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Worst Unemployment Since Great Depression; Trump Confirms Pence's Press Secretary Tests Positive; Analyzing Jogger Shooting Video; Georgia Lawmakers Renew Push For Hate Crime Bill After Ahmaud Arbery Shooting Death; Contact Tracing Crucial To Stopping The Spread; How Contract Tracing Can Help Fight Pandemic; Apple & Google Team Up On Contact Tracing. Aired on 8-9p ET

Aired May 08, 2020 - 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[20:00:13]

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: All right, Erin. That was a very poignant remembrance. Thank you for giving that sense of perspective about what we've watched this world go through, what we're going through now, are we showing the same desperation, the same derring-do to deal with the challenges we face? That's an open question.

I have a great weekend, my friend.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST, "ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT": You too.

CUOMO: I am Chris Cuomo and welcome to PRIME TIME. Coop is off, probably on daddy duty if I had to guess. You got me for two hours tonight.

Now, the virus is now inside the Trump inner circle. So they are doing all this testing, all this tracing. The president's upset. They are saying they have to be super careful because they don't want it to spread, and yet, the president at the same damn time is making a case against testing for the rest of us.

And he is saying we may not need a vaccine, either. It'll probably just disappear on its own. You mean like the flu?

He should be happy he has the luxury of detecting this around him. He should be upset that you do not. And he should be more open with you about his understanding the difference between you and him.

Did he put a group of elderly World War II veterans, the heroes of our greatest generation, at greater risk today?

And we're not letting up on the case of Ahmaud Arbery. And let's be honest. We waited too long to take this as seriously as we should. A black man, simply out on a jog, shot and killed. Today would have been his 26th birthday.

It took this day, 75 days after the crime, for investigators to say probable cause was clear to bring murder charges. Really? It was clear from the moment they saw the video, and they had that video day one. Don't believe these people telling you the video just came out. The cops had it, from jump. I'll show you what I believe could be the

most crucial part of that video, especially at trial, if there is one.

So let's get after it.

(MUSIC)

CUOMO: Tell you. No president wants their name attached to something like a depression, all right? They are very rare.

But, today, an unemployment rate of 14.7 percent, the worst jobs report in American history. More than 20 million lost their livelihoods last month, and, far worse, losses of life. Now, more than 77,000.

And there is no reason to believe it's going to go down anytime soon. And, yet, our president, instead of owning our reality, instead of treating desperate times with desperate measures, like we did during World War II, which we commemorate today, he keeps moving the goalpost, shirking responsibility, denying reality, even on the death toll.

Remember he said 60,000, that's all it'll be. Now, he says 100,000 or more. This is all dangerously close to him politically, but, more importantly, personally now.

A personal valet has the virus. Now, the press secretary to the VP, married to one of the president's closest aides, has the virus. Her name is Katie Miller. And we wish her well. I hope her symptoms are light. And that they move quickly.

She is the wife of White House senior advisor Stephen Miller. The entire family, I hope, nobody else gets touched. I hope it goes away quickly.

But we should deal with the reality. Two White House staffers, in 24 hours, with confirmed positive tests. OK? That's how it happens. It spreads.

Now, it's around him. What are they doing? They're testing everybody. What are they doing? They're tracing the people who had it to make sure they can limit the contagion.

Why aren't we doing that for the rest of us? The president is, still, downplaying the process.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOANLD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This is why the whole concept of tests aren't necessarily great. The tests are perfect but something could happen between the test, where it's good, and then something happens. And, all of a sudden, she was tested very recently and tested negative. And, then, today, I guess for some reason, she tested positive.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CUOMO: This should be very troubling to you. One, Katie Miller did nothing wrong by testing positive. OK?

Second, of course, the test is only as good as that day. It can't predict the future. How does the president not know this? What's going on with the people around him?

Tony Fauci, time for tit-a-tit. Couple cups of coffee or whatever he drinks, and explain to him, every day is a new day. You can be negative today. You can be positive a couple days later.

You know who was? I was. You know who else? A lot of people. Why? Because, not only can you be exposed and get the virus after you've been tested, which is kind of the duh part of this.

But this virus takes time to build in your system. And come to a level where it will be detectable, and where your body is starting to lose to it. But, no matter the science, forget the sophistication. What's the simple part?

Everything that I just told you is more reason to have more testing. They, obviously, matter. It's not a discount argument. You know, the thing's only good for today. It doesn't tell you what's going to happen tomorrow, so why even do it? Really?

I mean, if I said that, I might be taken off the air for a while. But, from the president of the United States, particularly one, thankfully, remaining healthy, in part because all of the testing done around him.

Let's bring in chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

Jim, I got to tell you. A little unsettling to hear the president kind of coming to a new conclusion that a test is only as good as the day it's taken on.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Very unsettling, Chris. Not -- not more unsettling, I think than having two staffers in two days test positive for the coronavirus. That really sent some shock waves through the White House.

I talked to a senior White House official just a short while ago who said they are, understandably, very concerned. They are very worried about whether or not somebody else might test positive.

I can tell you just some new information, Chris, in the last couple of minutes. This official tells me that they performed contact tracing inside the White House. That Katie Miller told officials, here, inside the White House, who were the people that she was in touch with. Those people were reached out to and tested for the coronavirus. Those tests came back negative, including for her husband Stephen Miller. That's the good news, at this point.

But, in the meantime, there -- there is a sense, Chris, and there's just no way to tiptoe around this, that the president, other members of his team, not all of them but many of them, don't take this seriously enough. You saw this down on the National Mall earlier today where the president was meeting with World War II veterans. The president was saying, well, you know, I don't necessarily have to be wearing a mask because I was staying far enough away from them.

These are elderly members of the greatest generation. It was sort of a monument to risky behavior, seeing the president down there on the National Mall doing this.

But, in the meantime, here at the White House, they say they are going to be doing more cleansing around the hallways of the West Wing. They're going to make sure that, you know, the staffers who go into the residence of the White House are wearing masks and that they do more testing and temperature checks.

But, no question about it, you have a president, you heard this earlier today, sort of downplaying the need for testing. When they were ramping up testing everywhere you look inside the White House because of this positive case involving Katie Miller.

CUOMO: And, look, let's be clear. They're doing the right thing. Temperature checks, I'm not a buyer. Too many get this and don't have fever as a symptom. I did.

Now, I saw a picture of Katie Miller not wearing a mask, and I think you were standing right next to her. Now, I know we try to keep ourselves outside of it but you know what? I need you.

And if you're out and around there, are you worried that she didn't have a mask on. And I'm not saying she meant it. She probably didn't know that she had the virus. I would guarantee, almost certainly, she didn't. But --

ACOSTA: Well, that was not me. But that was one of our producers. Nikki Carvajal (ph), you can see her on the far left of your screen right there, Chris.

I was not in the pool that day but she was, as well as one much our photographers. And as you can see, Katie Miller -- this was just yesterday. The vice president was dropping off PPE down in Alexandria, Virginia. And she was not wearing a mask and interacting with the news crews.

But, as you can see there, the members of the press are wearing masks. I was wearing one earlier today, even live on the air and in the briefing because, you know, listen. When they tell us that the vice president's press secretary tests positive for coronavirus, I'm going to wear a mask. There is no one around here right now so it's okay not to wear one I suppose for the time being.

But no question about it, Chris, this was -- this was very worrying and we have members of the press who were in the West Wing this afternoon. Scramble over to what we call lower press, which is the office of the press area of the White House where the more-junior press staffers are located. Instead of staffers being in their offices, White House physicians were in those offices giving everybody coronavirus tests, including me. I think I came -- I'm pretty sure I came back negative because they

didn't tell me that I tested positive but that's how things changed very quickly here earlier this afternoon.

CUOMO: Look, the reality is, this is a reflection of what we need everywhere. Testing is truth. It's the only way you know anything, especially, if you're anxious to get us reopen.

If you want us to be reopen, the only way that you'll give people confidence to go out and restart the economy, through demand, is if they have some indication that it'll be OK for them to do so. I'm glad that that wasn't you there. I'm glad Carvajal had mask on.

[20:10:01]

ACOSTA: Yes.

CUOMO: Now, the one quick thing. Are you hearing anything about Rick Bright? I know that he sat for an interview. But is there any word of him being reinstated? You know, interestingly, I had his lawyer on early this week. Here's why I ask you, Jimmy.

And the administration says this guy needs to show up for work, man. We gave him this great job at the NIH where he could make a big difference for people with coronavirus, if that's what he cares about.

His lawyer said, what job? He hasn't been told about any position. And they know where he is. He's been dealing with some physical effects and ailments, recently. What's the latest?

ACOSTA: Yes. I mean, the latest is -- is that his attorneys put out a statement, earlier this evening, saying that they've been informed by this federal selective office, called Office of Special Counsel, don't confuse that with Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

CUOMO: Yes.

ACOSTA: It's a different part of the government. And what they are preliminarily saying at this point is that there are grounds to believe that he was retaliated against in violation of whistle-blower protection, inside the federal government. That he was trying to warn the public of what was going on inside the administration. That there were things going on that shouldn't be happening when it comes to responding to the coronavirus. And that he was retaliated against.

Now, he was -- he was brought up during one of our photo opportunities with the president earlier today. President wrote him off as this disgruntled attorney. But he was on CBS earlier this evening saying he is not a disgruntled employee and, as a matter of fact, it is hurting the response to the coronavirus pandemic by him not having him in that position.

Here's more of what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DR. RICK BRIGHT, OUSTED BARDA HEAD: I am not disgruntled. I am frustrated at a lack of leadership. I am frustrated at a lack of urgency to get a head start on developing life-saving tools for Americans to move me over to a very small, focused project, of any scale, of any level importance, is not responsible. Doesn't make sense.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And what Dr. Bright, he raises a good question and, that is, why would you pull the top vaccine expert in the federal government out of the mix, in the middle of a pandemic? He says it's because he was being retaliated against for, essentially, questioning the president's embrace of hydroxychloroquine, which as we know has kind of gone by the wayside.

And so, this fight is not over yet, Chris, and I suspect this is just one of the early rounds in this battle.

CUOMO: Well, look. Rick Bright is not the first guy that we've seen have an unseemly exit from the Trump administration for going against the word of the leader on high.

Jim Acosta, I wish you good health and I hope the rest of the team is OK. That matters, most. And the only way we'll know is by people getting tested. Have a great weekend, brother, and thank you.

ACOSTA: Good to see you, Chris.

CUOMO: All right. So this president keeps coming up with every excuse not to wear a mask, himself. I wore one. You just didn't see me in it. I wore it backstage.

This is not a reality show. You are president of the United States. Today, he said it was windy. So it was blowing away from the high-risk group of veterans he was with. Somebody show him how to put on masks, please? It goes around both ears. It won't blow away.

What does this mean for others, when he doesn't wear a mask himself? Now that he could have been exposed?

One of our top doctors is here next. Imagine what you'd say about somebody else who did that, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:17:07]

CUOMO: West Wing is nervous. They should be. Two positive cases, in two days. You know why that happened? Because this virus is still spreading.

Now, our leaders are getting texted every tested every day. That's good. The people who test positive, unfortunately, are having tracing done. Very thorough. That's good.

The weird part is, the bad part, why don't they see the need for the same type of exercises for the rest of us?

Let's bring in Dr. William Schaffner joining me now.

Now, there is a little bit point of criticism that Trump and Pence, these people should self-quarantine. I say no because they're too important. We only have one of each of them. And if there is any excuse to keep them vital and in the loop of what their daily duties are, I think we've got to defer to that, for now. We only got one president, Doc. So I'll give a pass on that.

But, on the idea of not wearing masks, the president had an excuse. I wore one backstage, he said, as if this is all a reality show. Why does it matter whether or not the president is wearing a mask? Messaging aside, medicine only.

DR. WILLIAM SCHAFFNER, INFECTIOUS DISEASE SPECIALIST, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY: I'm going to say both things, Chris. Messaging is terribly important. This is a big weekend. Much of the country is opening up.

The pizza parlor owners, the folks who run nail salons, the barbers, the beauticians, as well as the grocery stores that have been open. No one should go into any of those establishments who's not wearing a mask. And the personnel in those establishments should be wearing a mask when they deal with their clients.

And the White House should be showing an example. This is very, very important. We need to protect our national leaders, absolutely. And that's why the staff inside the White House should, also, be wearing masks. You wear the masks to protect the people around you.

CUOMO: Now, one -- one point of pushback. One, you're right. The messaging matters, even in a medical capacity. You're right to make that point. Thank you, Doc.

In terms of masks, you guys have been all over the place with masks. Don't wear mask. A mask is meaningless. You got to touch your face too much. Forget it. It's more downside than upside.

Don't touch the mask. Leave them for the health care workers. Well, maybe a mask. Well, a mask won't hurt you. A mask is better than nothing.

And, now, everybody has to have a mask. It's confusing.

SCHAFFNER: Me, too. I was -- I learned as we went along. As soon as we learned that coronavirus could be transmitted by people who were perfectly healthy, then, the reason to wear masks, universally, suddenly, became apparent.

[20:20:01]

Because I don't know that I'm not infectious, right at this moment. If so, in order to protect you, if we were close together, I would have to wear that mask. That would help me protect you.

We're all in this together. We need to try to reduce the transmission of this virus. It's easily transmitted. This helps block the transmission.

CUOMO: I'll tell you what. The work that you're doing, what you mean to your institution, what you mean to us, in the media, because of how you're helping educate the public, I would rather get it again than hear that you have it. So, God forbid, you get the virus. We need you healthy. You mean too much to too many people.

Now, why is the irony being lost on the White House? That, exactly what they're doing right now, which they should be doing, upping the testing, making sure there is complete tracing, this is exactly what the president keeps saying isn't necessary in this country.

SCHAFFNER: Beats me. I listen, and I urge everyone to listen to the public-health leadership in this country. Dr. Tony Fauci, Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the CDC. Listen to them very carefully. They have the right track.

It's clear. Opening the country is a balancing act. All that misery that's out there, financial, social, cultural, we need to start bringing that back.

But if we do that too fast, too soon, too quickly, we'll get out of sync and there will be many, many more illnesses.

The only way we can manage this in the middle road is for all of us to be careful about what we do. Social distancing is with us, Chris, for the foreseeable future. The six-foot rule, hand hygiene, masks, people who are older, who have chronic, underlying illnesses. Take it easy. Don't go out right away.

Mass gatherings. Don't like those mass gatherings because the virus likes them too much. Loves to spread in mass gatherings. Take it easy.

CUOMO: All right. I hear you saying take it easy. And I see you, you know, say listen to Tony Fauci.

But anybody who wants to be played by Brad Pitt, I automatically discount in terms of their credibility. Fauci's out as far as I'm concerned. And it doesn't matter because the president says something else. Schaffner, you're a smart guy. Not as smart as me.

Fauci, eh, here's what he says about why we even need a vaccine or not.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I feel about vaccines like I feel about tests. This is going to go away without a vaccine. It's going to go away, and it's -- we're not going to see it again. You may have some flair ups next year, but, eventually, it's going to be gone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: What to worry about? It's just going to go away, he says. Like the flu goes away. Except, we need a vaccine, every year, for that. And there's absolutely no basis in science for anything he just said. So what is the message for people to hear after the most-powerful man

in the world just told them that?

SCHAFFNER: Please, the coronavirus is not going away. It's here. There are many people who are not infected. It's very contagious.

It loves going from person to person. We need to be careful, and we need to keep working hard on, both, therapies for when you get sick, as well as vaccines. In the meantime, what we can do, right now, to try to reduce the transmission of this virus, to -- to make sure it doesn't go from one person to other, or at least reduce the chance, is all that social distancing and wearing the mask. The mask is the new normal.

CUOMO: Dr. Schaffner, thank you so much. You make it interesting and informative, and I wish you a great weekend.

SCHAFFNER: Stay healthy.

CUOMO: Thank you. You, too, more importantly.

Now, I kind of love Schaffner, I got to be honest. I wish he'd been my doctor. Although, my godfather was my doctor growing up and he's a great guy too. He's my godfather.

So, listen, here's what I don't love. The reason that the president is telling you that you don't need a vaccine, it's going to go away. And testing's not all it's cracked up to be. There's a better way.

And that, you know, this is really just not going to be that big a deal. He wants to reopen, and he wants you to ignore the reality of the virus. That's why he's not into testing. That's why he says you don't really need a vaccine. That's why he flouts the mask.

But, remember, when it's his hiney on the line, everybody's getting tested every day, and they're tracing everybody. Now, that is a concern that a leader should have for whom they lead, not just themself.

[20:25:01]

If you want to know what he thinks about the coronavirus, hook at what they are look what they're doing in the White House right now. Look how he is treating himself and the people around him, who could get him sick. That's what you have to watch.

All right. Lot of new details coming up and something else we need to watch. And I blame myself for not putting your eyes on this sooner. Shame on me. The case of Ahmaud Arbery. The young, unarmed black man, shot dead more than two months ago.

No police action. His accused killer, arrested just yesterday. The two white men gave police an excuse for the killing, that's very suspicious, on the face of the video that the police have had, from day one.

What the police said today and what they should've been saying all along, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:30:22]

CUOMO: All right, more on coronavirus ahead. But we waited too long to get into a story that matters too much. And look, it's got to be about fairness under law. You got to have the facts come out. You're probably going to need a trial. But you can ignore it. And you can ignore a situation where there's been no police action for months. All right. This is an obscene case in Georgia. An unarmed black jogger shot and killed and I call him a jogger, because that is what he was, and is from every apparent indication from all the facts as we know them to this point.

Now today, the father and son who are facing murder choices made their first court appearance. Demonstrators took to the streets across the country. Many were running 2.23 miles in celebration of what would have been Ahmaud's 26th birthday, why 2.23 This happened on February 23rd. Now the arrests are the appropriate process for what we understand in this situation. Probable cause seems to be a very low bar, and they get over it easily on the video alone.

And remember, please stop spreading misinformation or at least stop believing it. If you're spreading it, I probably can't have any effect on you. The police had this video from day one. They wrote about it in their initial reports on this. It is not new to them. I want to show it to you again. OK.

Now before I even show it to the police say OK, this isn't me saying it. It's not the Arbery, the victim's family saying it, there were two confrontations between Arbery and these guys in the car with the shotgun and the pistol and the guy following them before what you're about to see. So a very important factor in, guy is jogging down the street twice, he is confronted by these guys. Now you're going to pick up at how he is acting. And what happens. OK? Let's watch.

(voice-over): You see him jogging. Get the bottom third off. You see him jogging. Now they're trying to get him again. Camera works not great, but we only have one we have. Now, he runs around the truck that has already come to him twice. There's a man with a long gun. They start a fight, the brother -- the father and the son say he attacked them.

Now, let's look at what we know from this. OK. What did you see in Ahmaud in the first scene what was he doing? He was running at a steady gait down the middle of the street. OK, you're going to see it here. This guy's pulling up, this guy is going to become of interest by the way. Why did you take this video? What was your role in this? See? You see him? There's Ahmaud.

Now let me ask you something, OK? Just think, just common sense, OK? You don't have to have 20 years of investigating these cases like me, you don't have to have a legal background, just common sense. You are fleeing the scene of a crime. Men have approached you, two white men, you are black, OK. They have weapons. They've approached you twice. And then you are still jogging down the middle of the street? Is that what somebody does when they're fleeing the scene of a crime? Jog down the middle of the street? No, it is not what you do. It is what you do when you were intent on jogging, and probably having some kind of emotional state of shock from the fact that these white guys keep coming up to you. But he kept jogging because that's what he was doing.

Reasonableness dictates if he was on the run, what do you do if a guy pulls up in a car and starts asking you about what you're trying to escape from? Keep jogging in a straight line down the middle of the street. No, you break left, right. You try to get away, you'd be evasive. That's what people do, especially when they have reason to do it. Not here.

Remember, police had this video. Police know from the investigating of talking to the guys that they finally arrested 77 days later that they came at the guy twice before this. He never ran away. He never dodged for some backyard. He never tried to escape. Not until the guy came out with a long gun in his face. And the father and son say he attacked us. What do you do when guys that intent on talking to you jump out of a truck with a long gun in your face, let alone injecting the race into this?

[20:35:08]

Martin Savidge has been on this story. His reporting took us deep into how this video came out and really exposed something more than that can't be underestimated, which is the police had the video, there's all of this talk online in defense of the process here that well, it's new information to all of us, not to them. You were at the demonstrations today. Tell us about the state of play Martin and again, thank you for giving us the information that gave us such insight.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. The demonstrations today with the largest that we have seen when it comes to support of Ahmaud Arbery and his family. There were hundreds of people that gathered in front of the Glenn County Courthouse. This demonstration had been planned even before the arrest had taken place. It went forward even after the arrest had been made. And the crowd was still frustrated. As one of the speakers said, this is not a celebration. This is just step one, on what has been a very long road of trying to even start the process of justice.

Many people are very upset with the previous DAs. They're asking that they be resigned, fired or ejected from office. And they believe that what has happened here has been exemplified by the GBI, the state level of investigation, which comes up in less than two days with the decision that yes, you must make arrests. Whereas the local investigators, that's the Glenn County Police Department for over two months, couldn't decide whether they should do anything. So there's still a great deal of anger and frustration.

CUOMO: Wow. That's what happens when an innocent man is shot dead on the street. And nothing happens for two months. I know you understand that, Martin, you've been all over this country, bringing truth to light in situations like this. The GBI or the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, so the local authorities somewhat taken out of the mix here replaced by state investigative authorities. They said today that the video is a very important piece of evidence. We don't need them for that. What else did they say?

SAVIDGE: Well, they pointed out that the investigation had been done almost completely by local authorities. They only interviewed a few more people in the neighborhood. What they really did was they went through all the documents, they went through all the evidence, they went through all the material that local law enforcement had, including the video, which by the way, the head of the GBI, who I asked directly, I said, when did local authorities have it? He said the day of the incident, they had that video.

And so what's so amazing that you learn is that the local law enforcement came up with a completely different take on that evidence than what the GBI officers by the end of their first day knew that they had to go to a judge and get an arrest warrant for the father and son.

CUOMO: Now, another key aspect of this is going to be the basis of the defendant's attention here, which they say a series of burglaries with for which this man fit the description. What can you tell us about burglaries in the area, knowledge of the same and a description of his potential assailant?

SAVIDGE: Well, Gregory McMichael, who is of course a former law enforcement. The first thing he begins telling to the officers when they arrive on scene after this horrific shooting, is that he implies they were in hot pursuit of a suspect because there had been a series of break ins in the neighborhood. And this is a perception that even some callers to 911 headset. So we went and started looking into the police records to find the reports about all those break ins. You don't find them.

There is one reported theft. It occurred on New Year's Day, and it actually was a gun that was taken out of an unlocked pickup truck and that pickup truck by the way, belong to the McMichaels. So, when you hear this depiction that there was this sense that this was a neighborhood victimized by crime, time and time again, it simply isn't verified by police records or reports.

CUOMO: And are very had no weapon on him, right?

SAVIDGE: No, I did not know. No.

CUOMO: Martin. Thank you very much.

Now, one other question any idea yet of -- I know the charges. Georgia is one of four states without hate crime laws, and that anything like that is taken into consideration only in sentencing. They were struck down in 2004 there I think by the Supreme Court, as being unconstitutionally vague. There have been efforts to pass them since hasn't happened. What does that mean in terms of how this case is being viewed by the state?

[20:40:03]

SAVIDGE: Well, I mean, many people, I think, outside of the state of Georgia when they might have heard the GBI being questioned about this whole hate crime thing and the director of the GBI said we don't have a hate crime in the state of Georgia. Well, if you're of the other states that do you were probably flabbergasted. It's Georgia, it's Arkansas, it's South Carolina, and one other state that does not at Wyoming.

So, you've already recounted the history here that many have asked, why is it that the Georgia legislature just can't seem to pass it again. There's been some speculation that because Georgia is a conservative state, that there are some who just simply do not want to give protections to the LGBTQ community. I don't know how truthful that really brings up because one of the last attempts to try to get a hate crime back on the books in Georgia was actually started by a Republican.

So it's clear, we don't have such a law. And what it would have done or would do in this case, is tag on extra years to the sentence once a conviction was derived.

CUOMO: Martin, I appreciate very much and again, thank you for opening the aperture of our understanding on this. This is one of those stories that has been to be completely infected by false narratives to justify all kinds of agendas. So thank you for making the record so clear so much, so early. Thank you very much.

SAVIDGE: My pleasure, thanks.

CUOMO: Now, as Martin told you today would have been Ahmaud Arbery's 26th birthday. I want to have you hear from his father and his father's attorney ahead about what this means to them that it took this course and what his son meant to him. Because that's why you have to care about these cases.

But also coming up, I have Silicon Valley giants like Google and Apple, right, I want to talk to you about this. They're stepping up to help take on the massive job of contact tracing, identifying those who may have been exposed to COVID. This country can't rely on one type of technology alone, but we do need tracing to reopen safely and a lot of you aren't going to like it, because it's going to have privacy concerns, but I want to bring in an expert who specializes in controlling outbreaks with a vast array of solutions about what you can do, next.

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[20:46:16]

CUOMO: All right, contact tracing, very important you're seeing it play out in the White House right now, when somebody tests positive, you have to know who else they might have infected, or who may have infected them, it's key to how you get through any pandemic, OK? It's key to allowing us to open up safely so that you can have the confidence that you can go out and buy and shop and eat and work and live and enjoy with a peace of mind.

So we need more testing. But we also need this companion part that you hear very little about. And really, that's because it's even harder than testing. And it's more expensive than testing. It takes a lot of manpower and time. So with more than a million cases, OK, in the United States already, it's going to be a tall order, but there is a cause for hope. We already know how to do this. We already contact trace for other diseases like HIV and Ebola.

Joining us now is an expert on tracing. David Harvey, Executive Director of the National Coalition of STD Directors. Thank you very much for joining me.

DAVID HARVEY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL COALITION OF STD DIRECTORS: Thank you, Chris. It's great to be with you.

CUOMO: First, do you accept the premise testing? Yes. But tracing just as much, but not discussed as much, because a lot of manpower, a lot of money, which is scary to people who are not in the business of wanting too much attention to tracing in the first place.

HARVEY: So yes, we've had a lot of discussions about testing. And so far, I think the coverage of kind of contact tracing has been very clinical, you know, and I hope what we can do tonight is to kind of humanize this a bit. This is something that we have done a lot of in the United States and we have a long track record of doing with other infectious diseases and we now need to know what we already know how to put to work for COVID.

CUOMO: The question becomes or what has been pointed resistance as the feds not going to do this. It's up to the states and every state says the same thing. We don't have the manpower and we don't have the money to get the manpower to do the tracing. What are we missing?

HARVEY: Well, we're missing federal money for one. But, you know, absent that happening in the next stimulus bill, we already know that states are moving forward on their own. Today, a coverage was issued by National Public Radio that shows that states are moving forward to hire 66,000 entry level contact tracers. And that is not enough by the way to do the job. So Congress needs to allocate about $8 billion, which is what the national public health community is asking for, to CDC to be allocated to states and local communities for this function.

And we think that figures should support about 100,000 contact tracers supervised by a more advanced contact tracer called disease intervention specialists, which are funded and supported out of the STD program at CDC.

CUOMO: All right, so David now help me understand is one of the uninitiated. All I hear huge numbers and a lot of money. I don't even know what happens. So take me through how this works in a community that wants to reopen, OK? They're telling you they're going to reopen businesses, they're going to do things. How does testing and tracing work together to make me feel I can go out there and enjoy myself with relative safety. HARVEY: So I think the first thing that I want people to know is that these are do-gooders. These are people who come from the community, who have a lot of love for their community and want to help and support people. So if you got a positive test for COVID, or if you think you've been exposed, or you may have been informed you're a presumptive positive, you may get a call from a health worker who works for the health department. This is a function that's vested with health departments.

[20:50:06]

New York City, the New York City Health Department is one of the leaders in the world in doing this work. And so when that call gets made people are experts at understanding how to reach people. I liken it to almost social work, people who are trained in crisis counseling. And so the purpose of this is to inform people, help them understand what's going on with their health, had a navigate the health care system, what needs to be done, to isolate if necessary, and to identify people that they've had sustained contact with.

And the reason this is important to do within a health department, is that there's laws, there's regs, there's very specific rules about confidentiality. And then of course, we need to count what's going on around the country. So health departments have this very well organized.

I also want to comment on the fact that cultural competence cultural humility, humility, rather is a very important function of what this workforce does. We know COVID disproportionately impacts African- Americans and Latinos. Contact tracers need to come from those communities. Our existing disease intervention specialist workforce comes from those communities. They know how to work with their local communities.

CUOMO: Tech versus face to face.

HARVEY: Tech versus face to face. So there has been an awful lot of talk about this. And I've been asked a lot about this Google and Apple and there's a lot of other companies by the way that have technology platforms that support the work of contact tracers and DIS smaller companies that you never hear anything about, checks out, mitre. So technology is a component of this work, but it's not the whole thing. Nothing is going to replace, building a trusting relationship with communities that often don't trust government systems, like the health department, and that has to be done in a phone to phone contact, or ideally, person to person contact.

Now, with social distancing, the way this is working right now is largely over the phone and through other social media platforms. But one day, we will go back to face to face contact with appropriate personal protective equipment and do this work. But for the moment, it's done over the phone largely.

CUOMO: What does it mean in terms of the efficacy of tracing that one of the aspects of this particular COVID is that they are spreading but they don't know it? Because they're asymptomatic? HARVEY: Right? So it's, you know, this is the facts and the science of COVID that people need to be tutored and educated about, and that's one thing that contact tracers do. So asymptomatic infection is the biggest challenge we're facing as a country, right? And so having this workforce who understands the science of what's going on here, and can help educate and support people and counsel people is what we desperately need. That is not a cheap proposition. As I said, you know, Congress needs to get off the dime and allocate this money to the CDC. And we need the CDC to step up. There are some excellent resources that CDC has already issued in this area, but we don't yet have a unified national strategy to guide states and local communities. We're hopeful that CDC is going to issue that very soon.

CUOMO: Well, they may issue it within the CDC. The question is, will it become part of public policy, we saw what just happened with the reopening guidelines. His White House is very determined to keep people believing that this is going away even though there's almost no data to suggest it, that's why I wanted you on David. I wanted people to understand the reality of what actually makes a difference. And the truth is what is going to get us through this. Not any suggestion --

HARVEY: Absolutely.

CUOMO: -- love, hopes and dreams. David Harvey, thank you for making it more understandable, even to a pumpkin head like me. Appreciate it. Have a great week.

HARVEY: Thank you, Chris. It's great to see you looking well.

CUOMO: Thank you very much. I appreciate the good word. God bless. Stay healthy.

HARVEY: Thank you very much.

CUOMO: All right. Actor Sean Penn, he is working in a way that I have seen nobody else in the society doing on an independent level. Of course, he's got a huge organization. He's working, he's raising money. He's doing all kinds of things. I keep talking about testing. he heard it long before and took it into his own hands and is building an organization to help stop the spread.

[20:55:01]

This is no dilettante thing. He is not the face of a situation. He's not raising awareness. He is doing the work. He and his group are creating tests, that people can come up with protocols that are quick, that are easy, and he's helping our first responders. You got to hear from him directly and you will later on.

First, Dr. Sanjay Gupta on the President's risk with yet another infection confirmed among the key White House play. Next.

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