis overwhelming Europe, and the images tell the story of desperation and disappointments. Thousands of men, women and children pouring in to Hungary from Syria and Iraq, trying to make their way to Germany. After a long standoff with authorities in Budapest, they were finally allowed to board a train, but were instead herded into camps.

CNN's senior international correspondent Frederik Pleitgen joins us live from Budapest this morning.

So, there are a lot of finger-pointing going on. You look at these images and you hear some of these officials like the Hungarian prime minister say look, don't criticize Hungary, but it's hard not to when you see these images.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, you're absolutely right. We have these images right here, Christine. As you can see, there are several of these migrants still cramped on that train, because one of the trains left the Budapest train station and stopped 20 miles after it left the train station, and since then, these people have been forced to stay.

They are refusing to leave the train because they don't want to be herded into camps because they say the conditions in the camps are so bad, that they simply can't exist in them. So, right now, they are refusing to get off. There's a lot of riot police, if we pan over here, you can see that there's a lot of riot police here on the tracks as well. They basically cordoned off the area. They are not letting us go to these people either.

So, it's very dire conditions. They have been telling us the conditions after 20 hours here on this track, are very, very bad on board that train. There's obviously very little food and water. They are also refusing to accept food and water from the Hungarian authorities. They say there's a lot of pregnant women, and also children on board.

We have seen some of the children. Again and again, they break out into these spontaneous protests here in front of us, in front of the media screaming "No Hungary, no Hungary. We want to go to Germany, saying no food, no camp. We don want to go to the camp."

It really is a very emotional situation where you can tell how frustrated many of these people are who have not only obviously been on these tracks for a very long time, but also made their way all the way from Syria through Turkey, through a lot of Europe to get here, only to be stopped a couple of miles away from where they want to go, which is Germany, Christine.

KOSIK: So, at this point, are they just waiting to hear from officials what to do next? They've been sitting there for hours and hour. They're just hours and hours waiting for these leaders of the European countries to make up their minds on what to do?

PLEITGEN: Yes. Basically that is what they are doing. They are saying they want to force the government here to allow them to go on to Germany, because what they've heard and what is happening is Germans are saying that any Syrians who come to Germany will not be sent back. They will be allowed to apply for asylum.

I was in Munich, in Germany, only a day ago. And there you could see the Germans ramping up their efforts in preparation to take in people like these. And they simply can't get through because they can't get out of Hungary.

Now, the Hungarians on their part are saying it is European law that the country that they first come into in Europe, that is where they have to register. For the time being, the Hungarians left refugees through. And that worked perfectly fine.

So, these people are saying they want to force the Hungarian authorities to allow them to go. The Hungarian authorities will not let them go any further. You have to get off the train and get on a bus and go to the camp and be registered. And the people are saying, by no means are we going to do that, because they say the conditions are so bad, Christine.

KOSIK: All right. Frederik Pleitgen, live from Budapest. Hopefully, something can happen there soon. Some of these people have been on the run for two months.

Arwa Damon interviewing one family on one of the trains. Two months. A woman with three kids, Christine.

ROMANS: What they left is horrific. When you think about what they left and just the last leg of the journey.

[04:55:00] This is the worst refugee crisis Europe has seen since World War II. But its laws are not up to the challenge.

Fifty-five minutes past the hour. Donald Trump says he would be the best jobs president ever. I'm going to give you a real breakdown of his job creation history, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: Good morning. Welcome back. I'm Christine Romans.

Let's get an early start on your money this Friday morning. Looks like an ugly end to the week for stocks so far. European shares are much lower. U.S. futures are down.

Of course, that could change depending on the August jobs report due out this morning. Economists surveyed by CNN Money predict 207,000 net jobs added last month, on part with the solid steady gains we have seen this year. The jobless rate expected to tick down to 5.2 percent. That would be the lowest jobless rate since the crash.

Donald Trump claiming he would be the greatest jobs president that God ever created. He also says he has created jobs as a businessman and he will do it on a bigger scale. So, how many jobs has he created? CNN Money finds 34,000 jobs to Trump.