Transcript of Harris and Trump campaign in competing events in this key battleground state

Look, on the left, Vice President Harris, expected to speak any moment now in all-important Oakland County, Michigan, which encompasses much of Detroit's northern suburbs. On the right, the former President in Detroit. He was in Oakland County as well earlier today, the second of two Michigan appearances for him and the third for her. In Grand Rapids this afternoon, MBC's Peter Alexander put her on the spot with the question she's been criticized lately for not fully answering. Here's how it went this time. President Biden said this week that every President has to cut their own path What is one policy that you would have done differently over these last three and a half years than President Biden?

I mean, to be very candid with you, even including Mike Pence, vice presidents are not critical of their presidents. I think that really, actually, in terms of the tradition of it and also just going forward, it does not make for a productive and important relationship.

She went on to lay out how she would differ on policy if elected, pointing to her plans for Medicare, affordable housing, and small businesses. Earlier, Here today, she sees on reporting in Politico that her opponent turned down a recent interview with the Shaderoom because, reportedly, of exhaustion. Reading now from the Politico piece, A Trump advisor told Shaderoom producers that Trump was exhausted and refusing some interviews, but that could change, at any time, according to two people familiar with the conversations. When asked about it by Politico, the Trump campaign called the story, quote, unequivocally false. As for the vice President, who has talked to the shade room, here's what she said today in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

I've been hearing reports that his team, at least, is saying he's suffering from exhaustion, and that's apparently the excuse for why he's not doing interviews. And of course, he's not doing the CNN town hall. He refuses to do another debate. And look, being President of the United States is probably one of the hardest jobs in the world. And so we really do need to ask if he's exhausted being on the campaign trail, is he fit to do the job?

Well, late today, he had a reply.

What event did I cancel? I haven't canceled. She doesn't go to any event. She's a loser. She doesn't go to any event. She didn't even show up for the Catholic last night at the hotel. It was insulting. All they are are sound bites. I've gone 48 days now without arrest, and I've got that loser who doesn't have the energy of a rabbit. Tell me when you've seen me take even a little bit of arrest. Not only am I... I'm not even tired. I'm really exhilarated. You know why? We're killing her in the polls.

Well, more on the former President shortly, specifically his remarks today about the Civil War and how he thinks Abraham Lincoln should have cut some a deal with the slave owning states of the Confederacy. First, CNN's Priscilla Alvarez at the Harris event in the Detroit suburbs. What else has Harris said about former President Trump today?

Well, Anderson, we're expecting the vice president only minutes from now, but certainly she has been trying to elevate and highlight his anti-labor comments, going so far as to show clips of some of those comments, something that we are recently seeing the vice president do to put him in his own words. Now, the vice president certainly ramping up her attacks of former President Donald Trump in three key counties, the counties that she has visited today, one of which voted for Donald Trump in 2016, then voted for Joe Biden in 2020. Those other two counties, counties where Biden was able to widen his margins. And so certainly the campaign is trying to emulate that and build on it. So the vice president is going to target her messaging, not only trying to criticize the former President, but also trying to showcase her own agenda and trying to make inroads, especially in the suburbs, with those white college-educated voters, somewhere where the campaign officials I've talked to say they see an opportunity to lock in her coalition, but also build on it. Now, I'll also tell you, Anderson, that the campaign is capitalizing on early voting. Tomorrow, the vice President will be attending a get out the vote event with Lizzo, bringing in that star power to, again, get people to vote and vote early.

Later in the day in Atlanta, she'll be later in the day, she'll head to Atlanta and do a rally with usher with a similar goal in mind. Now in the final stretch of this election, the campaign, clearly trying to finetune their messaging attacks on the former President, painting him as unfit and what we've heard the vice President say before, Unhinged and unstable, and then also make sure that they can lock down their coalition and especially They're going to capitalize on the early voting in those states where they can, Anderson.

What about next week? What's on her schedule other than the CNN town hall?

Well, a source tells me that the vice President is expected to do a joint event with a former Republican congresswoman, Liz Cheney. Of course, this is part of this continued push to try to reach GOP voters. Now, this is going to be potentially a town hall or a moderated conversation. Again, this is part of a push by the Harris campaign to peel off voters for former President Donald Trump. In addition to that, sources tell me she will be visiting these battleground states and doing multiple stops a day. Certainly an aggressive travel schedule ahead as she tries to lock in this coalition come election day. All right.

Thanks very much. We're going to listen to the vice president shortly. First in Detroit, former President's microphone does not seem to be working right now. These are live pictures. He seems just be wondering around the stage waiting for them to to fix the problem. Okay, we'll check in with him a little bit later. Joining us now is CNN Political Commentator Scott Jennings and Jamal Simmons, also Politico's Meredith McGraw and CNN Senior Data Reporter Harry Enton. Harry, what are polling?

Harry is fine, too.

Whatever you want, you can feel free to wander around the stage. There we go. What does the current polling in Michigan look like?

That would be quite a scene, wouldn't it? Be right on your show, me wandering around. Look, in Michigan, it can't get any tighter than it is right now, man. I mean, a month ago, Kamala Harris was up by points. You look at the average of polls today, she's up by less than a point. If that holds until the final day of this election cycle, it will be the closest polled race in Michigan in history. I went back in my spreadsheets. You know I love doing that. Since 1972, there has been a closer polled race than what we have going on right now in the Wolverine state. Now, in terms of- You actually sleep in a bed of spreadsheets. It's actually true. I actually do. I have a bed of spreadsheets. I actually fell asleep in my suit on Wednesday night, but that's a whole other thing. Anyway, look, Michigan is so important to both of these folks, mapped to 270 electoral votes. The chance that Kamala Harris wins if she wins Michigan is north of 80%. The chance that Donald Trump wins the election if he wins in Michigan is north of 90%. The bottom line is Donald Trump knows that if he can go into Michigan, win a State he won in 2016, that Joe Biden won in 2020, Kamala Harris's path to 270 electoral votes is awfully, awfully difficult.

Jamal, you heard vice President Harris once again declining to say what would have done differently from President Biden. This is the third publicly time that she's been asked that question. Is her answer the right one at this point?

I think it is the right one because the attack on Kamala Harris right now is about comparing past statements to current statements. What does she believe? If she changes something about what happened with the current President, I imagine the Republicans will then attack her about that. The idea here, I believe, is that this is about loyalty, and it's better for her to be loyal, even if they think it might cost her a little something in the beginning, it doesn't open up another line of attack. Here's what she's doing that's very good, though, in Michigan. She's going after Donald Trump. She's on the front foot. She's going after him for being exhausted. She's going after him for not showing up. She's traveling around the state. When you're a kid in Michigan, you learn geography very easily. She started out over here in Grand Rapids. She went here to Lansing, and now she's here in Detroit. She's been moving across the state. That shows a level of activity out of the campaign. Some of us were about a couple of weeks ago. The campaign just wasn't doing enough events every day. She's now doing two or three events a day, and that, I think, is also going to compel the attention to the campaign that she needs.

Meredith, it's interesting. On Jamal's point, previously, she just wouldn't answer what made her different from Joe Biden initially, and it seemed like that meant there was no difference. Now she's saying, Well, this is a loyalty thing. I'm just not going to speak about it.

It is a fine in line that she has to walk, and you saw it play out just in that clip with NBC, where she is trying to say, I'm respectful of the man that I'm serving with, but at the same time, I am the change candidate. Who is the change candidate in this election? How voters perceive who it is, whether it's Harris or Trump, is really the whole ball game. She is trying to convince voters that, Yeah, I'm the vice president, and yet I do have all of these policy differences with Biden. The question is whether voters are going to buy that.

Let's just see But I just want to see if the person Trump is speaking. Okay. He's still on stage. I'm wondering. We'll come back.

Just very quickly. In the Harris campaign analysis, this is about a change from Donald Trump, not Joe Biden. They've got to keep the attention on Trump if they think that she has a chance to win.

Scott, we mentioned the reporting that a Trump advisor told The Shaderoom that Trump was, quote, exhausted and backed out of an interview which Harris already seized on. The Trump campaign is denying it. I mean, is that a mistake for him to skip out on multiple interviews? Was just a little more than two weeks to go? Or, I mean, it's a site that's on Instagram. It targets an African-American audience. What do you make of that?

Yeah, I don't really buy it. I mean, Trump's done more media interviews and he's done more events than Harris, number one. Number two, Kamala Harris herself didn't show up for the Chicago Economic Club. She bailed out on time. I mean, look, I think what the campaigns are doing is they're picking and choosing what makes the most sense for them to spend their time at the end of the campaign. It's not uncommon to schedule some things, take other things off the schedule. Trump looks pretty vigorous to me. He went to the Al Smith dinner last night and did 30 minutes of standup. Kamala Harris sent in another cringy video. I think Trump is in fine shape, and he's doing plenty of events and media opportunities right now, far more than Harris has done. I don't really think he needs to lard up the schedule if his campaign doesn't think it's critical to winning.