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Conway Becomes New Campaign Manager; New Poll Shows Nearly 24 Percent of
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BARTIROMO: Because they don't want to vote for Hillary Clinton.
CARTER: That's right. And I think that what you see at the end of the day is people don't vote against somebody. They vote for someone. So the people who are saying they're going to hold their nose are likely not going to vote at all.
And then you've got to look at enthusiasm of the supporters. I think there's a lot of enthusiastic supporters for Donald Trump; there's not as many for Hillary Clinton. If he can win over some more people I think we are going to see that gap tighten and it could be much closer than anybody is anticipating at this point.
MCDOWELL: There's a large chunk of the population of this country who are looking for a reason to vote for him, because they can't get onboard with her, because they don't trust her.
BARTIROMO: So let's talk about this new team as first reported by the "Wall Street Journal": Breitbart News could founder Stephen Bannon, assuming the role of the chief executive and pollster Kellyanne Conway promoted to campaign manager. As you said Gerry -- Paul Manafort stays as chairman.
What do we know about these two -- I know Kellyanne Conway has been on this program.
BAKER: Yes. A long -- widely-respected longstanding pollster. She worked I think with the Ted Cruz campaign. She is well-respected in Republican circles. She's been advising I think informally up until now. Now she's given a more formal role.
And Steve Bannon is a former Goldman Sachs guy, very successful in business, very successful with Breitbart, which is a you know, conservative-leaning media organization which has been vocal in its support of Donald Trump actually.
So these are -- the question really I think is we talked about this a little bit earlier. Is this -- how much does Trump listen to people around him? We know he listens to his family. We know that his sons and his daughters, particularly Ivanka and Donald, Jr. are very influential and they probably are behind a lot of the changes when you see them. Can he listen to people who say, you got to get -- you know, you've got to get on message. You've got to stop doing -- frankly some of these crazy things that got you in so much trouble. Can he be guided in that way?
And again, part of the problem here is that Trump has been guided by his own instincts for so long in business, during primary campaign and it served him pretty well. So part of his problem is to say well I have got it right so far. Why are you guys so smart --
BARTIROMO: But there are so many things around that are negative around Hillary Clinton that he doesn't go to. He doesn't talk about. For example, just the week when he announced his economic speech, he came on this program Tuesday to talk to us about the economic speech. He should have been riding that economic speech whole week talking only about that.
BAKER: He'd fall over his own message. You know, you get --you know, we spent -- we had those terrible GDP numbers a few weeks ago.
BARTIROMO: Right. He should have jumped on that.
BAKER: We spend the entire week talking about this Gold Star family and whether or not Trump was, you know, insulting them. There is a lot of material to work with. As Dagen says there's a lot of people looking for a reason not to vote for Hillary Clinton. They want to be reassured that this candidate is someone -- they don't like Hillary Clinton. They don't trust her. They don't think she would be a great president. They've got all of those concerns about her but they look at Donald Trump and think, "I am not so sure".
BARTIROMO: Right.
CARTER: With all of the missteps that he had how much news did we miss about Hillary Clinton and all of the things that she did. I mean the Chris Wallace interview got buried on that --
(CROSSTALK)
MCDOWELL: But the ads are going to be critical.
CARTER: Really.
MCDOWELL: It's important to be really critical.
CARTER: Absolutely.
BARTIROMO: Yes. And the foundation, whether or not there are investigations going on that are active, we keep hearing the stories of pay-for-play. He's not talking about that.
So we will see if this changes now with this new team in place. Donald Trump has made the case for why he is best equipped to fight the war on terror. He made it in his speech last night in Wisconsin.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: To do this we are going to need a fighter in the White House. I will be your fighter. Believe me I will be your fighter. To defeat crime and radical Islamic terrorism --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: This coming as the Republican nominee gets his first national security briefing later today. I want to bring in Mike Baker right now. He's a former CIA covert operations officer and president of Diligence, a global intelligence and security firm.
Mike -- good to see you. Thanks so much for joining us.
MIKE BAKER, FORMER CIA COVERT OPERATIONS OFFICER: Thank you. Appreciate it.
BARTIROMO: Obviously you're (inaudible) with the national security briefing but terror is a top concern for voters. Do you think Donald Trump made the case last night that he should be the steward keeping the country safe?
M. BAKER: I thought it was -- the speech like his previous speech I thought wasn't as well structured as it could be, and I thought he was a little bit all over the map. So I don't know that he really made the case in that. But look he could, I mean he just -- it seems like he has a hard time staying on message.
And what people want to hear I think is why he is different than a potential Hillary Clinton administration. And I don't know that he is hammering that enough. There's plenty of room. There's plenty of opportunity to attack her track record, to attack the chaos that we've got in the Middle East and tie it to the current administration and to Hillary's time as secretary of state.
BARTIROMO: We were just saying this.
G. BAKER: Yes. I mean do you think people -- one of the concerns that people had about that speech the other day, it was good -- he reassured people after some of the frankly strange things he said about NATO, suggesting at one point that the United States may not -- under Donald Trump may not come to the aide of a NATO nation if it's invaded by Russia. He seems to have righted that. He seems to have said no NATO is fighting terrorism and that is important. We need to do that.
But do you think there is -- you know, one of the concerns about that speech was that again it contradicted so much of what he said in the past. And when he said he was against the Iraq war from the beginning he didn't really actually say that he was against the Iraq war from the beginning. He has criticized the Obama administration, both for doing too much in the Middle East and apparently for not doing enough.
I mean do people have a clear understanding do you think, Mike of what he actually --
(CROSSTALK)
M. BAKER: I think you're pointing to an important problem here which is that -- inconsistency, mixed messages, obfuscation or opaqueness -- it's not helpful when you're talking about foreign policy. And we have seen what happens over the past seven and a half years because the current administration of President Obama has done just that. The world has been confused as to where we stand and what our positions are from day-to-day.
And so I think it would behoove them to get on message, to take three or four points related to national security, and foreign policy, and just keep hammering those, I don't know who at this point is driving that train, from his team of advisors but I think they'd be well-served.
MCDOWELL: One easy point seems to be Iran though with the news that there 100,000 Iran-backed forces that are now in Iraq, raising the question of even if the Islamic state is defeated, then what kind of power moves into Iraq. And just given the fact that we cut this deal with Iran, we sent them $400 million -- amazing reporting by the "Wall Street Journal, by the way -- $400 million on pallets in foreign currencies I think that that is an easy thing to explain to the American people of like this is where this administration has gotten us.
M. BAKER: Yes. Well, if you can't make the case and explain $400 million in ransom payments to the government of Iran --
MCDOWELL: Right.
M. BAKER: -- I don't know where you are at. But look it is unprecedented. The Russian military is now running operations out of Iran. Think about that for a moment. Iran has more influence in the Middle East now than they have had in modern times. And now we're seeing a level of connection of ties between Russia and Iran that we have never seen before. The fact that they are flying their military operations into Syria out of Iranian bases is -- it is astounding. And it's not getting really any coverage to speak of.
MCDOWELL: Except on the front page of the "Journal" today.
G. BAKER: Yes, that's on the front page -- pictures of Russian bomber dropping his payload over Syria.
BARTIROMO: Look, Trump regularly criticizes Hillary's foreign policy is that enough? What else does he need to do to make that story resonate?
M. BAKER: He just needs to keep doing it and doing it more aggressively, doing it louder and again staying on point. I mean look, he gives the speech other day and he disappears down a rabbit hole about we should have kept the oil in Iraq.
BARTIROMO: It is the story this morning, by the way.
M. BAKER: People need to read that story. They need to understand how astounding this is. I don't know another word, I'm not eloquent enough to be writing for the "Wall Street Journal" but at the same time although you and I not we're not related but we have the same posh accent.
G. BAKER: You did better in the hair department.
I think it's exactly right. And these alliances that you're seeing -- you say -- you make a point that Iran has never been stronger in the Middle East, Russia has never had the role in the Middle East actually but this is a historic -- as you know better than in anyone here -- this is a historic mission of the United States was to limit Russia's influence in the Middle East. The Cold War, we did a very successful job of it, in the post-Cold War period Russia was withdrawing. It didn't look like there will ever be a concern there again.
Russia is now --
BARTIROMO: It's only gotten stronger.
G. BAKER: It's in an alliance with Iran, it's making friends again with Turkey after the problems that they've had --
(CROSSTALK)
BARTIROMO: Right there, in Syria.
M. BAKER: Military trades with Egypt. They haven't had a relationship with Egypt since the Nasser days. And you look at what they're engaged in, and you're correctly pointing out Turkey and the overtures there, a direct poke in our eye. I mean there's no doubt about it.
So we look at this and that is what -- that's what Trump needs to be doing. He needs to be pointing out -- again the chaos. And he tried to I think, but his speech again was -- it was too wobbly.
BARTIROMO: So Hillary Clinton's Russia reset actually empowered Russia pretty significantly.
M. BAKER: Absolutely. This current administration, their inability to, you know, to understand that if we're not at the top of the food chain --
BARTIROMO: Right.
M. BAKER: -- somebody else is going to race in there and there's just going to be chaos.
BARTIROMO: And they sure have.
Mike Baker -- good to see you.
M. BAKER: Thank you.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much.
Stay with us. Sam Clovis from the Trump campaign up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back.
Hackers now planning to auction stolen surveillance tools apparently used by the NSA.
Cheryl Casone with the story and headlines now -- Cheryl.
CHERYL CASONE, FBN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, quite a story -- Maria.
Programs created by the NSA could be online and they could be for sale, potentially jeopardizing the spy agency's operations. Criminal hackers known as Shadow Brokers released samples of what looks to be NSA programs over the weekend, putting them up for sale and they promised to leak more data to whoever puts in the winning bid.
Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden claims this attack against the NSA is likely a message from Russia. Washington has accused Moscow, of course, of interfering in the U.S. presidential election.
Well, in business headlines, Ford planning to be out with a fully- driverless car without a steering wheel or pedals in the next five years. Ford CEO Mark Fields joined us yesterday saying the development is going to be a game changer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK FIELDS, FORD CEO: We're looking at autonomous vehicles. We feel very strongly that autonomous vehicles can have the same, almost the same significant impact on society like Ford's moving assembly line did 100 years ago.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CASONE: And Ford also says it will initially target ride-sharing fleets and package delivery services with the driverless model. Eventually it will go to consumers.
And finally this looks like Taco Bell was getting into a food fight with Chick-Fil-A. This as insiders say the Mexican fast-food chain planning to test a new menu item called crispy chicken strips. This picture is from Reddit, we should say, not from the company.
Earlier this month we looked at another fried chicken choice from Taco Bell called the naked chicken chulapa (ph) it's going to launch across the U.S. next year. Chick-Fil-A had a whopping $6 billion dollars, Maria, in sales last year. They've been doing really well.
And by the way, according to a blog called Brand Eating, the naked chicken chulapa is a taco that uses fried chicken in place of tortilla. So -- picture the calorie count on that one.
BARTIROMO: I can't. Thank you -- Cheryl.
MCDOWELL: That sounds -- I'm like it just sounds greasy. It just sounds greasy.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
MCDOWELL: If you don't have the crispy shell on the outside instead it's a piece of chicken -- by the way, that photo was not appetizing at all -- at all.
(CROSSTALK)
MCDOWELL: I don't know what that is.
BARTIROMO: Coming up, from Target to El Brand, some of the top retail heavyweights reported earnings today. We're breaking down the biggest things to watch. What do these earnings tell us about the consumer today?
Then we're just weeks away from Labor Day and the long weekend. If you're planning on going out of town, you won't be the only one that's for sure. We will break down everything you need to know ahead of the big holiday weekend.
Stay with us. Back in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BARTIROMO: Welcome back.
Earnings season winding down as we results from the retailers roll on this morning. This morning Lowe's reporting disappointing second quarter earnings and revenue. Take a look at the stock this morning, that's going to be a loser. It is trading down.
Target also cutting its profit outlook for the year, that stock under pressure as well even though the numbers actually for the quarter were better than expected. Overall the sector among the big winners so far.
Joining us right now S&P Global senior analyst Lindsey Bell. Lindsey -- good to see you.
LINDSEY BELL, S&P GLOBAL: Good to see you.
BARTIROMO: How would you characterize earnings so far?
BELL: It's much better than expected for the overall index. Growth is coming in -- down 2.1 percent which is better than the 5.2 percent decline that was expected at the start of earnings season. You mentioned some of the retailers.
I would characterize retail earnings season as actually very good. I know today we got some mixed results, but growth from the retail sector is expected to be 13.9 percent which is 5 percentage points better than what was expected at the start of the earnings season.
You're seeing bigger beats from online, of course. And last week big surprises from the department retailers helped drive upside, obviously very low expectations for them going into the quarterly report.
MCDOWELL: Like with Macy's you saw the stock reaction when it isn't just ghastly, I think it was like a double digit gain on Macy's stock.
BARTIROMO: And then they cut all those stores --
MCDOWELL: Right, exactly. But in terms of valuations how much of all this good news is priced in because just -- even last week you've had new record highs on Amazon, TJX, stores -- you name it.
BELL: Yes, I know. And I think that, everyone is buying into the second half, hope rally here. Stocks are up. They're a little more expensive. I don't know that right now is the best time to get into retail.
The second half setup is good though. Comparisons are easier. The weather seems to be a little more favorable now and everyone is super-jazzed about two extra shopping days in holiday selling season. So there is a lot to look forward to but I think they're going to have to prove themselves because sales still are -- especially in department -- store sales are still down, though they're down less than they were down in the first quarter so the trend has been improving on a monthly basis throughout the second quarter.
That in general we're seeing sales improving across all of the retail which leading the better growth margins, better inventory positions. And that's a really good thing going in the back to school selling season here.
G. BAKER: Wages are rising, salaries -- you know, incomes generally rising so it's good news for most Americans after years and years and of stagnation. But is that starting to ease into profits?
BELL: Yes. We saw that with TJX yesterday. They actually cut guidance because of that. They're looking for the pressure to continue through all of next year. But I think that is a good thing, because when the consumer is making more money, they're going to spend more money, so. And gasoline prices I know they've been on the rise recently but they still remained depressed. And so I think the consumer is just feeling a lot more confident, confidence number still remain at very high levels we saw in most recent reports. I think the consumer is in good shape.
BARTIROMO: What is the big selling item going into the school season -- back to school?
BELL: It's been (inaudible). We have heard some really good things -- American Eagle and Abercrombie & Fitch, Macy's, they all have (inaudible) on this -- so that is the big item this year.
MCDOWELL: And you have new phones coming out. You've got the new Samsung Galaxy phone has gotten -- I think you guys have incredible reviews in the paper today --
(CROSSTALK)
MCDOWELL: I read the article, every story in the paper.
(CROSSTALK)
MCDOWELL: But, also, you've got Apple though will be coming out with a new phone as well and that at least gins up excitement.
BELL: And that's definitely driving the tech sector, by the way, as well. And when we look to the third quarter earnings season in general, the numbers have come down which is normal for this time of the year, but the tech sector is the one sector that we've seen estimates go up. So I think Apple (inaudible) --
BARTIROMO: Fed raises rates this year.
BELL: Yes, we -- our S&P economics team is estimating that they're going to raise by 25 base points in December.
BARTIROMO: December.
BELL: Yes.
BARTIROMO: Lindsey -- great to see you.
BELL: Thank you.
BARTIROMO: Thank you so much. Lindsey Bell, S&P Capital.
Up next Donald Trump warns of a terrorist attack here at home.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: And there will be more and what we're doing by allowing thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of people in here that we just don't know anything about, it's going to happen again.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: More on Trump's dire warning coming up.
Then, slimming down while eating at McDonald's -- is it possible? Behind Mickey D's plan to help you burn off those nuggets and fries.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MARIA BARTIROMO, HOST: Good Wednesday morning everybody. Welcome back. I am Maria Bartiromo and it is Wednesday, August 17th. Here are your top stories, 7:30 am on the east coast. A shake-up in the Trump campaign while the Republican nominee is overhauling his top staff. Now less than ninety days away from the election, despite the move, Trump still on the attack against opponent, Hillary Clinton.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, REPUBLICAN NOMINEE: Are you ready for change?
(APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: Are you ready for leadership that puts you, the American people, first together? First -
(APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: that puts our country first, America first, remember that, America first.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: Joining us right now is the president of We will bring you the campaign shake-up coming up and it comes on the day that Trump is set to receive his first national security briefing later today. Devastating images out of Southern California meanwhile, the wildfire that forced more than 80,000 people from their homes. A shocking tale of survival, the cruise ship passenger that survived nearly 40 hours, lost at sea. Plus get ready for some long lines, the massive number of travelers expected to hit the roads for the long Labor Day weekend coming up and the airports by the way. And the make fit, why McDonald's is looking to tap into the wearable fitness market. Markets this morning, meanwhile, searching for direction, investors are awaiting the latest Fed minutes, they are due at today at 2:00 p.m. Eastern giving us a window into the Fed thinking at its last meeting. New York Fed president, Bill Dudley, told Fox Business Network's Peter Barnes yesterday, we are edging closer to the time that the Fed will Increase interest rates. In Europe stocks of extend the earlier losses lower across the board, take a look. The worst performer there, Germany's DAX and decks down better than one percent and in Asia, overnight the major averages were mixed, the best performer was the Nikkei average in Japan which closed up nearly one percent. Startling new numbers on Immigration report, according to Pew Research, the U.S. has brought in 63,000 refugees since October 1, 2015. Of those refugees, almost half of them are of Muslim descent. This has Donald Trump says the United States is in big trouble. Trump sat down with Fox News' Sean Hannity during a town hall last night, it is going to air tonight where he addressed this top concern.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We can be nice about it, we can say it's never going to happen again, there will be more and what we are doing by allowing thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of people in the air that we just do not know anything about. It is going to happen again because there is something wrong. And until we figure it out, we have to stop it.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: Joining us right now is the president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, Dr. Zuhdi Jasser. Dr. Jasser, good to see you, thanks so much for joining us.
DR. ZUHDI JASSER, PRESIDENT AMERICAN ISLAMIC FORUM FOR DEMOCRACY: Thank you, it is good to see you, Maria-
BARTIROMO: So Trump revealed details of his extreme vetting plan. What is your take on where we are in terms of the refugee inflow? It is now at 63,000. How do you see it?
DR. JASSER: Well I think first of all, it is good to reflect that the numbers actually show the percent of non-Muslims almost at 50 percent. So some of the commentary that there was discrimination against Christians and non-Muslims may not be as true as we thought but also as Mr. Trump has mentioned the left has had a blind eye to vetting against Ideologies that threaten us, they just been sort of doing background checks from enemy regimes like Syria and others. So there has been no vetting, it has left us completely vulnerable and actually some polling has said 13 percent of those in Europe had sympathies for ISIS. So it is about time that we start to talk about how to vet them against the Salafi Jihadi Ideology and what Trump off script called extreme vetting but I do not think it is extreme. I think it is the type of vetting that should be done, it is not a right to come to United States, we have to make sure, Maria, that we are not allowing people that are going to come in as insurgent against our way of life and it is about time our Homeland Security start to vet against Theo- political ideologies that want to destroy the west.
BARTIROMO: This seems so obvious to me particularly at that time that we are seeing ISIS say publicly we are going to infiltrate the refugee flow and yet you do not hear this from the left at all, Lee. It is not a concern and you also do not hear from the mainstream media by the way. And I am just, why not?
LEE CARTER, POLLSTER: I think it is fascinating because they position us all as racist, they have positioned us all as unfair, but the bottom line is America even way back with Ellis Island, you used to have to have people vouch for you. -You did not come here without having any background checks. And so I do not think this is extreme. I do not think that this is something you know they are using all of these examples on the left of fear in the past. They are not using the examples of what we did from the very beginning of time. And so this is a privilege to be here, you need to want to be here.
DAGEN MCDOWELL, FOX BUSINESS NETWORK CORRESPONDENT: Adding to this and it is something that the left does not touch, that Liberals and Democrats do not touch and it is shameful, that radical Islamic Ideology believes in the suppression of women, the suppression of gays, even the murder of anyone, who is lesbian or gay. And even those of different faiths. And Donald Trump said that explicitly earlier this week and I think that is kind of an exclamation point for him.
BARTIROMO: Dr. Jasser, what are you in here?
DR. JASSER: Well I think unfortunately what happens is that the left because it is so obsessed about the left versus right, how to use Muslims in this political partisan battle rather than how to keep America safe. The left in Europe has begun to wake up to this. The President of France has called about a war against Islamism. The head of Britain has called about identifying the ideology. So the Europeans are far ahead of us, why, because they have had more acts of war committed but we are not far behind and unfortunately, we Muslims and the Muslim Reform Movement, have been calling for this type of vetting for years but we have been marginalized by the mainstream media, the left and others who really just want to use our faith community with the bigotry of low expectations that somehow feminist issues, gay rights, all these things do not matter to Muslims. We will just use them to check the box that we protect minorities. When in fact, the majority countries of Muslims that the Muslims are trying to emigrate from actually do not protect those rights and they do not share our values.
CARTER: Don't you think though, I mean so many people are saying that this is unfair to Muslims, right? But is it not really clear that this is not about Muslims in general, this is about a very specific radical Islamic fact, -that differentiation is not being made on the left.
