hello, i'm wolf blitzer. it's 1:00 p.m. here in washington. thanks very much for joining us. we're following two breaking stories today in politics and in terror. first, authorities have released the chilling transcript of the phone calls between police and the orlando nightclub shooter. one excerpt has the gunman saying, and i'm quoting now, praise be to god and prayers as well as peace be upon the prophet of god. that's in arabic. he goes on to say, i let you know, i'm in orlando and i did the shootings. we're going to have much more on this breaking development a few minutes. but first, let's get to the other breaking political news we're following. one of donald trump's closest

and longest serving advisors, corey lewandowski, forced out by the campaign. forced out by donald trump as his campaign manager, including by donald trump's own children. lewandowski just released a very terse statement. i stand by the fact that mr. trump is a great candidate and is better than hillary clinton ever will be. that's a direct quote from corey lewandowski as the latest turmoil that's plagued the trump campaign's inner circle continues. our chief political analyst gloria borger is with me and david gregory, host of "the david gregory show p" podcast. first, you, gloria. >> there was chatter but i think it came to a head when both ivanka trump and her husband, jared kushner felt that enough was enough and that jared has been very helpful on the fund

raising side, i'm told. and jared's husband in the campaign and more and more people were complaining, including then about the fact that corey was not managing this campaign well. i was told that, quote, it became an issue of performance for him. but getting the simplest things done or executed had become a problem in this campaign. i think along with ivanka and her husband, jared, were the other siblings, the two boys, and i think there was a sense that paul manafort ought to take the reins of the campaign because as one person said to me, another source said to me, it has been an insane few weeks. trump is dropping in the polls. the latest monmouth survey is behind 7 points to hillary and the bleeding has to stop and they decide this was one way to do it. >> what does it say to you about

the state of the trump campaign right now? >> it's in free fall and a fourth week of free fall. let's remember where it started. he consolidated the republican party behind him and in a position to define hillary clinton negatively and had ammuniti ammunition. a lot of material to work with and decided to take this down. i think that's a big moment in a conventional campaign. you have shake-ups. i think this is a different campaign. i think the problem is with donald trump. donald trump trusts himself. he manages himself. he has no governing philosophy. no campaign infrastructure. he hasn't wanted one. the fact lewandowski is out here is a sign of something or maybe a sign of continued turmoil. i don't have a way of looking at this in the conventional sense to assess campaigns because he is so unconventional. >> it's stark when you consider what was a month or two ago when corey lewandowski was in the news because he supposededly touch

grabbed a reporter and showed loyalty saying he's been with me. i'm not going to ruin this guy's life because of something like that. he strongly defended him but now all of the sudden, you're fired. >> you're fired. and i think this shows you that donald trump understands the free fall that his campaign is in. you don't have to be a rocket science to figure that out and when you have enough people going to you, ivanka and jared, very involved in this. when you say, we're out there. jared has been spending more time with trump until when they're saying to you and they're your family, something is wrong, he is listening to them. in my experience, it's never a great sign when the family starts running the campaign, but in this case, it might actually be a good thing. you know? because it's a different kind of campaign. right? >> he clearly trusts his daughter, ivanka and son-in-law, jared. >> there's no question to say the very least that trump is a gut player here on the political

scene, he's not a politician in any normal sense, any conventional sense. that's where he's been very successful. i do think he has a feeling now, a realization that everything that was authentic about him and that was resonating with his core supporters is being overwhelmed by self-inflicted wounds so perhaps now it's evident he's listening to outside voices even outside the original structure of the campaign to try to retool and to find his footing again. these things, they go up and down. twists and turns in a campaign. so nothing is fatal. but seeing this kind of instability in a campaign at this juncture is surprising. because it just shows you how disorganized and unprepared he is for the rest of the campaign. >> he wrapped up that republican nomination weeks ago. he should have been able to use that moment, that opportunity long before hillary clinton wrapped up the democratic nomination. he should have been using it to generate the kind of support that he would need if he's going to be elected president. >> that's right. and that's what got republicans

crazy and don't underestimate reince priebus' role in kind of letting the chairman of the rnc and letting the campaign know that things are not going well. priebus has been spending some time with trump. he was given a heads up on this today. i wouldn't be surprised if he was aware of it and, you know, they need to get a lot of machinery in place in the states and there was a real sense that corey lewandowski had become a human speed bump to a degree and lots of things were sitting in his inbox that needed to go to the outbox in order to get the organization. >> you've got to let trump be trump. clearly, voices around trump said, yeah, not so fast. you need some work here and if you're going to be president, you better start listening to some people who can help you direct your energies like any candidate would need. i think that's telling. >> the strategy that, let trump be trump, clearly worked to win the republican nomination but winning a general election, there may be a general strategy. you mentioned the monmouth university poll and hillary

clinton holds 57 point lead in a direct match-up. 47% to 40% among registered voters but among the likely voters, her lead expands to 49-41 and importantly, this is the monmouth poll, holds a 47-39 lead in the all important swing states. those are the ten states, the battleground states that could make a huge difference of who becomes president. >> these are the numbers that are worrying republicans because you've got so many in the senate up and in blue states and the other number that really struck me here is the gender issue. clinton leads among women by 27 points and while trump leads among men by 13 points. so he's not doing as well among men as he needs to do if he's going to offset. >> these polls are important going into this convention. tell me if this is wishful thinking, never trump movement that you hear so much about. if he's down by 10% or 15% or 20

points going into the convention in cleveland in july, that never trump movement and the rules committee and on the floor, that will get some momentum because they don't want to lose. >> they don't want to lose. i don't know what their vehicle is or process ultimately could be but says something, wolf. i was on capitol hill a couple of days ago talking to republicans. the physical wincing that goes on around trump and what this election season is about time for republican unity. obviously, what is hillary clinton doing? she's going to hammer him on the economy and hammer him on foreign policy. day after day, jabbing to that cut eye on his recklessness, his temperament. she's got the president and the vice president of the united states out there stumping. she's got elizabeth warren. she is really operating on all cylinders here. he has to still go to texas to raise money for the party instead of being in the battleground. >> not raising that much money. we're standing by live this hour from the vice president, joe biden. he's supposed to be delivering a blistering attack on donald

trump's foreign policy. there you see the microphone he's going to be speaking shortly. you know the vice president well. he presumably is itching to get into this fray as well. >> if the president was itching, i think biden was double itching to get into this, and he will. and on the issues, not only foreign policy but on the economy but joe biden considers himself a populist, if you look at this new poll we were talking about for the first time really i see that voters see clinton slightly better able to handle the economy than donald trump. that's been his calling card, the economy because he's a successful businessman but thought, okay, if they don't give hillary clinton credit on foreign policy because some don't think she was a good secretary of state, here, this was his calling card economics and doesn't seem to be working. >> i think it's worth pointing out how many liabilities hillary clinton has as a candidate. we discuss them but it's important to put that into this

context. vulnerabilities around e-mail, vulnerabilities around her approach to libya as secretary of state. there are all kinds of ways where she is vulnerable as a candidate. we know this. my point about analyzing the politics right now is that he's not in a position to make that case against her because his case is in shambles. not just relevant to the polls and elsewhere but how much time he has left to define it. >> stand by. we're going to have much more. standing by to hear from the vice president of the united states, joe biden, he's getting ready to deliver a blistering attack on donald trump foreign policy and another breaking story we're following. a new controversy over the 9-1-1 calls between the orlando terrorist and authorities. why some key experimecerpts wer released and we wait for joe biden to take the stage. take a look at this live picture. there you see the microphone. he's expected to really go after the presumptive republican presidential nominee. we'll have live coverage. stay with us. thanks for the ride around norfolk!

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transcripts of the orlando shooter with the 9-1-1 operator has just been released. >> while we are not releasing

the audio, while the killer made these murderous statements, he did so in a chilling, calm, and deliberate manner. >> officials have also redacted some of the transcript and that is causing some controversy. >> i'd like to tell you all that we consulted with our state partne partners. the release of the transcript complies with state law. in fact, the city of orlando led by mayor beuddy dyer and the chief wanted to release as much as possible with respect to these early morning hours. all of this is subject to a federal investigation. the attorney general decided upon this limited release. they are not in any way trying to hide anything. they're trying to be as forthcoming as possible. >> let's go to our justice correspondent, evan perez, been doing serious reporting on this. what struck you about these

triplet transcripts just release and what officials are saying about it? >> we know the pulse nightclub is a gay nightclub to the lgbt community but what struck me about the transcripts released is that there was an utter lack about homosexuality or motivated by hatred of gays and we'll post quickly the initial 9-1-1 conversations. you'll see him describing himself as being or acting on behalf of the islamic state. he said that he is calling on and quoting normal words that you hear from jihadis and calling for god's name and also citing isis. the name of isis is redacted from the transcript, of course, as is the name of al baghdadi, the leader of isis which is driving the controversy over what the justice department is trying to do.

there's some political critics who think this is in line with what the administration is doing to sort of minimize the role of radical islam in some of these terrorist acts and the justice department said that's not what they try to do and they simply try not to feed the propaganda machine and the rest talks about the negotiation in which they address why it took three hours for this situation to be resolved. he talked about having a bomb in his car outside as well putting suicide vests on some of the victims, wolf. >> where does the investigation stand right now based on everything you know, especially regarding the wife? >> the wife is still very much a focus of this investigation. what she knew, how much she knew. given contradictory accounts to investigators, wolf. so we expected that investigation is going to be moving very slowly and gathering a lot of evidence and said they interviewed 500 witnesses already they've interviewed.

gathered a mountain of evidence and may take weeks before we see a final answer on what motivated the shooter, wolf. >> thank you very much. let's get analysis right now. bring in two experts. senior law enforcement and cnn national security analyst. a lot of criticism already, tom, that they didn't release the whole transcript. they didn't edit it or release the audio, if you will. paul ryan issued a statement selectively editing the transcript as preposterous and we know he was a radical islamist extremist inspired by isis and targeted the lgbt community. the administration should release the full unredacted transcript so the public is clear about who did this and why. did they make the right decision in selectively editing that transcript? >> i think so, wolf. i was told by senior officials

by f bi that the decision was nt made by the white house. it was not made by the attorney general to do the redaction. it was strictly made by director james comey deciding to have his words go out, supporting isis, supporting al baghdadi and the boston marathon bombers was going to be used directly in future isis postings around the world about this terrorist act and just wanted to deny that and the thinking was everybody knows why he did it. everybody knows he pledged allegiance to them. they just didn't want it, in his words, to where it could be incorporated in future videos and social media postings by isis. >> since everybody knows, julia, those were his goals to promote isis, the islamic state, the isis leader, al-baghdadi, why not include all of that since it's public knowledge? >> i think just exactly what tom said that the purpose to this release is not to give isis a

lot of material for propaganda. the purpose of this release was actually to provide to the public and to those who have been questioning, why did it take so long for them to enter the bar? and so what's remarkable about this transcript is really, you get a sense of the police officer's situational awareness and the sense of the magnitude or what he was saying in terms of other bombs or weaponry he may have had. remember, they're getting phone calls from victims that there's multiple attackers. if you view it from the perspective of, this is going to give some clarity as to why the first responders responded the way they did, they did absolutely the right thing. the politics, i understand may be untenable but substantively and legally and morally redacting it was the right thing. >> the whole notion of spurring additional copy cats, if you will, is what we saw in orlando, going to result in more stuff by

copy cats out there, whether or not they release the actual audio? people know what he did. >> they don't want to add to the fervor of the isis messaging. yes, we'll have continued attacks like this for the foreseeable future, but why add to isis having a verbatim in the voice of the killer message go out over their social media? so that's why. the people that are assuming conspiracy and politicians saying the attorney general made the decision, i'm told that the director of the fbi made the decision for the reasons sfoesk isis messa specific to being denied in this case. >> a relatively low key, praising this guy. talking about him but i don't hear a lot of commotion coming from isis itself, the leadership in iraq or syria, for example. have you? >> no, wolf. i don't know if i just lost you on the skype, but no, part of

this is basically, as i like to say, he was buying hate and isis was selling it. they will use this. there's no doubt, as a recruiting tool, at least for the west. but i don't think they're going to embrace him because they don't know if he has a history and in particular, if he's in fact gay, that they will then have to walk away from. >> julia, thank you very much and tom to you as well. take a look. we've got live pictures of where the vice president will be speaking. he'll be taking to the lecture shortly and live coverage. ♪ so let's restart the show that started at nine ♪ ♪ and while we're at it, let's give you back your 'do ♪ ♪ and give her back the guy she liked before you ♪ ♪ hey, that's the power to turn back time. ♪

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we're just getting word. there's the picture of the vice president. the location where the vice president, joe biden, is expected to speak momentarily. he's expected to deliver a blistering attack on donald trump's foreign policy. we'll have live coverage of that. stand by. we also just received word that corey lewandowski was just fired by donald trump and his campaign. we'll be sitting down with our own dana bash in new york momentari momentarily. we'll have that for you live. corey lewandowski's first public comments on what happened, why he's now out from the donald trump campaign. corey lewandowski's exclusive interview with dana bash coming up momentarily and we'll have live pictures of that. the vice president, we're told by aides, expected to slam donald trump's foreign policy with putin called to build a

border wall with mexico and the u.s. gloria borger still with us. our cnn political analyst david gregory. we'll hear momentarily from corey lewandowski. when dana interviews him, we'll have his explanation of what happened. a lot of people are really interested. >> right. and i guarantee you, he's still going to defend donald trump and he's going to continue to be a donald trump booster. but i think it's clear what occurred and it will be interesting to see how he addresses this with dana is he did not have the family with him, wolf, and i think the family, particularly, ivanka and jared kushner, were not with him. and i think they made it very clear that they thought this campaign had not been well run.

and that if they were going to win, they took a look at the last few weeks and how trump was plummeting in the polls and felt somebody needed to get a handle not only on the campaign but also on the candidate himself. >> because the assumption now, true or not true, there was a rivalry between corey lewandowski and paul manafort. called in to help donald trump get the nomination. >> lewandowski was known as letting trump be trump which unfortunately has allowed trump to inflict damage on his own campaign and on himself going on for a month and a further sign of the level of chaos within this campaign is that corey lewandowski thinks it's actually helping donald trump to sit down and do an interview on cnn, that's the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard. he got fired. he should go away and be quiet. it's a rough business. this is only going to add attention on the turmoil within the campaign. but we're journalists, we love

it and it will be interesting to hear. from the campaign point of view, it's just more turmoil. >> the statement that the trump campaign initially put out and the statement by press secretary that donald j. trump campaign for president, which set a historic record having received almost 14 million votes has today announced corey lewandowski will no longer be working with the campaign and grateful to corey for his hard work and dedication and wish him the best in the future. that was the statement put out by the trump campaign. >> we'll have to see what corey lewandowski says going forward with his interview he's going to give to dana. i think donald trump's problem is much bigger than corey lewandowski. he's been in this place with historic negatives because of the things he's said and the way he's conducted himself. that is what has republicans worried. there's few republicans i've talked to saying we want corey lewandowski out. they want a better candidate

from donald trump. and i understand that his kids are more active now and trying to get him in a different place but i assume they'd be there all along as well as he's called for a ban, a temporary ban on muslims as he talked about judge curiel in a way a lot of people called racist. so this idea that this is a shake-up that's going to put him on a more solid footing is questionable because of the troubles of his own making so far. >> the only statement we have so far from corey lewandowski is, quote, i stand by the fact that mr. trump is a great candidate and is better than hillary clinton ever will be. we're about to hear a lot more from corey lewandowski when he has this interview with dana bash but it took a lot of us, i'm sure it took you by surprise this dramatic development today. >> well, yeah, but when they did, they won the primary, really, with a new model, right? they built this massive media operation with very little conventional structure underneath it. and that was enough to overwhelm this republican field but as

their own statement noted, they won nearly 14 million votes in the republican primary to win the general election and they're going to need almost certainly north of 65 million votes and there simply have not been any of the kind of steps to building the structure that will allow you to do that. one of the most striking numbers explaining why is the figures over the weekend about the spending on the ads and the battleground states and up to 23 million. and not only they failed to adapt from the primary to the general and kind of made that transition, many of the things they did to win the primary and speaking to that more narrow, more ideological basically all white primary audience are the same things causing them the difficulties you now see for the bigger, broader election. another poll. 47/70. that is where the race settled. the republicans need the shake-up on the right. >> if you look at what was spent

in the primaries with 16 other republican candidates, they spent hundreds of millions of dollars. we did some checking today. trump's campaign spent in all of those primaries and caucuses, 17 million yet he crushed all of them primarily by going on television a lot and making his case and presumably, that was going to be his strategy this time around as well. would that not work in the general election? >> i think that was the conclusion, it would not among virtually all republican professionals, that could not work in the general election. speaking to the much broader audience. no question that donald trump has kind of revolutionized campaigning in the way he has dominated the mass media in a way no candidate has before him. his twitter feed reaches comparable audience as any of the evening network news broadcasts. he can reach a lot of people. but as i said, it's one thing to speak to 14 million or 15 million people or another to speak to 65 million especially when many of those are voters not nearly as in sync with you.

a much diverse electorate and more female as well than the republican primary electorate and voters not as inclined to be with him. mobilization is not going to be enough for donald trump to win in november. he needs persuasion as well and simply, i just don't see how you do that without more of the structure of a conventional campaign than they seem to put together so far. >> to contrast what's going on in the trump campaign to what's going on in the hillary clinton campaign. she got biden to speak for her. she got the president of the united states, elizabeth warren. except for bernie sanders. everybody seems to be on board. >> and he'll be on board. it's a beheemuth. joe biden, hillary clinton, will get bernie sanders. they've got as many surrogates as they can possibly need. people in the senate, governors, et cetera, look at the trump campaign. where are the strong surrogates out there? you've got maybe a handful at

most. you don't have organization. you have people contorting themselves in the senate to say, i endorse the nominee, but the words donald trump can't flow from their mouths. you have the senate leader, the republican senate leader saying enough about the presidential candidate. let's talk about something else. on and on and on. so, you know, the last month has been completely squandered. >> i think what's striking too is that what hillary clinton is engaging in doing is protecting the obama coalition from 2012 and tending to that well. disorganization happens and it's surmountmeable but donald trumps actually subtracting from where he was. he's not adding. this is the time for addition. and that's what he's got to get to. >> stand by. we're expecting momentarily to hear from corey lewandowski sitting down with our dana bash for this interview and also standing by to hear from the vice president of the united

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let's go right to the breaking news. i want to bring in our chief correspondent dana bash in new york right now with donald trump's former campaign manager,

corey lewandowski who was fired earlier today. dana, i know you have an interview with him and we're all anxious to hear what happened. >> thanks, wolf. that's right. and corey lewandowski is here with me. thank you very much for coming in. so many questions to ask. first, from your perspective, what happened? why were you fired? >> i don't know. i don't know the answer to that. but what i know is what we've been able to achieve in this election cycle has been historic. we had a candidate who in june of last year now is going to run for president with no elected office experience in a feel iel the race that's gone on to something historic almost 14 million votes and fundamentally changed the way people look at politics and proud to be a small part of that and running as the outsider of this campaign which he has done, running against the corrupt washington, dc establishment and political correctness has been something i've been proud to be a part of. things change as the campaign

evolves and general campaign is well funded giant organization like the clinton campaign is very different than running against those smaller primary state elections. even when it was a big day. >> you think it was appropriate for donald trump to make the change and let you go? >> what i think is that the voters have a binary decision coming up on election day. they can either vote for hillary clinton and her liberal policies or put someone in place to change washington and i will do everything i can to make sure the latter of those two happens which means, donald trump is elected president. if i can do that inside the campaign, it's a privilege. if i can do that outside the campaign, that's also a privilege. >> did mr. trump himself call you this morning and say, i don't mean to use this term, but it is the term, you're fired. >> i had a nice conversation with mr. trump and said to him, it's been an honor and privilege to be part of this and i mean that for the bottom of my heart. i think as you look at how small

this team has been and how close knit this team has been, it's really important to know there are highs and lows in every campaign and we've been through them together and we need to continue with the rnc to utilize the resources they have available to us. it's been a great privilege, and look, i wouldn't change one second. the hardest part for me has been just not being able to spend time with my family the last 18 or 19 months but i would not look back. i have no regrets. it's such a privilege and honor to have been a small part of this, to learn and experienced what he's been able to achieve. it's been truly amazing. >> were you surprised? were you blind sighted? >> i don't know if it's so much of that. it's been a lot of conjecture in the media lately about what's going on and what isn't going on well in the campaign. i think a lot of that is just the media trying to hype up the candidate. we've got a candidate on the

other side under criminal investigation that most of the mainstream, instead talking about things donald trump said or did 20 or 40 years ago. and a great policy speech, probably the best speaker our country has seen, he doesn't get credit for those things. >> i want to get in some of the specifics how the campaign was run and where you are right now but before that, were you escorted out of the building by security today? >> it doesn't work like that. obviously, there are protocols in place so when someone is no longer an employee, there's no escorting out. i've had the privilege of working with these people for 19 months. they're friends of mine but there's a protocol and everyone follows it and i think that's the right thing. >> so yes. >> but it was security from the office. >> let's get to what went on inside the campaign. sources who i've talked to and others talked to said they described you as a hot head and you just didn't treat people right. what do you say to that? >> look, i think i'm a very

intense person. my expectation is perfection because i think that's what mr. trump deserves. i think he deserves the very best because he's put his life and his fortune into this campaign. spending tens of millions of dollars to go do something that he didn't need to do. he's had a great life but wants to change the country for the better and i see how hard he's worked in this campaign. he works 18, 19, 20 hours a day consistently. >> but this has been a question about you. >> i understand. his leadership starts at the top and i see what he's put into the campaign and when i see someone not working as hard as the person who's funding the campaign, the campaign principal meaning the candidate, that bothers me. because leadership is at the top and not asked someone i wasn't willing to do myself and not asked something he wasn't willing to do himself. i've had the privilege of working with him a lot and he works all the time. that's the mindset and the

tenacity and intensity to being president of the united states and i think you can expect out of people. we never had 700 people in a campaign. 70 people more efficient, leaner, meaner. does that mean you need people to do extra, stay late? you bet you do. >> i want to put up on the screen, i don't know if you've seen this. one of the senior advisors to mr. trump put out a tweet almost immediaty after you were fired. michael caputo. ding dong, the witch is dead. that doesn't happen, corey, you worked in a lot of campaigns. i don't mean to put it up to be hurtful. >> let's be clear. michael caputo has no formal role. he's a volunteer. he doesn't get paid by the campaign. no formal role with the campaign. >> for anybody involved in the campaign and wa wants the best donald trump to put that out. i wouldn't have put that up had it not been a narrative that we

were hearing and i'm sure that's why you wanted to come on to try to push back on a lot of that. >> i think in all campaigns, you've got detractors and you've got supporters. that's the nature of the beast. and i think if you went out. i don't know michael caputo. he's a volunteer who's been to the campaign for three or four weeks, in cleveland, i don't know what he does for the campaign. talk to the people who have been here from the beginning. state directors here from the beginning. the people who have been in the trenches, who understand and have seen mr. trump's work ethic and what he's been able to accomplish whether it's new hampshire, south carolina, iowa, those states where no one gave him a chance and he became successful and became the republican nominee. i think if you asked them, they'd stand toe to toe with me any day of the week and 20 hours a day to make sure that they had the same work ethic i do and i think that's what i try to foster with the people i've worked with. >> sources from the campaign, in and around the campaign, have

told us they thought you were feeding mr. trump's worst instini instinc instincts. one of your lines is let trump be trump but if there was a plan in place, now in the general, that you would get on the plan and undercut that plan and bring out his worst instincts. how do you respond to that? >> i say, what interest do i have in doing that? >> i think the suggestion is that just, it's who you are. >> if donald trump wins, that's good for corey lewandowski and good for the country. and so when you think about it, why would i want to do anything other than what's the best interest of him in the campaign for the good of country? i've given up 19 months of my life and my family and all of the other things to make sure he's in the best possible position. and i'm not the only one. many people have done that. for anyone to insinuate that i wouldn't want what is best for him, does that mean every time he asks me something, do i push

back on it? no. because candidly, he has had his finger on the pulse of the american public for the last 16 or 18 months of this campaign and he has seen things that i didn't see, and he knows how to message things that i don't know how to do. >> should you have pushed back more in recent weeks now that it's a totally different ball game? >> it's important to push back on issues that are important. i think you have to be selective when you do that. mr. trump is unparalleled success in the business world and now unparalleled success in the world of politics and i think when he presents an idea, some ideas are very, very good and they should move forward. some are pretty good and should move forward and the ones that i take exception to, if they are there, i let my opinion be known and anyone who knows me i don't just give a yes answer but to my detriment and fight for my opinions forcefully. doesn't mean i'm always right or always wrong but what i do say is, i think this is what we should do this time. at the end of the day, there's

one person who makes the decision in this campaign as it goes forward and it should be that way. >> you mentioned that there was a lot of real tension. what was the relationship with him? >> when paul first came in, he was going to manage the delegate process and then we were fortunate enough to secure delegates we didn't need a delegate manager. we have gotten along amazingly well and the media doesn't want to report that but we work side by side, talking multiple times a day. he had his roles to oversee on the campaign. i had a very separate functioning making sure that the schedule is accordingly. fund-raising side of things. we divided things and a great relationship. no animosity of paul and i. >> forgive me but it's hard to believe that it was as sort of rosy and happy as you describe with discussion -- >> the campaign is so small and

bringing in a progressal like paul helped us grow the campaign and we need to continue to grow to be successful. so everything that paul did for the campaign is one less thing i had to do. i'm thankful for that. >> he's still there and you're not there's a power struggle and he won? >> i don't think that's the case. you know what i think? i think this campaign continues to grow and donald trump will be the next president of the united states. if there's anything to do to make help make that happen, advice to paul or mr. trump or advice anywhere along the line, i'm happy to do that. >> let's talk about mr. trump's family. my understanding and others here are reporting is that his children were very forceful saying it's time for corey lewandowski to leave. does that surprise you? >> okay. i can say i've had a great relationship with the family and i think i continue to do so. look. everybody has their own opinions and i think what you have is a

transition in the campaign from a very, very successful 37-state primary state process managed at a one-off level to look to a bigger picture. that's okay. the's nothing wrong with that. more ideas, people givingen put, that's great, important. i'm an implementer. that's what i try to do. take the ideas laid out and implement them to the best of our ability and most important thing and that includes the kids' input, other professionals input, elected officials and d.c. people's input. i try to implement what the collective organization is best for the campaign. >> our understanding is that evan ka trump's husband is much more involved and was intimately involved in saying it's time for you, for corey, to go. can you tell me about your relationship with him? >> i've had a great relationship with jared. he's helped us from the onset of

having a better online presence. being aggressive in a good way of getting us to have a stronger social media presence, posting the facebook page. he understands a different component than i understand. he's very, very good in that regard and very good at moving the campaign forward in that regard. i think it's been a great relationship so i'm not sure where that's coming from. someone -- >> reporting that he found out that you were trying to plant some not so nice stories about him. is that true? >> i have no interest of doing that. i want to get mr. trump elected president of the united states. i'm privileged -- >> you weren't trying to undermine him? >> what i want to do is get mr. trump to be the president of the united states. that's been my job and only goal and that includes focusing on my job. look. the job of a campaign manager and 16 other guys had this, as well. is to go and implement the best policies for the campaign and build a team so come november 8th you're successful.

16 other managers tried this and with respect successful. i was successful because we have the best candidate, the best speaker, the person with the biggest crowds who won 37 states and primaries and caucuses around the country. that's important to remember. >> two more people and then getting the strategy. ivanka trump. >> great asset to the campaign. i mean -- >> would you be surprised if you heard she was not thrilled with the job that you were doing? >> i don't think that's the case. i think ivanka understands her father and a fantastic surrogate for the campaign, a sense of calmness to the campaign and connects immediately not just with women but business executives, polished and professional and an honor to work with her for 18 months. >> let's talk about the roles you did have and talked about personnel and the strategy and about what did not seem to be working that way. just, for example, there's new polling today of monmouth with mr. trump down 7 points, 47% to

40%. do you feel that as your role as campaign manager part of the issue was that the campaign wasn't managed correctly in terms of what he needs to do, forget about the personnel side but to win the white house? >> no. i think the strategy is looking to expand the map from a traditional republican campaign would look like so if you look four years ago at the states mitt romney lost, florida and virginia and pennsylvania, those are places that donald trump is going to win. and that's fundamentally changes the outcome of this election. national polls, while important, you know what? what's more important is state specific polls. new jersey where donald trump is winning and florida and ohio winning or within the margin. >> what polls? >> polls in the respective states. one or two points on the side within the margins and making a difference. and so if you want the poll the people of alaska, you want to poll the people of idaho, you

know, those are all inclusive in the respective national polls but a presidential election is traditionally run well in ten or 11 states. he'll run it in a much bigger states turning states like pennsylvania red again. >> the only way to do that in a traditional campaign we know that he's not a traditional candidate, certainly didn't have a traditional structure in the primaries, but to build a network to have field staff and to do that you have to raise money. if you're not going to self fund and not going to in the general. my understanding is that there's no fund raising network and that you are relying, the campaign is relying a lot on the rnc infrastructure. but that was your job. right? to fund raise. >> let me touch on it. as we started to raise money in 30 days or so. he's self funded through the primary and of which we're still part of right now and raising money for the rnc for their infrastructure. which means their data programs,

their field staff. they have 500 field staff in place right now. four years ago, the rnc with four in place. key battleground states. >> i understand. a different model. i have done reporting on that. but this is more of a question about the fact that they still need donald trump and the trump campaign to raise money. >> he's done that. if you look at what he did in the last four days through texas and north carolina and georgia and las vegas and arizona, he raised $12 million to $15 million for the party in a 4-day swing. that money goes to the joint fund raising agreement so that the joint fund raising committee so the rnc has the resources necessary to put the boots on the ground, enhance the data program and all of the resources necessary. >> what i'd heard from a source familiar with this is that part of the trouble that he had with fund raising is that the donors didn't respond to you and donors used to being coddled and got calls -- >> money is pouring in. california one event, i think $6

million or $8 million in one evening in california. what you have seen in the last four or five days and reince priebus on the trip to texas, the goal at a particular event is $2 million. they raised $3.5 million. >> you're going to see more money raised than people devibing? >> absolutely. the money is pouring in. people want to come on board. join the trump train because they know if hillary clinton is elected president of the united states, four more years of the obama administration. >> you have that kind of money, my question is, the clinton campaign has $40 million in ads and bought ad time for the next six weeks, donald trump and his campaign, zero. >> that's right. >> but if you had that kind of money and organization, why wouldn't you -- leave the air waves to her? >> jeb bush spent $150 million running for president in the primary. spending money on major media investments of which do not do him any good or win him any state in the primary. scott walker, same thing.

reserved $7 million in ad time and didn't spend the money. >> totally different world. >> it is a completely different thing and you have to understand donald trump can bypass the mainstream media to go to the people. he's done it successfully and continues to do that and something the media doesn't like and he can go to twitter or facebook account or instagram or 20 million plus people following him and get the message out. of course he'll do advertising but the difference is you can't just look dollar for dollar by one campaign to another campaign and if money was the metric of success, donald trump would not be the republican nominee right now. jeb bush would have been. >> no question. >> or ted cruz or all the people that out raised him. >> i'm with you on that but you had the ability to get the entirety of the republican party, the infrastructure, behind donald trump. >> and they are. >> money and -- but not really. i mean -- >> look who's behind donald trump. mitch mcconnell, speaker ryan behind him.

>> half heartedly. >> reince is raising money. the party is raising money. mr. trump is raising money. >> not making it iz for them. >> that's not true at all. he had meetings with all kinds of people to be part of the campaign and we put a plan in place with the rnc to have the resources necessary and mr. trump could be raising the money for the campaign but he wants to make sure that the party has the resources and the boots on the ground and the data programs and the build-out so they can be successful. the difference was four years ago romney has his whole team of fund raising and bundlers and going into the states, two very separate groups of people there. romney people and rnc people. we're completely integrated. it is a different model and much more efficient than four years ago. >> okay. so you're telling me that at the end of the day we'll see fund raising better than it seems to be now and the infrastructure better, before i go to the question to ask, i want to ask about infrastructure because i had reporting that the campaign had 70