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Trump: "Vaccine Or No Vaccine, We Are Back"; JCPenney Files for Bankruptcy After 118 Years; Newly-Released Videos Bring More Questions In Arbery Case; Wisconsin Crowds Cram Bars With Stay Home Orders Lifted; Trump Admin Pushes Wuhan Lab Theory In China Blame Game; Kenneth Cole Launches Initiative To Fight Mental Health Stigma. Aired on 8-9p ET

Aired May 15, 2020 - 20:00   ET

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

[20:00:21]

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Hey, I'm Chris Cuomo. Anderson Cooper, the man I call Coop, he's home doing daddy duty.

So, welcome to PRIME TIME.

We're back, says the president. Even without a vaccine, while still touting the effort to get one at warp speed.

Now, tonight we're going to talk about what this is all about, this warp speed vaccine pitch and take us back to the reality of where we really are. It has never been about reopen or not reopen. That's a false choice.

The only choice is reopen, it's how. Can you do it smart? Through science? Testing?

No? Without tracing measures? Without a real plan? Is that reopening or is that reinviting disaster?

We don't even know what's right, right now. Except to wear masks and keep our distance. And, of course, how many of us are ignoring that?

Also tonight, we just acquired a load of new video in the Arbery murder case. Key context to advance our understanding of the mind frame of the suspects. No, I don't care where our Arbery was. I don't care how many times he was there whether it was someone else.

It was irrelevant. This isn't about Arbery. It's about understanding why these men felt they needed to do what they did.

The mother of Ahmaud is here to share her thoughts.

So what do you say? It's Friday night, but let's get after it.

(MUSIC)

CUOMO: So, did you hear what came from the CDC. Ominous projection tonight, at least 100,000 deaths in America by the end of this month. We're at more than 87,000 deaths now, and the president is cheering this number like -- yes, we're doing great.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I just want to make something clear. It's very important. Vaccine or no vaccine, we're back.

Other things have never had a vaccine and they go away. So I don't want people to think that this is all dependent on vaccine.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Like the cacophonous horns of truth behind him, don't listen, he refuses to tell you the truth.

This will not disappear. Do we have to have a vaccine? I don't know. Let's listen to the scientists about that.

Are we open anyway without one? Yeah. Is that something to brag about? No. We had to reopen without it, but it was never about a vaccine.

Look, this whole thing today was a play, bringing out the secretary of defense. We'll have one by January. Great. It would be great.

What does the media do? January, January. Can they do it? Let's get experts lined up to say no, no.

You're getting played. You're all getting played. Don't you see? I know you do at home. But you start listening to the media because we won't shut up.

Who cares about a vaccine right now? We're reopening right now without a plan, without the right testing and tracing, people none of the wanting to wear masks because they can't get clear guidelines. We don't know where to go.

We don't know how to do things. The federal government is quiet on too much. The states, the states.

States need help. Vaccine, end of the year. End of the year? We're talking about summer, right? That's the state of play, summertime.

What are we going to do? How do we do this the right way? Crickets. You haven't heard Trump saying anything about that.

School's not open, we're not reopen. If we don't have a vaccine, we still open. Great, we all want to do that. That's the easiest decision to make. How about making some hard decisions?

Let's talk about the reality with chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

I mean, Jim, you know, I know you're aware where my head is on this. I think we were getting played today with this vaccine talk. It was such a beautiful distraction from the reality of all these states opening beaches and people running like crazy with no real direction. JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: To some extent,

Chris, you're right. Absolutely no question about it. The president wants people to see an optimistic view of all of this when we're heading towards 100,000 deaths by June 1st according to the CDC.

But let me fill you in on something I heard from the administration. It's important we lay this out. This official said there is a way to get to hundreds of millions of doses by the end of the year, and it's by engaging what they call at risk vaccine development, which means by late this summer, July or August, they're going to begin to churn out millions of doses of a vaccine that may not be completely proven to be effective against the coronavirus.

[20:05:06]

It is a financial risk for the federal government, not a human risk according to this official, but they hope if by December or January, by the time that time rolls around that they have a vaccine that works, they've already ramped up that production to get to that hundreds of millions of doses level.

The risk is for the federal government, Chris, is whether this vaccine doesn't work.

CUOMO: Right.

ACOSTA: If the vaccine doesn't work, then they have to throw all those away to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. But that is the kind of at-risk production that's going to be engaged in according to the senior administration official I just spoke with.

Setting all of that aside, Chris, absolutely the president was trying to have it both ways today. He was trying to tout this Operation Warp Speed project that's been launched by the federal government while at the same time saying he's reopening this country, he's pushing to reopen whether there's a vaccine or not.

CUOMO: First of all, your reporting is excellent. I've been hearing the same types of things for weeks. So to get it from a senior official is really gold in terms of the journalism of it. Thank you for that.

Yeah, it's a risk of money. They say they'll follow the testing phases, so it's not about risking health but if they're wrong about the vaccine, we're out of pocket for that much. But the risk-reward right now is looking good to the White House.

But this other point, Warp Speed, as we both know, only exists like in "Star Trek," okay? It's not a real standard thing to begin with. But what is the real standard is the speed of deception.

So if we say they can't really get this vaccine, the science is questionable, now we're the negative Nancys. Oh, look at that Acosta, always trying to kill our optimism.

ACOSTA: That's right. CUOMO: Look at the Democrats, always trying to find a reason for people to stay at home, Jim, when we're all so desperate to reopen.

See, the president has beautifully defined a false choice. Reopen or not, Jim? That's where my head is. That's never the question. It's always been how.

And how little of you heard from this White House about their plan to motivate how to reopen safely for states?

ACOSTA: I mean, we've got no plan, we have no details on that. You're absolutely right.

People want to go to the beach. They want to enjoy Memorial Day weekend. We just don't live in that world anymore.

And so, one thing we should point out what the president has been saying over the last couple of days is he is hell-bent on reopening no matter what. Yesterday, he was saying that testing may be overrated. Today, he was saying, well, a vaccine is not necessary in terms of reopening the country.

He's laying out these benchmarks that essentially, whatever the hell happens, he wants to reopen this country. He was talking about reopening schools in the fall and keeping teachers above the age of 60 or 70 from going back to schools or universities.

Well, how does that work? I remember teachers back in my day who were that age, or at least they seemed that way at the time. You know, the president is not dealing with the reality of the situation. We've seen that since the beginning of all of this.

But apart from the president, away from the president, there are scientists on the case. If this Operation Warp Speed can get us to a vaccine by the end of the year, it doesn't matter what the president says at that point. This society, this country, the rest of the world will be in a better place.

CUOMO: And, look, everybody wants to reopen, so why wouldn't you play the politics that way if you can?

Now, again, credit to the president, Democrats dummied up on this. They allowed themselves to be the party of "no," and they're not framing questions the right way and they may pay a political price for it.

But you're right about teachers. We had the Catholic school experience. Sixty-five-year-old nun had faster hands than Bruce Lee, throwing eraser better than Andy Pettitte.

Jim Acosta, have a great weekend.

ACOSTA: Watch out for that ruler, exactly.

CUOMO: Believe me, I know all too well. Have a great weekend, my brother. ACOSTA: All right. Thank you.

CUOMO: All right. So, where does the country stand on reopening? Well, come on, man. How many people do you know who don't want to reopen, right? It's about can I do it safely, right?

I don't want to this to be worse. I don't want rebound effect. But who doesn't want to reopen? It's a false choice.

So let's take a look at what reopening is taking shape as around this country. Our thanks to Nick Watt for this nationwide snapshot.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Across Louisiana, dinner and a movie is now an option once more. But your server might be masked.

COLLIN ARNOLD, DIRECTOR, NEW ORLEANS OFFICE OF HOMELAND SECURITY DEPARTMENT OF EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS: We really have, you know, kind of crushed the curve and because it's due to our residents, really. They stayed at home.

WATT: Forty-eight states now have an opening plan under way today. Half of New York state begins its long road back.

BENJAMIN WHITMORE, BARBERSHOP OWNER: All I can do is get back to work and hope that they'll come.

WATT: Beaches in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut will, we're told, be open in time for Memorial Day, but New York's pause order extended another two weeks for millions in the state, including everyone in New York City unless numbers improve.

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY), NEW YORK CITY: We need a massive city- wide apparatus, testing, tracing.

[20:10:03]

WATT: Meanwhile, in Michigan, resistance to regulations goes on. The blue governor says there are red protesters.

GOV. GRETCHEN WHITMER (D-MI): These are not just citizens who are unhappy about having to stay home. This is a political rally, essentially.

WATT: That might actually delay reopening.

WHITMER: It's the congregating of big groups of people who aren't wearing masks, who aren't staying six feet apart, that will perpetuate the community spread.

WATT: And April's retail numbers are out, a historic low. Retail sales down 16.4 percent. Clothing sales down nearly 90 percent.

PETER NAVARRO, DIRECTOR, WHITE HOUSE OFFICE OF TRADE AND MANUFACTURING POLICY: Most of the 50 states are going back to work in some form. So, I like to look forward.

WATT: Ford will start making cars again Monday, and restaurants will reopen in hard-hit Miami as the county looks to hire up to 1,000 contact tracers.

Texas just set a record, most reported COVID deaths in 24 hours. Gyms and offices still scheduled to reopen Monday.

In North Carolina, big box stores can reopen, but church gatherings still limited to just ten people.

SHERIFF KEITH STONE, NASH COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA: I'm not enforcing it. And I don't intend enforcing it.

WATT: Others sheriff's say the same.

STONE: I would rather you turn towards the Lord than the liquor store.

WATT: Meanwhile in Sin City, now you can buy a mask from a vending machine at the airport as Caesars gets ready to reopen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In the new world, there will only be three chairs and nobody will be able to be within six feet.

WATT: Good news from L.A., the USNS Mercy hospital ship just left, after seven weeks supporting the COVID-19 fight. The curve here has flattened.

Nick Watt, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CUOMO: Our thanks to Nick Watt for that.

Now, where does that ship go? Where does the Mercy go? Where does the other one go? See, that's part of how.

The casino thinks how, why? Because they're intelligent and they're very savvy. What do you hear from the sheriff? I don't know if eight enforce it. We hear that from lawmakers all over the country in law enforcement, why, because they don't want to do their job? No, they're our heroes.

It's because there is no real plan. I can't enforce these things, so you have to figure out how to do the most important thing, and we know what that is.

What will give you the most confidence to go back to work, to let your kids go to school? What's the situation where we're going? How sick are people there? How has it gone there?

That's testing, that's tracing. You don't hear a peep about it except very general platitudes, why? Because they don't want to take it on because it gets in the way of the easy self of we're pro-reopen, but the question is how. And on that point, we got a very telling moment from the Trump

administration today. You had the secretary of defense clear, OK? This was a designed statement. He wasn't caught off guard or ad-libbing.

The primary object is about what they want to sell to you as a win. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK ESPER, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: Winning matters, and we will deliver by the end of this year a vaccine at scale to treat the American people and our partners abroad. We will deliver, we will win this fight.

And, Mr. President, thank you, again, for all that you've done. We will get the job done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: But again, that undertone, no, that's not what it was. I don't know what it was. It doesn't matter.

What I'm saying is, of course, we want a vaccine by January. It was perfect bait because it has nothing to do with now. It's not going to change your confidence level now. But it does make my brothers and sisters in the media talk about it right now.

Instead of fact that people are reopening there's no real plan and the federal government doesn't really seem to show leadership. I don't blame the secretary of defense for what he said.

And you know what happens when you question it, you seem like you're anti-optimism. Where do you get January from? A lot of people tell us you can't do it, hater. What do you want people to do? Just stay home?

That's the alternative, right? That's the way the Democrats have been framed on this. They want you to stay home.

And then you have people painting it darkly. Why do they want you to stay home? Because they're about control and taking your freedom.

This is crazy talk. But in a vacuum of a better message, you'll get painted this way. Trump knows it, that's why he doesn't have the mask on.

Let's bring in Dr. Ashish Jha, the director of the Harvard Global Health Institute, and a kind of brilliant mind you need on this.

You're not a politician, but I'm telling you, Ashish, give me a better explanation than what I'm about to give you. Trump doesn't have the mask on when everybody else does because he's all about reopen without rules. Mask, bad. Mask, control. Mask, people like Ashish Jha trying to take your freedom and suffocate you literally with a mask, not me.

Why else would he not do it? His explanation made no sense. Isn't it a play? DR. ASHISH JHA, HARVARD GLOBAL HEALTH INSTITUTE: Yes, so, Chris,

thanks for having me on. Look, masks are freedom.

[20:15:02]

Wear the mask, you get to go back to work. Have testing? You get to go back to work.

Wait until the case loads are declining enough, which a lot of states are heading that way, just wait a little longer and you can go back to work. It won't be like six months ago, but we can get a lot of it back.

So, I'm puzzled why masks and testing are seen as anti-freedom. I see them as pro-freedom. I see them as getting our lives back.

CUOMO: You know why? Too smart. That's your problem. You have to think politics, not science or even prudent policy.

It's summertime, brother. I want to call you up and have an adult beverage with you and you're telling me wait a little longer. I want to fish and get my family out of the house. My kids hate me. I hate them almost as much. I want to get them out of the house.

You're saying wait a little bit longer. Trump's saying, now, forget the vaccine and the mask, forget about testing. I don't think we need it. Reopen, baby, that's strength.

Now, you would fail me if I gave you that answer on a test. But in politics, who do you think wins? My answer to you is this, Doc, look around the country. Who's winning?

JHA: Yeah. So look, I'm going to gently disagree with you.

CUOMO: Don't be gentle, Ashish. Go ahead.

JHA: Respectfully. Look, 80 percent of Americans in all the pollings basically say, yeah, we want to get back, go in again, but not without more testing, not without more security and safety. So I don't know how the politics of this comes. I know how the science is, and the science pretty clear.

More testing, mask-wearing, social distance, open up safely, and we can have a pretty good summer. It won't be the same as every other summer, but we can get back and we can even get through the fall if we keep ramping up testing and keep all these things in place. So, I'm all in on that, but I want the data to drive by decision.

CUOMO: That's the way to put it. I'm going to make a politician out of you yet, Ashish. I know it goes against you having all this high character, and always having to tell the truth and based everything you say on facts, but I'll beat that out of you over time because if that's the message from the community that is protective here, we all want to get back.

Let's get back now, but we have to do it in stages and steps. It'll be a better messaging situation than the one right now because right now it's reopen or not, and that's not only a false choice, it's not even where the science is telling us to go. But it is the state of play in politics.

So thank you for stepping out of your comfort zone. It's always a pleasure to have you, Doctor. The best for you and the family for the weekend.

JHA: Thanks, Chris. You too.

CUOMO: All right.

Now, we're going to take a break, okay? When we come back, economics, that's what's driving this. Yeah, a lot of it is wants. A lot of it is needs. Real pain, real fear, what people see as a form of dying, OK?

We have to talk about it, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:21:37]

CUOMO: Breaking news. I don't like it. After 118 years, the department store icon JCPenney has announced it's filing for bankruptcy, sign of the times.

They're not the only ones suffering. Early numbers show retail sales dropped more than 16 percent from last month. That's the largest drop ever recorded since the government started tracking these numbers.

We know why. The question is what to do about.

Catherine Rampell, perfect guest for this.

Haven't seen you in a minute. Hope the family is well. Hope your head and heart are well. Thank you for joining me.

CATHERINE RAMPELL, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Of course, yeah. No complaints so far all things considered.

CUOMO: I'm not going to let you slap me around with the false choice. You know it's about how.

On the economic side, how real is the pain when people are talking about their own personal economy at home and what it means to business in general?

RAMPELL: Look, the numbers are just mind-boggling at this point. Whether you're looking at the tens of millions of people who are officially out of work, the additional people who have had their hours cut or given up looking for work so they're not even counted in those tallies, whether we're talking about the real -- excuse me, the retail numbers, the pain is just incredibly vast.

And that's part of the reason why I would argue that nobody wants this indefinite shutdown, obviously. We want to get the economy humming again. So that people can get back to work and put food on their families' tables.

CUOMO: Now, you may be one of the people who agrees with me. I know the polls say 60, 70, 80 people -- 80 percent of people, poll say, let's not open if it's not safe. See, but I see that as, like a false answer, like when we asked people, what do you want from the news, they say I want hard news, and then they watch anything that's tantalizing.

I think the reality out there is the reason that the idea of reopen no matter what is so resonant is because despite what those polls say, Catherine, people are so worried about their economic future. And they think we'll get over this pandemic one way or another, but I may never get my livelihood back. What do you think of that?

RAMPELL: I think that's a very real concern. We don't know how many of these firms are going out of business permanently, as opposed to temporarily. Most workers right now who are laid off say they're on temporary layoff, but we just don't know that's the case.

Of course, just because the government might reopen officially the economy for business as usual doesn't mean we will actually have business as usual. If you look at the data leading up to those government-enforced shutdowns, in fact, economic activity was already dropping whether you're looking at consumer spending, work hours, people didn't wait to be told by politicians stay home, don't shop, don't go to work. They were doing it anyway.

So, if people still don't feel safe even though the governor is saying, hey, go out and shop again, they're not going to shop again. And that's why you really need to get the pandemic obviously under control and to reassure people that they can have some sense of normalcy even if it's not going to be a snap back to what it was before.

CUOMO: Even if it's the love gov from New York asking you to go out and spend, Catherine? I think it gets complicated, the analysis.

But here's the other thing that you've talked about a lot before the pandemic with me. What reopening will look like in terms of the tools the government has, a big tax cut made it hard to use tax cuts that way. Having the Fed keep the rates so low now, you know, almost paying people to borrow money.

[20:25:04]

We don't have the tools to spur the economy.

What does reopening look like in terms of the ability to incentivize and regrow the company absent just huge waves of consumer demand?

RAMPELL: Well, look, at its heart, this economic crisis is really a public health crisis. So until you assure people it will be safe to go out, that there are some sort of metrics in place to test people, to track people, to make sure that, you know, there's mask-wearing or social distancing if they go to the restaurant or they go to their local target or what have you, they're not going to be willing to go out again.

Nobody is suggesting that everybody should stay home or we should return to business as usual as it was before. It's more a matter of finding that middle ground so that people feel safe so that you do have, again, the health problems under control because you're not going to fix the economy until you fix the pandemic, or at least bring it down from the heights of what we saw before.

CUOMO: Last quick thing. Let's say you reopen with no rules. Looking at how consumer demand was before all this, let's say you get a 20 percent bump of people with pent-up demand and they come out and hit it.

How long do you think it takes to get an economy back that is showing strong growth again?

RAMPELL: Well, if you look at the forecasts from Wall Street economists, for example, most of them are predicting that later this year, we will see some recovery, but it will still be years before we get back to the level of economic growth -- rather, the size of the economy, economic activity we had before until we get back to the number of jobs that we had before.

Remember, after the great recession, it took something like seven years until we returned to the level of employment that we had before that crisis. So it could be a very, very long haul until we get to full recovery this time around, even if things start to show some gradual improvement later this year.

CUOMO: Now, I heard you draw that analogy early on that the great recession, totally different situation, that was forced on us, we didn't force it on the economy like here, but it took almost a decade to get 20-something million jobs put back in. Here we have almost getting close to 35 million jobs out already.

How long can we get back? How much faster can we do it?

Catherine Rampell, great to see you. Best to the family. Thank you for making us a little bit smarter tonight.

RAMPELL: Thank you.

CUOMO: All right

Every night, we're learning not just about COVID, but this other focus, at least on this show. The Georgia killing. Look, I think it's a metaphor for so much that's going on in our criminal justice system and our larger culture.

So, we've been trying to build a case here of understanding not about a prosecution, about the facts, why did this happen? What did they think?

From the beginning our suspicion has been these guys knew Ahmaud Arbery. They thought he was someone that they were looking for, and more and more evidence -- now we have new information that makes this point. Video to show you from inside that same home.

Why? Why be fixated on this? It doesn't matter who was in there. But it does matter. Who was spotted there the day he was killed? Ahmaud.

But there's a lot of context about how many times people have been looking at video of that place and getting worry about it and wanting to act on it. What the McMichaels thought, that's what we have to be able to figure out before this trial if there is one, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:33:02]

CUOMO: All right, tonight we have even more newly released videos of the property that's under construction tied to the Ahmaud Arbery shooting death.

Martin Savidge is on the case for us in Glynn County, Georgia. Here's the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): These latest to be released videos come from inside the home under construction in the neighborhood where Ahmaud Arbery was chased and killed while jogging according to his family, February 23rd. Three of these videos are from two months before the shooting, all from the same night December 17th. The cameras appear to capture a black man wearing a T-shirt and shorts. In the last segment, you can see the individual take several steps in the direction of the road and then set off on a run.

In a statement released Friday, the Attorney for the property owner says the individual depicted appears to be the same young man captured on video inside the house on February 11th. This is the February 11th video from the same place in cameras showing an unidentified person walking in and out of view inside the construction site. That night the visitor who the property owner says he cannot identify didn't just trigger cameras, but also a 911 call from none other than Travis McMichael, who reported seeing a young black male by the home side.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 911, what's the address of your emergency.

TRAVIS MCMICHAEL, SUSPECT: We've had a string of burglaries. I was leaving the neighborhood and I just caught a guy running into a house being built.

SAVIDGE (voice-over): Police arrived on scene and joined by neighbors search for the person Travis said he saw, but find no one.

Attorney Elizabeth Grady says the property owner and legal team have spent considerably more time viewing the clips and say they had discovered what was attracting the visitor. It now appears that this young man may have been coming into the property for water.

There is a water source at the dock behind the house as well as the source near the front of the structure. The attorney says though you can't see the water source on camera, in security video from December 17th that they have studied the young man appears to wipe his mouth or neck and at one point what sounds like water, he's heard before the person heads off at a jog. [20:35:12]

And additional videos obtained by CNN from the construction site show that the home was visited by a number of different unidentified individuals and people on a number of different days. The property owner says there was never any damage or theft.

Ahmaud Arbery was seen inside the same house under construction the day he died. His presence that day triggers the chase captured on video and the confrontation that would lead to his death. As Arbery lay dead on the ground, killed by three gunshot blast from Travis McMichael's gun, Gregory McMichael tells authorities he thought Arbery was the person seen on video in the house under construction, describing Arbery as a suspect in a series of break ins.

The property owner never use the word break in or suspect. And now says the only thing taken was a drink of water.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SAVIDGE: The legal team now for Gregory McMichael held a press conference today. That's Franklin and Laura Hogue from Macon, Georgia. And among other things, they said that the truth of what happened will come out implying that what has been heard so far may not be the whole truth. And they say, if it gets to trial, they will have a very different narrative to tell the court, Chris.

CUOMO: Well, Martin, OK, as we both know, having covered so many trials, they're going to pick their strategy. It is unusual to hear defense teams talking about the anticipation of putting on evidence. You know, obviously, the defense has no burden at a trial, the burden is on the prosecution to tell a story that makes sense to the jury beyond a reasonable doubt, meaning no other story makes better sense. It's interesting to hear the defense suggest at least, they may take on that burden.

Just to be clear, Martin, we're not showing people these videotapes to explain that there was a crime or wasn't the crime? What do you believe to be the relevance of examining these in terms of the larger story?

SAVIDGE: Well, for one thing, the homeowner is constantly maintained that he was not in communication with the McMichaels. And that he was not upset or even worried about whoever it was coming on his property. He knew it was happening because the security cameras portrayed it to him. But again, he said there was never any theft. Nobody was doing any harm that he could tell. And he knew that there were others that were coming on the property as well.

What is interesting is that it's the McMichaels who depict the videos and whatever they saw going on at that home that they see as crime. And that's clearly -- that home is the center of what they call this series of break ins. There's only one other crime that has been reported and that was the theft of a handgun, taken out of Travis McMichaels vehicle on New Year's Day. But beyond that everything else centers around this whole bunch of construction. And it appears that the McMichaels and just about only the McMichaels look at what's happening there as criminal. The owner himself did not.

CUOMO: And you know, here at CNN very from very early on the reports that were going around even in the media that there had been robberies in the area, they've been burglaries in the area. You know, how we knew that that wasn't true, at least verifiable by reports, and that the only one we could verify was by the McMichaels that about this gun, Martin Savidge and his team.

Thank you for the reporting. Thank you for helping us understand the proper context here. Have a great weekend, Martin, appreciate it.

All right, we're going to speak to Ahmaud Arbery's mother and her attorney in our next hour. Why? What do they make of what is being vilified and who is being vilified here? We'll hear their perspective.

First to Wisconsin, and the front lines of what not to be doing during a pandemic look, we all want to reopen, but pub crawling in the middle of a pandemic, really? Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:42:59]

CUOMO: You know, whenever people don't want to deal with the substance of criticism. They always try to make it cheap, especially in politics. I say that look at Wisconsin, man, you got to be careful about that. Oh, you hate Wisconsin? Who hates any state? Shut up. Let's just deal with what's in front of us. OK.

Why are we looking at Wisconsin as a laboratory, because the idea of people coming out to fill up bars and restaurants when the numbers are going like this in the state worries me? I want the people there to be OK. I want the leadership to be savvy. They're all confused about fighting a power struggle about reopen, good, not reopen or anything short of it bad.

So, now after this court ruling throughout the state stay at home or to this week, that's exactly what you have. Cases are still going up. The state doesn't meet the White House's own guidance on seeing the 14-day downward trend. They're not even close look at it. So if we're only as safe as the precautions we take, which is true, not just because it rhymes, but because it is empirically. How's this going to play out.

Omar Jimenez joins us from Mainstreet in Waukesha County. Thank you for being there. This place is the laboratory for our nation right now.

OMAR JIMINEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It really is, it is right around dinnertime here on Mainstreet in Waukesha County. And one thing that you'll notice is that people are enjoying dinner and drinks inside. And this is new. And as a result of that state Supreme Court order, they came down, striking down the statewide stay at home order, leaving the responsibility, the health responsibilities in the hands of business owners and the individuals in this particular county.

Now, I spoke to the owner of this particular bar and he says he actually didn't necessarily want to open. He felt that given the opportunity, and with these times and the economic struggles that they have had, he felt like he had to.

CUOMO: So Omar, first thing, in terms of the appetite for reopening, what are you seeing and what are you hearing about in terms of how quickly people are responding to the opportunity?

[20:45:00]

JIMINEZ: People are responding quickly. It's just a matter of if they're able to sort of meet that moment. So that -- this bar in particular was able to open yesterday again, just less than 24 hours after that order came down. We went to another restaurant that had waiters and waitresses in masks, waiting on people that were outside, they only felt comfortable serving people outside and weren't quite ready to welcome people inside.

There are other places that aren't quite ready yet at all, because they are trying to reconfigure their places to try and make it as safe as possible. Because as wild as this may seem to the people looking from the outside in, a lot of these business owners are trying to care as much about their customers as they can because they feel if their customers get sick and their business places are compromised, then they can't move forward at all.

So there's interest on both sides to try and watch out for themselves. But the worrying aspects for a lot of people is that this -- there's a dynamic in this state where if you go a county over the restrictions are different. So if you feel like the restrictions of your particular spot are too strict, you just drive a county over. Enjoy what's over there. And then you bring home with you the risks of exposure that you again got from that county.

CUOMO: Yes. You know, in the law, they have the concept of an attractive nuisance. You know that when somebody has something that is unsafe, but it draws attention, it creates risk even beyond that own backyard. But it'd be very interesting to see which method draws the most, you know, mouths and appetites. Is it the full open with no restriction? Is that the doing it outside? Is it a little bit of a mix? Very interesting when you talk to people? Are you seeing this reflection of I'm a little worried, I don't know what I'm going to do. Maybe I'll try it. Maybe I won't. Obviously, not the people in the restaurants they've already decided, but what do you get from other people?

JIMINEZ: Well, from other people that are walking through, I was just talking to a guy actually who lives right on this block who was out and he says he's immunosuppressed. He says he needs to run back inside and grab his mask because he looked around and saw the people that were sitting and again, legally and as they are allowed to do enjoying their food and drinks inside some of these places, but he's basically limited to just going and grabbing food and then bringing it home. And that's not just him. There are plenty of other people who are, for example, this restaurant, even they are still doing their takeout orders where people are pulling up, running in really quickly grabbing their food and going back inside.

And that's something that these business owners have actually encouraged saying, if you don't feel comfortable coming to these places, you don't have to. And again, we spoke to the owner of this particular business, and he told us that he did not necessarily feel like he needed to be open, but felt like the opportunity was too good to pass it up to at least try it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAN ITALIANO, OWNER, MAGELLAN'S: There's a lot of other businesses around that were opened up. And if this would have been if I would have been say, the lone wolf in this, I wouldn't have done it, you know, but there's, I think we're all trying to exercise as much caution and, you know, basically keep our livelihood.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: It's tough balance.

JIMINEZ: And there's a major question now when we talk about -- well, it is a tough balance. That's right. I mean, people are balancing their health responsibilities and their economic and fighting for their family's economic survival in this. And as far as moving forward where we could potentially see any sort of statewide order, again, that could only come from the Democratic Governor Tony Evers working with the Republican led legislature to try and put something in place. But given their working history over the course of this pandemic, it is not likely we are going to see something anytime soon, even though many may be waiting.

CUOMO: Well, especially when this has been politically weaponized now. And that state, Wisconsin is different than a lot of other states. They have written into their law, that the governor can't just do this on this issue. It had to be from the state agency, which is their, you know, their health and human services agency. And then the court rejected that. So they're caught in a, you know, in a tight little loop right now, we'll see what happens and it doesn't look like the legislature is going to act anytime soon.

Omar Jimenez, thank you so much.

JIMINEZ: Of course.

CUOMO: All right, 87,000 people plus dead from the virus as of this hour, the death toll is climbing. The President again, pointed east.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: This came from China, it should have been stopped in China.

Io should have been stopped right at the source. But it wasn't.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Look, everybody says don't look backwards. Everybody says it's not worth blaming. This is politics. OK? He wants to blame China because it gives him an excuse when people say, well, why did this happen to us? But there's a lot of blame to go around. And let's be honest, nobody knows exactly what happened here, was it China, was it escaping from a lab? Did it move from China to Europe and then come here so when we were blocking China, we should have blocked Europe in a different way. We don't really know.

But let's get some insight on what the right questions are. Alex Marquardt follows the facts.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): The pandemic that has now blanketed the globe is universally accepted to have exploded out of the Chinese city of Wuhan. What is not known or agreed upon, is the exact origin. Now less a scientific question than a political one.

[20:50:05]

TRUMP: I think they made a horrible mistake. And they didn't want to admit it.

MARQUARDT (voice-over): The Trump administration has been stepping up the blame of the Chinese regime, leaning hard on the theory that the virus known as SARS-CoV-2 may not have come from a Wuhan wet market, which China claims but leaked accidentally from a government affiliated lab.

MIKE POMPEO, SECRETARY OF STATE: I have said before I've seen evidence that this likely came from the -- a Wuhan Institute of Biology. Happy to see other evidence that disproves that.

MARQUARDT (voice-over): Secretary of State Mike Pompeo points to the security risks at the Wuhan lab. According to cables reported by the Washington Post, the State Department or in 2018 about safety and management issues.

The body of evidence is circumstantial. U.S. intelligence agencies say there's no smoking gun, but what they do believe is that the virus was not man made and was not released purposefully.

The Trump administration isn't ruling out that the virus came from elsewhere. But it has been much more aggressive than other countries and pushing the lab theory which foreign intelligence partners dispute.

SCOTT MORRISON, AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER: There's nothing that we have that would indicate that was the likely source. Now, you can't rule anything out in these environments. MARQUARDT (voice-over): That lack of certainty has allowed the Trump administration to use the lab theory to be more critical of the Chinese government.

CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON, PRESIDENT, CHINA STRATEGIS GROUP: It makes a more compelling case for Chinese Communist Party malfeasance and cover ups. And you know, foisting this on the globe basically, which helps I think the administration shift blame to some degree.

MARQUARDT (voice-over): Without more evidence, the World Health Organization, which has been blasted by the Trump administration says the lab theory is speculative.

PETER BEN EMBAREK, WHO FOOD SOCIETY: The markets must have played the role somehow, either as the source of the outbreak or an amplifying setting, meaning a setting where the virus was introduced.

MARQUARDT (voice-over): The virus could have been carried to the market or to the lab, which are eight miles apart. What is clear, health experts say is that at some point last year, the virus moved in nature from an animal to humans.

Dr. Anthony Fauci told National Geographic, everything about the stepwise evolution over time strongly indicates that this virus evolved in nature and then jumped species. That doesn't discount the lab theory.

The Trump administration and Republican allies in Congress argued that the delay of China's warnings and its alleged stockpiling of protective equipment bolster the possibility that the virus escaped the government lab, since they likely would have known sooner. Still, if it leaked from the lab and the government knew, former CIA China analysts Chris Johnson says, U.S. intelligence would likely have picked up on it.

JOHNSON: The administration is trying to make this case very hard. They would leak it if they had it, and they don't or it hasn't been leaked, so they probably don't.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARQUARDT: So one big thing that the Trump administration can point to and arguing that this virus escaped from a lab through workers is that in fact, Chris it has happened before, not in Wuhan specifically, but in China in Beijing in 2004, two lab workers were infected with SARS. And then the year prior in Singapore, which of course is not in China, a student was also infected with SARS through accidental contamination.

But for now, outside of the U.S. most everyone agree is it is highly unlikely bet this virus came from the lab. For its part China has called the notion absurd and says that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is insane for pushing it. Chris.

CUOMO: Insane. That's a whole new category of illness. Alex, thank you very much. OK. Eventually the facts will come out. Appreciate the reporting. Thank you for following the thread along to where we are at this moment in time.

Oh, here's the reality, no matter where it came from, what do we know for sure, makes us sick, makes us sick everywhere makes us sick. Psychologically, emotionally physically. Wait a minute, why did I say physically less, one of those other two takes us to tonight's American.

He is no other than Kenneth Cole, you know him the fashion mogul, not to me, to me, he is my brother-in-law and has been for many, many years. He is also a huge advocate for social justice, including mental health.

Today, he launched a Mental Health Coalition. He believes the only way that we can get out of this stigma is by collecting such a big group of advocacy people and organizations and celebrities and business leaders working together. Then we blow through the stigma because there are too many people that you want to listen to saying, stop being silent.

As part of this, they've also launched a social media challenge to encourage people to talk about how you feel. Really? You know, oh, I got a fever. Oh, it's my stomach. Oh, it's my heart. It's my anxiety. It's my emotion. It's depression. Model Kendall Jenner helped kick it off. Here's a little bit of her video.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[20:55:03]

KENDALL JENNER, MODEL: For me, I have good days and I have some really anxious days. So I'm kind of off and on but I want you to join me in this challenge. I want you to tell me how you really feel and know that you're not alone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: And she's right. The idea is to share how you really feel and nominate some others to join in. Ken Cole nominated me, so I posted a piece, here's a little bit you can see the rest of my Instagram.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO (on-camera): So I'm nervous, worried, trying to do my best and trying to be my best at home and trying to be my best for you. I'm trying to do my best for myself. It's all real. Just feels that fever ad.

So how do you really feel? Think about it because it matters. And even though there shouldn't be a challenge, I'll make it one, because there's such great minds and people out there who I hope will spread the same message.

So I'm going to call out my two betters, Rachel Maddow on MSNBC, the professor and Sean Hannity, on Fox News.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CUOMO: Calling them out is the wrong phrase. I'm hoping they'll join in. They're good people, I hope they add to the cause. They certainly mean a lot to me in my life, and you can go to the mentalhealthcoalition.org, to learn more. We'll be right back.

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