Trump Calls Crowd "Patriots" After Chanting "Send Her Back"
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's really what we've seen play out at the White House, because we went from the president saying, oh, I tried to stop it, I started speaking quickly when he was one-on-one with a reporter who was asking why he would let his supporters go on and chant something like that. And then today the president stuck a much more defiant tone, talking about how his supporters are patriots, the people of North Carolina were patriots. While yesterday, he was telling reporters to drive back to North Carolina and ask them why they made those comments. So you are seeing him change his tone after the coverage. And Abby said that Melania Trump was also frustrated by their comments, which is interesting because she was standing over his shoulder today in the Oval Office. But, yes, it seems you're seeing the president back off his seeming distancing himself from the comments from yesterday.</s>JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: That is exactly what we saw with Charlottesville riots.</s>COLLINS: And same with the "lock her up", he distanced himself from that originally and then became a staple of his rally.</s>TAPPER: Toluse, the president said he doesn't know whether this is good for him politically or not. He's not focused at all on the politics of it. Do you buy that?</s>TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: This is a president that is always focused on politics. He's looking at 2020 and you could look at anything he does through the lens of 2020 and whether or not he thinks it is good for him. Now, he and some of his advisers think it is good for him to able to elevate some of these congresswomen who they believe are too far left for the country and would paint the Democratic Party as being socialist party and that is what he's trying to do here. Now when he sort of walks back his comments and then doubles down, it sort of gives his supporters what they want, it gives the people who are concerned about what he said, what they want as well, because they could say the president disavowed those comments, you know, let's move on, and then the supporters say he's fighting for us and sticking with us. So, we've seen -- so as Kaitlan said, we've seen him do this before like Charlottesville where his supporters heard what they wanted to hear, the people who were Republicans and concerned with his initial response also heard what they wanted to hear and they were able to say, you know, the president has condemned the neo-Nazi and white supremacists and let's all move on. So, it is a strategy the president is using to play both sides of the aisle and all of it is politics and looking at 2020.</s>TAPPER: Let's be clear, these congresswomen have said things that are critical of the United States. The president also completely, continually misrepresents what they say. They have not called the United States garbage. But, Tara, take a listen to what President Trump said just a few moments ago in response to a question from Abby Phillip.</s>ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSE PRESIDENT: Why is it OK for you to criticize America but not Democratic congresswomen?</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I believe all people are great people. I believe everyone is great. But I love our country.</s>TARA SETMAYER, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Kudos to our colleague Abby Phillip for asking that question because it really put him in a situation where he should have answered it and didn't, he deflected, because he can't. That was half a step away from there is good people on both sides right there. You know, this president has disparaged this country time and time again. He went after John McCain who was an unquestioned war hero in this country. You tell me that was patriotic, when he went after Gold Star families, that's patriotic? When he sat there he let those -- those people who chanted "send her back", those are examples of patriots? No, they are not. Would he feel the same way about the people back in the civil rights era that were chanting send them back for African-Americans during segregation? Or what about the brown shirts in Germany who were chanting God knows what about the Jews, people would think they were being patriotic. I mean, this is ridiculous for the president to continue using these examples that these people are patriots by sending them back. Was it patriotic when the Ku Klux Klan had billboards in the South saying love it or leave it? They could say they were being patriots and they didn't want those people of color there. I mean, this is absurd. It's asinine of the president to use it as an excuse and frankly the Republicans who came out who said this is not a good thing, the nativist approach, not only do they thank god recognize the dangerous slippery slope but they also know the numbers. We have 22 million naturalized citizens in this country, including 400,000 in the state of Pennsylvania which he only won by 44,000.</s>TAPPER: And, Jen Psaki, let me ask you, the politics of this? The president ran a campaign that was -- that was racially tinged at the very least in 2016. In 2018, he had the whole caravan thing. 2016, it worked electorally at least. 2018, it definitely didn't. Are there fears in the Democratic Party about what this might mean, the immorality of racism that it might be effective?</s>JEN PSAKI, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think what President Trump is look back at 2016 as you touched on and decided that is his playbook. 2018 doesn't matter and that wasn't about me, I wasn't on the ballot. That is true historically for past presidents and past midterm elections and he's trying to run the same playbook. So, as Kaitlan has touched, and as the whole panel touched on, we've seen this playbook before. This is almost like his security blanket and his safety net to go back to racially-tinged and racial language in order to satisfy his base. Now, that doesn't mean it's the right strategy because he's betting on getting the exact same group of people out to vote. He has not expanded it at all and that is not a way to win election when you are president.</s>TAPPER: All right. Everyone, stick around, because we got a lot more to talk about. What front-runner Joe Biden might want to practice as he gets ready for the CNN debate? Stay with us.