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Report: Trump Says Second Amendment People Could Thwart Clinton; Orlando Shooter's Dad Spotted Behind Clinton at Rally; Ex-Fox Chief Caught on Audio Tape; Fox News Staff Feared Boss Was Bugging Them; "SNL" Drops 3 Cast Members Before New Season. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired August 9, 2016 - 15:30   ET

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


[15:30:00] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: We were listening just a short while ago to Donald Trump, he's out on the campaign trail. He's in the important battleground state of North Carolina, specifically in Wilmington. He just made a statement that we want to play for you. I still have Kayleigh McEnany sitting next to me, a Trump supporter, to talk about perhaps the implications of this statement. Here you have it for yourself.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Hillary wants to abolish essentially abolish the second amendment. By the way, if she gets to pick -- if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the second amendment people, maybe there is. I don't know. But I'll tell you what, that will be a horrible day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: All right. Kayleigh is with me, let me just say as we have covered so much on the second amendment, Hillary Clinton has never said she wants to abolish the second amendment. She just wants fair and smart gun laws and to keep guns out of the hands of folks who just shouldn't have them. That said, the curious part of the statement, "although the second amendment people, maybe there is." I don't have Donald Trump sitting here. I don't know what he meant by that. But what do you think?

KAYLEIGH MCENANY, DONALD TRUMP SUPPORTER: I think is he referring to the fact that the National Rifle Association is the most powerful lobby hands down in the United States. If anyone can stop a very anti second amendment agenda, it would be the NRA and second amendment folks. When he talks about Hillary wanting to roll back the second amendment, he is referring to how she doesn't like Supreme Court jurisprudence on the second amendment.

Which includes the Heller decision that says the right to bear arms includes the right to own a handgun. So whether he is simplifying that are not I know Hillary Clinton simplifies a lot of his policies calling it the Muslim ban even though that's never what he proposed. That's what my take on that is just hearing it in this moment. BALDWIN: We will see if he clarifies a little later on. Kayleigh,

thank you so much. For sticking around, important to talk about. Meantime Trump is in North Carolina. Hillary Clinton is in Florida. She just wrapped up a campaign event there. But yesterday an unexpected supporter showed up for her rally in that state. He was the father of the Orlando gunman who killed 49 people.

[15:35:03] He was there seated behind her with the hat and mustache, sort of front and center at this rally. He sat behind her as she addressed the crowd there, even looked on as Hillary Clinton offered her condolences to the Orlando community and the victims of that mass shooting.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

IGNATO MAYFIELD, ORGANIZER: My name is Ignato Mayfield, I am an organizer up in orange county. Every day I get to work with an amazing group of volunteers and organizers who know just how important it is that we win this election. They're out registering voters, making phone calls and going door to door to talk to voters about this election and why we need Hillary Clinton to be the next president of the United States.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: So let's go to Brian Todd covering this for us from Washington. And Brain talking about the politics of it, obviously it is embarrassing for the Clinton campaign. They didn't know that's who that was. A Florida affiliate reporter recognized him. Isn't that correct?

BRAIN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. That is correct, Brooke. An affiliate reporter did recognize him. A lot of people in that rally especially connected to the Clinton campaign did not recognize him at first. This is clearly an awkward situation, a horrible optic for the Clinton campaign and it is frankly an unforced error by them.

This rally took place in Kissimmee, Florida only 30 minutes from the site of the Pulse nightclub. As Hillary Clinton was talking about that massacre just at the beginning of the rally, thanking the Orlando police, there he was, Saddiqui Mateen, he is the father of the shooter, Omar Mateen, prominently sitting behind her. Our affiliate WPTV caught up with Saddiqui Mateen, after the event and asked him why he showed up. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SADDIQUI MATEEN, FATHER OF OMAR MATEEN, ORLANDO NIGHTCLUB SHOOTER: Clinton is good for United States versus Donald Trump. I wish that my son joined the army and fought ISIS and destroyed ISIS. That would be much better.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TODD: Bizarre indeed. During that interview Saddiqui Mateen displayed a banner showing support for Hillary Clinton for, among other things, her position on gun control. Mateen says he is a Democrat and he was invited to the rally. We reached out to the Clinton campaign, a campaign aide told us this was an open door event for the public but this aide said, "this individual was not invited as a guest," and the campaign was not aware of his attendance until after the event.

A key question this afternoon, are these people behind the candidate vetted for those placements that they get. We have a guy who is embedded with the Clinton campaign, Dan Merica, I talked to him about this day. He says he sees a lot of staffers showing up with many people who show up at these rallies.

Dan tells us he wouldn't call this vetting so much but he says usually an advance person for the campaign often a young person, goes through and picks people to come on stage. Sometimes they are VIPs and people known to the Clinton campaign.

Sometimes they are often picked as people who show diversity in age, race, et cetera, Brooke. But this is clearly a mistake. They did not know he was there. Of course if they had, this would be even worse for them. What's interesting, Donald Trump in that rally that you just saw in the last hour had an opportunity to pounce all over Hillary Clinton for that.

We didn't hear one word from Donald Trump. He's holding another event later today. We'll see if he says anything about that. We'll have a lot more about this on "The Situation Room" at 5:00.

BALDWIN: We will see you then, thank you, my friend. Brian Todd for us in Washington.

Coming up next, explosive allegations from inside the halls of Fox News. We'll talk live with a "Vanity Fair" reporter who has details on what's being called secret audiotapes of the former chief, Roger Ailes. Stay there.

[15:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: More bombshells at Fox News today. CNN has learned that staff there, including on-air hosts, were fearful their boss was taping their phone calls, monitoring their e-mails, further fueling allegations that a culture of fear may have kept former network boss Roger Ailes protected. This comes as a TV host is stepping forward with allegations of a cover-up.

She is Andrea Tanteros, she says she was demoted and taken off the air back in April after reporting Ailes to top executives at Fox for sexual harassment. The allegations are direct contradiction from senior Fox execs who say they were unaware of any claims what so ever against Ailes until former anchor Gretchen Carlson filed that lawsuit against him in July.

Now according to this exclusive report by "Vanity Fair," we may soon get damning audiotapes allegedly proving Ailes inappropriate dealings with employees. With me, the woman who has that exclusive reporting, she is Sarah Ellison, "Vanity Fair" contributing editor. Also with us, Mark Geragos, CNN legal analyst and defense attorney. So welcome to both of you and Sarah just to you and your piece written for the high, you write about how you go inside the Fox News bunker talking to former or current employees, and on the issue of audiotapes, what did you learn?

SARAH ELLISON, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR, VANITY FAIR: Well, I learned that there are a number of women who allegedly taped Roger Ailes while in conversation with them. And that the existence of those tapes has come in settlement negotiations between Gretchen Carlson and 21st Century Fox over what -- the resolution of this entire lawsuit that was started by Gretchen Carlson, obviously.

[15:45:09] Any time there are tapes, everyone's ears perk up and everybody wants to know obviously what's in them.

BALDWIN: What's on the audio?

ELLISON: And it is an incredibly charged situation. Obviously the company wants to get this out of the way. Ailes doesn't want these tapes to come to light. Gretchen Carlson appears to be using them as leverage in the lawsuit.

And I think that all we can tell at this point, this has been a very -- we know a lot more than the official statements that have come out of this entire situation. So the existence of tapes like that that might be leaked or might see the light of day is obviously sort of terrifying for the certain people involved.

BALDWIN: So that's a huge question, the other question then being, obviously -- I've heard that she wants to fight this, yet you are reporting on the eight-figure -- wow.

ELLISON: That means at least $10 million.

BALDWIN: -- potential settlement.

ELLISON: Yes. I think everybody wants to fight and everybody wants to have their day and she's obviously had an incredible influence already. She's brought about the end of the career of one of the most storied names in television news and even in politics, for that matter. So I'm sure she wants to fight it. I think that this -- I'm not a lawyer, but this stuff -- so many things end up settling and I think eight figures is a very --

BALDWIN: Well, we have lawyer with us right now, Mark Geragos. You are listening to all this here. What do you think about this potential settlement, first of all?

MARK GERAGOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Every time a client tells me they want to fight this, I tell them, look, when you're over in money court, which is what civil court is, it's all about money. You can fight all you want. But when somebody's putting eight figures, which Sarah says is a minimum of $10 million, on the table, it's not likely that somebody's going to walk away from an eight-figure settlement. Mind you from start to finish, this has been 45 days.

So if they get some kind of a settlement in some kind of an eight- figure range, you're going to tell somebody, go rent a temporary courtroom. You can go fight it out in a mock trial. We're going to settle this case. The lawyers aren't going to let them walk away from an eight-figure settlement.

BALDWIN: What about she is suing Roger Ailes directly. Why would Fox News or their attorneys be involved?

GERAGOS: Well, look. Fox News has not been named as a defendant. That doesn't mean that they couldn't be added at some point in the litigation. Fox News needs to get rid of this and they need get rid of it now. They hired an outside law firm. That law firm is doing an internal investigation. Those as Sarah mentioned in her article and I will tell you from personal experience, those never turn out well.

It's never a good thing when you have to hire an outside law firm to come in and take a look at your business practices. They need this over with. They need it over with from a corporate standpoint and they also need to stop the bleeding. Remember, this entity that generates close to $1 billion in profits a year. The amount of money that they can spend to get rid of this distraction is minimal. So they've got to decrease the pain and the way they decrease the pain is to buy out of it.

BALDWIN: Sexual harassment allegations, the so-called black room. Now potential audiotapes. What could be next? Sarah Ellison, Mark Geragos, thank you so much.

Coming up next, "Saturday Night Live" lets three cast members go right before this next season, right before the presidential elections. The amazing Joe Piscopo formerly an SNL cast member joins me how the show will have to replace its best impressionists.

[15:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Okay, a bit of a shakeup at 30 rock for the cast of Saturday Night Live. Three cast members will not be returning to the show's 42nd season this fall.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TARAN KILLIAM, "SNL" CAST MEMBER: Well, Wolfe, if I'm president I can promise ISIS will hate me and how do I know? Because everyone who knows me hates me.

JAY PHAROAH, "SNL" CAST MEMBER: Of course, I can tough, as a surgeon I had to tell people things that didn't want to hear.

PHAROAH: Now look I am going to try to not lose my temper. But what is it going to take for us show a united front on this?

KILLIAM: Well, not to be rude Mr. President, but the only reason I invited Prime Minister Netanyahu was because I wanted to meet a world leader whose people actually respect him.

JON RUDNITSKY, "SNL" CAST MEMBER: I already have a job to do. And that is to be the best speaker of the house I can be, a job I swore I would never ever take, and then I did. But come on, that was like six months ago. I would never do something like that now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: All right, CNN's senior media correspondent, Brain Stelter host of "Reliable Sources", and former SNL, not ready for prime time player, Joe Piscopo. Good to see you boys.

I'm sad because I really, really liked Taran specifically.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: It's bummer, yes.

BALDWIN: I met him a couple times, that is a funny dude. Tell me more about them and then I'm going to ask you how this works

STELTER: It is a real loss. I think some losses affect us more than others. These are losses that are really going to felt by the show. SNL has been in rebuilding mode for a couple years. And these three especially Taran Killiam has been helping the show get back to where it was. Jay Pharoah as well and his impersonations of Obama and so many other people.

This is how it goes in SNL. they always bring in new people. But in the case of Taran, he had one year left on his contract they decided to let him leave early because he wanted to go work movies and on other projects.

BALDWIN: How does this work? I've heard that like that the final cast party, the last show in the spring is always sort of bittersweet because you never actually know who is going and who is staying. How does Lorne decide?

JOE PISCOPO, FORMER "SNL" CAST MEMBER: I went through the blood bath of 1980 of replacing the original cast. So that was wild because we didn't know, we went in and it was a no-win situation. You couldn't replace Gilda Radner and Chevy Chase and Danny Aykroyd and John Belushi, you just couldn't do it.

Oh my gosh it was terrible, so we went on the air, we didn't do so well. So we went in, we got called back in, and they brought us into the producer's office and they started whacking everybody. Boom, boom.

BALDWIN: One by one, that's how they did it.

PISCOPO: And they kept Eddie and I, and Eddie and I were like so young, we didn't even care, we had to go do a set at the club. We didn't care. But you have to with that attitude of just -- you almost have to be flippant, cocky attitude to be able to survive.

[15:55:05] BALDWIN: They had a huge, huge season this past season. Right with all the debates and all the politics, they have to be like jonesing at their computers ready to write more sketches for the fall. I guess they have Darrell Hammond playing Trump, and Kate McKinnon playing Hillary Clinton. But we'll see some new blood, right?

PISCOPO: Great question, I don't know. I just got off the phone. Name drop, get ready, got off with Jay Pharoah. I called Jay, loved this kid. This kid is so funny, did probably the best parody, what might my girls say, remember that song. How great that was -- you know what I said, Jay, I'm going on with Brooke, and I said how are you doing?

He's great, onward and forward, he's working constantly. The one thing we always appreciate about Lorne Michaels, once you wear that badge of honor from "Saturday Night Live", you get the greatest respect, you are always working. And Jay was going, he's so booked up, so I'll see you next week. But he is booked up, everything is great.

STELTER: He's going to have a great career ahead of him. His impersonations are second to none.

PISCOPO: How about his Eddie Murphy, no one can do Eddie Murphy, he nailed Eddie, right.

STELTER: But SNL has got to figure out a new President Obama now. They are coming into the fall election season, presumably they are going to have a lot of fun the next few months with the election and with the transition to power. Whether it is Trump or Clinton, they are going to have some casting trouble now, it is going to be interesting what fresh blood they bring into the fall.

BALDWIN: Brian and Joe, thank you. Excellent name drop. Feel free to do that any time.

STELTER: Can I borrow his cell phone for my report?

BALDWIN: Joe Piscopo, Brian Stelter, thank you two very much. Just in, Donald Trump causing a stir, bringing up the second amendment when talking about Hillary Clinton at a rally in North Carolina. More on that, next.