Show: ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES Date: January 7, 2016 Guest: Jess Kell, Caroline Jones, Tim Jones
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST: Thank you, Chris.
Good evening from Burlington, Vermont. I`m Chris Hayes. We are live from the Vermont Pub and Brewery. Right now basically across the street, Donald Trump has come into the heart of Bernie Sanders land in a state that had the most lopsided margin for Barack Obama anywhere except for Hawaii.
Lines all day long, he`s already been interrupted twice by protesters as his people were checking loyalty at the door. Let`s take a listen to what he`s saying now.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Oh, no. It`s only the same people coming down. No, there`s a remnant. Yes. He`s right there.
OK. Yes. Throw him out. Throw him out into the cold. You know --
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
Don`t give them their coat. No coats. No coats. Confiscate their coat.
You can`t -- by the way, just to finish. I have one word left -- Iraq. And nobody heard it because these characters.
So, they not only got a great deal but they also take over Iraq with the second largest oil reserves in the world. They have it, sure as you`re sitting there. They have Iraq.
So, we`re spending trillions. And who`s taking over? Iran is taking over the oil. They`re taking over Iraq.
I mean, what we are doing is so incredible. There`s nothing like what we`ve done. We`re destroying ourselves. We`re losing our jobs. We`re losing our base. We`re losing everything.
And it`s not going to happen anymore. It`s not going to happen anymore. It`s not going to -- we`re not going to let it happen anymore. Not happening.
Now, and I will tell you something about the protesters. And I respect what they`re doing. But I really believe unless they have a substance abuse problem, which is probably there -- he does. He definitely does.
No, I really think I can take them into a room, talk to them for 20 minutes. What are we doing? We want strong military, we want good health care, we want a good country. We want low taxes. I`d cut the taxes way down, especially for the middle class in business.
And, you know, I actually said, I could take these kids, most of them are kids -- are they talk -- I don`t even hear them. Their voice is so weak I don`t even hear them. OK. You can get them out. Yes, get them out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is amazing.
TRUMP: Thank you, darling.
I love my people. They say my people are the most loyal of anybody, I can do anything.
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
They say -- they say we have the most fun. I`ll tell you what, I have the smartest people. They were trying to say, well, our people aren`t -- let me tell you, we have the smartest people. I`m really smart.
My uncle was one of the top people at MIT for years. He was a -- we have good stuff. We have great genes in this room. We have smart people. They get it. They get it. They really do get it. It`s been an amazing -- it`s been an amazing journey for me.
Is somebody shouting back there? Oh, "I love you." That`s good.
(APPLAUSE)
But isn`t this more exciting, though, than these other rallies where they have no protesters, nobody cares. Nobody cares. They go in, everybody falls asleep, they say can I go home now, darling? And everyone leaves. And the guy`s standing there, please vote for me.
How about this guy O`Malley? I mean, here`s a guy -- no, think of it. His number one credential is he was the mayor of Baltimore. Can you believe it?
And he -- OK. So now he holds a rally and one man showed up. Did you see that? It was one of the great -- and he`s sitting there talking to the guy for an hour, just two people.
Then the guy gets up and he leaves and the press says, well, are you going to vote for him? No, actually, I`m not.
Spends a -- I mean, it`s time for him to get out. It`s time. Time for O`Malley to get out. He is really bad news.
At least Bernie is getting some action. He gets much smaller crowds than me. But at least Bernie gets some action, right? Oh, would I love to run against Bernie. I would love -- I would --
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
That would be a dream come true. But actually, I must say, I have my mindset on Hillary. I have my mindset on Hillary. It`s just -- it`s just going to be -- what?
We`ll take it -- what does that mean? That`s not nice. I got in such trouble. How about last week, did I get in trouble? What did I say? What did I say?
I said nothing. But I did -- I did get in trouble. The crowd there was incredible too. You know what happens? We have amazing people. We have like these crowds. And they`re all like interchangeable.
We have great people. You go to the south, you go to the north, you go to the west, the people have one thing in common -- the enthusiasm. The love of their country, they love their country. It`s unbelievable.
(APPLAUSE)
And let me tell you. Let me tell you something. It`s going to be very interesting. I don`t think we can be beaten. There`s a momentum that we have. There`s a momentum that we have that is so unbelievable.
I thought I heard a little voice over there. Get them out. Take them out. Get them out of here.
(CHEERS)
Don`t give him his coat. Don`t give him his coat. Keep his coat. Confiscate his coat.
You know, it`s about 10 degrees below zero outside. No, you can keep his coat. Tell him we`ll send it to him in a couple of weeks.
All right. It`s amazing. No, it`s amazing. But you know what? Sometimes we have -- sometimes you go into 20,000, you have none of that. I knew I was going to have some in Vermont in all fairness. If we didn`t have that, it wouldn`t be Vermont, right?
Hey. Why do you think the other Republicans are not coming up here, folks? OK? I`m the only one. Why do you think?
But it is -- it`s a funny story. So, the first time it happened was a couple of months ago. And I was really nasty. I`ll tell you one thing. We all like Bernie. Do you like Bernie? OK.
Well, if you want to pay a 90 percent tax -- he wants to tax you at 90 percent. So you don`t like him. I wasn`t sure. I had to feel that out.
But how about when the two young women took over his microphone? They came up screaming at him, and he retreated. He went like -- and they made the speech for the rest of that. That won`t happen with me. I promise. I promise. I promise.
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
That was a terrible -- I tell you what. It was so embarrassing to watch that. You know, because he`s a politician, he`s from this country.
When they took over that microphone that night, screaming at him, he was petrified. He walks to the back of the stage with that tall guy, the goofus guy. He stands there. And they`re both watching these two girls speaking.
And the crowd is saying, give him back the mike. Give him back. And Bernie`s standing -- I lost so much respect for Bernie. That was terrible. We can`t let anybody take over our mike. We can`t let it happen. Can`t let it happen.
HAYES: He`s obsessed with this on Bernie Sanders, that the mike was taken away.
TRUMP: June 16th in New York. I said to my wife, you know, we`ve got to do it. And I looked down at that building at Trump Tower, 57th and 5th Avenue, and I looked down, and I saw more of those cameras than I`ve ever seen at one place. I have never seen.
The entire lower level of Trump Tower was cameras, cameras, cameras. Outside on the streets they were closing -- trucks. The equipment. NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, everything. Networks I never even heard of. I never saw so many networks.
I said, are there that many -- it was like the Academy Awards. It was. It was like the Academy Awards. You all remember it.
And everybody said he`s not going to run. So they were all waiting. But I just said, look, we`ve got to do it. And I took a deep breath. And I said, let`s go -- because it takes guts to run for president. It really does. No, it really does.
I mean, it`s not something I had in mind. Steve Burke who`s a great guy, the head of Comcast, he came to my office just before. He wanted me to renew for a lot of episodes of "The Apprentice." It sounds a little trivial.
We love "The Apprentice." It sounds trivial. It`s not. It`s a lot of money. And then the deals I lose. Plus, I love my lifestyle. And, you know, now I`m driving around in an armored vehicle. I drive around in a vehicle. I say how good are those windows? Sir, they can take 28 AK-47 bullets before they degenerate. I say that`s a hell of a window, right?
And then I say how about the doors? The doors are unlimited, sir. They can take -- and the bottom and the top. I`m driving around in an army tank. I`ll never see a Rolls Royce again! Think of it. I may never see a car I want to be in again.
And they always put me in so fast. I`m going in. You know, it`s whatever the hell they call them. And I -- boom, get in. Boom, the door closes. And when that door closes we`re talking about -- the only good thing, if you ever get hit nothing`s going to happen. I`ll tell you that.
But it`s been a really amazing experience. I mean, the best part of the experience are the people that I`ve met. The people in this country are so competent. I mean, they`re so incredible. And they`re so enthusiastic. And I mean that, I love the people. I love the people.
But I said to my wife, I said, come on, we have to do it. We`ve got to do it. And I really didn`t know until that escalator. We`ve all seen the famous escalator ride down. Melania and her beautiful white suit and me waving. I didn`t even know who the hell I was waving to.
And I came down and we made a speech and we talked about illegal immigration, right? Did I take heat? Did I -- Rush Limbaugh said he has never seen so much incoming to one -- it`s true. I took -- I never had anything like it.
And then two weeks later, it started dying down, dying down. Now, people are saying he`s right. It`s turned out to be right. It`s now -- I`m like -- I`m like all these guys are trying to catch me.
And Ted Cruz, who I like, but three nights ago, he was being interviewed and he said, and we will build the wall. He never said that. My wife side, that gentleman just said we`re going to build a wall, he`s going to build a wall. I said he never said that before.
So, they`re all coming to me and they`re all -- but nobody can do it like - - first of all, nobody can build a wall like me. That`s for sure.
HAYES: All right. We are continuing to listen to Donald Trump, who is just down the block here from the Vermont Pub and Brewery. We can keep listening to him if you folks want to keep listening to him here in the Vermont Pub and Brewery.
(BOOS)
HAYES: OK. I listen to the crowd. The crowd has its way.
That sentiment that`s inside the location here I think is broadly shared by a lot of folks in Burlington, in Vermont. Certainly protesters outside.
Joining me from outside the rally, NBC News correspondent Katy Tur.
And, Katy, it looked like every time a protester was in the hall and got tossed out, they would come out to cheers from the protesters across the street.
KATY TUR, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And each one of them does a little victory dance. You`ve got to remind yourself you`re covering a political campaign, covering a candidate for president because oftentimes these rallies and especially this one can seem more like a rock concert or a circus even with the protesters and the supporters. They`re fighting, they`re cheering, they`re going inside and they`re pumping their fists and they`re just so excited to be here.
It is -- it`s jarring. It must be so weird to cover a candidate like Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio even because of the difference there is between the crowds. But this is certainly one of the biggest protests we`ve seen for a Donald Trump rally. And it`s not surprising.
Look, here`s another one. They`re jumping up and down. And everyone`s cheering for them.
So, this is definitely a new thing. But there are often protests at all of his rallies, certainly not this large.
I want to give you an interesting fact, though, about Vermont. Why is he here? Well, this state votes on March 1st. It`s an SEC primary state. Nobody campaigns up here because they assume it`s a blue state, why bother? Trump does a little bit of campaigning up here, a little bit of campaigning even in Massachusetts, and then he`s able to hopefully in his camp walk away with this state, win two states pretty easily.
Vermont also is, as we`ve been talking about, the home of Bernie Sanders. OK, look, here`s another one.
And when he comes in here and says I can draw 20,000 people who RSVP for me, look what I can do in Bernie Sanders` backyard, I am a crossover candidate, I can win where nobody else can.
And a little fact about Vermont, it was a red state for a long time. In the 1850s until 1992, they only voted for one Democrat. Then in 1992, they voted for Bill Clinton and it has been a blue state ever since. So, there is certainly something in the Trump campaign that maybe they can do some damage here potentially. I don`t know about that, though.
HAYES: All right, Katy, thank you much.
The story going into tonight was Donald Trump comes into Bernie Sanders` backyard. We went over to the Bernie Sanders headquarters today. We`ll bring you some of those interviews.
But the question was, they gave out these 20,000 tickets. The venue seats 1,400. We got here about 11:00 today, started talking to people online and the question was, what`s the deal, are these people here actually to see Trump? Are they here to jeer Trump or protest Trump? Are they undecided about how they feel about Trump?
What ended up happening was when folks got to the door, despite the fact many had been waiting for five or six or seven hours, some I think just in genuine good faith wanted to hear what the guy had to say, they were asked point blank, are you a supporter or not? And if they said, no, they were tossed out.
Joining me now, are three people who were turned away from the Trump rally. Jess Kell who was one of the first people to line up this morning, Caroline and Tim Jones.
Jess, so what brought you down to the rally?
JESS KELL, TURNED AWAY FROM TRUMP RALLY: I came down because I wanted to see the process as it unfolded.
HAYES: And you were with your son, right?
KELL: My son was in line at 10:00 this morning. I actually got here around 4:00.
HAYES: So you go up and you`re about to go in and what do they say to you?
KELL: They say, are you a Trump supporter? And I said I`m here to listen and observe and learn and they repeated their question, are you a Trump supporter? And I said I`m here to listen. And they indicated that I needed to leave, you need to leave now or you`ll be arrested for trespassing. This is a private event.
HAYES: This is a private event for Trump supporters and you were trespassing if you were not a supporter.
KELL: And I was escorted out by the police.
HAYES: So, Caroline, what happened to you when you got to that line?
CAROLINE JONES, TURNED AWAY FROM TRUMP RALLY: It was a pretty similar event. I got up to the front of the line after waiting for six hours with my brother in the cold and a man asked me if I was a Trump supporter. And I didn`t think twice about it. I just said no.
And he told me I had to leave. I started to argue with him and he pulled a policeman over and he told me the same thing, that I`d be arrested for trespassing if I didn`t leave.
HAYES: What was your response? One of the things that struck me is the city of Burlington, the municipal officials here, I talked to the police chief and the mayor, are going out of their way to say, look, we welcome him to the town, but this is America, democracy, First Amendment, he wants to have a rally here, good for him. What`s your -- how do you feel about being kicked out?
TIM JONES, TURNED AWAY FROM TRUMP RALLY: I mean, I think the real shame is that you know, when you have a political event you have -- they say online if it was a phish concert they would totally shut down the event. It would be not -- the irresponsibility of the campaign giving so many tickets away and with so many -- few seats to actually hold people, then they wouldn`t even let those people in.
But you know, to those -- the fact is there are a lot of people who just want to hear the campaign.
HAYES: Yes, and that`s -- in some ways when you`re on the trail in, say, Iowa or New Hampshire you do events not just for your supporters. In fact, that`s what campaigning generally is, is going to talk to people who don`t yet support you and try to convince you --
TIM JONES: I was undecided. I wanted to hear the opposing points of view. I wanted to hear why, you know -- because I hadn`t seen him speak in person. There`s certainly many reasons that he may not have come across that way in the way the media portrays him.
HAYES: Right. I talked to people today, I thought it was interesting. What Katy said there is key. When you go back and look at 2008, right? Barack Obama campaigned in states that people forgot about. It actually helped him put points on the board.
The idea that Vermont is actually a Super Tuesday state. And I talked to people in line who said, I respect him for coming here.
KELL: Yes. I think one of the biggest shames of today is there are so many young people in line that may have not gotten a chance to go inside. My son is 17. He`s with a group of high school and college students. Most of whom will be voting in their first presidential election.
HAYES: Your son was smart enough to say he was a supporter.
KELL: He did.
HAYES: All right, Jess Kell, Caroline, Tim Jones, thank you very much for joining us. Really appreciate it.
All right. Yes, we are here at the Vermont Pub and Brewery. We have a kind of Mount Rushmore of Vermont here. We`ve got Howard Dean in the room, Jerry of Ben & Jerry. Everyone is here.
But in Washington, D.C. right now is my colleague Chris Matthews, host of "HARDBALL."
Chris, have you ever heard of a political campaign event during campaign season where you could only get in if you already support the candidate?
CHRIS MATTHEWS, "HARDBALL" HOST: Well, I guess we have to squeeze 20,000 people into 1,500 seats. You get pretty extreme about it. I haven`t seen anything like this before. You`re right.
But I`ll tell you something. I`ve been listening to the guy tonight, as I always do. He`s running against the Republican Party, which is certainly interesting for a candidate for a Republican nomination, any party`s nomination, to basically say, I`m running against the Republicans. He`s running against the Iraq war. I mean, he`s running against the trade policies in the Republican Party that he says are costing us jobs.
It`s not against Obama as much as against his own political party that he`s chosen to run in, which is going to tell us a lot about where this campaign`s headed by next November.
This year, the November election could possibly, plausibly have a nominee of a party who`s run against the party and has beaten it. That`s possible.
HAYES: You know, and I talked to a bunch of people today. I probably talked, Chris, to I don`t know, three dozen, four dozen Trump supporters. And to a person it was -- people don`t think particularly highly of the institution of the Republican Party. We know how much the establishment as we call it is hated.
But also, people basically -- I mean, a huge part of it is the guy is a celebrity. I mean, a lot of people are there because they think I like Donald Trump, I`ve seen him on TV, I`ve read his books. So, I think, you know, the country`s screwed and he`s a successful guy.
MATTHEWS: You know, I think there`s a lot of showbiz and a lot of those years on "The Apprentice" where he really built an audience and he`s got a lot of interesting kind of charm. He`s very funny. You may not like him at all. People don`t like even hearing you think he`s funny.
But I sit here with people, we laugh. A lot of the time we laugh because it`s so over the top, it`s so outrageous what he says. And I think this political correctness, he says things most people don`t say and it has a certain edge to it and it can be bad and dirty and ugly even sometimes. I`ve pointed that out. We`ve all pointed it out.
But there`s a certain irascibility to it that jumps away from listening to Martin O`Malley or one of the other candidates. You go yeah, yeah, yeah. Here`s a big difference. Hillary Clinton`s positioned herself we know as on the center left.
TRUMP: Go ahead, get him out of here.
MATTHEWS: And Cruz has positioned himself on the hard right of the Republican Party. Where has Donald Trump positioned himself? In a totally different world of nationalism, of anger, of entertainment. You put all the pieces together. He`s selling something that hasn`t been sold before, and that`s why he`s got the crowd.
HAYES: You know, I guess as we`re watching here, the are you a Trump supporter test has proved to be less than foolproof over the last 45 minutes, perhaps not shockingly. That -- there are a lot of people that got in there to protest.
MATTHEWS: He wants them --
HAYES: Of course he does.
Chris Matthews, thanks so much for joining us. I really appreciate it.
MATTHEWS: Good luck with the show. I think you built your crowd tonight, Chris. Ha!
HAYES: Well, we`ll see if I get disrupted by any protesters or heckled or anything like that.
Donald Trump is still speaking at this hour. He talked directly about Bernie Sanders, said he would love to run against him, although Bernie Sanders has been drawing huge crowds.
We went and checked out his campaign offices. We`re going to talk about the Bernie Sanders phenomenon including an interview I had with the man himself, just after the break.
TRUMP: This is what happens. And this is why we lose control of our country, folks. This is why. We lose control of our country, because everybody`s afraid to do anything. The police, who are these phenomenal people who are totally mistreated, by the way, totally mistreated --
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
And they really are. They`re afraid to lose their job over stuff. Can you get them out of here? Get them out.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Are you guys Trump supporters? Is that why you`re here tonight?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
HAYES: How did that start?
MAREE CHIERA, TRUMP SUPPORTER: For me, it started when I was 17. My dad gave the book "The Art of the Deal" before I went to college and that was it.
HAYES: What do you say when people say that, you know, Donald Trump has said these things about, you know, Mexicans being rapists and banning Muslims?
DAVID VILLENEUVE, TRUMP SUPPORTER: No, he doesn`t mean that. They twist this stuff around and sometimes they`re using words. I think he`s as human as the rest of us.
HAYES: Obviously, he said a lot of things that people thought were very offensive, you know, things like banning Muslims from the country --
MICHAEL HART, TRUMP SUPPORTER: I`m anti-P.C.
HAYES: Anti-P.C.
HART: You can say anything about me. It is what it is.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: All right. Just before the rally started, I spoke with some Donald Trump supporters streaming into Burlington Flynn Center by the thousands all gathered to see the man up close, Donald Trump.
The line was filled with a heady mix of die hard Donald Trump supporters, Sanders fans, a lot of people who just came to see the show.
Joining me now the former governor of the great state of Vermont, MSNBC political analyst Howard Dean.
How are you?
HOWARD DEAN, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: I`m great.
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
HAYES: You and I have talked about this. You know, Chris Matthews has made a point about he is running full scale against the Republican Party.
DEAN: He is.
HAYES: I remember the speech you gave in California when you were running for president where you said what I want to know is -- and you beat the stuffing out of the Democratic Party. You got up there and said why is the Democratic Party doing X and Y and Z particularly over the Iraq war.
DEAN: Right.
HAYES: You very much ran against the party successfully. And ultimately the party had its revenge on you in certain ways.
DEAN: Yes, they did.
HAYES: And the question -- you know, part of the question here is does the party have -- as a man who ran a political party, does the party get to have its revenge on Donald Trump?
DEAN: Well, they`re going to try. They`re going to go after him. The closer he gets to the nomination, he`s getting closer every day, the more scared the Washington Republicans get. They`re terrified by this.
HAYES: You were talking to me downstairs that obviously Vermont has gotten the margins in, say, presidential elections has grown year over year. But there are still folks here who are conservatives. I talked to a bunch of them today. You said you were able in this state to win some of those people when you were governor here.
DEAN: Bernie won a lot of them. I remember the year after did I civil unions, I barely got my governorship re-election. Bernie got every vote my opponent got in the northeast, which is the more conservative part of the state.
So, there is a vote of working-class people here. The thing that makes us different, though, is we don`t have a lot of people that are way out there like this governor of Maine or somebody like that that are off the charts. Our working people are just thoughtful, decent people, and they may be more conservative socially than others but they`re not crazy.
HAYES: Well, but it also strikes me you`ve got a situation in Vermont and Maine, you`ve seen it in New Hampshire, there`s been a lot of attention paid to particularly New Hampshire about opioids and levels of addiction. But also just the basic economic circumstances of the white working class in a place like Vermont, a place like Maine, a place like New Hampshire, something Bernie Sanders talks about, in some ways what Donald Trump in his own way is talking about.
DEAN: The difference is Donald Trump is scapegoating large groups of people in order to appeal to his constituents. That is a mistake, and you cannot get away with that here.
HAYES: You have not seen that work in Vermont.
DEAN: It will not work here.
HAYES: Why not? What is it about the political culture?
DEAN: Because we all know each other. No, we do. We know each other.
HAYES: I know.
DEAN: Negative campaigning does not work very well here. And the reason is --
HAYES: Right, because you`ve got to see the guy the next day.
DEAN: Not only that. You`re likely to know the other person and you know they`re not a jerk or whatever the negative campaign is. So, if you call somebody a jerk, guess who they`re going to think is the jerk. The person who`s running the ad.
HAYES: Now, here`s the question for you. And I know you`re a Hillary Clinton supporter. This is the question for Bernie Sanders, guy says I`ve never run a negative ad in my life, it`s not what I do. It`s served him very well in the political culture here, right?
We`re watching the opposite of that in Donald Trump who all he does is insult people. He comes out of New York politics where that gets you pretty far, OK? But the question becomes can Bernie sort of pivot to running a campaign where he can credibly attack Hillary Clinton when it`s not in his blood?
DEAN: I don`t think he wants to do that. And do I think -- Bernie is a terrific politician. He really is. He`s added an enormous amount to what I think is an essential debate, which is the issue of income inequality and the fate of the working class in this country. That`s a legitimate debate. He`s pushing the whole debate in the direction it wants to go in.
I think that`s what he wants to do. He`s a guy with a lot of integrity. He`s not going to sully himself with dirty campaigns.
There`s a difference between comparing voting records and running a negative campaign. I don`t think Bernie`s running a negative campaign.
HAYES: No, he`s not. We`ll see how this develops. Howard dean`s going to stay with us at the Vermont Pub and Brewery here in Burlington.
Still ahead, my interview with Bernie Sanders. Stay with us.
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: And you know why? Because I will have told him that if you build that plant, you`re going to have a 35 percent tax for every single vehicle that comes across the border.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: . great guy. The father is like this great guy. His son was the apple of his eye. Young boy. Walking down the street. Right in front of his house. Going home to see his father. And he gets shot in the face three times by an illegal immigrant that wasn`t supposed to be here. Or the woman -- or the woman in Los Angeles who got raped, sodomized. She`s a 65-year-old veteran. Raped, sodomized and killed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC ANCHOR: In a country of 330 million and with 12 million undocumented immigrants, Donald Trump takes a moment in every stump speech to focus on a few incidents of crime trying to communicate to people that crime in America is to blame on illegal immigrants, undocumented workers.
Well, I got a chance to talk to Bernie Sanders this week about both the Trump phenomenon but the broader thing that`s happening in this election we`ve seen on both sides, which is basically a crisis of authority in American life, a lack of trust in the parties, in the institutions, and how you run a race under those conditions. He had some very interesting things to say about that. Stick around.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Eventually Hillary Clinton`s going to be the nominee. You guys are going to pack of the tent. You why do -- I mean, I guess my point is like people here are like you guys believe you`re going to win this race?
JOSH GACHETTE, VOLUNTEER: Yes.
HAYES: Do you this is like, and do you feel like people here are ready to do what it will take to make that happen?
GACHETTE: Yes. No, absolutely. I don`t think we can undermine the rest about populism. You know, I think that for a very long time the Clinton brand, with all too respect, you know, to the secretary, has been one that leaves a lot of Americans out.
And I think there are a lot of people in this country who, you know, some of them are lining up for Trump tonight. You know, they felt that the levers of economic and social mobility that they`re entitled to as citizens haven`t been afforded to them. And the Clinton`s have been able to distract those people for a long time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: I spent the early part of my day here in Burlington at the Bernie Sanders national campaign headquarters, which is a stone throw from city hall where Bernie`s political career first got off the ground as a mayor of Burlington back in 1981.
There is no doubt staffers and volunteers not only believe Bernie Sanders will win this election, they seem to be relying on him to pull off the upset.
I sat down with the senator from the great state of Vermont and we talked about whether his approach, addressing the injustices of working people will be enough not only to win over the Democratic electorate, to turn many Republican voters, even Trump supporters, his way.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BERNIE SANDERS, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The American people are angry and they`re frustrated, all right?
The median male worker today is making $700 less in real inflation adjusted for dollars than he made 42 years ago, women 1,000 bucks less than in 2007. People are angry. They`re worried about their kids.
Now what I am saying is OK, you have a right to be angry. Let`s create an economy that works for all of us. We`ve got to get to the root cause which has a lot to do with Wall Street, greed and corporate greed. Let`s stand together and take them on.
What Trump is saying is, yeah, you`re angry, and you know what the cause of your problem is? It`s the Latino tomato picker over there who`s making 8 bucks an hour. Or it`s that Muslim engineering student. We`re going to keep them out of this country. That`s the old-fashioned scapegoating. So I think he is tapping into an anger scapegoating and doing what demagogues always do.
HAYES: But that is the question, right. The question is, is this thing, I mean you were talking to Chuck Todd about your -- the possibility of getting those people as Sanders voters. And I`ve heard -- I`ve got some folks who work in Iowa who say they will encounter people that are -- that were Rand Paul people and they`re now Bernie Sanders people.
SANDERS: Yeah, yeah.
HAYES: You poll very highly among Republicans in Vermont.
SANDERS: Because I got 25 percent of the vote from Republicans in my last election.
HAYES: But then there`s this question about the way politics works now, right. Because when you talk about your material interests are this, right? Your politics have gotten very tribal, very polarized. There`s this real kind of demographic fear that`s playing among a lot of what we used to call the white working class. That`s a real thing, right? I mean that`s not something that`s kind of a malleable.
SANDERS: What we have got to do, this is what you have to do, as you know, my whole life I have been pro-choice, I am pro gay rights and so forth. And what you have to say to people, OK -- and this is why I went to Liberty Union, Liberty University a few months ago.
Look, we disagree on gay rights. We disagree on abortion issues. Can we at least agree that income and wealth inequality, the grotesque level in this country is a moral issue? Can we stand together?
HAYES: Right.
SANDERS: Should we work together to end the fact that we have a high rate of childhood poverty of almost any major country on earth. Can we work together on those issues?
So the point is into reaching out to people, is like, "Look, we do have disagreements but your kid can`t afford to go to college."
HAYES: There`s also this dynamic that there`s a loophole that Trump has exploited which is the gap between the donor class from Republican Party in the base. And there`s three issues where he`s done this. Medicare and social security where the donor class wants to cut it and he says I don`t want to cut it because Republican voters don`t want to cut it at all.
Trade, NAFTA, right? The donor class loves these trade deals. Rank and file Republicans don`t, and immigration. The donor class wants comprehensive immigration reform and rank-and-file Republicans don`t want it.
Do you see similar issues in the Democratic Party where there`s this gap between what the elite to the party want, what the donor class or Democrats want and what rank-and-file.
SANDERS: Before I get to the Democrats, let me say a word on Trump. What Trump also wants is huge tax rates from the wealthiest people in the country. Don`t forget about that.
HAYES: Oh, he wants lots of things the donor class also loves.
SANDERS: He doesn`t want to raise the minimum wage. And in the debate, the Republican debate he said wages in America are too high.
HAYES: Right.
SANDERS: OK, so, in terms of, you know, what you have, I think the division in the Democratic Party, and I think I`m trying to bridge that, is on one hand you have folks who say look, gay rights is terribly important, women`s rights is terribly important, climate change is terribly important. I agree. But, you know what? You have to pay attention from the fact that working people are struggling, that real wages are going down, that their kids can`t go to college. You have to pay attention to the need to rebuild the trade union movement in this country.
So it can`t just be gay rights or women`s rights. It has got to be trying to create an economy that works for all of our people.
HAYES: What is part of the frustration, right? Is that you can say -- come before them, say "I`m Bernie Sanders, I believe in these things." And I think people believe you when you say that because you do believe in them. Your record shows that, right. This is not a con job. But there`s some little faith that anyone can change this. When we`re talking about 40 years of the way the global economy is.
SANDERS: Yes.
HAYES: Right, so in some ways it`s like great, good for you.
SANDERS: I will tell you.
HAYES: But what are you going to do?
SANDERS: Can I tell you a happy story?
HAYES: Yes.
SANDERS: Invisible times. Let me tell you a happy story. When I was elected to be mayor of Burlington, Vermont I won by ten votes, OK. 1981.
Two years later we almost doubled the voter turnout. You know why? Because we showed people -- and I`m not here boasting -- that we would stand with working people, low-income people. We did things that would improve their lives. And they said "You know what, maybe government is not such a dumb idea, maybe we`re going to come out and vote."
It`s a vicious circle. If, for example, we would be able to raise the minimum wage tomorrow to 15 bucks an hour, millions of working people would say "Gee, maybe government does make a difference." Provide health care to all people, "Yeah, government." But if you don`t do that and you say "Vote for me," why? Why should I vote for you?
HAYES: Bernie Sanders on the trail down the stretch. Great to see you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: All right. Here in Burlington, Vermont, the Vermont pub and brewery, which is right in the heart of the political capital of America for the evening, we are here just a block away from where Donald Trump finished up his speech.
(OFF-MIC)
HAYES: Just across that plaza there is the Flynn center. That`s where Donald Trump finished up about an hour and 15. He`s making his way through the crowd after periodic interruptions by folks who had gotten in there. He`ll come out and be greeted by protesters.
We`ve also got kind of -- as I said before there`s the Sanders campaign headquarters where we talked to some folks earlier. As I said before, we`ve got the Mount Rushmore of the state of Vermont right here tonight in the pub.
We`ve got Former Governor Howard Dean, who is here. And of course we`ve got Ben and Jerry of Ben & Jerry`s Ice Cream, big Bernie Sanders` supporters.
We will be back with much more on the Trump rally here in the heart of Bernie country in just a bit. Stick around.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: . We love you.
HAYES: How many of you here are Trump supporters?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: All right, I was just a little earlier at the huge line that winds its way around the Flynn Center talking people who are lined up. We got talked to a bunch of them. We`re going to talk about what this phenomenon is, what it all means of (inaudible) who is been watching this happened every single day.
Howard Dean, the one and only Charlie Pearce will all be here live at the Vermont Pub and Brewery. Do not go anywhere.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: All right, we`re back here in Burlington, Vermont. You know, in Maine, one of Vermont`s northern neighbors, there`s a Republican governor by the name of Paul LePage who just landed himself in hot water after recent comments, responding to a question about the heroin epidemic at a town hall last night, so LePage blamed out of state drug dealers. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL LEPAGE, MAINE GOVERNOR: These are guys of the name D Money, Smoothie, Shifty, these type of guys that come from Connecticut and New York. They come up here, they sell their heroin, then they go back home.
Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave, which is a real sad thing because now we have another issue that we`ve got to deal with down the road.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Yeah, that was Maine`s governor talking about d-money impregnating white women in Maine.
Governor`s office said in a statement "The governor is not making comments about race. Race is irrelevant. What is irrelevant is the cost to state taxpayers for welfare and emotional costs for these kids who are born as a result of involvement with drug traffickers. His heart goes out to these kids because he had a difficult childhood too."
Joining me now, I`ve got here Charlie Pierce, political columnist for Esquire magazine. NBC News Correspondent Katy Tur and we of course got former DNC chair and six-term government of Vermont Howard Dean.
So I want to play you guys a clip of a guy I talked to today because one of the things I think that happens is when you think about politics if you`re a very political person, you think about politics professionally, you think about it in certain categories and that`s not -- those are not necessarily the same categories voters think about politics in, right?
And I -- so when you think about the idea of is there a voter out there that could vote for Bernie Sanders for senate and also Donald Trump for president, which seems preposterous, right, if you think about those categories.
Well I talked to a guy who basically is probably going to do that today. Take a listen to what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. HOWARD DEAN, (D) VERMONT: I`m kind of undecided about Donald Trump. You know, he already has a huge fortune, a lot of fame. Is he really genuine about being president because I think he could do some good stuff if he gets in there. The biggest issue for me is up here in Vermont I work personally a lot of hours and I have to work two jobs and there`s a lot of people in our area that work two jobs and seems like you can never get ahead.
HAYES: Bernie Sanders is your senator obviously, sort of Vermont institution. What do you think of him?
DEAN: I like him a lot. My last name is actually Sanders as well so.
HAYES: No relation?
DEAN: No relation. My father knew him well. And, you know, I really always appreciate what he`s done for the state.
HAYES: Do you know someone who could imagine yourself voting for either Trump or Sanders?
DEAN: Exactly. That`s why I took the day off to come here, to learn more and, you know, see it firsthand and hear from him directly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Katy, you know, there`s a line about I work -- a lot of you worked two jobs, find it hard to get ahead. I mean, one of the questions for this election, and I think it`s true in the Democratic primary and will be true in the national election is basically who`s got the best story to tell about helping those folks?
TUR: And I think there is actually some crossover between Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. On the face of it doesn`t seem like there is because they have such different platforms but at the same time they`re both talking directly to the disaffected worker, the one who this economy has passed by, and I have often heard people say that they do like Bernie Sanders as well, they`re deciding between Bernie Sanders and Donald.
HAYES: You`ve heard that?
TUR: I`ve heard that on the trail at Donald Trump rallies and some of it. It`s true. You guys might not like it, but it`s true. And I`ve heard people say that they do like both. And I`ve also heard people say they like Hillary Clinton and Donald trump. That`s very rare.
HAYES: Right.
TUR: But it has happened. I think that Donald Trump according to GOP insiders, they do think he`s going to be able have some crossover, he`s going to be able to convince some people to move over, some soft Democrats and they independents.
HAYES: Here`s my theory. Donald Trump is a stronger general election candidate than Ted Cruz is.
CHARLIE PIERCE, ESQUIRE MAGAZINE: Oh, no question. I`m a stronger general election candidate.
HAYES: Because I think Ted Cruz is probably one of the weakest general election candidates they have on their side right now. If I were ranking them. And what`s remarkable about how this is playing out is that Trump`s strength it looks like it`s leading to the possibility of Cruz having a real shot at this.
PIERCE: We were talk earlier, the governor and I talked earlier, I`m trying to figure out where Trump is going to be stopped and who the person is that`s going to stop him and I can`t figure it out right now. Because everybody`s got problems everywhere. You just ran that clip of governor LePage in Maine. He`s Chris Christie`s problem now. Because he was one of Chris Christie`s.
HAYES: The first person to endorse.
PIERCE: And they fill campaign together this weekend.
HAYES: The first event that Chris Christie did I think. I`m pretty sure.
PIERCE: Yeah.
HAYES: Was with Governor LePage, who he helped when he was running the Republican governors association, and went up there and stood next to the guy.
PIERCE: Yeah, well, the rest of these guys are all fighting right now over a small sliver of the electorate and they can`t get out of their own way to do it.
HAYES: Right.;
PIERCE: If the Republican Party were actually a political party still, you know, the powers that be in the former Republican Party would get a couple of these guys out of the race.
HAYES: Here`s a story I think that ends up happening. You`ve got a situation where on the Republican side I think Cruz is very strong in Iowa, then .
DEAN: . in California.
HAYES: Which is shocking. I agree. You`ve got New Hampshire where I think, you know, right now Trump is very strong candidate.
DEAN: I would say Trump.
TUR: And the problem is all these establishment candidates are duking it out.
HAYES: And they`re all about 10 percent, right?
TUR: And they`re taking the -- they`re splitting the vote amongst themselves. Donald Trump is coming out as the larger portion of that vote.
HAYES: Katy, I have a question for you. How do they survive in South Carolina with all those moderates who all get 9 percent of the vote?
TUR: That means, they do really well in South Carolina when it comes to the rallies. Those are actually the most well-attended rallies we go to. And they`re also the loudest and most boisterous.
HAYES: You`re talking about Trump. I`m talking about the so-called moderates.
DEAN: Yeah.
TUR: I know, I think they have a real problem in South Carolina. I certainly think that Ted Cruz could definitely walk away with Iowa easily. Trump could come in a close second. Trump could come in, take New Hampshire, fight it out with Cruz in South Carolina, and then I`m not sure anybody else gets any traction after that.
HAYES: Here`s what i think has been so interesting about the difference in the conversation in the Republican primary and the Democratic primary.
One of the just, you know, basic facts about the Obama era and everything about Barack Obama as a President, and I tend to think he`s been a pretty good one, is that most people are taking home less money now than they were in 2007, right. I mean, the recovery has happened but actual wages are lower. Right? The Democratic conversation has really centered around that thanks in part to Bernie Sanders.
DEAN: Right.
HAYES: On the Republican side that has not been in the center of the discussion, right. I mean, Trump is one of the few people who sort of talking about that. He at least telling a story about why that`s the case.
PIERCE: Look, he`s not saying why. He`s just saying he`ll fix it.
(CROSSTALK)
PIERCE: He`s saying we`re getting screwed but I`ll fix it.
HAYES: We`re getting screwed by China. We`re getting screwed by.
PIERCE: Basically, his fundamental argument for his candidacy is I`m Donald Trump, you`re not, and neither are these other guys.
DEAN: So here`s the fundamental problem with Trump.
TUR: But he`s speaking in such a way that is so different from every other politician they`ve heard in the past and they`re so sick of politicians, and he`s speaking to them like their neighbor speaks to them. And that`s why he`s resonating. They don`t care what a politician (inaudible) because.
PIERCE: They look your neighborhood. I don`t have any megalomaniacs in my neighborhood.
TUR: I can response to that because .
PIERCE: Well, I mean. This is the most megalomaniacal campaign I`ve seen. It`s not Wallace. It`s not Huey Long.
HAYES: Right.
PIERCE: Huey Long had policies, they got proposals. A lot of them were daffy but people didn`t come for the entertainment. I don`t know what Donald Trump`s policies are and he won`t tell us.
TUR: They don`t call it politicians when they say, here`s what my policy is because they get into office, and oftentimes those policy positions don`t come out.
(CROSSTALK)
PIERCE: Let`s just run Chewbacca.
HAYES: Well, that is the point. Right? And this gets to the point, which is that you have arrived at a level in which I could say to you I remember when it was 2004, before I was a full-time journalist, I went door to door in the Collar Counties outside Madison, Wisconsin knocking on doors for league of conservation voters which I endorsed John Kerry.
And we only talked to undecided voters. OK? And I talked to undecided voters day after day after day at the door. And you would say to someone what do you care about? And they would say I care about minimum wage. And they say John Kerry supports a raise in minimum wage. And they`ve looking at you like you like -- you were saying that politician was going to end winter, right.
DEAN: Yeah.
HAYES: Or he was going to just give you three more bedrooms.
PIERCE: Howard Dean...
HAYES: This was after the primaries. My point, though, is to Katy`s point. If a citizen and a voter does not think that the actual causal mechanism works, that the system functions well enough that I person says I`m going to do this for and you then they can go and do it, then yeah, then your off the hook to vote for a guy like Donald Trump.
PIERCE: But this didn`t start with Donald Trump. Ronald Reagan in his first inaugural address said government isn`t the solution, it`s the problem. And that began a 30-year effort mostly by Republicans but some Democrats played into it too to separate politics from government. Government is this big evil alien thing, politics is what you do for fun. And until you put the two of them back together again you`re going to winded up with demagogues like we have across the street tonight.
HAYES: I think there is -- if you feel as a voter that there isn`t a real good connection between what you want and what the government does. I think that`s not a ridiculous way to feel. A ridiculous way to feel, you know, I mean like this goes back to this idea that, you know, what was in the budget deal that just got passed, right? What got shoved in there at the end? A Cyber security rider, right? Did anyone really want that? No. That`s the kind of thing that sort of -- that`s the deal that gets made.
PIERCE: But yeah, but can you pick a time in history when you knew what was in the federal budget?
HAYES: No.
PIERCE: I can`t. And I`m pretty old.
HAYES: Right, right. There was a piece Ezra Klein the other day where he basically said one way to think about who stops him, to Charlie`s point, is he wins until he doesn`t and maybe he just stops winning.
PIERCE: He may not be stopped. He may win the Republican nomination.
DEAN: I think possible now.
PIECE: At this particular moment -- look, I`ve been wrong about everything I`ve said about Trump since last march. Every time i said he was done he got stronger. At this particular moment if you had to make a bet I`d bet on Trump winning the nomination.
HAYES: You`d bet on Trump.
TUR: He`s the only one that has multiple paths right now.
DEAN: Right.
TUR: I mean, did Ted Cruz needs to win Iowa.
DEAN: Right.
TUR: And the rest need to win something. Rubio doesn`t have a state he`s locked up at the moment. But Donald Trump has options in a number of places. And when we`ve gone to some SEC states down south, places like Alabama, Mississippi, he gets massive crowds down there.
HAYES: Yes.
TUR: And as much as he`s not coming out with his policy positions and yes, he isn`t saying anything really and he does the same thing at every single rally. But there is something about the way that he projects himself, that there is a large segment of this population that has attached themselves to it. Is it more than the 30 percent that he`s getting in these states? And would that be able to get all the delegates.
HAYES: Not a lot. Here`s the problem.
TUR: I`m not sure.
HAYES: Here`s the fundamental problem with Donald trump.
DEAN: He`s mean. And we do not elect mean people.
PIERCE: This is a real question.
HAYES: That`s right.
DEAN: But they`re not.
HAYES: They may be angry but they`re not mean.
DEAN: They`re angry but they`re not mean.
HAYES: Let me show you just to that point, take a look at the way that he was throwing protesters out tonight.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Yeah, throw them out. Throw them out into the cold. You know -- don`t give them their coat. No coats.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: All right. Partly tongue-in-cheek, but no coat throw them in the cold. There`s things he says tongue-in-cheek and there are genuinely not just mean but vile and odious. And what`s going on in the audience is not tongue-in-cheek.
DEAN: That`s right. You were in Lowell.
HAYES: Yeah.
TUR: They would get more violent and more violent the more protester that`s would interrupt.
HAYES: And you were at Lowell. There`s a video that will go around and people just sitting there quietly in Lowell holding a sign saying (inaudible) and people just basically ripped up their sign and bullied them.
PIERCE: Well, here`s an interesting point today. And that is, suppose he doesn`t win Iowa, OK? And it`s possible he won`t. And he`s got a ready-made excuse because it`s a very weird system.
HAYES: Right, right.
PIERCE: He can says, the way people actually vote? I don`t understand this. If he loses Iowa and somehow reacts badly.
HAYES: Yeah.
PIERCE: I mean, I don`t mean to (inaudible). Well, seriously if he really trumps it up after losing Iowa, then maybe that throws him off a little bit in New Hampshire. But I don`t know what he could say.
HAYES: Pretend to being a losers.
PIERCE: I don`t know what can he say to it.
HAYES: Right. It`s not going to be something he says. Charlie Pierce, Katy Tur, Howard Dean, thank you for being here.
Thank you to the folks here and the Vermont on the road, for all Sanders, to fine citizen of Burlington and Vermont. Thank you.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END