Donald Trump Speaks at Rally in Florida; Presidential Candidates and Surrogates Campaign in Battleground States; North Carolina Voters Line Up for Early Ballots
HILLARY CLINTON, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We have unfinished business to do.</s>DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm asking you to dream big. You will get the change you've been waiting for.</s>CLINTON: Let's make sure that we send a loud, unmistakable message that love Trumps hate.</s>TRUMP: I didn't have to bring J Lo or Jay-Z. I'm here all by self.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have to think about the future and that is why I'm with her.</s>TRUMP: We will make America great again.</s>CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: All right, so glad to have you with us here in the Newsroom in D.C. I'm Christi Paul.</s>VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Victor Blackwell.</s>PAUL: And we are overlooking some beautiful site today.</s>BLACKWELL: You got the White House right behind us here, beautiful, beautiful set for you this weekend, the final Saturday of the 2016 presidential campaign. The race for the White House of course ending in just three days from now. The prize, you see it right us here, 1600 Pennsylvania avenue. That's where either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump will call home.</s>PAUL: This race is getting closer in the home stretch though, as you know. Both campaigns in full force this weekend. I want to take you live -- a live look at Tampa, Florida, where Donald Trump is going to kick off his first of four stops in four different states today. Florida, Colorado, North Carolina, and Nevada. And he is set to speak at any moment. When he does we will certainly bring it to you. But you can see he hasn't stepped up to the podium just yet.</s>BLACKWELL: Let's take a look at Hillary Clinton and her surrogates, where they will be going to the battleground states. She will start in Florida and then north to Pennsylvania. You see Bernie Sanders, the vice president, Joe Biden, the vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine, and Chelsea Clinton out on the trail as well. All day we've got live a political experts and reporters, part of our team coverage. We're standing by in the battleground states.</s>PAUL: And we should talk about the fact that in the next -- in the latest CNN poll of polls Trump and Clinton seem to tie in Florida.</s>BLACKWELL: Yes.</s>PAUL: Big state. And that's a must-win state for both.</s>BLACKWELL: Yes. CNN national correspondent Jason Carroll is live there at a Trump event in Tampa. He's expected to be on the stage soon. So we'll go to Jason Carroll in just a moment. I've got a producer in my ear. Let me come to you, Phil, and what we're seeing from these candidates as we go into the last stretch.</s>PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. You guys talk about Florida, and Florida is crucial for this really good reason. Obviously 29 electoral votes. Donald Trump has to win Florida really to have any kind of pathway whatsoever if you look through. And he has a narrow pathway to begin with. But Florida is a place where his team has felt good, but his team has also made very clear if Donald Trump does not win Florida, Donald Trump will not be sitting in that house behind you on January 20th, period, end of story. So that's why you see Donald Trump in Florida today. That's why you see Hillary Clinton in Florida today. Now, the interesting element I think we've all been trying to dig out in Florida is what does the early vote data tell us, what does the polling tell us, all of that sort of issue. If you look at early vote in Florida right now, you talk to the Clinton campaign, they feel good about where they are. But if you compare it to 2012, while Democrats do have a lead in the early vote, they are far behind where they were in 2012. Trump advisers, Republican operatives point to that and say this is good news for us. The big question, though, and you guys have been talking about it a lot this morning, the Hispanic vote. They believe it is coming out at levels, and the early vote seems to imply this, it is coming out at levels that is significantly higher than we saw in 2012. And while we've seen a down tick of some sort in the African-American vote both in Florida and North Carolina and other places, if that Hispanic vote is coming out like Democrats think that it is, in Florida that could be the ballgame. We talked about Nevada earlier. We've seen that Hispanic vote come out in a big way. That could be the difference maker. That could be the story. But if you look at it right now, all the polling, all the early voting, it looks like Florida is absolutely still a toss-up.</s>PAUL: All right, sounds good. Let's talk about North Carolina as well because that is, as it's been called, a must win state for both of these candidates. Both of them have their eyes obviously on that key battleground. And we're talk about 15 electoral votes are up for grabs there.</s>BLACKWELL: Let's go to our Gary Tuchman who is watching the race from such an important state as we know for both campaigns, but the Trump campaign especially. Gary?</s>GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Victor and Christi, good morning to you. And yes, North Carolina, a battleground state, incredibly important. Election nights are also about mathematics in addition to who is going to become president. The mathematics are not kind to Donald Trump if he doesn't win here in the state of North Carolina. It's hard to see path to the White House if he doesn't win this state. Hillary Clinton doesn't need to win this state. And if she does, if we find out early in the evening Tuesday if she has, it would not look good for Donald Trump. So that's why this is an incredibly important state. The people here realize it. And Election Day in many states including North Carolina is not just Election Day. It's the last of the Election Days. They've been voting here for over two weeks in early voting. But this is the busiest day. This is a library in Charlotte, North Carolina. I have just counted. There are 435 people in this line waiting outdoors. How long have you been waiting, sir?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been here --</s>TUCHMAN: Getting his watch out. Nice watch, by the way?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you. About an hour and 45 minutes.</s>TUCHMAN: Hour and 45 minutes and he's not near the front of the line just yet. So these are very dedicated people waiting to vote. I've done some math. There's 11 machines inside. If every voting experience -- I'm sorry about that, sir.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No problem.</s>TUCHMAN: If every voting experience takes five minutes, you're talking about a three-and-a-half hour wait. Can you wait three-and-a- half hours in this line?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.</s>TUCHMAN: Important for you to vote?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.</s>TUCHMAN: You feel that way?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Definitely. I'll will wait five hour if I got to.</s>TUCHMAN: It's good you're in North Carolina and not North Platt, Nebraska, where it's much colder right now. It's actually cold for North Carolina. It's been in the 40s, but people are very dedicated. They're willing to wait. In 2012, 61 percent of the people who voted did early voting. And authorities here in this state, here in the Tar Heel state, say it will be higher this year. And you get an idea, 435 people in line waiting to vote. Early voting comes to an end at 1:00 eastern time today. But anyone in line will be able to stay and vote. So they could still be here until 3:00, 4:00, 5:00. Victor, Christi, back to you.</s>PAUL: Interesting. All right, hey, Gary, thank you so much. Of course they have to keep it open so they can vote because if they didn't we would have accusations of some impropriety happening.</s>BLACKWELL: Yes. And we saw there the poll of polls there, Hillary Clinton ahead by four points there. But any really reliable --</s>PAUL: Metric?</s>BLACKWELL: Yes, any metric, any equation of putting 270 together for Donald Trump includes North Carolina. So he will have to do well there on Election Day and this last day of early voting there. Again, our thanks to Gary Tuchman.</s>PAUL: We want to get you back to Florida. We were talking about how pivotal Florida is. Jason Carroll is there right now. Good morning, Jason.</s>JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Christi. There's been so much talk about early voting. Let's talk about early voting here in the state of Florida. It ends today in many counties here in the state, so you can imagine why there's such a huge, huge push for Trump supporters to get out and vote. That's what we're hearing today from some of the surrogates who have already taken the stage. Trump expected to speak just in a few minutes. The campaign is really encouraged by what they say are early signs of many early voters coming out in support of Donald Trump. The Democrats, though, on the other side, very are encouraged by what they says is a huge uptick in Latino voters here in the state for Hillary Clinton. Trump for the most part though staying on message with his attacks on Hillary Clinton, really hitting her hard on the issue of the Clinton Foundation, her e-mails, her trustworthiness, bringing that into question. These are issues that really resonate with the base. However, at one point he did go off track just for a little bit when he mentioned all of the celebrities support that Hillary Clinton has been receiving from folks like Jay-Z and Jennifer Lopez. Donald Trump saying, look, I'm out here doing this by myself. He's got his surrogates out there campaigning for him as well. One surrogate that won't be out there for him, Governor Chris Christie who was expected to campaign in New Hampshire this weekend, but after two of his former aides were convicted during that bridge-gate case on charges of -- charges of conspiracy and fraud, Chris Christie now not campaigning for Donald Trump this weekend. But this crowd more than happy just to have Donald Trump speaking in just a few moments. Christi?</s>PAUL: All right, and when that happens we will certainly bring it to you live. Jason Carroll, we appreciate it so much. Thank you.</s>BLACKWELL: All right, some important shifts in the CNN electoral map. First for Donald Trump, first for Hillary Clinton. We'll show those to you. And the question here, can Clinton hold on to this lead to reach 270 on Tuesday night? Stay with us.