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CNN NEWSROOM

Megyn Kelly And Donald Trump Rematch; Prince's Sister Files Papers In Minnesota Court Claiming The Artist Had No Will; Trump and Clinton Expecting A Night Of Victory. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired April 26, 2016 - 15:30   ET

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


(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[15:30:00] KELLY RIPA, HOST, LIVE WITH KELLY AND MICHAEL: This is a tremendous opportunity and I couldn't be and we couldn't be prouder of you and everything we accomplished together.

MICHAEL STRAHAN, HOST, LIVE WITH KELLY AND MICHAEL: I'm so happy you're back.

RIPA: Thank you.

STRAHAN: One thing I know about you and you love this show. You love the fans. You love the staff. I love you. And I am so happy you're here because you brought me here. And this show has -- is transforming for me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Joining me now, finally we get him, Dan Abrams. He is the founder of the popular news and opinion Web site mediaite.com. He is the former general manager of MSNBC.

Nice to have you here. Welcome.

DAN ABRAMS, FOUNDER, MEDIAITE: Great to be here.

BALDWIN: First of all, can I just say? I love Kelly Ripa. I loved how honest she was this morning. I found myself sort of shouting like respect. You go. You know?

ABRAMS: She had to do three things today. She had to make good with Michael, she had to make good with the network and she would make good with the audience.

BALDWIN: Yes.

ABRAMS: And she did all three. But basically saying the audience here is why I haven't been here for the last week is because I wanted to think about this. I want to say the right thing. She handled it perfectly. It was like she was one of the most underestimated talents on television. I was one of the 50 something people who tried out and didn't get the gig for Michael Strahan did. And she is so witty and so quick, she could be hosting any morning show in America. And I think she handled this perfectly. BALDWIN: So he was supposed to -- Michael Strahan was supposed to

leave in August. Now, I guess they moved it up to May. You know, we can't pretend like we can crawl into the minds of ABC execs and understand what's going on. But what do you make of all of that?

ABRAMS: Look. You know, I think that it was time, right? The announcements how has been made. GMA wants Michael there.

BALDWIN: Full-time.

ABRAMS: And you know, Kelly's probably ready to move on.

BALDWIN: Find her new co-pilot.

ABRAMS: Find a co-host and, you know, just makes more sense.

BALDWIN: Let's move on to Megyn Kelly. Megyn Kelly has landed after much ado and much tension with this guy, Donald Trump. You know?

ABRAMS: This guy.

BALDWIN: This guy. I think you have heard of him. And you know, reported when she walked in Trump tower sort of incognito I think to have a maybe, I don't know, a come to Jesus as we would say in the south with the man to try to land an interview. She has done so. But also this is in the wake of she said this just earlier this month.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MEGYN KELLY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR, THE KELLY FILE: That when the post mortem is done in the coverage of Donald Trump, wherever this race goes, let's make sure we are on the side of the angels. And I'm proud to tell you that our show has not taken those pressers, nothing to do with happened in the debate and even before the debate we had the policy. Yes, we all have to worry about numbers to some extent, if that is the reality of TV news in 2016. But we also have to worry about our souls and journalism.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Listen. I'm a huge Megyn Kelly fan, as well. But the whole what she said there and now they are going to promote the hell out of this interview.

ABRAMS: This isn't just an interview. This is now the Megyn Kelly/Donald Trump event, right?

BALDWIN: Event.

ABRAMS: Because, you know, ordinarily tell, it is a good get, right. They are going to have a good interview. This isn't just an interview now. This is a national event. Megyn Kelly and Donald Trump on stage for the first time since that great debate. This is going to be a great moment.

Look, I think that it's going to be a bit of a letdown. Right? I don't think there is going to be the sort of fireworks that people are hoping for. But this is -- let's be clear. This has been a great thing for Megyn Kelly. And I don't just mean because it's gotten her that much more famous, which it has, but it also means that every time someone's talking about Donald Trump attacking Megyn Kelly, they talk about how good Megyn Kelly is. And so, that's just such a net positive for Megyn Kelly in this context. And the fact that she got this interview, it all comes full circle.

BALDWIN: Donald Trump, cover of "Variety." do we have the shot? Let's show everyone. So this sort of artist rendering. The mascara, the lipstick, the hair. The hair drier, you know, the puff, powdering his nose. What -- what do you make of that?

ABRAMS: Look. Donald Trump has dictated the terms of this nomination process, right? I mean, he likes to say I'm just the one who is punching back. I'm a counterpuncher, is what Donald Trump says. But the reality is when it's Cruz or Kasich or Rubio or Bush throwing a political punch at Donald Trump, very often Donald Trump returns with a little bit of a sucker punch. And the truth is that's now what the campaign has become. Think about Rubio tried to do before he got out. He tried to play in that world, right.

BALDWIN: Didn't work.

ABRAMS: In that reality show world. And you can't do it unless you know how to play it. Donald Trump knows how to play it as well as anyone. And that has given him a huge advantage.

BALDWIN: So, is the cover is you get a message is I have played you?

ABRAMS: Well, it is that this campaign is like a reality show, right? And the reason for that is because Donald Trump has dictated the terms. You play on the reality show circuit. Donald Trump is going to win. You look at what happened to Jeb Bush, right? He seemed so uncomfortable because it was a different game. It wasn't the game Jeb Bush had been accustomed to playing, Brooke. This is a seasoned politician who has won a lot of election and yet, he couldn't seem to get out of his own way because Donald Trump changed all the rules. And I think that's a completely fair analysis of what's happened.

[15:35:14] BALDWIN: I think he changed the rules. I think some of what he's done will forever change the process from here on now. I'm just curious to see how the actual process itself, you know, all of his calling out the rig, the system, everything else, if anything changes from there post-November for now.

Dan Abrams, come back.

ABRAMS: Brooke, great to see you.

BALDWIN: Thank you so much. Thank you so much.

We do have some breaking news. Let me pivot to this. Investigators here have found a key piece of evidence that could reveal what caused that cargo ship "El Faro" to mysterious sink, killing everyone on board. So we are learning that soon the NTSB, the national transportation safety board, will announce that it has found the ship's data recorder. It sank near the Bahamas back in October, 33 people died. That data recorder could really hold the keys here, help investigators learn not only what caused the ship to sink but what the crews saying and doing as the tragedy unfolded.

Coming up next, polls close in just couple of hours from now and five crucial states in these primaries today including the state of Pennsylvania.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your prediction of how the state of Pennsylvania will go?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Definitely Trump. The only thing I'm worried about is that Cruz might steal their delegates. That would be --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here in the state?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. And that would be against the will of the people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Our political guru here at CNN aka political director David Chalian, he will join me live. We always want to talk to David. Three things he will be watching for tonight as the results come in. Stay with me.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:41:10] BALDWIN: Here we go. It is round four Super Tuesday. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton expecting a big night. One of five states holding primaries, Pennsylvania, the biggest prize. But the way it awards is Republican delegates is complicated. Whoever wins the popular vote automatically gets 17 delegates. The remaining 54, though, they are unbound, unpledged.

Pennsylvania Republicans have to choose them by name on today's ballot and some have said they will support a certain candidate but they can change their mind up, here is the thing, up until the July convention.

CNN's Michael Smerconish asked the Pennsylvanians who switch parties to both Republican this go around, what they think of this system.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN HOST, MICHAEL SMERCONISH SHOW: So there will be three delegates selected from each congressional district and they have absolutely no requirement to follow the will of the people. I think they should. Do you think they should? We agree, right? John, what are you thinking?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, I think at the end of the day I'm hoping and praying that Pennsylvanians are going to look and say, you know, do we want someone who is as crass and obnoxious as Donald Trump is? Or, are we going to look towards someone for civility in the White House and the guy like John Kasich?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Republicans have to decide do they want an outsider? Do they want an insider? Or do they want someone from another planet?

SMERCONISH: Jim?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Outsider and I think with a little help, I think it would another Ronald Reagan.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: God.

SMERCONISH: Mary Lou?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want a person for president whom I can honestly say Merry Christmas.

SMERCONISH: Why can't you say merry Christmas now? Who stands in your way of saying that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The government.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I registered for this election because I wanted to have fun. It's like a roller coaster just to be on that ride. Whether or not I vote for Trump, will come that, I'll literally make that decision in the voting booth. But if I do vote for him it will be so that he losses the general election.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: So, besides Pennsylvania, voters in Delaware, Maryland, Connecticut and Rhode Island, they are all voting today. Let's get the Chalian cheat sheet. CNN's political director David Chalian joins me live.

Hello, sir.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Happy primary day, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Happy primary day, David Chalian. What are the three things you should watch for tonight?

CHALIAN: First thing I am watching for is clean sweep on both sides. I'm watching to see if Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton can walk away with all five states voting tonight with victories in all five states. Now, you and I both know, we talk about it all the time and we will get to in it a moment. This is a delegate game. It is not about how many states you win, but there's obviously a psychological momentum affect to being able to walk away from tonight with all the states in your column and clearly both Trump and Clinton are on good turf and they may be able to do that, Trump perhaps a little bit more than Clinton. That's a first thing I'm watching for. The second thing I'm watching for is Democratic delegate distance.

After tonight, how far does Hillary Clinton pad her delegate total and the distance between her and Bernie Sanders? And what does that mean for how the Sanders operation sort of thinks through the rest of this primary season? Because if Hillary Clinton who already has a really significant and big delegate lead over Bernie Sanders adds to it, it's just going to create more conversation in Democratic circles about the Democratic end game. If indeed Hillary Clinton is going to emerge as the nominee, what does Bernie Sanders want? How does she woo his supporters? That conversation will continue and watch to see how that delegate gap grows tonight.

And then the third and final thing are those Pennsylvania 54 that you were just talking about at the top of the segment. This is unbelievable. These 54 delegates like those Democratic super delegates we talk about all the time. They can change their mind from now until they vote on the convention floor, but they are telling us and if you go online at CNN.com/politics you see a great story by a couple colleagues of mine who talked to nearly every single Pennsylvanian members running to be a delegate that are on the ballot today.

[15:45:21] BALDWIN: Wow.

CHALIAN: And many of them are saying they are going to go with the statewide winner or the winner of their congressional district. If that's the case and if the pre-election polling is right, Brooke, that may bode well for Donald Trump and give him a bid of an advantage with those free agents, those 54 delegates from Pennsylvania.

BALDWIN: Talked to one last hour and he was sort of saying the same. But it's what they're saying now, right? Things could change.

David Chalian, thank you very much.

CHALIAN: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Meantime, we have information here pivoting away from politics for a second about Prince's death. We know now that his sister says there's no evidence that Prince had a will. We will dig into the first court documents and what could be a long battle over the singer's multi-million dollar estate.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:50:29] BALDWIN: It is some breaking news about a quote/unquote "dangerous situation" for millions of people across the Midwest and the Great Plains. 3.5 million people are threatened by what forecasters are predicting will be a tornado outbreak. So that obviously means multiple tornadoes across multiple states, dark clouds already loom over here you have it Oklahoma City.

CNN meteorologist Chad Myers is tracking the latest models for us.

Chad Myers, what are you seeing? CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: I see the potential four tornadoes on

the ground, Brooke, from Nebraska through Texas. And this is going to go on even past midnight tonight. So even after dark. And those that are on the ground after dark are always the most dangerous because the lead time is a little bit shorter because they are not seen by this patter as quickly and probably asleep.

So, here's the big red zone all the way from about Kearney, Nebraska, down to Waco, Texas. That's where the big areas is. And we already have watches in effect. There was significant weather that just rolled through St. Louis. That was not a tornado event. The tornado event is in the two big red boxes here, from Carney and Grand Island down through Wichita, Oklahoma City all the way down to Altos. There is the first set of storms that rolled through St. Louis about an hour ago, now in the East St. Louis.

We are just now beginning to see the first line of storms pop up west of I-35. In fact, we have Rosa Flores here. She is out there looking at some of these storms. There is a big gray clouds on her live shot. They will be chasing all day long into parts of Wichita, all the way down I-35.

But this is what radar will look like in three hours, Brooke. An amazing event, will go from nothing to tornadoes and hail on the ground everywhere. And this is going to be an event that goes through evening hours back into Kansas City, back into Dallas, significant weather all in those cities. We will be here watching in for you and warning you whether live or on twitter. We will also be cutting in when we need to during the special event, obviously tonight, Super Tuesday number four -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: We will see you, Chad Myers. Thank you so much.

Coming up nest, Prince's sister just filed official court documents claiming that he had no will. We will talk to an estate lawyer coming up to discuss whether this could be the first step in a very long legal battle.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:56:40] BALDWIN: A fight over Prince's estate may just be beginning. We have learned this afternoon that the music icon's sister filed papers today in a Minnesota court saying that as far as she knows, he did not have a will. Prince's estate has reportedly valued at somewhere near $300 million, and there are all of the unreleased songs stored in his vault.

And estate attorney tells CNN that under Minnesota law, without a will, all of Prince's assets could go to his sister and six half- siblings. That attorney is my next guest. And she says this could be chaotic.

Danielle Mayoras is co-author of the book "Trails and Errors." Danielle, welcome.

DANIELLE MAYORAS, ESTATE ATTORNEY: Good to be here. BALDWIN: So what happens now?

MAYORAS: Time will tell. Just because the sister went to court and doesn't think there's a will doesn't mean that something won't turn up. And we have seen this happen in other cases before like Michael Jackson's estate, when his mom went to court thinking there was no will, and all of a sudden we learned there was a trust. So it's still possible that a trust will turn up and things might be different than what we expect right now.

BALDWIN: That's part of the issue, too. Apparently he and the sister were estranged for quite a while. So she may not be fully in the loop, perhaps he had a will, perhaps there was a trust. Who and could make claims to his estate, Danielle?

MAYORAS: Under Minnesota law, his sister and his half siblings would be the ones entitled to inherit if he doesn't have a will or a trust. And obviously that's a little sad because you know, everyone wants to control their legacy when they pass away. And this is a lot of money that people will profit from.

BALDWIN: I imagine people will come out of the woodwork, then you have ex-wives. How would a judge or whomever figure out who has a claim here?

MAYORAS: Well, it's pretty simple. If someone passes away and they don't have a will, then the state they live in has one waiting for them. And in the state of Minnesota, when someone passes away, and they don't have a spouse, and they don't have kids and they don't have living parents, then all of the money goes to their siblings. And Minnesota half-siblings are considered the same as full siblings. So we are looking at half-siblings as well as his full sister Tyka receiving his estate unless he did something that we are not aware of right now.

BALDWIN: So you wrote this book, and it is on celebrity estates, and hopefully, this won't be the case with Prince. But there are many cases where things get so ugly, just because there's so much at stake, so much money at stake.

MAYORAS: It's true. And really, the best way to protect your assets and protect your legacy especially when you are talking to up to $300 million or more is to use a trust. And one would hope that Prince did a trust, because he was a private person during his lifetime, chances are he wanted to remain private after he passed away. But unfortunately, if things proceed in probate court that's absolutely not going to happen because a probate court is a public process. And you really lose all control over who receives your money, and how they receive it, and even who is in control of the estate and his rights and licensing and everything else.

BALDWIN: He was such a bright man, you would think we would hop, we would hope.

Danielle Mayoras, I'm sure it would come out in time. Thank you so much for now. And thank you for being with me here on this big Super Tuesday. Of

course, coverage continues through the day. Let's toss it to Jake Tapper.

"THE LEAD" starts now.