Just after the 9:00 p.m. Eastern hour on Election Night, Donald Trump remained ahead in Florida and it triggered CBS This Morning co-host and Obama family friend Gayle King into two brief freak-outs at the closeness of the election between Trump and Hillary Clinton.
CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley relayed the vote totals as they stood at 9:02 p.m. Eastern and then King immediately launched into one diatribe demanding that “we talk, Scott, for a second about why he's doing so well with working educated women in Florida.”
“When you look at all the things Trump had said with his issues with women, the Access Hollywood tape, the comments he made about Alisha Machado, the accusation of sexual assault starting with Megyn Kelly in that very first debate, how do we explain this is possible,” King bemoaned.
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Fortunately for voters, Face the Nation host John Dickerson calmly laid out why it wasn’t a blowout for Clinton in the Sunshine State in addition to the fact that “Republicans who like him are willing to forgive him those things”:
We talked to voters in the Trump camp and they say they were the ones who said this is locker room talk and that's part of it why they forgive him. Why do they forgive him? Because they don't like Hillary Clinton and they think is country needs to be turned around and they think he can do it.
“Another thing about Florida just that’s just true of all these other states that are battleground states, this is a debate here in the country right now between the cities and rural areas, and when Donald Trump is doing well in Florida is he's doing well in 40 or so counties...and Hillary Clinton is doing well in the cities, but that's the comeback,” he added.
Just over ten minutes later, King again interjected and wondered to Dickerson if “temperament doesn’t matter” because Hillary so harshly chided Trump in one of the presidential candidate for being unfit for the presidency but the race remains close:
Are we to believe, though, John, temperament doesn't matter? I remember vividly the debate, Norah, that we covered that Hillary Clinton said in the middle of the debate, he is not fit to be president and I’ve never heard an opponent take on another opponent that way. You may disagree with his issues. You may disagree with some of his policies, but I’ve never heard someone say, you are not fit for this job.
The relevant portion of the transcript from CBS News’s Campaign 2016: Election Night coverage on November 8 can be found below.
CBS News’s Campaign 2016: Election Night
November 8, 2016
9:02 p.m. EasternSCOTT PELLEY: But the big headline of the hour is Florida. Almost all votes, 91 percent of the votes have been counted in Florida, more than 8 million votes have been counted and, at this moment, Donald Trump is ahead of Hillary Clinton. They are separated by only 140,000 votes. Still much too close to call.
GAYLE KING: Can we talk, Scott, for a second about why he's doing so well with working educated women in Florida? When you look at all the things Trump had said with his issues with women, the Access Hollywood tape, the comments he made about Alisha Machado, the accusation of sexual assault starting with Megyn Kelly in that very first debate, how do we explain this is possible?
JOHN DICKERSON: Well, the Republicans who like him are willing to forgive him those things. We talked to voters in the Trump camp and they say they were the ones who said this is locker room talk and that's part of it why they forgive him. Why do they forgive him? Because They don't like Hillary Clinton and they think is country needs to be turned around and they think he can do it. Another thing about Florida just that’s just true of all these other states that are battleground states, this is a debate here in the country right now between the cities and rural areas, and when Donald Trump is doing well in Florida is he's doing well in 40 or so counties, 40 or more counties, all over the rural areas, doing a little bit better than Mitt Romney did and Hillary Clinton is doing well in the cities, but that's the comeback. So in these states you will see a sea of red, all the counties small population that Donald Trump is doing well in and then deep blue cities and you’re seeing that right now in Florida, we’ll see it in all the battleground states.
CHARLIE ROSE: And a point you made earlier. It's an older population, too.
DICKERSON: Yes, and that's the difference between college educated women in Florida versus college educated women. If we want to look for another echo, perhaps we might look in Iowa where the population is older. We’ll have to see what happens.
(....)
9:14 p.m. Eastern
KING: Are we to believe, though, John, temperament doesn't matter? I remember vividly the debate, Norah, that we covered that Hillary Clinton said in the middle of the debate, he is not fit to be president and I’ve never heard an opponent take on another opponent that way. You may disagree with his issues. You may disagree with some of his policies, but I’ve never heard someone say, you are not fit for this job.
