Trump Said to be "Pissed at Damn Near Everyone"; 17 Democrats Vow to Vote No for Pelosi as Speaker; Judge Allows Voters More Time to Fix Signature Problems; Jeff Flake Vows to Block Judges After GOP Blocks Mueller Protective Vote
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: This, says the company, is not true. It is 10:00 a.m. in the East. 7:00 a.m. in the West. I'm Jim Sciutto in New York.</s>POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Poppy Harlow. We're glad you're with us this morning. The White House is, quote, "running very smoothly, thank you." That is according to President Trump, who for his part, according to one White House official, is, quote, in this official's words, "pissed at damn near everyone." That is because of the midterms and the Mueller probe and of course the sudden ouster of a top White House National Security aide at the behest of the first lady.</s>SCIUTTO: The midterms are still a work in progress. In Florida, the deadline to finish machine recounts is just five hours away. Court fights are sure to last far beyond that, though. In Florida, and next door in Georgia as well. We begin this hour with CNN's Kaitlan Collins, she is at the White House. Kaitlan, the question of the hour, can the White House run very smoothly when the president is, quote, "pissed at everyone"?</s>KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim, the idea that the White House is running smoothly is not an assessment that most people who work inside the West Wing would agree with right now. They've actually been the ones describing the president's dark mood, which they say has only intensified in recent days since he returned from Paris, and a lot of them are fearing for their job security, unsure if they're on stable footing with the president. Now that's not only limited to the chief of staff, John Kelly, but also the Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen. And when the president was asked about Nielsen's future in this administration, he did not give a yes or no answer during an interview with the "Daily Caller" yesterday, but he did points to how administrations make changes after the midterm elections saying, "After the midterms you make changes so I'm looking at things." He said, I've got a lot of options. And I'm quoting the president now, he says, "I haven't made a decision yet. I will be making a decision on Homeland shortly." Jim and Poppy, we've been talking about that, the fact that the president is obviously wanting to get rid of Kirstjen Nielsen in that post at DHS. He's just not sure who it is he should replace her with yet, and then that creates another question, does the Chief of Staff John Kelly who brought her into this administration in the first place follow her when she does leave, which we are told by sources is a matter of if not when. A question of if -- when, not if, when she does leave the administration. But it's not just staffing changes that are making the president's mood so dark in recent days. He came off that trip from Paris and he was very embittered about the PR and the optics of it, after he cancelled that trip to a military cemetery. He also feels that the White House has lost that winning narrative they had in the days after the midterm elections. So all of those are on the president's plate. And then as you can see from Twitter this morning, he is quite troubled by the Russia investigation once again.</s>SCIUTTO: Yes. That's putting it mildly. Kaitlan Collins at the White House. With us now, CNN political commentators Doug Heye and Patti Solis Doyle. Doug, if I could begin with you, because also in this "Daily Caller" interview, the president propagating once again unfounded and -- you know, genuinely dangerous myths about voter fraud in Florida. He said, I'm going to quote here, "I have seen it. I've had friends talk about it, when people get in line that have absolutely no right to vote then they go around in circles. Sometimes they go in their car, put on a different hat, put on a different shirt, come in and vote again. Nobody takes anything. It's really a disgrace what's going on. The disgrace is that voter I.D. if you know buy a box of cereal, if you do anything, you have a voter I.D." Let's set that aside for a moment because of course you can buy cereal without an I.D., and in fact, in Florida, a voter I.D. is required here. In your view as a Republican as well, is this dangerous for the president of the United States from his pulpit here to be calling into question the votes in such a crucial state as Florida?</s>DOUG HEYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: In a word, yes. And I think it was troubling for a lot of people when he was doing so in 2016 as well. Obviously, he won that result and then it was a big, beautiful result with no fraud because he won. But politically the reality is I think Ron DeSantis is going to win the governorship. I think Rick Scott is going to win the Senate seat. They are both leading right now. So calling into question the results is, I think, a dangerous precedent anyways. But it also doesn't suit his political purposes if Republicans are going to win. Why call into question a result that would benefit you?</s>SCIUTTO: Yes.</s>HARLOW: Patti, just moments ago, the president tweeted again about, you know, the Russia probe and collusion, et cetera. Nothing new there, but I did find it fascinating, and I wonder if it's a warning to some Democrats on how to proceed here in the new term, what the CNN poll that we just got showed us about impeachment. It said 55 percent of Americans don't think the president should be impeached or removed from office. Six in 10 say there's not enough for Congress to even begin impeachment hearings. And I think you only had 3 percent here who felt that that should be the top priority for Congress right now. What should Democrats take from that come January?</s>PATTI SOLIS DOYLE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Look, I think talking about impeachment now is not a good idea for Democrats. We have to wait for the Mueller report and see. You know, there's a high threshold for impeachment. High crimes, and we don't know whether Mueller will say that indeed President Trump obstructed justice or indeed he colluded with the Russians or his campaign colluded with the Russians. So we have to wait. But trust me, there is plenty of other things that now a Democratic- led House can do. First and foremost, I think, is getting the president's taxes. Secondly, there's just a plethora of ethics violations in that administration right now. But also, there's legislation to be done. There's an infrastructure bill, there's a voter rights bill. There's work to be done. So I think talking about impeachment is just not smart for Democrats and it's very premature.</s>HARLOW: Interesting.</s>SCIUTTO: Doug, let me bring up this crazy idea of bipartisan legislative cooperation. Funny thing is, though, that both sides, even the president, had a Democratic lawmaker on, Eric Swalwell, on in the last hour talking about that and then bringing up specific ideas. First, we had this prison reform bill yesterday, bipartisan support for that. There's talk on drug prices, on infrastructure, possibly on DACA. Do you see with this split Congress and noting the difficulty that Democrats might have voting along with the president on anything, but do you see the potential there for some of these priorities moving forward?</s>HEYE: I do. I think in a limited sense, infrastructure being one. I was at a criminal justice reform event yesterday in Los Angeles that Van Jones was doing with Kim Kardashian. And you know, bringing that kind of attention to an issue like that only propels things further. And we have Republicans and Democrats who support it. Hakeem Jeffries, the Democrat, Doug Collins from Georgia, the Republican, who pushed the First Step Act. That's a good first step forward. Not just on the issue but on bipartisanship. I have long thought, Jim and Poppy, that Donald Trump is in a unique position to cut deals that no other Republican would be able to cut, say a President Jeb Bush or a President Scott Walker on guns or on immigration. That may be a taller order, but if issues come up where that needs to be done, Trump is in the unique position to do it if he seizes that moment. And then people would be very surprised that he is the great negotiator he's always told us he is.</s>SCIUTTO: Well, yes, I mean, one caveat, there has been talk on gun control. We saw that in the last session. Didn't go anywhere. We'll see.</s>HARLOW: Patti, to you, on Nancy Pelosi. I mean, you have these 17 Democrats who put their name down on this letter saying we're not going to vote for her. CNN's reporting is there are five more who haven't signed it yet but are in that camp as well, and that would mean that she wouldn't have the votes, the 218 number that she needs to be speaker and the CNN polling again shows when you look at all Americans, only 3 in 5 -- 3 in five say they'd prefer someone else. And even among Democrats and Democratic leaning independents, 44 percent only back her. 46 percent want someone else to take the lead. Is this the time for a new leadership for the party?</s>SOLIS DOYLE: You know, I don't -- I can't remember a more effective speaker than Nancy Pelosi. She is very, very good at what she does. And you know, with the help of others, she took a great lead in actually winning back the House for Democrats. But having said that, Nancy Pelosi has a problem. There are several new members, newly elected members of Congress, who pledged that they would not support Nancy Pelosi for leadership. And if I were advising any of those new members, I don't think that going back on your campaign pledge is a way to start your new job. So she's got a problem with those members, for sure. And for a long time, Republicans have made Nancy Pelosi the boogey woman.</s>HARLOW: Yes.</s>SOLIS DOYLE: Much like they've made Hillary Clinton the boogey woman. It's unfair, it is not right, it is not substantiated by any real facts in terms of her doing her job. And she's more moderate than she is liberal, actually. But it is an issue for her. Ultimately, I think she will win, but she's got a problem right now.</s>HEYE: Can I respond to that really quickly?</s>HARLOW: Very quickly, yes, go ahead.</s>HEYE: In 2010, I helped spearhead the "Fire Pelosi" campaign at the RNC. And I agree with Patty, one of the reasons that we wanted to fire Pelosi was because she was so darn effective and she put Obamacare through. Democrats would be foolish to cast her aside, I think.</s>HARLOW: That's really interesting.</s>SCIUTTO: Interesting. You have -- she has your endorsement. We're going to let her know that.</s>HARLOW: There you go.</s>HEYE: A weird one.</s>HARLOW: There is that. Thank you both, Doug and Patti. Nice to have you as always. So this morning, Florida Governor Rick Scott is appealing a judge's ruling that allows voters to essentially try again to match their signatures. Earlier, a federal judge in Florida extended the deadline for voters with mismatched signatures to sign again and see if they match this time.</s>SCIUTTO: It's a hard standard to meet. This comes as officials in Florida work to meet a 3:00 p.m. recount deadline today. Just a few hours from now, all 67 counties must submit all machine vote totals. Let's get right to CNN's Ed Lavandera. He is in Tallahassee, Florida. What's the latest, Ed? Do we expect to see a resolution today?</s>ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's what we're waiting for, for this 3:00 Eastern deadline from the secretary of state here in Florida, as all of the counties across Florida are sending in their recount numbers that have been implemented here since last week's election. But really the focus here in Tallahassee is the ruling from this federal judge extending this deadline on the question of signatures that didn't match. And this is a deadline that is extended until Saturday afternoon. So they have several days to go back to all of these people, which is close to some 5,000 people across the state. Now what is interesting here, Jim and Poppy, is that right now, Rick Scott leads Senator Bill Nelson in this senatorial race by more than 12,000 votes. So if even unlikely scenario that all 5,000 of these signature ballots that are in question were all to vote for Bill Nelson, which we all know is highly unlikely, that means that there still aren't enough votes there to make a difference. But this is just one of several lawsuits that are still winding their way through the system here in Tallahassee as Democratic lawyers and Republican lawyers continue to fight it out here in the courts as these deadlines of counting and certifying this vote quickly loom here in the state of Florida.</s>HARLOW: Been there before. Ed Lavandera, thank you. So will McConnell cave? Outgoing Republican Senator Jeff Flake says he will vote against, block judges if a vote to protect Special Counsel Bob Mueller does not get taken to the floor. And prosecutors push for the death penalty for five people charged in the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. But the Saudi Foreign minister says this has nothing to do with the crown prince.</s>SCIUTTO: Hundreds are still missing as wildfires burn across California, sparking fears that what's already the deadliest wildfire in state history, that that death toll could rise.