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Trump Transition Team Full of Washington Insiders; Shakeup in Trump Transition Team; Megyn Kelly's New Book Raising Eyebrows; Warren Buffett Reacts to Trump Win. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired November 11, 2016 - 14:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:33:12] BROOKE BALDWIKN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back.

Instead of draining the, quote, unquote, "Washington swamp," which is what we heard from so many of those rallies with Donald Trump, it looks like he walked deep into the waters in Washington. The president-elect's transition team has revved up with a staff of long- time Washington experts, veterans, K Street lobbyists, think-tank veterans, and among these names being tossed around for his cabinet, you have Chris Christie, Newt Gingrich, Reince Priebus, Rudy Giuliani. Not exactly a pool of political outsiders.

David French joins me now, a writer for the "National Review," and an anti-Trumper conservative, whose name was floated as an alternative if Trump, perhaps, as a candidate, And he's also a veteran of the U.S. Army.

So, first and foremost, David, thank you so much for your service.

DAVID FRENCH, WRITER, NATIONAL REVIEW & U.S. ARMY VETERAN: Well, thank you. It was the great privilege of my life.

BALDWIN: Beginning with politics, now the news that it will be the vice president, no longer Chris Christie, heading up the transition team. It will be the vice president, Mike Pence, Vice President-elect Mike Pence. What does that tell you about what the Trump administration might look like based upon that change?

FRENCH: It's telling me good things so far. It's telling me rather than Trump saying I'm going to go with who was with me first he's going with someone who would -- he believes would be best calculated to do the job, and do effective job and reach out to conservatives who were Never-Trump conservatives. I like Mike Pence, I have always liked Mike Pence. This is saying he's reaching out to people across the entire GOP spectrum, that he's not valuing first-in loyalty over everything else. He's looking at who could be effective in the job. And I think it's an encouraging sign.

BALDWIN: Let me throw another name in, Reince Priebus, RNC Chair Reince Priebus. Now sources telling CNN all signs point to Reince Priebus as Trump's chief of staff. Your reaction?

[14:35:12] FRENCH: LoOK, if it's between the -- one of the heroes of the Alt-Right in Steve Bannon, and Reince Priebus, consider me Team Reince Priebus. I mean, again, that's a very, very good move. For those of us who were concerned about a Trump administration, we had concerns about character and ideas. And we had concerns about some of the character of the people that surrounded Trump. And I had disagreements with Reince Priebus. I had disagreements with Mike Pence as a Never-Trump conservative. But I never sat there and thought that these guys are Alt- Right, that these guys are authoritarian, these guys are demagogues. No, they're constitutional conservatives. And if he's surrounding himself with constitutional conservatives, I'm pleased by that decision. This is another good step.

BALDWIN: How about, in my hand I have the -- this is from the Trump team. This is this list of men and women who would be involved in the transition. On the list, I'm looking at Jared Kushner, President- elect Trump's son-in-law. Farther down the list, I see Don, Jr, Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump. Do you think that's a good thing that he picks his own blood, his own family members as part of the transition playing roles and conflict of interest, David?

FRENCH: Yeah, that's starting to get more problematic.

BALDWIN: Why?

FRENCH: Look, it's to be expected you'll have loyalists around you. It's to be expected he'll trust his family above all else. But when you're talking about a transition team -- let's be clear what transition teams do. They're responsible for locating literally thousands of people who are going to be the GOP talent, the conservative talent, hopefully, to fill the ranks of this administration. This requires an awful lot about knowledge, not just about policy but about people. And when you choose people around you, yes, I get he trusts his family, but do they have the depth and knowledge required and are there conflicts of interest when the family is running Trump businesses while he's in the oval office? So, that's much less encouraging. But if the process is being run by Pence, truly run by Pence, more reassuring than these other aspects are troubling.

BALDWIN: What about also just as a Never-Trump guy we had heard that even though he's no longer in charge of transition he's an ally of Trumps, Chris Christie, Governor Christie, so apparently, governor Christie was trying to persuade Trump to consider never upcoming administration. A, do you think that would happen or would hell have to first?

(LAUGHTER)

B, would you be interested in.

FRENCH: LoOK, A, I think that particularly when it comes to foreign policy it's going to be really hard to fill the ranks of the foreign policy experts and the foreign policy professionals without dipping into some Never-Trump ranks. So, there's a little bit of necessity is the mother of invention here and necessity can sometimes be the mother of reconciliation. That may happen. As far as I'm concerned, look, here's my view. I am praying for the

next president. I hope and pray that I'm fundamentally wrong about his character and that I've been fundamentally wrong about what policies he'll pursue. That's what I'm praying for. If the next administration wants my help in any given way -- I sincerely doubt they would -- I'd be happy to serve my country --

BALDWIN: I'm hearing a yes.

FRENCH: -- in any capacity.

BALDWIN: OK, David French, thank you so much. Keep us posted.

Meantime, let's listen to former New York mayor, and ally of President-elect Trump, Rudy Giuliani, speaking here.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: what's your expectation going to be?

RUDY GIULIANI, (R), FORMER NEW YORK CITY MAYOR: I have no expectation. I just give my advice. Donald has been my friend for 28 years. All my work for him has been out of great loyalty and friendship for him. I can see already how he is going to be a great president and I'm glad I could play a small roam.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: What's your advice for him in picking his cabinet.

GIULIANI: That I give to him personally.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Do you expect to be part of his cabinet?

[14:40:29] BALDWIN: More from Trump Tower, more on the comings and going here on this Friday afternoon now that we know the next leader of the free world is President-elect Donald Trump.

We'll be right back.

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BALDWIN: Megyn Kelly became one of the faces of the 2016 election. But her new book is raising eyebrows about her actions with President- elect Donald Trump. According to the "New York Times" review, ahead of this book's release, Kelly says Trump called FOX News the day before the first debate and said he heard the first questions would be a, quote, "very pointed question directed at him." And of course, we now know that to be true. But her story gets even more bizarre, because on her way to the convention hall on debate day, her driver, she writes, "Enthusiastically offered to buy her some coffee. She finally said, yes, OK, I'll take the coffee, only to become," she says, "violently ill 15 minutes later." These are just some of the revelations we're getting a peek into.

Sarah Ellison is joining me, contributing editor for "Vanity Fair." She has written extensively about FOX and Megyn Kelly; and Brian Stelter, CNN senior media correspondent and host, "Reliable Sources."

Sarah, to you first.

I read "The New York Times" review as well. What was your biggest "wow" moment in reading it?

SARAH ELLISON, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR, VANITY FAIR: My biggest wow moment was that this was an incredible window into one high profile journalist's relationship with the president-elect. And it wasn't necessarily the Ailes stuff. It was how Donald Trump not only threatened her in public ways but tried to sort of woo her as well. And I thought that was a very interesting window into the way he operates with journalists.

[14:45:16] BALDWIN: The bit about "I'll take care of you and your girlfriends at Trump Soho, the hotel room, for a weekend," she said no, no.

Stelter, what did you think?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDICA CORRESPONDENT & CNN HOST, RELIABLE SOURCES: And he says -- Megyn Kelly says Trump tried to do the same thing with other journalists as well. She says it was an untold story of the campaign. Let's remember the verbal barrage, the assault Kelly experienced from Trump and his aides. One of his aides said Kelly should be gutted like a fish. There was a lot of incendiary commentary about Megyn Kelly during the campaign. So to some degree this might be a preview of what a Trump administration would be like with regards to the press. It's an open question about whether President-elect Trump will treat other journalists the way he treated Megyn Kelly. And her book, which officially comes out next week -- so we'll see her stuff next week -- could be a window into the future.

BALDWIN: But some of this about the questions ahead of time and the coffee she drank, and when you jump on her Twitter today, Brian, it seemed to me she was walking it back.

STELTER: Technically, you're right. She's on there saying for the record in my book it does not suggest Trump had any debate questions, nor do I believe he did. Certainly, though, in the book she insinuates Trump knew something. She also said on twitter she does not believe she was poisoned by anybody, she does believe she got a stomach bug, the same one Rand Paul did. But she insinuates she wondered if it was possible there was some sort of conspiracy to make her sick before the debate. Given that she's been so critical of Donna Brazile sharing questions ahead of time with Clinton aides, which was an awful thing for Donna Brazile to do, she was attacking CNN and Donna Brazile for that. Now there's an issue of whether someone at FOX was helping Donald Trump. You have to look at Roger Roger Ailes, former fox news boss and wonder if Ailes, who was talking to Trump all the time, might have given Trump inside information about the debate.

(CROSSTALK)

ELLISON: I have a little bit of -- (CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: If she had that inkling, Sarah, as a journalist, shouldn't she have disclosed that?

ELLISON: What, that he expected that the first question was going to be difficult? I mean, I think that -

BALDWIN: Yeah.

BALDWIN: I think that it unclear. When you're dealing with somebody like Donald Trump, when you're working with somebody like Roger Ailes, how much is smoke and how much is real? Does she disclose that on the debate stage? Does she say I heard -- I'm sure her employers knew. I know Roger Ailes knew Donald Trump was saying there was this pointed question coming and she was sharing that with her producers and people she worked for at FOX. Was she supposed to disclose that publicly? I don't know exactly how she would necessarily do that.

I do know one piece of reporting I've picked up since this morning, and I have it on good authority, that Roger Ailes was evidently as angry about Megyn Kelly's first question in that first debate to Donald Trump as Donald Trump was. So, he was not the one that fed the question. He was just an angry with her about that question as Donald Trump was. it's possible that someone else was feeding information or he gave Donald Trump a sense of that, but it was not that specific question.

BALDWIN: Interesting.

OK, Sarah Ellison, thank you.

Brian Stelter, thank you.

STELTER: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Billionaire investor, Warren Buffett, says he is 100 percent optimistic with a president-elect Trump. In an exclusive interview with Poppy Harlow, Buffett, who, remember, supported Hillary Clinton, says he's putting his concerns about Trump aside and giving him the respect he deserves as the commander-in-chief.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You are the eternal optimist. You're the one who wrote the opinion piece in the middle of the Great Recession saying bet on America.

WARREN BUFFETT, INVESTOR, BERKSHIRE-HATHAWAY: Absolutely.

HARLOW: Do you feel optimistic about America right now? A divided America?

BUFFETT: 100 percent.

HARLOW: Why? BUFFETT: It's the great- this is a fantastic country. In my lifetime

-- I was born in 1930 -- the real GDP per person has gone up six-for- one. We were the most advanced country in the world when I was born, and one person's lifetime, six-for-one. I've never seen anything like it. We have $57,000 of GDP per capita. Family of four, $228,000. They don't get it. But this system will produce more and more stuff and better and better stuff and services.

HARLOW: The system works regardless of who the president is?

BUFFETT: The market system works.

(CROSSTALK)

BUFFETT: But it doesn't work for everybody.

HARLOW: It doesn't?

BUFFETT: It works in aggregate.

HARLOW: Let's talk about the markets. Long-term, the market reaction to all of this, to President-elect Trump, what do you expect it to be long-term, given the policy proposals he's laid out, if he carries through with them?

BUFFETT: Are you talking about the stock market?

HARLOW: I'm talking about the stock market.

[14:50:09] BUFFETT: The stock market will be higher 10, 20, 30 in years from now than it would have been with Hillary and will be with Trump.

HARLOW: So these predictions that the market was going to tank under president Trump?

BUFFETT: They're silly.

HARLOW: Silly?

BUFFETT: They're silly.

HARLOW: Let's dig into some of the proposals that Donald Trump has put out there, economic proposals, and your take on them. He has suggested and proposed instituting a 35 percent tariff on goods imported into this country. A lot of business leaders say that would cause a trade war, that would cause a recession. What do you say?

BUFFETT: Well, I think it's a bad idea, a very bad idea. But I'm not going to say it will cause a recession. Any time you start playing around with retaliatory type trade things it's very likely the other side is going to play, too. That's been the history.

The problem for trade -- and this is why you need what I would call an instructor in chief as president, because you cannot blame anybody that lost their job because industry -- their industry moved abroad because there was a comparative advantage for some other country, you can't expect any of them to say, ah, I'm for free trade because it helps the society as a whole. It does help society as a whole, but the benefits are very diffuse. I may the socks I have, the underwear I have a few cents cheaper because of the comparative advantage of some other country in producing it. But I don't get down every time I go to Walmart and buy them, I don't say, "Thank God for free trade."

HARLOW: Does it worry you then to hear Donald Trump say he will scrap NAFTA, which he will have the power to do as president?

BUFFETT: We'll see what happens. It is true there will be -- with the Republicans in control of the Senate and the House --

(CROSSTALK)

HARLOW: You don't think he'll do it?

BUFFETT: Well, he has to get the House and Senate. He has to get support on it. There will be a lot of -- this is not exclusive to Donald Trump. There are a lot of things said in campaigns that don't happen after the election.

HARLOW: Donald Trump ran on the platform of being a billionaire businessman, arguing that gives him the unique ability to help all of the Americans, millions of people who are struggling, who cannot get by on one job, who cannot support their family, and they believe he is their answer. Do you think that Donald Trump is a good businessman? Because you certainly went after him on his business record during the campaign?

BUFFETT: Major failures. And he was very good at licensing and very good at things that involve promotion of his name. Actual operation of the businesses in the 1980s and 1990s, it left him essentially bankrupt in multiple companies. But he -- I would say this, he understands business but his record has been better at licensing and --

(CROSSTALK)

HARLOW: Than operations.

BUFFETT: -- than putting out his own capital, yes.

HARLOW: His publicly traded Trump casino empire. No major U.S. casino filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy more. Are you concerned about his ability to operate big businesses?

BUFFETT: He's not going to be operating businesses. I don't have to worry about him running a business at all. He's the one that -- you know that doesn't really, in my judgment, determine whether somebody makes a great president. Harry Truman went broke in a haberdashery store in Kansas City. He wasn't much a businessman. He turned out to be a terrific president.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: That's just a piece of Poppy's interview with Mr. Buffett. Please tune in when you're watching Poppy's show 3:00 p.m. Eastern.

Up next, back to breaking news in Washington. A shakeup within the Trump transition team. Governor Christie no longer heading up that effort. Trumps' kids are taking on roles.

[14:54:06] We'll be back to discuss.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

Silicon Valley was strongly pro-Clinton and now after a Donald Trump presidential victory, entrepreneurs are thinking about the role of the tech community in the election in this week's "Upstarts."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LAURIE SEGALL, CNN MONEY TECH CORRESPONDENT: You guys have traded your technologies that you can code your ideas into the hands of billions of people. What questions in technology with these leaders who have so much power should we start asking?

JUSTIN KAN, PARTNER, Y COMBINATOR: We have created systems that bring people together to find common ground or have we created systems that divided us into different parties, Republicans, Democrats, I think that's a hard question. Through technology it's very possible to live in your own bubble. In my President Bush feed, you would never believe Trump would be elected. And the information sources that I was consuming failed to examine the things that were appealing to large body of Americans.

SEGALL: What's the responsibility? You look at someone like Mark Zuckerberg, who has incredible power, he can tweak an algorithm and it could affect an election. This is the new era we live in. So, what responsibility or conversations within should these tech companies be having?

KAN: We've lived in a feedback cycle for technology that's around how do I drive the most engagement? How do I drive the most page views? Same in media as well. And consequently, you get things that are click bait, things that feed people the information that they want.

BALDWIN: Top of the hour. You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin here in beautiful Washington, D.C.

On this Friday and specifically on this Veteran's Day, if I may just take a moment. Yes, we live in a divided nation and, yes --