This is a rush transcript from "The Kelly File," September 27, 2016. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MEGYN KELLY, HOST: Breaking tonight, 24 hours after the political showdown of well, the century, the numbers are in with a record breaking 84 million people tuning in to watch Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump. The question now who won with the voters.
Welcome to "The Kelly File" everyone. I'm Megyn Kelly. Today, the pundits were in full spin mode each suggesting their respective nominee had won the big debate. As for the candidates, they were back on the campaign trail in key battleground states. Mrs. Clinton in North Carolina, Mr. Trump in Florida. Remember there are just 42 days until Election Day. Can you believe it? Six weeks to go. And only two more opportunities for these two candidates to debate each other. Take a listen to a little of what the candidates had to say today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON, D-PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Well, we had a great, great time last night. One of my favorite baseball players growing up, Bernie Banks used to get so excited about knowing to playing that he'd say, let's play two. So, I'm looking forward to the next debate and then the one after that.
Did anybody see that debate last night?
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
Oh, yes. One down, two to go.
DONALD TRUMP, R-PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Last night was very exciting and almost every single poll had us winning the debate against crooked Hillary Clinton big league. For 90 minutes she argued against change while I called for dramatic change. We have to have dramatic change. We have to get rid of ObamaCare, we have to strengthen up our depleted military.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: In moments, we'll be joined by President Obama's 2008 Campaign Manager David Plouffe. And by former Reagan Education Secretary Bill Bennett.
But we begin tonight with our chief political correspondent, campaign Carl Cameron who is reporting tonight from Melbourne, Florida where Mr. Trump just wrapped up a rally. Carl?
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Megyn. And it doesn't look like it now but there were 9,000 people in this airport hangar in Orlando just an hour ago and another 6500 outside, and that's according to police. Donald Trump knew he had a good night last night. He was pleased by it. Hillary Clinton did too. Last night after the actual debate in the spin room, Mr. Trump was talking about how he had problems with his mic and it kept on cutting out.
This morning Hillary Clinton said, if you're blaming the mic, you've got a problem. But Trump is definitely high on those snap polls, the ones overnight. We'll get a better feel for who gets the downside of this probably by the end of the week when the lengthy taken polls will begin to come out. But Trump was on fire tonight. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Last night I talked about how we have the worst so-called recovery since the great depression. The American people rendered their verdict. The post-debate polls, as I said to you were so great. But we exposed Hillary Clinton's real position on NAFTA and Trans-Pacific Partnership, another disaster that she lied about. She called it the gold standard.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAMERON: That was one of the things on which Trump scored point last night. And the campaign is riding pretty high on the idea that one of the things that they've been looking over the results and the analysis of the debate last night that they really hit well with was for the assertion of the last 26 or 30 years in his words, Hillary Clinton has been in Washington and been involved in politics and got nothing done, expect to hear a lot of that in the next few days. They think that that was a winning line last night and they tend to keep ringing the bell -- Megyn.
KELLY: Carl, thanks. So, what are the big takeaways from last night's event?
David Plouffe served as President Obama's 2008 campaign manager and later as a senior advisor to President Obama. He's with me now. Great to see you, David. So, what was your biggest takeaway?
DAVID PLOUFFE, OBAMA 2008 CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Well, the debate really was about for Hillary Clinton I think trying to win undecided voters as it was for Donald Trump and I think she needed to provide more enthusiasm for the so-called Obama. I think she did those things. I mean, the first 15 minutes or so I think were fine for Trump. After that it was a disaster. And I have been through good debates and bad debates. The question for me really was --
KELLY: And you're open about the fact that Barack Obama had a very bad debate.
PLOUFFE: Yes.
KELLY: That first debate against Romney.
PLOUFFE: Yes. And we were honest about that externally and internally. By the way, the Bush campaign was in '04 too. The thing I worry about Republicans is that if Trump actually believes he did well and he's not going to adjust, and if he brings into that town hall meeting, what he did in New York it's going to be a disaster. I mean, those are one of the worse debates I think a major party nominee has had. And really raised questions about his fitness and his temperament. Oddly he talked about that and saying, there are also a lot of things coming out of the debate. Alicia Machado. Him saying it's smart enough to pay taxes.
KELLY: The former Miss Universe.
PLOUFFE: Right. His Iraq craziness about call Sean Hannity and confirm he was against it. So, there was a lot of things that will leave on in the next couple of weeks.
KELLY: Right. So, who was the target? So she needed to energize her base. But who was her target? Like, who were they both fighting over in that debate?
PLOUFFE: Well, I think there are undecided voters, true undecided voters and I think it's hard for -- I don't think Trump lost any vote last night but he's in a position in the race where he has to add vote.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
PLOUFFE: So, I think undecided voters are not going to make their decision overnight. But I think she solidified and help herself. And then she's also got, you know, younger voters with, voters that might be thinking about Gary Johnson. It's very important that she convert some of those.
KELLY: Here's what Newt Gingrich came, a big, you know, surrogate for Trump. He came out and said, he's sickened by the intellectual dishonesty, arrogance and smugness of the so-called intellectual yet idiots, talking about how she's got this Ivy League polish and arrogance and smoothness but he's the one who appeals to real people out who are there suffering. Is there any truth to that?
PLOUFFE: I mean, that's just a bizarre statement. Newt is off his rocker. I generally respect what he has to say. So, listen, Trump is going to get, 42, 43, 44. Any Republican nominee is going to get that. The problem is to win the presidency, maybe in this election, when you only need to get to 48, let's say in the battleground states because the third party is going to get some votes.
No, absolutely not. And his 30-year thing, I'm sure that will be part of the next debate. And, you know, I'd put her record up, Secretary of State, Senator, First Lady of Arkansas and of the country versus what I think she exposed last night. Not paying taxes. I mean, he basically admitted he doesn't pay taxes.
KELLY: Well, certainly for those two years that wound up in that one -- audit.
PLOUFFE: He seemed pretty proud of his smart approach on taxes.
KELLY: Smart he was.
PLOUFFE: Right.
KELLY: But I have to ask you this. Because we've been watching the polls as I know you have. Although David doesn't pay as much attention to these polls that we all look at. He looks at some other secret information that we don't have access to. And it's been seriously tightening. I mean, in Colorado, the CNN poll yesterday shows he's at 42, she's at 41. She had an 11 point lead on him. Pennsylvania she's at 45, he's at 44. She had an 11-point lead there. And so it really looks like this race is tightening and could swing his way in the last six weeks. No?
PLOUFFE: Well, I think, first of all, there's going to be a poll every day for whatever your view on the race is. I mean, there was a national poll by NBC yesterday that had her up seven nationally which is the margin we beat McCain by. So, none of these polls look at 100 percent of the vote that's going to happen on Election Day. And when you look at that, I think she's got more to gain. I think she'll better with undecideds. She'll pull off some of the Johnson and Stein vote.
And I think Trump is coming up against a ceiling. So a poll that says something, it's 42/40, even if it's right, even if that's the firm choice, what about the other 18? So, most of the polls this time after the first debate in 2012 had Romney winning nationally, had the states tightening. But what we were able to see through good data and good analytics was a presidential year turnout, very much to our liking.
So, I think she's got a decisive edge in the Electoral College. Pennsylvania to me, you don't need to look at analytics. She's going to have too big of a margin coming out of Philadelphia and the surrounding sub-urban counties for him to make that up.
KELLY: You say no way does he win Pennsylvania?
PLOUFFE: No way.
KELLY: Wow! How about Florida?
PLOUFFE: I think she's got the edge. The edge in North Carolina, edge in New Hampshire, edge in Nevada. I think she'll win Ohio too but those are the two where Trump is doing the best. There is no question about that. And I think --
KELLY: What do you put the odds of a Hillary Clinton victory at?
PLOUFFE: I say 100 percent. Once I know people think it's crazy. But I have been through this a couple of times. And you look at how do you get to 270 electoral votes. The other thing I'd say, it's going to sound partisan. But this is what I believe, the quality of the candidate matters. This is not someone I think who's got the temperament or the fitness for office to get a winning number in a presidential race. He's got passionate supporters and that's important but he doesn't have the ability because of the quality of the candidate.
Listen, Hillary Clinton has her challenges as a candidate. There is no question about that. Her favorable numbers aren't where we like. The passion isn't quite where we like yet. But when you compare the two of them, and I think that's what came away last night was, somebody, even if you don't agree with much of what she said, seemed presidential throughout the whole debate and Trump particularly in the latter half of the debate became a little bit unhinged and unmoored.
KELLY: You're going to be hearing from some of those passionate supporters and twitter in five, four --
PLOUFFE: It's always a joy.
(LAUGHTER)
KELLY: It's a joy having you here. Thanks for coming.
Well, David mentioned Alicia Machado. She's the former Miss Universe who is not on this Hillary Clinton ad, who Trump allegedly called Miss Piggy and Miss Housekeeping. She's a Latina. We'll going to speak with her shortly.
But joining us now, Bill Bennett. Secretary of Education under President Reagan and the chairman for conservative leaders for education. Bill, great to see you.
BILL BENNETT, FORMER EDUCATION SECRETARY: Great to see you.
KELLY: Let me just -- I'll serve you up what David Plouffe said and let you take a crack at that. What did you think?
BENNETT: Well, a hundred percent chance to win. That's pretty good. You know, I was a guy who used to make bets. Those are pretty good odds. And I watched the business with Hillary there at the beginning of the show, Megyn, looks like a little bit of overconfidence. Hundred percent. And bring on the debates. It's Greek code word. Be careful there with that overconfidence before you enter into the next debates. You're right. This is a very tight race.
The debate was very interesting, very engaging. Trump needs to make some adjustments and he lost some opportunities and missed some opportunities. You know when you're asked a question about cyber security, you know, he's just got to say it begins at home, Hillary.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
BENNETT: And then other things that he needs to bring up. But I think what people saw was passion about changing the country, a sense of earnestness about the country and where it is. And I think that spoke to a lot of people. I want to know, even David Plouffe, 100 percent Plouffe, I am going to call him now, I used to call him uber (ph) Plouffe. Now, I'm going to call him 100 percent conceded that the first couple of rounds went to Donald Trump. Now, what was he talking about? He was talking about jobs and the economy. What are people talking about and worrying about in Ohio and Pennsylvania and all of those states which Plouffe said are easily going to Hillary.
KELLY: Well, he is saying that Trump got a very good chance in Ohio but he is saying Pennsylvania is a dream, it's never going to happen because of the turnout in Philadelphia which will be almost all Democratic.
BENNETT: Sure. Right. But what do the numbers say and where are the numbers been going? Hillary --
KELLY: But that's what he does. Just so the audience knows, that's what David does. He analyzes numbers. I've known him for years. He says, this is how they got Barack Obama elected by just looking at the raw data.
BENNETT: Yes. No, and he's good at it and he is a very good analyst but I would have to say, he's a partisan too.
KELLY: Yes.
BENNETT: And he does have to account for the fact that the gap in Pennsylvania has been narrowed to one point or no points from ten points. We see which way the arc is going. I think by a couple of adjustments by Donald Trump, he'll do better.
KELLY: What did she do specifically, Bill? How can he improve?
BENNETT: Well, not a metamorphosis because he's about 69 to 70 years old, he is not going to change fundamentally. But I think a few words in his head like Syrian refugees, the wall, immigration, e-mail and how about the stuff she said last night, we all have a bigotry problem.
KELLY: We're getting to that.
BENNETT: I mean, my gosh all mighty. I know you will. And what about releasing these people from prison? All these civil, this criminal justice reform. People need to take a look at the drug dealers, dealers, big-time dealers they're releasing from prison.
KELLY: Let me ask you this because his defenders say and I get this, they say, you know, the people who are suffering in Ohio, in Michigan, and elsewhere, they don't give two figures about Trump eloquently making the argument. They know who their guy is.
BENNETT: That's right.
KELLY: So, if you accept that, who are these debates for? I mean who is at stake?
BENNETT: I don't care -- yes, well, they are certainly for undecideds and they're to ensure the base and to bring the base out. But I do think it matters when you say things that resonate with the base. And I think he said some things last night that do. Again, on jobs and the economy, it's not just Ohio, it's Pennsylvania as well and other states. So I think that's important. And he got her, I think, a couple of good times on her record, just exactly what is she offering this country.
What you saw in him I think was a lot of passion and a lot of worry about where the country is and where it should be going. And he matches the national mood much better than she does. One thing David Plouffe did not talk about is right direction, wrong direction. That's a very big point. You know, it's another phrase he could bring up.
KELLY: He had her on the ropes on TPP. There was no question. He had a record on that one. He had done his homework, he had a record, she denied it but the facts are there. We're going to get into that in just a bill as well.
Bill, always a pressure, sir.
BENNETT: Thank you. Thanks, Megyn.
KELLY: Forty two days to go. Six weeks exactly until Election Day. Gosh, it's feels like it's been a long time.
And with the candidates in a dead heat, Larry Sabato is next with what to look for in the polls that are going to be coming out at this debate.
Plus, critics today accusing Lester Holt of being harder on Trump than he was on Mrs. Clinton. You can't win. You can't win as the debate moderator. We'll take a look at the evidence with Brent Bozell and Krystal Ball, next.
And then we'll speak with a woman at the center of one of the hottest controversies to come out of last night, Alicia Machado, the former Miss Universe joins us to detail what she says really happened between her and Mr. Trump in the wake of a Miss Universe pageant. And then Katrina Pierson will respond. Stay tuned.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: There were two ways, termination or working with her. We want to work with her.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KELLY: Six weeks from right now we'll be sitting here together going over who won. How about that? Right. Yes, yay, here's to the end of the race. It's coming. And Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are locked in a neck and neck race right now according to polls released just ahead of last night's big showdown. The latest Quinnipiac University poll shows Mrs. Clinton with a one-point advantage over Trump, her lead widens to four points and Monmouth University's poll down from, I think it's seven on that one, I'm not sure. Down from seven, yep.
With the Bloomberg politics poll putting Mr. Trump ahead by two points. Meanwhile, history suggests a winning first debate performance isn't necessarily a sign of things to come. Two of the past three losing presidential candidates saw a bump in the polls after their first debate but ultimately went on to lose in November.
Joining me now, Larry Sabato, founder and director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. Larry, great to see you. So --
LARRY SABATO, FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA'S CENTER FOR POLITICS: Good evening, Megyn.
KELLY: Okay. So, is there anything we need to know about that, the fact that you've got John Kerry who erased a seven percentage point deficit with the great first debate, lost the election by two-and-a-half points. Mitt Romney erased a four percentage point deficit, lost the election by about four points.
SABATO: Well two points. There's a reason why we have three debates. You know, we just had part one. We've got part two and part three. I leave aside the vice presidential debate for the moment. So the story line can change and the candidates can improve their performance or deteriorate, depending on what they have learned from the first debate.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
SABATO: And the other thing, Megyn, that I think is very, very important, there are fundamentals in any election that probably matter more than the debate. The thing that helps Donald Trump the most and has helped him all year long is, he's the change agent.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
SABATO: We've had two terms of one party and in modern times, we like to switch parties after eight years. That's what in part has propelled Trump forward. Notice how much he tried to make Hillary Clinton the status quo candidate. She fought back trying to make the issue Donald Trump.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
SABATO: And we'll see in the next two debates.
KELLY: Let me ask you because you're numbers guy too. What did you make of David Plouffe's analysis on Pennsylvania. I mean, he just thinks that that is an impossibility for Donald Trump.
SABATO: I never say anything is impossible. I'm a lot older than David Plouffe, that's why I never say anything is impossible. You have a 100 percent chance that Hillary Clinton is elected, you know, God bless him. I wouldn't want to risk all my savings on one particular election result. Look, is Pennsylvania tough for Republicans? Of course. They haven't carried it since 1988.
KELLY: No. But it's within the points. I mean, that's what's incredible.
SABATO: Yes. Well, that is one poll. That is one poll. The polling averages are about three but look, it can change overnight. I'm not saying it can't be done. I'm just saying it's tough. I certainly wouldn't say it's impossible.
KELLY: Larry, a pleasure. To be continued.
SABATO: Thank you, Megyn.
KELLY: Well, as we track the fallout from last night's debate, one of the big stories involved, the moderator, what a shock. The moderator is getting beaten up again, NBC's Lester Holt in this case. Some debate watchers are suggesting that Holt pressed Mr. Trump harder than he did Mrs. Clinton and here is a little of what they are pointing too.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LESTER HOLT, DEBATE MODERATOR: The IRS --
TRUMP: Excuse me.
HOLT: -- is the audit of your taxes. You're perfectly free to release your taxes during an audit. Mr. Trump for five years, you perpetuated a false claim of the nation's first black president was not a natural born citizen. Can you tell us what took you so long? We're talking about racial healing in this segment. What do you say to Americans --
TRUMP: Well, I was very, I say nothing.
HOLT: Mr. Trump, a lot of these are judgment questions. You had supported the war in Iraq before the invasion.
TRUMP: Wait a minute. I was against the war in Iraq. Just so you put it out.
HOLT: The record shows otherwise.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: Joining me now, Brent Bozell, president of the Media Research Center and Krystal Ball, senior media fellow at the New Leaders Council.
All right. Good to see you both. So, Brent, I confess. I've already said, I thought he did a good job. So, I'm not going to argue against you. But I'm going to give you the floor to make the case about why you think, you know, he pressed Trump. All of those questions seemed fair to me. Is the argument solely that he didn't do it as aggressively with Mrs. Clinton?
BRENT BOZELL, PRESIDENT, MEDIA RESEARCH CENTER: No. The argument is that he didn't do it at all. Here's the facts and the facts are irrefutable. He asked Donald Trump about his personal taxes. He challenged him. He asked him about stop and frisk. He challenged him. And by the way, that was a Candy Crowley moment where he got it wrong. He asked him about the birther issue. He challenged him.
He asked him about Iran, about Iraq and he questioned, interrupted him, fact-checked him five or six different times. Now that's perfectly fine by me provided you do the same thing with the other side. What are the facts? He not once challenged Hillary Clinton on anything, not once asked her a tough question. And didn't even ask her anything about her controversies. Now, Megyn, let's be objective here.
KELLY: He asked her about the e-mail. He asked her about -- he didn't put it in his own words but he gave her the chance to respond to e-mails.
BOZELL: Exactly. Way different. Way different.
KELLY: No, no, no. But Brent, let me just explain.
BOZELL: He gave her the opportunity.
KELLY: Let me say, let me explain, I have no idea. I haven't talked to Lester. But this is what I think happened there. You got a question on e- mail. He must have had a question on e-mails for her. So, you're going to get the e-mails with Hillary Clinton. When Donald Trump brings it up, you can just save your question, you can save the 25 extra seconds it would have taken you to read your question and just say, hey, Mrs. Clinton respond that e-mails.
BOZELL: Okay. But Megyn, where is the fact-checking. Where's the follow- up? There was a follow-up to everything Donald Trump said. What was the follow-up on this? What was more important, Megyn, birther issues or Benghazi medical records of the Clinton Foundation? There's so -- the e- mails. What's more important? How could he not have asked these questions?
KELLY: Okay. Krystal?
KRYSTAL BALL, SENIOR MEDIA FELLOW, NEW LEADERS COUNCIL: Well, apparently Donald Trump who his campaign manager called the Babe Ruth of debating the master showman cannot handle Lester Holt. There's a big difference between the questions being unfair and the candidate being unable to handle the questions which is what happened here. I mean, if you look at the first half of the debate, Lester basically let both candidates go, let them make their points, let them go at each other.
But when you have one candidate -- and this is not my opinion. This is the opinion of independent fact-checkers both about last night's debate and overall in this campaign saying that one candidate lies disproportionately more than the other candidate, of course you're going to have more pushback, of course you're going to have more fact-checking. The other thing I point out here, at times Trump wouldn't even let Lester Holt get his whole question out. So, that led to these contentious exchanges because Trump was not only interrupting Hillary Clinton aggressively, he was interrupting the moderator himself.
KELLY: Well, that's right. There were definitely some moments where Lester was pressing like Trump didn't answer the question and Lester was following up saying, you know, if you could just answer the question that I asked.
BALL: Right.
KELLY: But there is an issue about whether some of her controversies were left untouched, whereas more of his were hit upon. I think Brent, you know, Lester's defenders would say, Trump has so many. There's so many to pick from.
BOZELL: Well, here's something I want to put before your audience and you tell me which one is right. Robby Mook, the presidential campaign manager for Hillary Clinton was working this weekend as well he should calling on Lester Holt to be the traffic cop, to be the fact-checker.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
BOZELL: This is what Janet Brown also said. She's the executive director of the Commission on Presidential Debates. This is what she said about fact-checking this weekend. I don't think it's a good idea to get the moderator into essentially serving as the encyclopedia Britannica.
KELLY: Uh-hm.
BOZELL: So, who did Lester Holt listen to, her or Hillary Clinton's campaign manager?
KELLY: He didn't really do a lot of fact-checking. He pushed back on the Iraq war.
BALL: He was very restrained.
KELLY: You know, if you really wanted to do, trust me. Because I love to fact-check.
(LAUGHTER)
If you really wanted to do it, I mean, you could get up there. But, you know, it's not -- especially in the general election, presidential debates when there's -- it's two on two, it's like, fade away, like I'm not even here. I'm gone. I'm out. Look, the camera is following me. It's hard to do on my own show. I got to go. Great debate. Thank you both for being here.
BALL: Thanks, Megyn.
KELLY: They can find me wherever I go.
New reaction tonight to one of the debate's hottest moments. Hillary Clinton calling out Trump for his treatment of Miss Universe Alicia Machado.
The former Miss Universe joins "The Kelly File" next. And then Katrina Pierson will respond with the latest from Trump's inner circle.
Plus, wait until you hear former presidential candidate Howard Dean's theory about Donald Trump's performance in last night's debate, as he suggests the GOP nominee, a family man who does not drink, does not taking caffeine may have been on drugs.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KELLY: Developing tonight, new reaction to one of the debate's hottest moments. Hillary Clinton taking aim at Donald Trump's history with women and how he treated the former Miss Universe Alicia Machado during the Latino star's very public struggle with weight gain, watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: One of the worst things he said was about a woman in a beauty contest -- he loves beauty contests, supporting them and hanging around them -- and he called this woman Miss Piggy, then he called her Miss Housekeeping because she was Latina. Donald, she has a name. Her name is Alicia Machado.
TRUMP: Where did you find this?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: The former Miss Universe is here. She said Donald Trump made her life miserable. We'll ask her about that but first Trace Gallagher has the latest. Trace?
TRACE GALLAGHER, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Megyn, Donald Trump bought the Miss Universe pageant in 1996, Alicia Machado was her first winner and Trump acknowledges pressuring her to lose weight saying it was her job to remain in peak physical shape. But Machado accusing Trump of humiliating her as you heard, calling her Miss Piggy and because of her Latin heritage, Miss Housekeeping. Hillary Clinton is now using Machado's story in a new Spanish language ad.
In it, Machado recounts how Donald Trump once made her feel like a lab rat by inviting dozens of reporters and photographers to watch the "fat Miss Universe" work out, watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: She weighed 118 pounds or 117 pounds and she went up to 160 or 70. So, this is somebody that likes to eat.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GALLAGHER: Machado says she joined Hillary Clinton's supporters earlier this year because she's frightened by the thought of a Trump presidency, describing the GOP nominee as a man filled with grudges, racism and anger and blaming him for contributing to her five-year struggle with bulimia and anorexia.
But the former Miss Universe also admits that during her reign, she became hard to work with and refused to do some promotional appearance. Today on "Fox & Friends" Donald Trump said this.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
TRUMP: That person was a Miss Universe person and she was the worst we ever had. The worst. The absolute worst and she was impossible. And she was a Miss Universe contestant and ultimately a winner who they had a tremendously difficult time with as Miss Universe. She was the winner and yet she gained a massive amount of weight and it was a real problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GALLAGHER: Machado who is from an influential and politically engaged family in Venezuela is now a naturalized U.S. citizen. She is also a well-known Spanish and English language actress, which is bad for Trump because it means this story is playing big in both Spanish and English media. The Trump campaign calls Machado's accusations baseless and part of a smear campaign. Megyn.
KELLY: Trace, thank you. Joining me now, the former Mess Universe and now Hillary Clinton supporter, Alicia Machado. Alicia, thank you so much for being with us tonight. So, the Trump campaign can't really deny that he harassed you over your weight because it's on camera many times.
They seem to be denying the specific charges Hillary leveled which are the language of Miss Piggy and Miss Housekeeping. Was anybody there to witness when he said those things to you?
ALICIA MACHADO, FORMER MISS UNIVERSE: Well, first I want to say thank you to giving it to me this space and to share my -- the story with Mr. Trump. This happened 20 years ago. And you know, I don't need to share this story if I don't believe that person is not the right person than being a president or trying to be a president. This happened 20 years ago. In that moment, he was not the person that you can see now.
Maybe he was more just business guy. And I was a little girl, too. I was 18 years old. And you know, the only thing I want to do is to share my story. I think in this moment just for my community. I'm a Latina. I'm from Venezuela and from Venezuela and Cuba. And you know, I need to share my story. I think I can open a few eyes. I can maybe change a few minds. You know, I don't think this person is the right person that can be a president.
KELLY: You said as a result of what he said to you, you developed an eating disorder, bulimia and anorexia. But you had said publicly at the time that you suffered from both of those eating disorders prior to the Miss Universe contest and really you know have come into...
MACHADO: No, no, never, never prior the Miss Universe pageant. I never had any problem before Miss Universe.
KELLY: Well this is from "Washington Post."
MACHADO: Sorry, that have not...
KELLY: Let me just tell you what I'm referring to and then you respond. The "Washington Post" from May 16, 1997 reported this quote from you, "I was anorexic and bulimic, but almost all of us are. When I was preparing for Miss Universe it was an obsession for me to not gain weight. By the time I won, I was actually recovering, but the year leading to it I didn't eat at all.
And whatever I ate I threw up. I weighed 116 pounds when I won. I was skeletal." So, it sounds like without diminishing anything that you went through after Trump, it does sound like you had an eating disorder prior to his comments and prior to winning. No?
MACHADO: No. I'm sorry but that was not true. Maybe in that moment, the company, Miss Universe and a specific -- this person, they manipulate a lot of information about me. I'm here because I know this person and he's not a good person. That is the point. The point is no more abuse for us. No more abuse for the girls.
If you gain weight, if you don't look the most beautiful girl in the world, you have your mind, you have your heart, you are strong, you are intelligent. And in the future that ladies can be a president too. Why not?
KELLY: Listen, I thank you for your time and I congratulate you on your American citizenship. All the best to you.
MACHADO: Thank you very much. I'm really proud of that. And well, you know, we need to change minds and to respect for all of the woman in this country. That's it.
KELLY: Take care. Joining me now with more Trump campaign national spokesperson, Katrina Pierson. Katrina, good to see you.
KATRINA PIERSON: Thank you.
KELLY: Listen, so the only reason I pressed her on her prior statements was because the public is trying to decide now that she's been injecting to this campaign whether she is credible, whether they can believe the specific allegations, right, Miss Piggy and in particular Miss Housekeeping, which has a whole different connotation, right?
PIERSON: Absolutely.
KELLY: Having said that, there's no question that he really berated her about her weight and was so insensitive about weight, Katrina, and you know there so -- millions of Americans out there and you know that -- how that makes them feel. So why shouldn't they think -- why shouldn't they hold it against him? That he was so hard on her when it came to her weight.
PIERSON: Well, I think if we look at the context, we are talking about beauty pageants. These individuals who participate in these contests have a weight clause in their contract. This was not something that Mr. Trump just did. This is organization wide. We can look at 2011 when Miss San Antonio was told she had to lose weight in order to compete for Miss Texas. There's a reason why Miss Universe 2013 published her diet in "Shape Magazine." This is the culture. KELLY: Well, you know, he has called some women fat pigs. He's constantly evaluating women based on a number -- there are seven, there are 10, I mean, he's very into body shape of women.
PIERSON: Yes, but in that context though -- well, absolutely. Mr. Trump owned a beauty pageant and that's where some of that comes from. That is also entertainment, that is also television. When you look at the woman for example, like his wife and his daughters, they say he treats everyone the same. So we can't just pull out one section of women and say he only does this to woman. He will criticize those who criticize him.
KELLY: Well, he says you can't be a ten if you're flat chested. He hasn't said the equivalent of a man.
PIERSON: Well, I think everyone has their own opinion on what a ten is. But I will say that this particular charge is extremely important because as you asked her to back up the statement of what she said, did he or did he not -- are there any witnesses that can back up your claim of what he said, because that's really what's catching fire here. As you mentioned, the Miss Housekeeping is what's really bringing on a really -- a worse connotation.
KELLY: Well, Miss Piggy is bad too, and even (inaudible) I mean...
PIERSON: But she didn't back any of that up, Megyn.
KELLY: But here, listen, before we -- here he is -- here's Trump on Stern talking about her, listen.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
HOWARD STERN, RADIO HOST: You whipped this fat slob into shape. I don't know how you did it. I see all these diet plans, everything else. God bless you. You whipped her into shape and held the whole pageant together. Congratulations.
TRUMP: Well, that was an amazing one, Howard.
STERN: How did you whip her into shape?
TRUMP: She went from 118 almost to 170.
STERN: And you got her right down again to 118, didn't you?
TRUMP: Well, she's going to be the -- she's probably 145 or something. She gained 55 pounds in a period of nine months. He was like an eating machine. I guess she ate a lot of everything.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
PIERSON: Well, he also said in one of the previous clips that (inaudible) is showing on television today is, I'm the same way, I like to eat too. This is the context of a beauty pageant, and that's what's getting lost in translation. There is a weight clause. The current Miss Universe, if you go to her Facebook page, there's a ton of posts of her working out in a gym. This is extremely important to those women. But we are talking about things allegedly that Donald Trump said, not what he actually said.
KELLY: A lot of this is on tape.
PIERSON: A lot of that is on tape, but calling her those names, that's not on tape and there are no witnesses. We need to be focusing on actions like Hillary Clinton and what she did to that 12-year-old girl that was brutally raped to the point to where she could no longer have children. That is something that's permanent that sticks with a woman and she laughed about it.
KELLY: All right, I got to go. That's a longer story to get into for another night. Katrina, good to see you.
PIERSON: Thank you.
KELLY: So, a new controversy ignited as former candidate Howard Dean finds a new way to define taking the low road. Plus Marc Thiessen and Nomiki Konst on Mrs. Clinton's suggestion that the entire country has an issue with race.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KELLY: Developing tonight, are all Americans racist? Most of the media today focused on fact checking Mr. Trump's remarks on crime rates while very few outlets took a deeper dive on this from Mrs. Clinton.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LESTER HOLT, DEBATE MODERATOR: Secretary Clinton last week you said we've got to do everything possible to improve policing to go right at implicit bias. Do you believe that police are implicitly biased against black people?
CLINTON: Lester, I think implicit bias is a problem for everyone not jus police. I think unfortunately, too many of us in our great country jump to conclusions about each other. And therefore I think we need all of us to be asking hard questions about, you know, why am I feeling this way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: Marc Thiessen is an American Enterprise Institute scholar and a Fox News contributor and Nomiki Konst is a former Bernie Sanders surrogate and host of "The Filter" on Sirius XM Progress. Marc, what do you make of those comments?
MARC THIESSEN, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: I guess we're all deplorable now. Before it was just half of Trump's supporters we're racist, now apparenty we're all racists. That's the Hillary Clinton's ever expanding world of deplorable. I mean look, the reality is she was asked on a nationally televised broadcast the question, do you believe police are implicitly biased against black people. The proper answer to that is of course not.
The vast majority of American police officers are good, decent, honorable people who risk their lives to protect us and they are not racists. She did not say that. And there's this myth out there, Megyn, that there's this epidemic of race-based police shootings. It's simply not true. Harvard University had a study this summer that found -- they looked at over 1,300 police shootings in 10 police districts over 15 years.
And you know what they found? Zero police -- zero race bias in police shootings. In fact, they found police were more likely to fire their weapon when they weren't attacked when the suspect was white. So this idea that somehow the police are out there shooting black people willy-nilly is simply false and she should have said so.
KELLY: Well she was trying to get -- she was trying to get it away from just the police, Nomiki, because she could smell the danger there. She could sense the danger there and tried to say it so she encapsulated everybody saying, I believe that implicit bias is a problem for everyone. And there are many people who believe that, who believe we all have some inherent fear of other whatever the other may be.
NOMIKI KONST, POLITICAL ANALYST: Yeah, there's a big difference between biased and racist and let's make that clear right away. You know, everybody is inherently biased. There is 88 percent of Americans -- there's a project called The Bias Project, the inherent bias project and it measured 88 percent of Americans have some form of implicit bias. But that doesn't mean racism. And that also includes law enforcement.
And that's a danger zone for her politically because she's trying to appeal the moderates. But the reality is, I went up here with a study. UC Davis did a study that showed that unarmed black men are three and a half times for likely to be shot and killed by police officers than unarmed white men.
Not only that, Washington Post did a study just this year saying that blacks who are fatally shot are two times more likely to be shot even though they're not an eminent threat versus white men who are an imminent threat to the police officers.
KELLY: Go ahead Marc.
THIESSEN: So, you're saying that the police officers are biased but they are racists and in fact people...
KONST: Biased is different from racism.
THIESSEN: You know, this is the myth that's going out there. It's simply not true that there's an epidemic of race-based shootings going on in the United States of America. And the perfect example of this is what happened in Charlotte recently.
The New York Times this morning, if you look at them, New York Times this morning, they point out -- they talk about a black man shot to death by an officer last Tuesday. They don't point out in the story on the front page that the officer who shot him was black.
KELLY: Yeah.
THIESSEN: It doesn't even come up.
(CROSSTALK)
KELLY: And it's completely forgotten that the man who was shot in that case was indeed armed. He did have a gun that was registered to him. He had an ankle holster on. All those stuff gets ignored when it comes out later, you know, after the riots or the protests have died down. We're short on time tonight you guys. Thank you both so much for being here.
THIESSEN: Thanks Megyn.
KONST: Thanks Megyn.
KELLY: Up next, why Howard Dean is suggesting that Donald Trump was on drugs last night, nice, and how the world is reacting.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: So our country is in deep trouble. They're taking our jobs.
It's very important to me.
You're wrong.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: So Trump had the nerve to sniffle last night and now the critics have gone from suggesting that he may have been sick to suggesting he was using drugs. MSNBC contributor and former presidential candidate Howard Dean tweeting out a message that asked, "Notice Trump sniffling all of the time. Coke user?" And when Dean was given a chance to clarify his remarks today, here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HOWARD DEAN, FORMER VERMONT GOVERNOR: You can't make a diagnosis over the television. I would never do that. But he has some interesting -- that is actually a signature of people who use cocaine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY: So that's gross. And he's gross and he just lectured us about Hillary Clinton's health and how, look, she should just take a few days off and take care of that pneumonia. But now suddenly he can't diagnose somebody, I mean, Howie, you tell me. Howie Kurtz is here. How out of line this is?
HOWARD KURTZ, "MEDIABUZZ" HOST: This is way beneath somebody of Howard Dean's stature. I interviewed him during his presidential campaign when he inspired a lot of young people. To see him resort to the tactics of a smear immersion is just sad. And by the way, what a ludicrous charge, a 70-year-old man who doesn't even drink alcohol is suddenly doing a lot of blow? You know, Dean had a chance to apologize for the tweet and instead he stooped even lower.
KELLY: So what is this? Is this another Harry Reid, you know, Mitt Romney paid zero in taxes just like trolling Trump?
KURTZ: No, but that's -- it's almost to (inaudible) to call it trolling. I mean he smeared him, and by the way it's a serious question here.
KELLY: It's defamatory.
KURTS: Absolutely. And there's a serious question here for MSNBC. Is the network that went after conservative critics -- I also was critical of those who peddled bogus health rumors about Hillary Clinton. Having done that, is the network going to tolerate or even condone what Howard Dean said? He's going to pay any penalty for this and I didn't only see many in the mainstream press going after this either. It's only like, oh, another charge, you know, just to go off on the campaign.
KELLY: There's no basis -- there's no basis for that. And you know by the way, we all sniffle. It's the fall. I have allergies. I've never done drugs in my life. So there, Howard. He's got to brush up on those medical ethics. Great to see you.
KURTS: He's a doctor as well.
KELLY: Howard Dean, not Howard Kurtz.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KELLY: To clarify, the Charlotte cops, they say Keith Scott was found with a gun that had his fingerprints on it. The gun wasn't registered to him, but it had been stolen and the thief says he sold it to Keith Scott. Thoughts on the debate @megynkelly on Twitter. See you tomorrow.
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