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Violent Classroom Arrest Sparks Outrage; Republican Leaders, White House Reach Budget Deal; Poll: Carson Opens Double-Digit Lead Over Trump in Iowa; U.S. Navy Destroyer Sails by Chinese-Built Island. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired October 27, 2015 - 06:00   ET

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


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: First thing, I don't see the beginning of the video.

[05:58:47] UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is a teenage girl.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It makes you a little bit afraid of what is actually happening within our schools.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Would I have done it the same way? No.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Defiance is a part of what makes teenagers, teenagers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why is Ben Carson gaining momentum in Iowa?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Carson officially knocked Trump from his perch.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Carson has played this brilliantly. He has not gloated with polls.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Carson is lower energy than Bush. I don't get it!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ISIS fighters often go at night to that building just over there.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: On the frontlines in Syria.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who trained you how to use this?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota and Michaela Pereira.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, October 27, 6 a.m. in the East.

Now, up first, you're going to have to see this to believe it. I cannot describe what happened in this violent classroom confrontation between a cop and a high schooler adequately, but I'll tell you this: it has triggered outrage in South Carolina, and videos of the incident are going viral everywhere.

They capture a school resource officer, which is really a cop, pulling a female student from her seat, body slamming her in front of the class. You will watch; we will discuss; you can decide. Here's a taste.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: So there's the officer dragging the student across the classroom while other students are watching. Then she is restrained and arrested. That officer now placed on administrative leave by the sheriff's department. Some in the community demanding that he be fired.

So let's begin our coverage with CNN's national correspondent, Jason Carroll. Jason, what do we know?

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, guys, look, no matter what, no matter what the circumstances, this video is very disturbing, very troubling to look at. As you say, a number of folks there in the community asking for this officer to be fired.

Just as the video starts, you can hear the deputy say, "You're going to come with me or I'm going to make you." Then things got physical.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OFFICER BEN FIELDS, SOUTH CAROLINA SCHOOL POLICE OFFICER: Either you're going to come with me or I'm going to make you.

CARROLL (voice-over): South Carolina school police officer Ben Fields, seen here, is on administrative leave this morning after his violent takedown of a high school student was caught on camera Monday afternoon. You can see the sheriff's deputy tossing a female student to the ground after she refused to get up from her desk, then throwing her across the classroom floor.

FIELDS: Give me your hands. Give me your hands.

LT. CURTIS WILSON, RICHLAND COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: We don't anyone to rush to judgment, but we also feel that the video was very, very disturbing.

CARROLL: According to police, the Richland County student was asked to leave the classroom. When she refused, Fields was called in to arrest her for disturbing class.

School officials say the video is, quote, "extremely disturbing," and has banned the deputy from all district schools, pending an investigation. The sheriff's department, who's also looking into the matter, says it's still unclear what happened before the camera started rolling.

WILSON: We'll have to look at this in its totality to understand exactly what happened. Is this a pattern? Is this something that he's done before?

CARROLL: The deputy has been the subject of two lawsuits in the last ten years. In 2007, a couple claimed he used excessive force in questioning them about a noise complaint. The husband says Fields slammed him to the ground, cuffed him, and began kicking him, but the jury ruled in Fields' favor in 2010.

In 2013, a student claimed Fields falsely accused the teen of being involved in a gang, the school expelling him. That lawsuit is ongoing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When you see a video like what we've seen earlier today, it certainly alarms you and makes you a little bit afraid of what is actually happening within our schools.

CARROLL: The deputy has been working for the school district for seven years and was recently awarded the Culture of Excellence Award in 2014 for proving to be what they say was an exceptional role model to the students.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CARROLL: And that deputy has not responded to CNN's request for an interview. The girl that he arrested was not hurt during the arrest. She faces a charge of disturbing schools -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right, Jason, appreciate it.

Now one of the reasons this matters is, as you may know, there's actually a push to have more police officers involved in schools, because of what we fear about mass shootings. So it's important to take a look at how it works and how it doesn't.

Let's take a look at it again right now with Harry Houck. You know him, friend of show, CNN law enforcement analyst and a former NYPD detective. Live from Dallas, Mr. Marc Lamont Hill, CNN political commentator and a professor at Morehouse college.

Professor, Harry, good to have you both here.

HARRY HOUCK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Good morning.

MARC LAMONT HILL, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Good to be here.

CUOMO: All right. So let's look at it again, because everything is going to grow out of what actually happens.

He is called to the classroom. He is already in the school. We'll talk about why you would have him called to a classroom and what should really be done, but here's what happens. OK. Let's take a look at it.

He comes in. We know there is a "get out of the chair or I take you out of the chair." We know that there is resistance to that suggestion and then this ensues is, OK? So that's this part.

Then there's this part, what happens at the end of this necessary or unnecessary taking from the chair.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FIELDS: Get your hands behind your back. Give me your hands. Give me your hands. Give me your hands. Let me see your hands. Let me see your hands.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's nobody getting...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: All right, "Give me your hands, give me your hands, give me your hands." Got the knee on the back. He's taking her down, as you would any really violent assailant that you just chased through the streets after she took an old lady's bag and hit her over the head with a brick. That's what he's doing here.

So let's look at the -- we have general issues here, Harry, right? When should you have a cop? What happens when you call a cop? What's going on in these schools with discipline. All true, true, true. But start with the specific. Give me the best defense for what this guy is doing in these circumstances.

HOUCK: OK. First of all, let me tell you, there's a police officer in that school for a reason. A lot of violent gang activity in that school, all right?

Now, this officer's called to the classroom because this student will not leave the classroom. Apparently, the teacher had some kind of a problem. Now, a teacher is supposedly trained on how to handle children like this, calls the police, for the officer to come in.

[06:05:07] The officer tells her twice to get out of the chair. She won't get out of the car -- of the chair, all right? Therefore, we have this altercation here, which she does not get really hurt in. The officer pulls her out, handcuffs her, all right, and that's it. Can the officer do that? Yes, he can do that.

CUOMO: Why?

HOUCK: Because you failed to comply. You are under arrest. You're failing to comply now. All right? So the officer can use whatever force is necessary to affect an arrest.

Now, it looks really bad. Like, a lot of videos we've sat here and talked about before in the past, how bad the video looks. She did not get hurt, all right. So apparently the officer did it in a way where she could not get hurt. It just looks bad in the video.

CUOMO: Harry, if you get called to this classroom and this kid says, "I'm not getting out of the room," what do you do? "I'm not getting out of the chair. I'm not doing it."

HOUCK: You pull her out of the chair.

CUOMO: And as you pull... HOUCK: He asked her twice.

CUOMO: ... and she's not letting go, then what do you do?

HOUCK: You pull her out of the chair and...

CUOMO: Like this?

HOUCK: Yes, exactly. That's exactly what you do. What are you supposed to do? Stand around and wait for her to get out of the chair?

CUOMO: No. I think that you have to try -- let me answer. Marc, what do you do in this situation? You get called to the classroom. You're a police officer. The teacher says, "I can't control this kid."

You say, "Get out of the chair."

She says, no. Now what?

HILL: Well, before we get to the point where the police officer is called, Chris, I mean, I think that's part of the problem that we have to analyze, right.

CUOMO: But that's the general bigger issue. I wanted to deal with this in the specific, first.

HILL: In this specific instance, this child was criminalized. This child -- let me answer a question first. This child was criminalized when -- when the police officer was called for classroom management. We're outsourcing classroom management...

CUOMO: Yes.

HILL: ... to the police now. That is part of the problem in this case. Not in the abstract or in the general. I'm saying in this case.

CUOMO: I hear you. You've made that point before. But remember this. Keep your head...

HILL: Going to keep prohibiting (ph).

CUOMO: I understand. That's why you want to look at it in the specific and the general. When people see this video, they don't think policy. They think, how was this necessary in this circumstance?

So when you see this, and you hear what Harry is saying and you've gotten to know Harry, you understand that it's always coming from a place of reality, when you see how the officer addresses the specific, what do you see as the criticism?

HILL: The fact -- how quickly he went from 0 to 60 in terms of the use of force, the type of force that was used. For example, and I don't support any use of force against this child, but for example, what would be the difference between grabbing the desk and pulling the desk forward, not putting a hand on the child's body, and physically taking the child, slamming her to the ground and putting his knee in her back.

And to say, well, it wasn't that bad because she wasn't hurt is unreasonable. That's not the standard of whether use of force was reasonable or not in a classroom.

CUOMO: Yes. Why didn't he just take the desk out?

HOUCK: It is a problem. It's just failure to comply. In all these cases here, people don't listen to the police when they're given a command. You must comply.

And then Marc's -- Marc's giving people the impression that you don't have to comply to police officers.

HILL: Not at all.

HOUCK: And that's why we're having a lot of incidents. You're giving that impression, Marc, every time I speak to you. You always have a problem, you know, talking about an officer's use of force.

And I'm telling you, it's a result of a failure to comply. If that girl got out of the car -- got out of the seat when she was told, there'd be no problem. But apparently, she had no respect for the school, no respect for her teacher, probably has no respect at home or on the street, and that's why she acted the way she did.

HILL: So Harry -- but here's my problem. Let's go reductio ad absurdum. Let's take this to the most extreme example.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: ... reasoning. Professors love that phrase. Go ahead.

HILL: What if he had shot and killed her, right? Well, we say, well, she should have complied...

HOUCK: He didn't shoot and kill her.

HILL: I know, harry, but that's why it's an example. I preface that. Just listen for ten seconds.

HOUCK: No. It's a lousy example.

CUOMO: All right, all right. He's taking to it the extreme to see if it makes more sense that way. Go ahead.

HILL: So if you understand -- thank you. If you were to shoot and kill her, we, of course, would say, well, that's too much. You couldn't just say, well, she didn't comply, so whatever happens happened. So obviously, there is a limit to what a police officer can do, even if someone doesn't comply. We both agree shooting would be too much. I'm saying let's take

it down the line. Would punching her be too much? Of course. And I'm saying if we take it down to drag her out of a chair and choke slamming her like a pro wrestler, I'm saying that also is too much. There are other things in between talking nicely and sweetly and slamming someone to the ground that a police officer can do.

But lastly, Chris, I disagree with the premise that what I began with was unnecessary for the conversation. I'm saying everybody here is complicit in terms of the school. Not just the officer, but this teacher who thinks it's necessary, and a system that think it's necessary to have police officers handle classroom management for everyday children.

CUOMO: I understand that.

HILL: We're criminalizing it.

CUOMO: I understand that. What I'm saying is we're getting ahead of the conversation. You have to look at this for what it is here, see whether or not it makes sense, and now we get to this; and we end this part of this conversation. We'll keep talking about this. It happens too often with, yes, maybe you can make a very good argument that a cop in the school makes the school safer, if there's a God forbid, if there's a mass shooter, if there's something deranged, if there is prolific gang activity. Cops are cops; teachers are not cops.

[06:10:04] But the idea that this is not a gang breakout in the middle of class, right? Where there's blue and red.

HOUCK: Right.

CUOMO: So this lady says, "You better shut up when I talk to you. When I ask you where your homework was." Because the school's not telling us what happened.

HOUCK: Right.

CUOMO: And believe me, that's not a coincidence. So why would you use a police officer in a circumstance like this, in an educational environment.

HOUCK: I don't like it. I don't like it at all.

CUOMO: They call him a resource woman, but...

HOUCK: The bottom line is a police officer should not be used, like Marc said, to discipline children in school. The fact that, you know, if I was a police, I would not have done it this way, let's say. All right? If I was the officer that responded to this, I would have went to the principal and said, did that child commit a crime? If they commit a crime, then I'll take action.

CUOMO: No, she won't listen to me. HOUCK: Now, if you tell me that that's not a crime, OK, I would

have said, "I'm not going in there. I'll see you later, good-bye. This is not a police incident." All right?

But now the school, they're turning around now. They're against the officer. They're the ones who called them in. Those people in the school are the ones who are supposed to know how to handle these kids. We're police officers. We know how to handle crime. We get called into a certain situation, we're going to react a certain way, all right?

And that school shooting, but they didn't want to be the bad guy. They wanted the cop to be the bad guy. And that's why this happened.

HILL: There's also -- there's also the option of not acting a certain way, right? We could make different choices about how we intervene in classrooms. I agree with you...

HOUCK: You're not a cop, Marc. You've never faced anything like this on the street, OK? And that's exactly what I'm saying about.

HILL: Right. And you've never been a classroom teacher, and I have.

HOUCK: Right.

HILL: So we both can speak from respective circumstances. What I'm saying is, as a citizen, as a father, as a reasonable person, I'm saying that that child didn't need to be slammed and choked. And that, just because you don't comply with police officer's instructions, that should not open you up to the full range of violent possibilities of the state or of law enforcement, more specifically.

CUOMO: Right. But the reality is...

HILL: There have to be better choices.

CUOMO: The reality is that, just to sum up his part of it, once you create the dynamic of -- of adversarial relations with a cop, we know which way it's going to go. It never ends well.

But this wasn't a student -- this was a student. This was in a classroom. This was in a different context. That's why we need to have the conversation.

Professor Hill, thank you very much. Good to have you.

Harry Houck, don't look at me like that.

HOUCK: Thank you, host, Chris.

CUOMO: All right. We will keep this conversation coming up. Coming up in our 8 a.m. hour, we're going to talk to Victoria Middleton. Now, she's the executive director of the ACLU of South Carolina. We'll get her perspective on this, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Chris.

Breaking overnight, news to tell you about. House Republican leader striking a budget deal with the White House to avert a government shutdown.

CNN's Michelle Kosinski joins us live from the White House with details on the deal and the reaction. What do we know, Michelle?

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Alisyn.

Right, this is the budget, that important thing that nobody wants to hear about until it affects the things that you like. Right? Well, before anybody's eyes glaze over, this is made all the more important now, because the U.S. could default on its debt in a matter of days.

And a few weeks later, the government could shut down when funding runs out. Republicans don't want to raise the debt limit or fund what the government has already spent unless there are cuts to offset it.

And Democrats in the White House don't want to cut certain things, and they don't want to keep the government at those stick sequester spending limits.

But now, Republicans and Democrats, in the House and Senate, seem to have come together to craft that most endangered of Washington creatures, the compromise.

This would be a two-year plan. It would raise the debt limit. It would lift some spending caps on both defense and domestic spending. And it would offset that with things like spending or selling some of the strategic petroleum reserves.

There are expected to be some changes to Social Security and Medicare. And the sequester limits do stay in effect for the next ten years. So any raises in spending as part of this plan are seen as temporary.

Now this isn't a done deal yet, but we could see something come to a vote as soon as Wednesday -- Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right. Stick with CNN. We'll watch that with you. Michelle, thanks so much.

Well, Donald Trump is feeling the heat in Iowa. A new Monmouth University poll showing Dr. Ben Carson expanding his lead over Donald Trump by double digits. CNN senior Washington correspondent Joe Johns tracking this big turnaround for us -- Joe.

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Michaela.

The latest Monmouth University poll does show Dr. Ben Carson out to a double-digit lead in the race for the nomination in the first in the nation caucus state of Iowa. The third poll showing Trump trailing in that state. Carson at 32 percent, Trump in second place at 18 percent.

A substantial shift from the last time the poll was taken in August. At that time, the top two candidates were just about in a dead heat.

The second-tier candidates in the Monmouth poll shows Republican senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio tied at ten apiece and former Florida governor, Jeb Bush, just a couple clicks behind at 8 percent.

Also a big dip in the poll for the only woman in the race for the Republican nomination, Carly Fiorina.

[06:15:00] So what is the reason for Ben Carson's surprising showing? The poll suggests evangelical Christians, as we knew, in Iowa, continue to throw their support behind him, and support for Trump, in that very same group, appears to have dipped just a bit.

But if you look a little closer, Carson has also picked up even more support among non-evangelical Republicans, as well, even among liberal and moderate Republicans, showing a 17-point lead for Dr. Ben Carson in the state of Iowa.

Now, it's certainly not all bad news for Trump. He does appear to be doing much better in polls in the first-of-the-nation primary state of New Hampshire, where he appeared Monday. So we've still got a long way to go. Chris, back to you.

CUOMO: It's true. Joe, you know, it smells like organizing on the ground must be the difference, but we know that that is not Dr. Ben Carson's strategy so far. He's much more online than he is on the ground, so we'll figure it out in our next segment. Joe, thank you very much.

We also have breaking news for you this morning. A warning from China after a U.S. Navy destroyer sails within 12 nautical miles of this artificial island in these contested waters off the South China Sea. Now, China calls the maneuver illegal, insisting it does not intend to militarize the island. The U.S., however, not so sure.

CNN's Will Ripley is live at the Yokosuka Naval Base in Japan with the latest. Will, what is the warning?

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the warning is simple. China says if the United States continues to do these freedom of navigation patrols, which the U.S. says are totally compliant with international law, even though China says they're illegal. China is even promising to perhaps build up their infrastructure on these man- made islands even further.

Now, the USS Lassen, which is actually based at this naval base here where I am, it was headed towards these domestic disputed islands in the South China Sea. Take a look at these satellite images. You can see the Chinese essentially beat them up over coral reefs. There's an airstrip; there's docking ports.

And these are -- these are concerning, because some have actually called them unsinkable aircraft carriers, if China did decide to militarize and to put military hardware in this area. You can see the location. It's a strategic location. It's a vital economic trade route with trillions of dollars of trade passing through every year. Six hundred miles from mainland China, and yet the Chinese military is a regular presence there, as CNN's Jim Sciutto found out when he was on patrol in May, flying over these artificial islands. Listen to the Chinese military, the warning they gave.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Foreign military aircraft, this is Chinese navy. You are approaching our military alert zone. Leave immediately.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the Chinese navy. This is the Chinese navy. Please go away quickly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RIPLEY: Very harsh words from the Chinese foreign ministry saying, quote, "If relevant parties insist on creating tensions in the region and making trouble out of nothing, it may force China to draw the conclusion that we need to strengthen and hasten the buildup of our relevant capabilities. I advise the U.S. not to create such a self-fulfilling prophesy." That a spokesperson for the Chinese foreign ministry, the U.S. saying these patrols will continue. This situation could certainly escalate -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Will, thanks so much for explaining that.

Another story about mounting tension. In a sign of frustration with the war on ISIS, "The Washington Post" reporting that President Obama and his national security, his senior advisers, are considering a plan to move U.S. troops closer to the front lines in Syria and Iraq. The action would put boots on the ground in Syria for the first time and also positions U.S. advisers closer to the combat zones. This move would require formal approval from President Obama and could come as earlier as this week.

PEREIRA: Twenty-five-year-old Adacia Chambers, who allegedly plowed her car into spectators at the Oklahoma State University homecoming parade, she's being held on $1 million bail. She faces four counts of second-degree murder. Court documents reveal that Chambers told investigators she had attempted suicide several times and was suicidal at the time of the crash. A judge has now ordered a psychiatric evaluation.

CAMEROTA: Well, with his poll numbers sinking and his staff salaries being slashed, what is Jeb Bush to do? He's huddling in Houston with family members. He's hoping to refocus his troubled campaign. We have the inside scoop on what happened during that meeting and his new plan.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:23:32] CAMEROTA: A little bit of breaking news to tell you about, because there's been a breakthrough bipartisan budget deal that was reached on Capitol Hill. Congress tentatively avoiding a government shutdown in the process. But many Republicans are furious. We also have lots of campaign news to discuss.

So let's bring in CNN's senior political analyst and editorial director for "The National Journal," Ron Brownstein; and CNN political commentator and political anchor at New York One, Errol Louis. Gentleman, great to have you.

Ron, what are they doing? They passed it before the 11th hour.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Normally, they wait until midnight the night before it expires. Why are they two weeks ahead of the game?

BROWNSTEIN: This is that mythical unicorn Washington beast. A reasonable, pretty reasonable bipartisan compromise that will raise the debt ceiling, eliminate the threat of a government shutdown, make concessions to both sides, probably pass with a center-out coalition in each house. And also, along the way, kind of generationally rebalance the federal budget in the sense of constraining entitlements to put some more money into the discretionary spending that goes more towards young people and the productivity of future generations.

So all in all, kind of a striking final act by John Boehner. Worth noting, nine times before, he has violated the Hastert rule, so- called Hastert rule in past bills, that a majority of Republicans oppose. This might be the tenth, but they might also get a majority in both parties, in both chambers for this legislation. We haven't seen that in a long time.

CUOMO: Ironic, that which helped push him out is what wound up bringing it together. It shows the need for compromise and to avoid brinksmanship.

However, let's go to what's making the GOP upset. Part of it is fallacy, part of it is fact, Errol. The fallacy is that, the optics are when you keep raising this debt ceiling, it makes us seem like we're weak and we're spending too much money. That's the fallacy, right? Because raising the debt ceiling has nothing to do with how much you can spend. It's how much you've already spent.

[06:25:08] CAMEROTA: But they have added new spending into this one. Haven't they?

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, they have. They've added...

CUOMO: But that has nothing to do with the debt ceiling.

BROWNSTEIN: Well, they've shifted (ph) from entitlement spending to discretionary spending.

LOUIS: Right. They've shifted some in the domestic programs and increased the military spending and there's a special war budget, which is for entirely separate reasons, a little disturbing.

But yes, they're making clear that they want to sort of move forward. I think what's key here is that a lot of this was negotiated by staff members. You know, when you take the politicians out of the room, it's amazing what can get done. They said that the legislative leaders and the president did not meet, you know, and those have been sort of tense meetings in the past.

And so you can actually get some of this stuff done; and it is, in part, I think a reputation of this notion that Washington never works, Washington can't work. Washington apparently can work.

CAMEROTA: All right, let's talk about the campaign trail, shall we, speaking of working?

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Ben Carson in the third poll now, in Iowa, has leapfrogged over Donald Trump. Let me put up -- this is the Monmouth University poll. It was out yesterday. Ben Carson is now at 32 percent. He's up from 23 percent just in August, and Donald Trump is at 18 percent. In other words, a 14-point lead for Ben Carson.

Also, while we're at it, Rubio has also doubled his support. What do you see here, Ron?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, first of all, the winner of evangelicals usually wins the Iowa Republican caucus. They're almost 60 percent of the vote. Rick Santorum in 2012, Mike Huckabee in 2008, they won evangelicals. They lost non-evangelicals, which foreshadowed the problems they had growing into full-scale candidates.

But in each case, they won evangelicals, and that was enough to win Iowa. This is the first poll that shows Carson not only winning evangelicals but winning non-evangelicals.

CAMEROTA: Let's put that up on the screen.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Because that is significant. The non-evangelicals, Carson gets 28 percent to Trump's 19.

BROWNSTEIN: Other surveys have not found this, so we'll have to see if this is a real development. But in the end, look, I mean, I think Carson has the potential to do what we've seen before, which was consolidate a lot of evangelical support and be a very formidable opponent in Iowa.

I think he faces a challenge with some of his views on Medicare and other issues that I think we're going to hear a lot about at the debate tomorrow night. Sixty percent of Republican voters in 2012 were over 50. This is an older electorate. And I think you're going to see, I think, Donald Trump going at Carson now from the left on entitlements and from the right on immigration simultaneously.

CUOMO: Errol, look, two things. One, who was the last person to win Iowa and also win the nomination or the election?

BROWNSTEIN: George W.

LOUIS: George W. Bush.

CUOMO: It's a very long time ago. So it's not a guarantee of success, but look, it's a good step for a guy that nobody expected to be taking a step like this.

So now he gets the deeper scrutiny, which is what Ron is referring to. The idea of shifting your position on something like Medicare. His answer to our friend, Chris Wallace, on FOX on Sunday was, "Hey, I'm not a politician. Don't judge me by my ability to change once I start to talk to people who know what they're talking about and change my mind." Is that enough?

LOUIS: Well, it's a reasonable thing to say if you're not a politician. But I think it really sort of -- sort of spotlights the fact that you've got this dual Republican primary going on. You've got the outsiders and the insiders. The outsiders can always fall back on that and say, "Well, I'm not really a politician." So...

CUOMO: But is that outsider-insider, or is that a leadership vision thing?

LOUIS: Well, no, I think -- I think it is, I mean -- it's a convenient excuse that professional politicians never try -- or try never to resort to. What a professional politician will say, "I thought this through. I'm going to be consistent. I have some principles. I have a track record. I don't mind being examined, you know, as far as where that track record will take me."

And if you're brand-new to this game, if you're Carson, if you're Trump, you don't have to do any of that stuff. And I think the voters are going to have to decide which style of leadership they actually prefer.

CAMEROTA: I want to get to Jeb Bush.

LOUIS: Right.

CAMEROTA: Because Jeb Bush has had this retreat with his donors and supporters and family; and a lot has come out about what's gone on there. But what he talked about was the difference between himself and Marco Rubio. And in fact, they put up a PowerPoint presentation, because nothing says fresh and new like PowerPoint presentations.

CUOMO: No.

CAMEROTA: About how Marco Rubio is really just a GOP Obama. Let me read to what he told -- what Bush told his supporters.

"Marco has not received a single endorsement for a fellow U.S. senator. Governor Bush has been endorsed by three of them, as well as 20 House members." But he's saying that Marco Rubio has a strikingly similar profile to Obama: first-term senators, lawyers and university lecturers; served in part-time state legislatures for eight years; had few legislative accomplishments; hasn't shown much interest in the process of advancing legislation and getting results.

Ron, this fired up his supporters...

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: ... we're told, by people in the room.

BROWNSTEIN: First of all, nothing says -- nothing says fresh and new like retreat to advance, also. And that's the other -- the other part of it.

Look, this is a reality, as Errol said. This is a reflection of the fact that there really are two Republican races going on. I mean, I would phrase it differently than insider/outsider. You have Donald Trump, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz and some of the others appealing to that conservative, mostly blue-collar vote.

And then you have a group which is Bush, Rubio at the top, Kasich and Christie a little behind, who are...