A Razor-Thin Race
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It's Monday, September 23rd. Right now on CNN This Morning, a razor-thin race. New polling shows just how close things are in battleground states. Now just six weeks out from November 5th. And... Join me on the debate stage. Let's have another debate. A debate dare. Kamala Harris accepting CNN's invitation for a rematch. Why Donald Trump claims it's too late. And this.

Extensive strikes. Israel warning civilians to leave parts of Lebanon as strikes ramp up. And later. We're going to win North Carolina. In our battleground beat, is North Carolina really back in play? Democrats see a path to victory after a scandal rocks the governor's race.

All right. 6 a.m. here in New York City. A live look at the skyline on this Monday morning. Good morning, everyone. I'm Casey Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us. We are now just 43 days until Election Day. It's just a little over six weeks, though for some, the election already

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Trump's 44% in this poll is the lowest level of support that the former president has seen in any poll that meets CNN standards since Harris entered the race in July. But in the critical battleground states that will ultimately decide the election, Harris and Trump are in a virtual deadlock. The latest CBS YouGov polls show Harris has a slight two-point edge among likely voters following the debates. This is higher for Harris than it was last month, but it's still within the margin of error.

And it wouldn't be 2024 without yet another debate over debates. Over the weekend, Vice President Harris accepted a CNN invitation to debate Donald Trump in Atlanta on October 23rd. The setup would mirror the Trump-Biden debate from June. Join me on the debate stage. Let's have another debate. There's more to talk about and the voters of America deserve to hear.

The conversations that I think we should be having on substance, on issues, on policies. What's your plan? What's my plan? And we should have another one before Election Day. While Harris pushes for a second showdown, Trump is telling his rally crowds it's too late.

The problem with another debate is that it's just too late. Voting has already started. She's done one debate. I've done two. It's too late to do another. I'd love to in many ways, but it's too late. The voting is cast. The voters are out there immediately.

Joining us now to discuss David Frum, staff writer for The Atlantic, Alex Thompson, CNN political analyst, national political reporter for Axios, Matt Gorman, former senior advisor for Tim Scott's presidential campaign, and Megan Hayes, the former director of message planning at the Biden White House. Welcome to all of you. Thank you so much for being here.

Alex Thompson, let me start with you because we also have some new polling out just this morning, New York Times, Siena College polling that shows Harris within the margin of error in North Carolina, 47-49. It shows a little bit of a wider spread in Georgia and in Arizona, the other Sunbelt states.

This polling news for her, which seems to be pretty positive, certainly got good reaction from the sources I talked to over the weekend. Also coupled with some reports in The Washington Post, The New York Times both did big stories about Donald Trump's relative lack of discipline and challenges inside his campaign here in the final weeks of the race. What are you hearing about where things stand and how things are moving here with just six weeks to go?

Yeah, I mean, these polls and Kamala Harris's world are really sort of keeping together this campaign because this campaign, this is not the ideal way to run a presidential campaign, you know, entering just a few months ago. And then, you know, none of these a lot of these people are not people that she hired that are on this campaign. You know, it's sort of a combination of Biden people who she doesn't totally trust her own people, plus all these Obama 2012 candidates.

operatives. And the fact is that as long as the polls are good, that things are going to keep going well. But if the polling ever turns south, there are a lot of sort of subtle tensions within this world. And you could start seeing some subtle finger pointing. Now, that being said, they're going to keep saying we're the underdog, we're the underdog, we're the underdog. That is their talking point. The fact of the matter is that they are feeling pretty good

about where they are. And that's part of the reason also why they are not doing interviews because they feel that they can still sort of coast and let Donald Trump be the main character and possibly still win.

David Frum, your view on that? Because, of course, as Harris's team, I mean, I take Alex's point about the ways if in fact they were to stop feeling ahead again, it's much easier to run a campaign when you feel like you're winning. It's just smoother sailing. We are starting to see the Trump campaign obviously have a little bit more infighting, some potential tensions between the top.

Susie Wiles, Chris Lasavita, Corey Lewandowski, creating some reporting in the Washington Post. What do you make of all of it? Can I start with your headline about the polls? We opened this segment by saying there are new polling this weekend that show Kamala Harris probably five percentage points ahead of Donald Trump in the polling, but is closer in the battleground states. Now, what if we rephrase that? Kamala Harris is five points ahead in national polling, which translates to an advantage of probably seven or eight million votes

But in the states where it's close, it's close. Because the way you get to be a battleground state is the state where it's close. But this election is widening. And it's very much what happened, I think, this year, what happened in 1980 with Ronald Reagan, where between Reagan and Carter, it was close, close, close, until it suddenly wasn't close in the last month and a half of the election when the leader pulled away. What we're watching is the leader pulling away.

And I think one of the questions I am contemplating is when it's all said and done,

Will the Trump campaign say the problem was that the president was kind of older and he didn't he was got lazy. He didn't work very hard. And we need to find a harder working younger Trump. Or do they learn some real lessons here about about what the country is like and that this kind of authoritarian, racist, corrupt style of politics doesn't work? It doesn't work in North Carolina. It doesn't work for.

for Donald Trump. And it doesn't work when you give it a law degree at a better haircut than J.D. Vance. Matt Gorman, let me let me give it to you to respond to what David said there. And also with the question, is he right that Harris is pulling away here? Is that what we're seeing?

Yeah, I mean, look at the public polling nationally. She's going to have a consistent lead. I mean, I think what you probably see is a popular vote she might likely get. But again, in the swing states, she can run up a margin in the more Democratic states. Swing states, they were tight before, they're tight again. It's a matter of kind of what it is. And I think what we're seeing now with the New York Times-Siena polls, along with kind of some of the other polling, is this is really going to zone in on three states.

Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, and really who can get two of those three states. I mean, North Carolina kind of got the headlines the last couple days because of Mark Robinson, understandably. But really, Pennsylvania is also going to be the biggest prize. You know, it's so hard to get where you need to go for 270 without it. And then if you if you get it, you're having to open up immeasurably. You only need Georgia along with Pennsylvania or obviously North Carolina. So I think that is that. And look,

I think this is, you know, you're seeing a bit of a polling bump for Harris. Absolutely. It's the debate combined with also we haven't really had a coherent message from the Trump campaign since the debate ended. And then this is a byproduct of that. Megan Hayes, do you agree?

Yeah, I actually do really agree with Matt here. I also think that, you know, polls are a snapshot in time, which we've all talked about. And I think that the polling, I'm not sure that the polling is accurate and enough to capture some of these things. I think we always thought it was going to be close. It was going to be close when Joe Biden was running. It's now close when the vice president is running. But I do think that some of these

unfortunate incidents that are happening with the Republican Party in North Carolina and some of the other stories that are making news will impact turnout, which I do think will have a result in the end in November. And like Matt said, with Trump not being able to get a cohesive message, that is only in the Democrats' favor. So where the vice president's running on vibes and being able to capture the enthusiasm, we are also being able to capitalize on some of Donald Trump's downfalls.

I don't think we should say that Donald Trump doesn't have a clear message. He's got a very clear message. This country needs to go to war with Taylor Swift to stop Haitians from eating dogs.

Well, I mean, and that was, you know, the subject of two of these big stories in the Times and the Post over the weekend, as you point out, that that is what they have that's breaking through at the moment. Your point is well taken. All right, coming up here on CNN this morning, a battle without limits. That is how Hezbollah describes the new phase of fighting with Israel underway as we speak.

Returning to Earth, a trio of astronauts undocking from the International Space Station and heading home. That's going to be one of the five things you have to see this morning. Plus, will North Carolina flip blue for the first time in 16 years? We're going to ask the state's former Republican governor when Pat McCrory joins us live. 45 days from now, we're going to win North Carolina. We're going to defeat Kamala Harris. And we're going to make America great again. We're going to make it great again.

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Developing right now in Lebanon, a region on the brink. Live images showing smoke rising over Lebanon as Israel and Hezbollah engaged in their most intense fire since the war in Gaza began nearly a year ago, deepening fears of a wider war in the region.

Today, Israel's military is urging Lebanese citizens to evacuate areas where the militant group operates immediately, warning that they plan to engage in extensive, precise strikes. Despite the U.S. urging Israel to de-escalate, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issuing this message over the weekend.

Over the past few days, we have struck Hezbollah with a series of blows it didn't imagine. If Hezbollah didn't get the message, I assure you they will get the message. We are determined to return our citizens in the north to their homes safely. No country can tolerate incoming fire against the citizens, incoming fire against its cities. And we too, the state of Israel, won't tolerate it.

Joining us now, CNN International diplomatic editor Nick Robertson, who's live for us in Tel Aviv. Nick, bring us the latest here. We've been looking all morning at a live picture of the horizon where you can see the smoke rising from Lebanon.

Yeah, a huge number of strikes. Extensive is how the IDF spokesman described it this morning. And when he described it early this morning, those early dawn strikes, he said there were about 150 of them into Lebanon over a wide geographical area, perhaps the widest area in Lebanon that we've seen in one series of strikes. But late this morning, there's been a second wave of Israeli Air Force strikes into Lebanon. That's what we're looking at now.

And according to the IDF, that's over 300 strikes into Lebanon. And for the first time, as you were mentioning, the IDF is warning residents in villages along the Lebanese-Israeli border to evacuate and leave their homes if they believe that houses nearby have Hezbollah teams.

Hezbollah missiles within them. It's a very clear warning from the IDF. And if we look at what they've done and what they've said previously in other arenas such as Gaza, when they say these -- when they make these warnings to civilians, the IDF very generally follows up with those strikes. And they have released video today showing a strike on a building they say had a Hezbollah cruise missile inside of it. So, it really is

becoming a much more wide scale offensive today. The Ministry of Information in Beirut has said that they've also received a warning to evacuate their building directly. They received a phone call. They say that this is psychological scare tactics.

But what we're witnessing in Lebanon at the moment is a number of people in a number of villages and towns are evacuating and moving away. Quite how many people isn't clear at the moment. But at the White House, this, of course, creating concern. And John Kirby, the national security adviser there, had this very clear statement for the Israeli leadership.

We don't believe that a military conflict, and we're saying this directly to our Israeli counterparts, George, we don't believe that escalating this military conflict is in their best interest. It's certainly not going to be in the best interest of all those people that Prime Minister Netanyahu says he wants to be able to send back home.

But if you look at what's been happening over the past week now from the decision to Israel's cabinet decision, the government's decision here to make the northern front, the border with Lebanon part of their war aims, we've seen this steady escalation. And that escalation is continuing today.

All right, Nick Robertson for us this morning. Nick, very grateful to have you. Thanks for being there for us. All right, more to come after the break. A scandal throwing the North Carolina governor's race into turmoil. Will it cause issues for the top of the ticket, Donald Trump, in that battleground state? Plus, a robot helping police with a standoff in Texas. It's one of the five things you need to see this morning.

All right, 22 minutes past the hour. Five things you have to see this morning. Police in Canada say they've now arrested a woman who ran over someone while stealing their car. Police say the 18-year-old suspect was posing as an interested buyer when she got into the car and put it in reverse, running over the car's owner. Police say more arrests in the case are pending.

A police standoff in Texas with a dramatic ending. A robot fired tear gas at a suspect barricaded in a motel room. Then when he tried to flee, the robot ran over the suspect, pinning him until police could take him into custody.

Right now, NASA astronaut Tracy Dyson, two Russian cosmonauts are returning to Earth. Their spacecraft separated from the International Space Station just two hours ago. Dyson has been in space for 184 days.

49ers wide receiver Jawan Jennings may have just made the catch of the year in the NFL in Sunday's game against the Rams. The San Francisco wideout reeled in this grab over a Los Angeles defender. Jennings had a huge day with three touchdowns, but the Rams got the last laugh with a last second victory over the Niners.

And meet Pesto, the king penguin. At just nine months old, he weighs 50 pounds and he's already bigger than his parents. Unlike most penguins, Pesto is covered in brown feathers and eats more than 30 fish a day. That is twice as many as the average adult penguin. Aw, buddy.

All right, time now for weather. Something may be brewing in the Gulf of Mexico. The National Hurricane Center is watching for a tropical system to form in the next couple of days. Let's get straight to our meteorologist, the weatherman, Derek Van Dam. Derek, what are you seeing? Good morning, Casey. You'll be hearing a lot about Helene in the days to come. That is our next name on the Atlantic hurricane season, and for good reason. The National Hurricane Center has tagged a very organized cluster of showers and storms over the western Caribbean today.

and invest, meaning that they're going to focus a lot of attention on this approaching storm system that will develop likely into a depression, tropical storm, and eventually a hurricane with the potential of a powerful landfall and hurricane by later this week as it approaches the Florida Gulf of Mexico coastline. Now is the time to review your hurricane evacuation routes,

get your hurricane kit in place, and also keep an eye on the forecast. Anywhere from the Florida Panhandle right through Tampa Bay, that is where the clustering of our ensemble models that we look at, the weather models that give us the guidance on where the storm is going, although there has been some shifting to the east in the overnight model, so we'll monitor that quickly. One thing's for sure, a lot of warm water ahead of this storm system.

That means we have the potential for a strengthening storm. And you can see the differences between the European model, a weaker storm further to the west, the American model further to the east, and a stronger, more powerful storm making landfall about the same time later Thursday and into early Friday morning. We're going to monitor the Gulf of Mexico for Helene in the days to come. Lots of rain, potential for flooding and tornadoes with this system as well.

All right. Lots to watch. Derek Van Dam for us this morning. Derek, thank you. All right. Still ahead here on CNN this morning, there's a plan in place to avoid a costly government shutdown. Is it going to work? We'll have details just ahead. Plus, former North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory joins us to talk about the race in North Carolina. Could a Democratic candidate for president win there for the first time since 2008? I feel pretty good about North Carolina, which is great because two months ago we did not.

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Shop lines.com right now and get up to 45% off select styles. Rules and restrictions may apply. Is totally out of control. Today I'm announcing a new plan to end all sanctuary cities in North Carolina and all across our country. We will get them out of North Carolina. 45 days from now we're going to win North Carolina. We're going to defeat Kamala Harris.

In our battleground beat today, we're looking at the Tar Heel State. Former President Trump attacking Democrats on immigration during a rally there this weekend. One thing he didn't mention, though,

The North Carolina race for governor where embattled Republican candidate Mark Robinson wants a fixture of Trump rallies there continues to face calls to resign after a CNN report revealed lewd posts he made on a pornography website's message forum. The Harris campaign seizing on the Robinson scandal by tying him to Trump in ads like this.

And he's been an unbelievable Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson. For me, there is no compromise on abortion. I think you're better than Martin Luther King. We could pass a bill saying you can't have an abortion in North Carolina for any reason. Abortion in this country, it's about killing a child because you aren't responsible enough to keep your skirt down. I've been with him a lot. I've gotten to know him and he's outstanding. Donald Trump and Mark Robinson, they're both wrong for North Carolina.

All right. Joining us now to discuss former Republican governor of North Carolina, Pat McCrory. Governor, wonderful to have you on the show. It's great to see you again. It's great seeing you again, Casey.

Really appreciate you being up early with us to kind of walk through this. I mean, obviously that ad that the Harris team put out, they raised that together. They released it on Friday after the CNN story broke. But the words they're using there are ones that comments that he made long before we learned all of this about what he had said on a pornography website. Michael,

question for you is whether or not, I mean, we knew Robinson was going down, right? That was something that was baked in already. But does this new and potentially worsening set of issues for him impact the top of the ticket in a way that you think is going to be decisive?

It could make a determination of several thousand votes at a minimum and several thousand votes mean a lot in North Carolina because every election in North Carolina at the presidential level, at the governor's level, and at the Senate level, which we don't have this year, can be within one or two percentage points. I know, listen, I lost an election in North Carolina by 10,000 votes out of 4.6 million.

So every vote makes a difference. And right now the Republicans are running away from Robinson as quick as they can. His campaign staff, his finance manager and his campaign manager resigned yesterday. The Trump people have actually quit being with him for the past month.

because the rumors were out there that more was coming out on Robinson. There's already a lot out there on his business ethics due to a nonprofit that he'd had. So the Trump team has been trying to keep him away

for well over a month now. So most of the clips that the Harris campaign is using are older clips, but they're going to try to connect the two as much as possible to maybe impact 5, 10, 20, 30,000 votes, which could make the difference in the presidential campaign right here in North Carolina. There is no loyalty in politics.

There is no loyalty in politics. Well, I mean, look, Donald Trump tries to demand it from people. But yeah, clearly, in this instance, they are they're just and my question on that is how far are they going to go? I mean, do you do you see or are you picking up signs that they are trying to push him to get out of the race entirely? Do you think that they would that would help them? Is that even possible at this point?

I don't think it's even possible at this point. This Robinson has dug in his heels, denying everything. But the denials are pretty general. In fact, Senator Tom Tillis came out with a unique announcement yesterday. Basically challenge him either defend yourself, challenge the report or get out.

And so it's interesting how some of the Republicans, especially out of D.C., are responding right now. And I thought that was an interesting response by Senator Tom Tillis. Either challenge the CNN report or get out. And he's not challenging anything. He's saying it's not true, but he doesn't seem to be providing any evidence to the contrary.

That's correct. That's correct. And if that sort of report was directed toward me when I was running for office, I'd be fighting like the Dickens, even legally. And he doesn't seem to be doing that. And plus, he has other baggage that's been the reason why he's been falling behind during the last two or three months. A lot of it related to business ethics with a nonprofit that he and his wife run.

were a part of. And there are some investigations going on right there. But the Trump team has been moving away from him for a while now. He bullied his way onto a stage several weeks ago with sheriffs. He wasn't invited. And Robinson kind of went up on the stage with the sheriffs when he when he wasn't supposed to be.

Interesting. Governor, there's a report out over the weekend from the Associated Press on kind of a ground operation that the Trump team does or doesn't have in place. And they're doing their ground operation in an unorthodox way. They have outsourced it, basically. And the AP writes this with fewer than 50 days until the November 5th election. Dozens of Republican officials, activists, operatives in Michigan, North Carolina, other battleground states,

say that they have rarely or never witnessed the group's canvassers in Arizona and Nevada. The Musk-backed political action committee replaced its door-knocking company just this past week. That's, of course, a reference to Elon Musk. What evidence do you have? What have you seen in terms of the Trump ground operation in North Carolina specifically? Do you think that they're doing what they need to do? I've seen very little ground operation. Most of the canvassers

campaign is being run on TV ads right now by both parties, and it's just dominating the airwaves right now. You know, there's one unique thing that we're maybe not seeing in the polls. We do not know, not only North Carolina, but Georgia, Florida, Nevada, Arizona, what I call the transplant COVID vote. So many people during COVID moved to North Carolina from New York, Pennsylvania, California. So

So they've never voted in North Carolina. And these are tens of thousands of people. And I think that's the unknown is what type of voter moved during COVID to these Sunbelt states

And how will they vote? And I think that's the unknown that's going to occur in all of these swing states. And by the way, the states like Michigan and Pennsylvania, people move from those states to the Sunbelt states so they could even have an impact on Pennsylvania and Michigan, not knowing who that voter is at this point in time.

Yeah, that's a really interesting thought. Governor, briefly, before I let you go, you had been involved in No Labels. Who are you going to vote for this cycle, Donald Trump or Kamala Harris?

Well, one thing I've learned, first of all, I'm in media now. I have my own media show called Unspun on PBS, so I'm staying away from that. But another thing, I think our founders were brilliant in having the secret ballot. In this cancel culture of today, I would recommend people maybe keep their vote quiet at this point in time because of the cancel culture. Former Republican governor of North Carolina, not saying you're going to vote for Donald Trump.

Won't acknowledge Harris either, but I take your point about the secret ballot. Thank you. I really appreciate your time, sir. I hope you'll come back. All right. Talk soon.

Less than two months away from Election Day, Republicans are still trying to figure out how to campaign on the issue of abortion. Ever since the Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade and got rid of the federal right to an abortion, it has largely been an issue that we have seen Democrats take the high. They've been winning on it, basically. Now it seems Donald Trump is trying to reassure women voters on this issue.

You will no longer be thinking about abortion because it is now where it always had to be with the states and with the vote of the people. I will protect women at a level never seen before. I will protect women as I have you have never seen before. Matt Gorman, I want to put this to you because this is something that Trump has really gone back and struggled to message on. What is going on here and are people going to buy it?

Yeah, I mean, look, I think level setting right now, I think what Republicans going into this saw is that we needed to win men more than we need to lose women. Dems, the opposite need to be true, right? And so I think the way you're seeing it's easier for Trump to pump the margins up with men by, say, going to Theo Vaughn's podcast, playing golf with Bryce and the Sham on YouTube than it is to try and win back some of that lost women vote.

In some polls it worked, but the NBC poll that came out yesterday showed us losing ground and women were losing women more than we're losing men, at least in that poll. And I guess the remarks both on Truth Social and at the rally

tell me that the Trump internals likely see something similar right now. So they're trying to kind of claw back some of that gender gap among women that they really need to do. And I think that is where you see something like that, where it's, for Trump, very scripted, very clear objective out there, which is rare. David Frum, do you agree? What do you see here and how this cuts? Donald Trump believes that

The voter has no memory. Donald Trump believes the voter doesn't know anything. And Donald Trump believes that everyone wakes up every morning and the world is completely born anew. And so if he says something today, he can contradict his whole life. He can contradict everything that's been happening. But look, since Dobbs, the Dobbs decision was handed down and abortion, the national federal abortion right was removed in the United States.

Americans have seen Republican state after Republican state put women under a surveillance regime that

unlike anything that this country has seen since maybe the aftermath, well, since its darkest days. And that doesn't go away just because Donald Trump has some new talking point. He doesn't believe the world is real. He just thinks you can say whatever you want and everything becomes new. But voters remember, one last thing. One of the things I think is very clear when you listen to Donald Trump and even more is running make JD Vance talk about Americans.

They see men. They think of the typical American voter as a man. But of course, more American voters are women than men. The typical American voter is a woman. And until Republicans internalize that truth and until they learn to speak that way, until they begin to bring women into the very highest levels of decision making, everything, every time Donald Trump speaks about women,

You hear the you people in it. You, you. It's never us. It's never it's never together. It's always you. I will do this for you and you will owe me, even though I did the opposite yesterday and all the years before that. Megan Hayes, very briefly, it seems revealing to me that this is what they are doing and that it seems to send the message that they are concerned about where this is.

Yeah, absolutely. But we've been seeing this for months, right? But the problem is, is they can't keep themselves on message and they keep criticizing women in a way that is just unproductive and unhelpful to them. So I do think that they are trying to be out there and he's trying to stay on message. And you can see he's almost uncomfortable saying those things out loud. And like, that is his message.

But you saw yesterday in the same NBC poll that Matt talked about that people see the vice president as the change candidate. So, I mean, that's interesting that he is going to take credit for the Dobbs decision, but then also said that he's going to protect women. And I just don't think that women, especially women, are going to see it that way in November. Yeah. Alex Thompson, quick final thought.

Yeah, I think you are going to see potentially the biggest gender gap in this election in American history and how women and men are voting. Matt is completely right that Trump has really more focused on driving up that male vote rather than the female vote. And that's why it was just like an off the cuff one remark in that rally.

All right, fair enough. Straight ahead here on CNN This Morning, another debate dilemma. Kamala Harris daring Donald Trump to meet her on the debate stage, but he seems adamant it won't happen. Well, he changed his mind. Plus, four dead, dozens more injured after a mass shooting in Alabama. In our morning roundup, one survivor recounts the moment he was shot.

All right, 48 minutes past the hour. Here's your morning roundup. Police are searching for several suspects in connection with a deadly mass shooting in Alabama. The shooting happened Saturday night outside a nightclub. Police say it was a targeted hit against one of the four victims who was killed, but 17 more people were injured in the crossfire. Literally a horror movie. There's bodies just laid out all over the sidewall. There's gun smoke in the air.

Local police are now teaming up with the FBI and other agencies to track down the suspects in the attack. We are one week away from a government shutdown, but we could be close to a deal to avoid it. On Sunday, House Speaker Mike Johnson announced plans for a vote for a clean continuing resolution to fund the government into December. Johnson hopes to pass the bill by the end of the week.

The Vatican says Pope Francis is canceling his audiences because of a, quote, slight flu-like state, end quote, according to the Vatican. The announcement comes days before he was expected to take a trip to Belgium and Luxembourg. All right, let's turn back now to this. Join me on the debate stage. Let's have another debate. There's more to talk about and the voters of America deserve to hear. The problem with another debate is that it's just too late. Voting has already started.

All right, more back and forth this weekend as voters wait to hear whether or not we're going to get to watch a second presidential debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. The vice president accepting an invitation from CNN to debate Trump on October 23rd. That would be just short of two weeks from Election Day. Trump recently told reporters he would consider a second debate if he, quote, got in the right mood and, quote, has yet to agree to the CNN proposal.

Trump's old debate coach, the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, predicting that there will be another presidential debate before November 5th.

If the polls continue to move a bit away from Trump, you know how much he focuses on that, and he's going to need something to change it. And in today's media landscape, absent a big mistake by one or the other, this is the only thing that's changed. But has his confidence been shaken after the first debate? Come on. His confidence shaken? No. He will convince himself that if she gets in the ring with him again, that he'll knock her out. I think he'll eventually capitulate.

All right. Joining us now is Mark McKinnon. He's a former advisor to George W. Bush, John McCain. He is also the creator of Paramount's The Circus. Mark, wonderful to see you. Thank you so much for being here. What do you think? Is Christy right?

Good morning, Casey. Yeah, he's right on point. And debates are the one opportunity and the only opportunity left in 45 days where you can really move the dial. And I guarantee you that if Trump is losing, he's going to be looking for any lifeboat that he can to get back in the race. So I think unquestionably he's going to look to it. I think CNN, your platform, he was pretty pleased with the last result. He liked the moderators. He thought it was a fair result.

a fair debate. So I think that he will absolutely be jumping on board because there's the old politician that you remember, Haley Barber from Mississippi, who had a great saying. He says, good gets better and bad gets worse. And we're in that phase of the campaign right now where things are going well for Harris, things are going bad for Trump, and he's got to do something to change the dynamic.

Do you think that his advisers would offer that same advice to him, even knowing how he performed last time and seeing the degree to which he has not really stuck with the program that they have laid out for him?

Yeah, I think I suspect that the advisers are 100 percent in alignment that he needs to do another debate. Listen, they know what's going on. They know that the winds are shifting in the wrong direction. By the way, the most interesting thing I've seen over the weekend, Casey, is that the fundamental of any presidential race is, is it a change or is it an incumbent reelection? Do people want change or more of the same? And this is absolutely a change election, which is the big challenge for Harris, because she's

technically an incumbent as the vice president. So that's been a challenge for her, is how does she argue for change when she's an incumbent? And the latest polls that I saw over the weekend is that she has shifted that number, that people believe that she more than Trump for the first time represents change, which is an amazing feat for an incumbent vice president to do

in an election year. So that's the most important thing that I've seen change over recent days. And I know that the Trump campaign is well aware of that. And if I'm on their team, I say, we gotta get back in the ring on TV.

It's so interesting you point that out, that number in the NBC poll. We were just here in New York screening a new film about James Carville, who, as you well remember, you know, had that. That is like his one of his defining principles of how you win an election is that you have to be the candidate for change. How do you think it is that they have pulled that off?

Well, it's been an incredibly disciplined campaign and the compressed nature of the campaign has been really helpful. I mean, first of all, she's she doesn't talk about it, which I think is really smart. That's one of the things you learn from losing campaigns. I learned a lot more from losing than winning. She learned a lot from Hillary Clinton. She got a lot of lessons there. And one of them is don't talk about change. Be changed.

She's an African-American woman running to be the first African-American woman president in history. People get that. They know that. That just that says change in itself. You don't need to talk about it. It just is. And she's been very disciplined about separating herself from from Biden.

She's talked about policies and change. She's talked about the freedom agenda instead of the democracy agenda. And she's, instead of making Trump a threat, she's diminished him and make him small. So all of those things say she's different, different than Biden, different approach, different kind of democratic president. And of course that was the whole Clinton mantra, different kind of Democrat. And she's done a really good job of making it clear. She's not an ideologue. She's a practical, you know, more centrist focused person.

a candidate running to unite the country. And I think that that is just screen change across the board. Very interesting. Mark, both The Washington Post and The New York Times kind of had their versions of the Trump campaign behind the scenes, infighting, kind of outlining how Trump himself has swung back and forth between talking about people eating pets to hating Taylor Swift.

basically the litany of things that he has done to hurt himself here in the final weeks. What impact do you think Trump's lack of discipline is having at this stage, considering how just how damn close this election is?

It's gotta be driving all of them crazy because the roadmap's really clear. I mean, talk about the economy, talk about the border, talk about inflation. That's all you got to do, right? And there's a clear path. And again, sort of just by the numbers on paper, this should be a Republican election.

If you just follow the follow the plan, but he can't follow the plan. So what does he do? He throws Corey Lewandowski, which is like throwing a cherry bomb in the toilet. I mean, he walks in and basically says to the campaign infrastructure that's already there. I'm coming for you. So that just creates, you know, infighting and chaos at a time when you really need unity. So, like I said, as Haley Barber says, bad gets worse. And that's kind of where they are in the campaign right now.

I love a Haley Barber quote on a Monday morning. Mark McKinnon, I'm so grateful to have you. Thank you for being here. I hope to see you next week. Thank you. All right. Now to this. Donald Trump seems to be suggesting this election will be the last time he runs for president, even if he loses. He did this interview with Sheryl Atkinson where he was asked what would happen if he loses in November. If you're not successful this time, do you see yourself running again in four years?

No, I don't. No, I don't. I think that that will be that will be it. I don't see that at all. I think that hopefully we're going to be successful. All right. Our panel is back. David Frum, you you heard him there saying he's not going to run again if he loses your thoughts. Trump is pre losing. He's losing in his own mind.

That's why he's desperately selling silver coins when he should be campaigning. That's why Mike Johnson is ignoring Donald Trump's demands and threats and keeping the government open. The speaker is keeping the government open when Trump wants the government shut. That's why his wife is hawking this book. And that's why he seems so depressed every time you see him. He is tasting defeat. He knows what's happening and he can't exert himself or mobilize himself in order to defend

do anything. That's why he's doing so few events. He's listless, he's lethargic, and he's losing in his own mind. His world is crashing in on him. He's pre-losing. Matt Gorman, do you think Trump is losing the election right now? I mean, look at the polls. I mean, I think he's certainly not in, it doesn't have momentum. He's not in the kind of the catbird seat. I mean, the Harris campaign can claim they're the underdog, and I get it. It's talking points. But right now, the polls show they're not, especially coming out of the NBC poll and a

or so days. Now, look, that'll tighten. We all went through this exact same process a month ago with the never-ending honeymoon. And it'll tighten back down where we're still, you know, 40 some odd days is an eternity. But that being said, right now, you know, the more preferential position is where the Harris campaign is rather than the Trump position. I was struck by his comments, though, too. I think he was, it was very blunt. Now we'll see. I mean, who knows? A lot can kind of happen to change that. His age, certainly notwithstanding. But yeah, I was struck by the comments

Yeah. Alex Thompson, honestly, 40 some odd days is an eternity in politics. Anything could change here. There is this question of another debate. You heard what McKinnon had to say. I mean, I tend to agree with him. Right. It's if Trump's losing, he needs to do something to change it. That's an opportunity. Does the Harris team think that there's going to be another debate if if at the end of October?

They're really not sure. And let's do a few things. Trump's comments that it's too late to do a debate are complete BS because Donald Trump also participated in October debates the last two election cycles. So but the fact of the matter is that Donald Trump's campaign, there is a thought that because Kamala Harris is much more comfortable in the debate stage than she is during it.

In some ways, by denying her debate, it's denying her oxygen since she is not doing interviews. And so there is if you if you're Donald Trump and you think she needs oxygen, she needs to be able to introduce herself to make voters more comfortable with the idea of her being president. Not doing the debate could also deny her oxygen.

Megan Hayes, what do you think? Are we going to see another one? I actually do think we will see another debate because I think that he will feel desperate and need to get out there. But on the comments that he made about losing, the one thing that struck me was he didn't even fight that he wasn't going to lose. He wasn't trying to muddy the waters that the election was going to be rigged and all the other things that he normally does, which I think shows that he, like David Frum said, is probably more accepting that he might lose the election and is more coming to reality with that.

Yeah, it's an interesting, it's a good point that you raised, that he often tries to suggest that something is going to be nefarious, and he didn't do it there. All of you, thank you so much for being with us this morning. Really appreciate your time. Hope to see you soon. Thanks to all of you for joining us as well. I'm Casey Hunt. Don't go anywhere. CNN News Central starts right now.

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