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Donald Trump Speaks at Rally in Florida; Presidential Candidates and Surrogates Campaign in Battleground States; North Carolina Voters Line Up for Early Ballots; Republican and Democratic Voting Ground Operations Examined; Melania Trump Campaigns for Donald Trump. Aired 10-11a ET

Aired November 5, 2016 - 10:00   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[10:00:14] HILLARY CLINTON, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We have unfinished business to do.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm asking you to dream big. You will get the change you've been waiting for.

CLINTON: Let's make sure that we send a loud, unmistakable message that love Trumps hate.

TRUMP: I didn't have to bring J Lo or Jay-Z. I'm here all by self.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have to think about the future and that is why I'm with her.

TRUMP: We will make America great again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: All right, so glad to have you with us here in the Newsroom in D.C. I'm Christi Paul.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Victor Blackwell.

PAUL: And we are overlooking some beautiful site today.

BLACKWELL: You got the White House right behind us here, beautiful, beautiful set for you this weekend, the final Saturday of the 2016 presidential campaign. The race for the White House of course ending in just three days from now. The prize, you see it right us here, 1600 Pennsylvania avenue. That's where either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump will call home.

PAUL: This race is getting closer in the home stretch though, as you know. Both campaigns in full force this weekend. I want to take you live -- a live look at Tampa, Florida, where Donald Trump is going to kick off his first of four stops in four different states today. Florida, Colorado, North Carolina, and Nevada. And he is set to speak at any moment. When he does we will certainly bring it to you. But you can see he hasn't stepped up to the podium just yet.

BLACKWELL: Let's take a look at Hillary Clinton and her surrogates, where they will be going to the battleground states. She will start in Florida and then north to Pennsylvania. You see Bernie Sanders, the vice president, Joe Biden, the vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine, and Chelsea Clinton out on the trail as well. All day we've got live a political experts and reporters, part of our team coverage. We're standing by in the battleground states.

PAUL: And we should talk about the fact that in the next -- in the latest CNN poll of polls Trump and Clinton seem to tie in Florida.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: Big state. And that's a must-win state for both.

BLACKWELL: Yes. CNN national correspondent Jason Carroll is live there at a Trump event in Tampa. He's expected to be on the stage soon. So we'll go to Jason Carroll in just a moment. I've got a producer in my ear. Let me come to you, Phil, and what we're seeing from these candidates as we go into the last stretch.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. You guys talk about Florida, and Florida is crucial for this really good reason. Obviously 29 electoral votes. Donald Trump has to win Florida really to have any kind of pathway whatsoever if you look through. And he has a narrow pathway to begin with. But Florida is a place where his team has felt good, but his team has also made very clear if Donald Trump does not win Florida, Donald Trump will not be sitting in that house behind you on January 20th, period, end of story. So that's why you see Donald Trump in Florida today. That's why you see Hillary Clinton in Florida today.

Now, the interesting element I think we've all been trying to dig out in Florida is what does the early vote data tell us, what does the polling tell us, all of that sort of issue. If you look at early vote in Florida right now, you talk to the Clinton campaign, they feel good about where they are. But if you compare it to 2012, while Democrats do have a lead in the early vote, they are far behind where they were in 2012. Trump advisers, Republican operatives point to that and say this is good news for us.

The big question, though, and you guys have been talking about it a lot this morning, the Hispanic vote. They believe it is coming out at levels, and the early vote seems to imply this, it is coming out at levels that is significantly higher than we saw in 2012. And while we've seen a down tick of some sort in the African-American vote both in Florida and North Carolina and other places, if that Hispanic vote is coming out like Democrats think that it is, in Florida that could be the ballgame. We talked about Nevada earlier. We've seen that Hispanic vote come out in a big way. That could be the difference maker. That could be the story. But if you look at it right now, all the polling, all the early voting, it looks like Florida is absolutely still a toss-up.

PAUL: All right, sounds good. Let's talk about North Carolina as well because that is, as it's been called, a must win state for both of these candidates. Both of them have their eyes obviously on that key battleground. And we're talk about 15 electoral votes are up for grabs there.

BLACKWELL: Let's go to our Gary Tuchman who is watching the race from such an important state as we know for both campaigns, but the Trump campaign especially. Gary?

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Victor and Christi, good morning to you. And yes, North Carolina, a battleground state, incredibly important. Election nights are also about mathematics in addition to who is going to become president. The mathematics are not kind to Donald Trump if he doesn't win here in the state of North Carolina. It's hard to see path to the White House if he doesn't win this state.

Hillary Clinton doesn't need to win this state. And if she does, if we find out early in the evening Tuesday if she has, it would not look good for Donald Trump. So that's why this is an incredibly important state. The people here realize it.

[10:05:00] And Election Day in many states including North Carolina is not just Election Day. It's the last of the Election Days. They've been voting here for over two weeks in early voting. But this is the busiest day. This is a library in Charlotte, North Carolina. I have just counted. There are 435 people in this line waiting outdoors. How long have you been waiting, sir?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been here --

TUCHMAN: Getting his watch out. Nice watch, by the way?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you. About an hour and 45 minutes.

TUCHMAN: Hour and 45 minutes and he's not near the front of the line just yet. So these are very dedicated people waiting to vote. I've done some math. There's 11 machines inside. If every voting experience -- I'm sorry about that, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No problem.

TUCHMAN: If every voting experience takes five minutes, you're talking about a three-and-a-half hour wait. Can you wait three-and-a- half hours in this line?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.

TUCHMAN: Important for you to vote?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

TUCHMAN: You feel that way?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Definitely. I'll will wait five hour if I got to.

TUCHMAN: It's good you're in North Carolina and not North Platt, Nebraska, where it's much colder right now. It's actually cold for North Carolina. It's been in the 40s, but people are very dedicated. They're willing to wait.

In 2012, 61 percent of the people who voted did early voting. And authorities here in this state, here in the Tar Heel state, say it will be higher this year. And you get an idea, 435 people in line waiting to vote. Early voting comes to an end at 1:00 eastern time today. But anyone in line will be able to stay and vote. So they could still be here until 3:00, 4:00, 5:00. Victor, Christi, back to you.

PAUL: Interesting. All right, hey, Gary, thank you so much. Of course they have to keep it open so they can vote because if they didn't we would have accusations of some impropriety happening.

BLACKWELL: Yes. And we saw there the poll of polls there, Hillary Clinton ahead by four points there. But any really reliable --

PAUL: Metric?

BLACKWELL: Yes, any metric, any equation of putting 270 together for Donald Trump includes North Carolina. So he will have to do well there on Election Day and this last day of early voting there. Again, our thanks to Gary Tuchman.

PAUL: We want to get you back to Florida. We were talking about how pivotal Florida is. Jason Carroll is there right now. Good morning, Jason.

JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Christi. There's been so much talk about early voting. Let's talk about early voting here in the state of Florida. It ends today in many counties here in the state, so you can imagine why there's such a huge, huge push for Trump supporters to get out and vote. That's what we're hearing today from some of the surrogates who have already taken the stage. Trump expected to speak just in a few minutes.

The campaign is really encouraged by what they say are early signs of many early voters coming out in support of Donald Trump. The Democrats, though, on the other side, very are encouraged by what they says is a huge uptick in Latino voters here in the state for Hillary Clinton.

Trump for the most part though staying on message with his attacks on Hillary Clinton, really hitting her hard on the issue of the Clinton Foundation, her e-mails, her trustworthiness, bringing that into question. These are issues that really resonate with the base.

However, at one point he did go off track just for a little bit when he mentioned all of the celebrities support that Hillary Clinton has been receiving from folks like Jay-Z and Jennifer Lopez. Donald Trump saying, look, I'm out here doing this by myself. He's got his surrogates out there campaigning for him as well. One surrogate that won't be out there for him, Governor Chris Christie who was expected to campaign in New Hampshire this weekend, but after two of his former aides were convicted during that bridge-gate case on charges of -- charges of conspiracy and fraud, Chris Christie now not campaigning for Donald Trump this weekend. But this crowd more than happy just to have Donald Trump speaking in just a few moments. Christi?

PAUL: All right, and when that happens we will certainly bring it to you live. Jason Carroll, we appreciate it so much. Thank you.

BLACKWELL: All right, some important shifts in the CNN electoral map. First for Donald Trump, first for Hillary Clinton. We'll show those to you.

And the question here, can Clinton hold on to this lead to reach 270 on Tuesday night? Stay with us.

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[10:12:19] PAUL: All righty, think about it, three days until election, and, oh, these candidates are battling in some of the battleground states right now. Take a look at this line here in North Carolina. You just heard some of them waiting up to three hours just to make sure that they get their votes in, which of course is good news because that's what everybody wants to do. But look at those folks. It's going to look like this in a lot of places. In fact, let's talk about Nevada real quickly. They had record early voting, 57,000 people showed up in Clark County alone.

BLACKWELL: Yes, one day record.

PAUL: In one day. And it had previously been 48,000, so obviously a lot of interest in making sure people get out there and they get their voices heard. We're just going the have to wait a couple of days here. Everybody is a little on edge.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: Wait to couple days for what the final product will be. But that also brings us to how do you get to 270.

BLACKWELL: Yes, what the strategy here in the last three days as we see the end of early voting in some states. We see the last day in North Carolina, Georgia wrapped up yesterday, which surprisingly is a battleground this time around.

Let's bring in our panel to discuss. Joining us now, Angela Rye, CNN political commentator and former executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus, Hillary Clinton supporter, Jack Kingston, senior adviser to the Trump campaign, speaking of Georgia, a former Georgia Congressman, and finally Jason Johnson, politics editor for TheRoot.com and political science professor at Morgan State University. Good morning to all.

Congressman, I want to start with you and what we're hearing from Donald Trump this morning, brand new out today, delivery of the weekly Republican address. And this is what we said about Hillary Clinton. Let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Hillary Clinton is the most corrupt person ever to seek the presidency of the United States. And if she were to win, it would create a constitutional crisis like no other. She is under multiple federal investigations, has committed many crimes including perjury, and she is now facing the prospect of a federal indictment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: All right, so wrapping up there, this case that he's making with the prospect of a federal indictment. That reporting coming from Bret Baier of FOX News, who has not just wanted back some, but has apologized for using the term. Is this going to be Donald Trump's message, although the person or the entity he's relying upon has said it was I'm proper to use that term?

JACK KINGSTON, SENIOR ADVISER, TRUMP CAMPAIGN: I don't think this is going to be his closing message.

BLACKWELL: He's got three days. This is essentially his closing message.

KINGSTON: Well, it's one of his messages that you have somebody who is under federal indictment and there's all kinds of clouds and questions as to which direction that investigation -- excuse me, in which way that investigation may end up going, because you have the Clinton Foundation, you have the pay for play allegation, you have the fact that her great close ally, the governor of Virginia, has taken some Chinese money and some of that money found its way into the hands of a Democrat candidate.

[10:15:08] BLACKWELL: But what does that have to do with Hillary Clinton?

KINGSTON: Because she's tied in to it because they were contributors to the PAC. He was on the board of the Clinton Foundation. And that actually, Victor, is very important. It's a very, very tangled web on how all of this unwinds. Philippe Reines, who isn't a household name, he was on the foundation. He was a deputy secretary of state under Hillary Clinton. He's being investigated.

PAUL: Both of you are talking about --

(CROSSTALK)

PAUL: Jason, go ahead. And then Angela.

JASON JOHNSON, POLITICS EDITOR, THEROOT.COM: As nonaffiliated voter here, can I just say in all due respect, nobody cares about that at this point.

KINGSTON: I wasn't the one that brought it up.

JOHNSON: If --

KINGSTON: I wasn't the one who brought it up. I wanted to talk about Obamacare.

JOHNSON: Republican voters care about this sort of thing and it will keep them enthusiastic. It's not going to change anybody's mind. The most important issues these last three or four days is Hillary makes her case as Donald Trump makes his case is voter suppression and making sure that people can out. That is the primary focus of both these campaigns. They can talk all they want. If they can't get people to the polls for early voting this weekend and next Tuesday, it doesn't matter.

ANGELA RYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Let me go back to what you said. I think it's really important that we start doing an apples to apples comparison. So you want to talk about tangled webs. Let me give you a really good one. Paul Manafort potentially under investigation.

KINGSTON: Working with Tony Podesta.

RYE: I did not -- I did not --

BLACKWELL: Let her finish. Let her finish.

RYE: So I'm going to create the same kind of web that you created. It's a very treacherous and tangential web but I'm going to create one for you. Paul Manafort. I give you Roger Stone who called a host and commentators on this air things that are normally associated with racial epithets. Some who has created all types of scenarios and conspiracy theories that has driven Donald Trump's base, some of the folks who I city think is in the basket of deplorable, frankly.

I think the other issue you have is Roger Ailes, Megyn Kelly comes out and talks about her sexual harassment issues with Roger Ailes. He is a chief adviser to Donald Trump. I give you Steve Bannon, someone who has created conspiracy theories that are worse than in the "National Enquirer" and has used racial rhetoric to gin up Donald Trump's base.

BLACKWELL: Just as Jason said, the people are not going to be voting on what Jack Kingston offered. Is anybody going to be voting based on what you offered?

RYE: No, but my point is at some point we have to start comparing apples to apples. You cannot continue to make it seem like these are Hillary Clinton issues when they are not. And you all will distance Donald Trump from the very same. It's ridiculous.

KINGSTON: Donald Trump's campaign is not under the federal investigation that Hillary Clinton's is.

RYE: Neither, no it's not.

KINGSTON: And I am a little bit bothered that you are still calling our supporters deplorable.

RYE: I'm calling half of them or more deplorable.

KINGSTON: Here we are in the home stretch -- RYE: Racism, bigotry, xenophobia, homophobia, that is deplorable.

KINGSTON: I just want to make a point. Here we are in the home stretch. You're still calling our supporters racist and deplorable.

RYE: Absolutely.

KINGSTON: And that's the message of the woman, first lady, and the U.S. Senate, and doesn't have anything to talk about in terms of --

RYE: Oh, no, I have a lot to talk about.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKWELL: Hold on for a second. Hold or for a second because we've got the vice president nominee for the Republicans speaking right now, Governor Pence is speaking. Let's dip into that.

MIKE PENCE, (R) VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: -- the direction of this country. I mean, when I think of this -- when I think of these times at which we live, I don't think of it as even a choice between left and right or Republican and Democrat. I think of it the way Ronald Reagan described it years ago. He said it's a choice between up and down. When you talk to your neighbors and friends you might think about talking about it that way.

Here it is -- whether we're going to continue to go down the hill to a weaker America on the world stage, a more stifled American economy under the weight of more taxes, more regulation, more Obamacare and trade deals that are shedding jobs all over the world, an America walking farther and farther away from our most cherished constitutional ideals, or whether we're going to stop, plant our feet, turn around, and march back up the hill to a stronger America at home --

BLACKWELL: In Michigan, speaking to a crowd there.

Jason, let me come back to you, because what we're hearing here is possibly what we're seeing in these ABC News/"Washington Post" poll, that Donald Trump is bringing some of, as Governor Pence would characterize it, some of the Republicans home. He's now up to 88 percent of Republican support. He was at 82 percent on October 19th at the last poll. Still not, though, where Mitt Romney was four years ago at 93 percent.

JOHNSON: Right. Look, if you're still sending flowers 24 hours before Valentine's Day you're in trouble, right? That's essentially what's happening with Donald Trump.

[10:20:00] He should be at 90 something percent. He is the Republican nominee and has been the Republican nominee for months. But here' more key, and I think it's really interesting you see where the VP candidate is. He's in Michigan. That is the last ditch effort for the Trump campaign. If he cannot -- if Donald Trump cannot flip a solidly blue state he can't win. And Michigan doesn't have early voting. So you're going the see this as a state where you have Mike Pence, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, and President Barack Obama are all going to be campaigning in the next couple of days. It's very crucial for every single campaign right now.

BLACKWELL: One of the changes in the map, you've got New Hampshire now is a battleground which may be good news for Donald Trump but not so much for Kelly Ayotte. Does she want the campaign back in New Hampshire?

KINGSTON: You know, I think Kelly Ayotte has been kind of in there and out of there, in there and out of there. It's going to be difficult for her until 7:00 on Tuesday night when the polls close.

But here's what's very interesting is that we're going in -- the momentum has changed. We had 11 percent or 12 percent deficit two weeks ago. Now it's a cliff-hanger. Everybody associated with Clinton are all in the swing states. We're in the swing states, too. We're -- I think the three of us would absolutely agree everybody is everywhere they can be, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Michigan, trying to find that -- we want to flip a blue state, absolutely. We're going to talk about Obamacare. We're going to talk about a plan to turn the economy around. We're going to talk about jobs. We are going to talk about the FBI, but that is not the closing message of our team. Now, what I do here, Angela, which really does bother me is I hear a lot of racial baiting and the usual Democrat --

RYE: That's not what I'm doing.

KINGSTON: Not from you.

RYE: You said Angela, that's what I thought. That's reasonable, right?

KINGSTON: You were looking at me.

(LAUGHTER)

RYE: Because you're talking. You're talking. Out of respect.

KINGSTON: I felt the love. I felt the love.

BLACKWELL: You were looking at him.

RYE: I thought I was listening. And this isn't a --

KINGSTON: Deplorable or non-deplorable.

RYE: It depends on what you say.

PAUL: Listen, depending on what somebody says, Donald Trump is at the microphone. Let's listen to what he has to say.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We do it the old fashion way. We do it the old fashion way, folks. We fill them up because you love what we're saying and you want to make America great again. That's about it. (APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: And I actually like Jay-Z ,but you know the language last night. Oh. Oh. I was thinking maybe I'll just try it, should I use that language?

CROWD: No!

TRUMP: Can you imagine if I said that? So he used every word in the book. I won't even use the initials because I'll get in trouble. They'll get me in trouble. He used every word in the book last night. And by the way, in Hershey, Pennsylvania, last night we had an arena, we had 27,000 people show up. Maybe they couldn't get in. Far more -- far more than Jay-Z had with their free tickets, free tickets. Far more. And Beyonce. And I like them both. But he used language last night that was so bad. And then Hillary said, I did not like Donald Trump's lewd language. My lewd language.

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: I tell you what, I've never said what he said in my life.

But that shows you the phoniness of politicians and the phoniness of the whole system, folks.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: In three days we are going to win the great state of Florida.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: And we are going to win back the White House. Real change begins with immediately repealing and replacing Obamacare.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: It's just been announced that the residents of Florida, I'm sorry to tell you this, are going to experience a massive double digit premium hike. And I know what it is. I say this to everybody. I know -- I just don't want to destroy the spirit in the room. It's going to be a massive hike. So congratulations. It's not going to matter because if we win I'm throwing it out anyways, so it doesn't make any difference.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: But get ready. You're going to have a big, big, big hike. Hopefully it won't make damn bit of difference.

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: In the great state of Arizona where I was just a couple of days ago and where I'm going, premiums are going up by more than 116 percent.

(BOOS) TRUMP: It's going to go higher than that. Over 90 percent of the counties in Florida are losing an Obamacare insurer, and think of it, they're losing their insurers, over 90 percent of the counties.

[10:25:00] And remember, and most of you were there, almost all of you felt this whole movement right from the beginning when we came down for the primaries, right? We won 66 out of 67 counties, 66 out of 67. Florida is just a place I love, my second home. I'm here all the time.

(APPLAUSE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLACKWELL: New this morning, the "People" magazine reporter who accused Donald Trump of sexually assaulting her is speaking out camera for the first time. Natasha Stoynoff alleges that the 2005 incident happened at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort while she was writing a profile of Trump's one-year anniversary.

PAUL: CNN hasn't independently confirmed her story or accusations, but the Trump campaign repeatedly denied that Stoynoff's accusation is true. Last month at a rally he appeared to point to her appearance while dismissing her story. But Stoynoff says she will not be silenced.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NATASHA STOYNOFF, "PEOPLE" MAGAZINE REPORTER: I look at that as an attempt to silence women, perhaps other welcoming forward, and also to strike fear in the hearts of the women who already have come forward. And, unfortunately, that tactic works. But that's why I'm here today to show that we shouldn't be afraid.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[10:30:08] BLACKWELL: We should say that CNN has not independently confirmed Natasha Stoynoff's accusations.

Let's turn now to the blitz across the battleground states. Let's call it what it is. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump going state to state with just three days left. The main focus now, getting out the vote.

PAUL: And they're using new technology in order to do it. Here's CNN's chief political correspondent Dana Bash.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: On the ground --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm going to mark you down for 12:00 on Saturday for phone banking.

BASH: -- on the stump --

CLINTON: If we vote, we win.

TRUMP: Get out and vote.

BASH: -- it's now all about getting out the vote. And for Republicans, that means learning from their mistakes. After their lagging 2012 operation failed, the Republican National Committee began working three years ago to step up their game.

How is what you're doing in 2016 different from what you did in 2012?

MATT DAILER, RNC IOWA STATE DIRECTOR: We are 100 miles away from where we were in 2012.

BASH: The biggest difference, activists now use this phone app to get out the vote.

DAILER: It will show you their party affiliation, how reliable they are as a voter, their age, stuff like that. You just click that voter, do take survey, boom, right there.

BASH: And it gives volunteers what's called dynamic scripting, prompting different pitchers to voters depending on their answers. Information instantly sent back to RNC headquarters.

DAILER: We need to talk to propensity of Republicans and make sure they know when the election is and figure out who they are going to support.

BASH: Now in the final ands of staffers and volunteers are using that app in battleground states across the country. The RNC leading Donald Trump's ground operation says they will complete 17 million door knocks by Election Day, up from 11.5 million in 2012. It's all very ambitious, but it's been done before by the Democrats.

BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm doing great. What's your name?

BASH: Republican strategists admit they're trying to emulate the Obama ground machine that crushed the GOP for two cycles. Armies of Democratic activists are spread out over the same key states as Republicans. Clinton campaign aides say they've signed up some 1 million volunteer shifts for the last 96 hours alone. In some ways, team Clinton is old school, using paper and clipboards, inputted and tallied at the end of each day. Still, the Clinton system is very high tech, using social and digital media to build on that Obama operation.

JESSALYN REID, VIRGINIA DIGITAL DIRECTOR, CLINTON CAMPAIGN: It's now going to walk me through making my entire voting plan.

BASH: A personalized plan on where to vote, when to vote, and even how to get there.

Forcing people to get specific and to give a commitment.

REID: Exactly. I'm taking public transit. I'm voting in the morning, and I know my polling location, so I can get a reminder straight to my phone, straight to my pocket on Election Day and to tell me to go vote.

BASH: Clinton officials say volunteers are pretty much done trying to persuade voters to support Clinton.

REID: We're just focused on the turnout right now.

BASH: Translation, team Clinton knows exactly who her voters are. Now it's about making sure those voters actually cast their ballots.

Dana Bash, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PAUL: And today, four rallies for four different states for Donald Trump.

TRUMP: Yes, leave a lot there on the field. This as the Clinton campaign of course works to get out every vote, too, in their ground game. We'll break down the home stretch strategy, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:36:46] PAUL: Welcome back to CNN Newsroom out of Washington, D.C. today. I'll Christi Paul.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell. We have live pictures here for you in the battleground state of Florida. Donald Trump speaking to voters in Tampa, hoping to pick up some undecided voters and motivate his base to get out and vote. This state could of course decide who wins the presidential race. We've seen the implications of a Florida vote before. This is the first of four stops for Donald Trump today.

Early voting data shows the Latino voter turnout has been much higher than previous elections, and in the latest CNN/ORC poll of polls, Florida shows the two candidates in a very tight contest. Also, we've got the long lines in Charlotte, North Carolina, this morning, the other battleground state that is a must win for presidential hopefuls. We've been saying this this morning, more so for Donald Trump than Hillary Clinton. This is the final day of early voting across the state of North Carolina.

PAUL: Look at that line.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

PAUL: Three hours and waiting.

BLACKWELL: Gary Tuchman is there speaking with people who have been there for hours today, and the line just stretches along that building. We'll get to Gary a little later this morning.

Let's talk about the Republicans appearing to rally behind, rally alongside their nominee Donald Trump. It's a little different, a little difficult to tell based upon each case here. Of course it's the 11th hour, three days to go. Paul Ryan, speaker of the House, will be on a campaign event today, although Trump will not be there.

PAUL: Right. But there is this unity that people are looking at because it's awkward, to say the least. And the question is, after this month -- after all of these months of disunity, is it too late to put everything back together again?

Let's talk about that with Brian Morgenstern, Republican strategist, and Ellis Henican, political analyst. We also have Mary Catherine Ham. And I want to ask you, as we're talking about Paul Ryan, I want to get to something with Ted Cruz that was evident this week. He was in Iowa in a rally with Mike Pence. And in his prepared speech not once did he mention Trump's name. The only time he did so was here. Let's take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ, (R) TEXAS: Well, I'm here campaigning for Donald Trump, for Mike Pence. I recognize some of you guys are wanting to write stories suggesting divisions among Republicans. I'll make a point. I'm getting ready to get on a gigantic airplane that has Donald Trump's name painted on the side of it. On Monday of this week I voted for Donald Trump. I voted for Mike Pence.

PENCE: Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: OK, so that's the only time that he mentioned Donald Trump's name. Mary Catherine, what do you make of how this party puts itself back together?

MARY KATHERINE HAM, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: So divisions exist. They continue to exist. They have for a while. And yes, it is too late to sew them up for Election Day for sure. This will be a battle that is ongoing postelection win or lose for Republicans.

And it's an issue of their own making. Everybody is walking a line for a reason, because you have a nominee who is treacherous to get too close and treacherous to get too far away from, depending on where you are. So they're all trying to walk this awkward line. Paul Ryan from the beginning was basically sending the message, get used to awkward because it's going to look like this for the duration.

BAIER: Brian, what's the calculation here on Ryan's part? Is it that if this is a close loss for Trump he doesn't want to be blamed? Is he trying to secure his seat? What's the calculation going out with Mike Pence?

BRIAN MORGENSTERN, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: This has far less to do with Trump than it does Trump's voters. Paul Ryan wants to remain speaker of the House. Mike Pence and Ted Cruz want their names in the mix for the presidency in four years. They want to make sure that they have demonstrated enough royalty so that they can command the same loyalty when it's their turn.

For Ryan, he has had, obviously, I think, the toughest job in D.C. if not America because he's got the most fractious caucus, he's got the angriest base that's been denied power for a number of years now and have been frustrate with the Obama presidency, the idea of having Hillary Clinton who they view as corrupt and lying, I mean, the idea of that presidency makes them even more angry. And so Ryan is trying to keep this sort of Faberge egg from crumbling. So it's really about these voters and trying to solidify his support going forward and keep his speakership.

BLACKWELL: Do you think his speakership is in jeopardy?

ELLIS HENICAN, POLITICAL ANALYST: Clearly. He can try, but the divisions are so deep. And you're right, they're not going to be resolved now. The best analogy I can have, it's like Thanksgiving dinner when the parents are divorced. We're going to go with mom, we're going to go with dad, can we somehow force us all together at the same table? In the end they're Republicans and most people will come home. But it's an ugly scene.

BLACKWELL: For some this looks like putting the whole family in a car and going through a drive-thru.

HENICAN: Very scary thing to try. Do not try that at home, please.

(LAUGHTER)

PAUL: I'm wondering, as we talk about who is the leader, let's talk about the weekly radio address, the Republican weekly radio address today. It was by none other than Donald Trump. Let's listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: If we win on November 8th and elect a Republican house and Senate we can finally deliver the change the America people deserve. I'm asking for you vote and your help in electing a Republican majority in so that we can finally change this broken system and make America great again. And when I say great, I mean great for everyone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: All right, so he is coming to the table for his fellow Republicans. Does his voice work in those contests?

BLACKWELL: This is new for him.

HAMM: It is interesting in the closing days to see him making the down ballot argument. He's saying we need these guys, whereas some members of the campaign and sometimes himself have intimated that perhaps we don't need these Senate and House guys who haven't been perfectly loyal to me. So he's making that argument. I think it can be a strong one certainly to his base, which is part of what these guys need.

And on who is going to be the leader front, I think Paul Ryan and these guys don't just want to maybe be president, of course the ambition is involved here. But part of it is about policy, especially for Ryan, where he wants to be part of the discussion about what this party actually believes moving forward. And many of Trump's actual policy positions are very different from Paul Ryan's. So that's part of the negotiation as well.

And we should always remember he won his primary by 80 something percent, so I think there's an undercurrent of support that is not necessarily in the Trump base but that remains in the Republican Party.

MORGENSTERN: Yes. I think that's right. You know, throughout this campaign what's remarkable is what you refer to, which is how Trump has been not paying any attention to down ballot.

PAUL: To anybody else.

MORGENSTERN: And there are a number of places in this country where Trump is riding Senate candidate's coattails. If you look at Florida, Rubio is out polling him by far. Richard Portman is out polling him by some 15 points in Ohio. Richard Bird in North Carolina just to name a few, Kelly Ayotte in New Hampshire, these are down ballot candidates polling better than their presidential candidate. And now that it's coming down to crunch time I think Trump is seeing these people can help me.

BLACKWELL: Which makes you wonder why Donald Trump now in Tampa, Florida, is reminding the crowd he beat Rubio in 66 of 67 counties.

HENICAN: The primary season never ends.

BLACKWELL: It never ends.

We'll take a quick break. We'll continue the conversation right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:47:42] BLACKWELL: Melania Trump stepping back onto the campaign trail and stepping back into the political crossfire.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL CLINTON, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Yesterday I never felt so bad for anybody in my life as I did for his wife going out and giving a speech saying, oh, cyber bullying was a terrible thing.

(APPLAUSE)

BILL CLINTON: I thought, yes, especially if it's at 3:00 in the morning against the former Miss Universe and a guy run for president.

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: It's been a tough campaign season for a woman who could be the next first lady. And Jeanne Moos takes a look at that. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're not sure why they picked this song for Melania Trump's entrance. This astrological Taurus flashed a peace sign. Someone tweeted, "This the donning of something, but don't know about Aquarius."

Melania accepted love from the audience.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We love you!

MELANIA TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP'S WIFE: Thank you.

MOOS: No surprise, she got mocked for saying that as first lady she would focus on cyber bullying of kids.

MELANIA TRUMP: our culture has gotten too mean and too rough.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All I kept thinking was, have you met Donald Trump?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She can probably cut it in half just by taking her husband's phone away.

(LAUGHTER)

MOOS: This was Melania's first speech since she got burned for plagiarizing Michelle Obama at the Republican Convention. Before the plagiarism became known she walked off stage to thunderous applause which the Donald added to by clapping Melania's hand. After his boy talk on the bus went public, Melania came to his defense in interviews that sounded very similar.

MELANIA TRUMP: He's kind. He's a gentle man.

He's kind. He's a gentleman.

But my husband is real. He's raw. He tells it as it is.

My husband, he's raw and he's real and he tells it as it is.

It's damaging and it's unfair.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wow. Look on the bright side. At least she's only plagiarizing herself now, so that's progress.

MOOS: It's not easy being a potential first lady. Impersonators exaggerate every gesture.

[10:50:02] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All men are like this.

MELANIA TRUMP: Yes. They're all animals. If only a woman could be president.

(LAUGHTER) MOOS: Melania Trump may be making peace signs and talking about fighting bullies, but she's married to a guy who doesn't believe in turning the other cheek.

Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PAUL: A lot to talk about today, and in 10 minutes Fredericka Whitfield is going to take it over for us.

BLACKWELL: Yes, of course covering the campaign for the White House and for those down ballot races. She'll take a close look at those. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PAUL: We've been talking about voting, of course, but you can also vote for CNN Hero of the Year.

BLACKWELL: Meet Craig Dodson, one of this year's top 10.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CRAIG DODSON, CNN HERO: Essentially get them out of public housing, which is knuckles down, whatever it takes. Every day is literally a battle. For some kids the bike is the outlet. They've got all of this pent up angst. These kids have been through enough trauma to last three lifetimes. So the bike literally becomes the relief valve to get that out.

[10:55:10] Cycling is the hardest sport in the world. Mentally it's being able to put yourself in state of discomfort and stay there. Any time most humans are faced with discomfort they go into a negative pocket in the brain. That's the most prevalent thing, especially with our kids. So to be able to control those thoughts and divert that and push that aside and constantly think positively and persevere, those are things that eventually become the fabric of who you are as a person.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PAUL: All right, vote for Craig or any of your favorite top 10 heroes now at CNNheroes.com.

PAUL: We hope you make some great memories today. Thank you for sticking with us here as we're coming to you live from D.C.

BLACKWELL: Yes, there is much more ahead in the next hour of CNN Newsroom covering the campaign. We've got our analysts and reporters out on the trail with the candidates. We'll bring you their live comments and rallies. Fredericka Whitfield is up after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)