By ,
Published January 23, 2017
This is a rush transcript from "Special Report," April 25, 2016. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)
SEN. TED CRUZ, REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Indiana is facing a choice, and it's a very simple choice, between supporting a campaign that is based on yelling and screaming and cursing and insults versus unifying behind a campaign that is a positive, optimistic, forward-looking, conservative campaign. I am in for the distance. As long as we have a viable path to victory I am competing to the end.
DONALD TRUMP, REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He has no road to victory. He can't win. He's the first person in the history of the United States who picked a running mate - Carly -- who picked a running mate. He picked a running mate even though he has no chance to win.
(END VIDEO CLIPS)
BRET BAIER, ANCHOR: Well, they are all talking about Indiana. As we take a look at the primary there tomorrow, both on the Republican and Democratic side, 57 delegates up for grabs on the GOP, 83 on the Democratic side. As you look at the latest poll from the GOP side of the race, Donald Trump in this poll, NBC-Wall Street Journal with a 15-point lead. The Real Clear Politics average, however, is tighter. But there have been several polls that have been showing Donald Trump with some momentum in recent days.
We will look at the GOP side first. Let's bring in the panel, editor in chief of Lifezette, Laura Ingraham, Mara Liasson, National Political Correspondent of National Public Radio, and syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer. OK, Mara, is it over if Cruz doesn't win Indiana tomorrow?
MARA LIASSON, NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO: I think it is. This is not just the last best chance for the stop Trump movement, this is the last chance. And the polls had looked a lot tighter before. Now they look closer. I think that if Donald Trump beats him there and performs like his poll numbers say and goes on to win big in California, it's all done. It doesn't matter that Cruz has lined up all sorts of people who want him on the second ballot. I don't think there's going to be a second ballot.
BAIER: Laura?
LAURA INGRAHAM, EDITOR IN CHIEF, LIFEZETTE.COM: I agree with Mara.
Ted hates hearing this and I think the media is all against him. But at some point reality does begin to sink in. And one wonders whether Ted Cruz will, if, again, he could turn this around, maybe he could win tomorrow.
Who knows? But if he doesn't win tomorrow, and let's say it's a five to ten point victory for Trump, I don't know how you keep the narrative going that I'm winning and Donald Trump is not going to get to 1,237 and I have the grassroots. I mean, I just think it becomes less and less credible. I don't know if he's thinking 2020 or down the road. I think he has an incredible political future regardless of what happens. And I think maybe, at some point, it's time to think about that as you move forward in this race or not.
BAIER: He had a number of stops with the Indiana governor, Mike Pence, today, who endorsed him. And then there was one stop where he confronted a Trump supporter/heckler. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CRUZ: I'm running to be everyone's president.
UNIDENTIFIED TRUMP SUPPORTER: We don't want you.
CRUZ: You are entitled to your view, sir. I will respect it.
UNIDENTIFIED TRUMP SUPPORTER: Do the math. You asked Kasich to drop out. It's your turn. Take your own words. Time to drop out.
CRUZ: I'm curious. When Donald doesn't get to 1,237 are you going to call for him to drop out?
UNIDENTIFIED TRUMP SUPPORTER: He's going to get more than 1,237.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BAIER: That went on for, I think, eight or ten minutes he spent time with that Trump supporter.
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: I'm not sure it helps any candidate to be involved in that kind of exchange for that long. Look, Cruz is trying everything he can. He tried the coalition with Kasich, that didn't work. He tried a vice presidential nominee. He has tried a theme where he throws the kitchen sink campaign. But he has kind of lost the theme. It's hard to know what it is.
And what happened was after Wisconsin, he did well in Wisconsin, he had momentum, and then Trump with his instinct for the jugular and for the tactical advantage realized that he could change the narrative. Cruz goes after delegates, perfectly reasonably, legally, and within the rules. Any other candidate would have done it. And Trump understands it's the perfect way to strip Cruz of his claim and status as the outsider, because the Cruz defense was to say I'm playing by the rules as they exist. And remember, he ran as a guy who in Congress, in the Senate, would not accept the establishment rules, would not accept the dictates of the higher ups, called the majority leader of the Senate a liar on the floor of the Senate, and here he is arguing I'm going by rules. And Trump says that the establishment has erected.
BAIER: On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders is also talking about a rigged system. Take a listen to Sanders pitch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: When we talk about a rigged system, it's also important to understand how the Democratic convention works. We have won, at this point, 45 percent of pledged delegates, but we have only earned seven percent of super delegates. It makes it hard for insurgent candidacies like ours to win.
She will need superdelegates to take her over the top at the convention in Philadelphia. In other words, the convention will be a contested contest.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BAIER: OK, take a look at the RCP average in Indiana. It is tighter there but Hillary Clinton holds a slight lead in the average polls. Contested convention, Mara?
LIASSON: Contested convention, that's the first time I have ever heard that. A contested convention generally means no one has enough to get the nomination on the first ballot. But super delegates vote on the first ballot. She will get that.
The thing that's interesting -- he might win in Indiana, by the way. I think that the internal polls from the campaigns have it much, much closer than it is now. But even if Hillary Clinton lost all the remaining primaries by 20 points each she'd still comes in the winner.
BAIER: She's won 23 states. If he wins Indiana, he's won 18.
LIASSON: She's way ahead of him. She is 2.6 million popular votes ahead of him.
INGRAHAM: Trump is ahead of Cruz more than that.
LIASSON: So it's hard to make the case that this is somehow some phony- baloney rigged system.
INGRAHAM: I think something else is going on here, though. I think he's trying to really have influence on the platform. The question is are you going to go with the globalist Hillary, global trade deals, probably more foreign policy intervention. Bernie Sanders is trying to do the foe Democratic populist thing, which is why you keep hearing Trump making little pitches to the Bernie Sanders voters. I think you are going to start seeing some interesting movement to say, look, Bernie, you don't like the trade deals. Your only chance of not having these massive global trade deals is to help me knock off Hillary Clinton or at least push for the platform in the Democrat Party not to go forward with something like the TTP. If Bernie doesn't want the deals, Hillary gets in, TPP is going to be fast-tracked. They are going to push this thing right through.
BAIER: To your point, Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail has been talking about President Obama. President Obama has an op-ed in the "Washington Post" tomorrow about TPP.
INGRAHAM: This is the last little bucket list item. He doesn't want to be embarrassed with all of these 17 countries or so, 5,500 pages, even some in GOP leadership are surprised at all sort of little triggers in this Trans- Pacific Partnership. Most of them haven't read it. It gives countries like Indonesia the ability to come to the United States, buy a U.S.
corporation, bring all their own employees with them. I think that's chapter ten of TPP. So if you care about U.S. sovereignty and independence, I think the pitch is a deal like this is going to be another raw deal for the American people.
BAIER: Bernie Sanders stays in?
KRAUTHAMMER: Yes. He's in because what else is he going to do? I would stay in. If you are in that long, and he's in for a cause -- I think he knew long ago he wasn't going to be the nominee. But he campaigned because he believed in a cause. He's the man of a left. He believes in democratic socialism. He's only recently arrived as a Democrat in the first place.
But he's in because he wants to leave a legacy. The legacy will be the strength of his campaign, the organization he puts together, and the cohort of people who support him who carry it on. He wants to have a say in who is number two. And that number two, assuming the Democrats win, will carry on the legacy in the future. That's what he cares about -- progeny.
BAIER: Jane Sanders, Mara, asked about the FBI investigation said, "I mean, it would be nice if the FBI moved it along."
LIASSON: You know, this is -- one Clinton campaign official said to me, well, he's kind of nice to us in the morning, but by the afternoon it's a different tune. So the Sanders campaign has been doing two things at once
-- talking about defeating Donald Trump in the fall, unifying the party, but then you hear things like that. Maybe there's regret that they didn't go after the e-mails earlier.
KRAUTHAMMER: Well, exactly. It's a little bit late.
LIASSON: It's a little late for sure.
Content and Programming Copyright 2016 Fox News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2016 CQ-Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.
https://www.foxnews.com/transcript/is-this-the-last-chance-if-cruz-does-not-win-in-indiana