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Interview with Council of Economic Advisers Chair Kevin Hassett on Economy, Unemployment; Rosanne Cash's Daughter Verbally Assaulted over Mask; Sen. Tim Kaine, Wife Tested Positive for Coronavirus in March; Boston Announces Cancellation of Marathon; Update on Coronavirus Responses Around the World. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired May 28, 2020 - 14:30   ET

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

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[14:31:08]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Nearly one in four American workers has filed for unemployment benefits since the coronavirus pandemic began. New figures released this morning showing 2.1 million people filed jobless claims last week and that brings the total to more than 40 million since mid-March.

This was the tenth straight week with unemployment figures in the millions, something that had never been seen in the U.S. before this crisis.

With me now is senior economic adviser to President Trump, Kevin Hassett.

Kevin, I have a ton of economic questions for you.

First, I want to discuss what you said on "STATE OF THE UNION," that you called American workers "human capital stock." You received a lot of criticism for this. Do you stand by what you said?

KEVIN HASSETT, CHAIRMAN, COUNCIL OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS: That phrase was used over and over by every economist whosever trained in labor economics or macroeconomics. It was used over and over by the Obama administration.

I think the attacks are just baseless. And you could see there's a lot of Twitter defense by economists. So, yes, I stand by it.

KEILAR: OK.

Nearly one in four Americans is unemployed. That's a huge, devastating number. How many of these job losses are permanent? How many do you think may not come back?

HASSETT: Right. Well, I think what we're seeing is things are starting to come back. For every two people that went on unemployment insurance, three people came off.

There's starting to be positive signs because the economy is opening up again. Back a week, no states in the country had less than 10 percent of the people on unemployment insurance and now 20 states. So, the opening up is beginning to occur.

And then the question is: How successful will it be? How widespread will it be? We see a lot of variation across states. A lot of states that are opening up and things are really getting back to normal relatively quicker than I expected.

But then other states that aren't doing so well. Some of those are states that basically just rely on things that are going slow.

So, for example, Hawaii, it depends a lot on travel and leisure. And people aren't traveling to Hawaii right now. And the economy there and the initial claims there are really, really unfortunately high.

But other places that are starting to get open again like Georgia, for example, are actually seeing claims decline and people get back to work.

KEILAR: I think that's confusing to people when you say that, for every two people who went on, three came off, when they look at 2.1 million more filing for unemployment last week.

HASSETT: So, what happens, there are new people who filed for claims and then there are people that filed for claims a few weeks ago and either still getting insurance, unemployment insurance or going back to work.

So, we keep track of both, like the continuing claims, people who get unemployment insurance because they've got unemployed a few weeks ago and then the new people this week.

So, there's definitely still a number that's way too high in terms of people having separation from their jobs this week and filing for new unemployment insurance.

But it is actually somewhat, I think, confidence building to notice that people who were unemployed a week ago or two weeks ago are starting to get back to work.

KEILAR: As you see states reopen, are you seeing evidence that people are going out and spending money?

HASSETT: Yes, absolutely. And one of the metrics we have of that is just the percentage of businesses that are open. And that was in the low 50 percent in April for the country as a whole, and really, for most states.

There are some states right now where you're getting up to as many as 90 percent of the businesses open. So, we're seeing businesses open. You know, sales are not back to where they were before the crisis began but some states, we see sales down relative to a year ago.

[14:35:03]

So, yes, the economy is turning back on. And I think there's cause for optimism in the real-time data and seeing so many people go back to work and come off of continuing claims is a positive sign.

KEILAR: Sounds like there's a supply but, so far, there's not a demand. And the bright spot is the demand is not as much of a deficit as you hoped. So, if we go back to that, if you build it, they will come, so far, it's maybe being built but they're not showing up yet.

HASSETT: Yes, I think that's fair to say. They are showing up but the sales are still down significantly from January.

But this goes back to your first question for me. The productive capacity of the country is ready to get going. The workers are going back to work. The businesses are still in place. So, therefore, the capital that's required to do the supply for the country is there. Now we just got to get the demand to line up with that.

And I think that's happening faster than I expected. In part, because there's pent-up demand for things that people spend time sitting at home, not necessarily going out and doing the things that they're used to doing or shopping for the things they needed. And now that the economies are turning back on, they're going out and beginning to do that.

KEILAR: There's two officials, Kevin, who are familiar with the matter, and they tell CNN that the White House is not going to issue economic projections this summer, which is breaking with nearly 50 years of precedent. Is that true?

HASSETT: You know, right now, I can't confirm or deny that. The group of people that makes that decision includes the treasury secretary and the OMB director.

The only thing I can say -- I remember when President Obama's team came in. They received a lot of unfair criticism because their budget had to finalize the economic forecast late in the year, like maybe December, and then the budget came out months later --

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HASSETT: Let me finish.

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KEILAR: We're talking about the Trump administration and the --

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HASSETT: You're not letting me finish. Come on.

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HASSETT: No, what I'm saying, a high uncertainty, like the Great Depression, there's uncertainty about the number. And this number would have had to have been buttoned down weeks and weeks ago when there was an enormous amount of certainty about where the economy is going to go. And so, I think there will be more news to come out about that. But right now, if you go back weeks, and then think about, what is the economy going to look like in July, there's just an enormous amount of uncertainty about that.

We look at a second quarter that's likely to be the biggest decline since World War II. And the third quarter about to be the biggest increase. And the changes in those numbers are going to be a factor of 120, bigger than normal changes. So, the uncertainty right now is the highest that we've seen since World War II.

And so, I think --

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KEILAR: OK, I'm going to --

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HASSETT: -- so it's a very uncertain time.

KEILAR: OK, I'm going to interject just because you're repeating yourself.

HASSETT: Yes. No.

KEILAR: But are you then going to issue the economic projection then later, if that what you're saying, once you have a better sense of the certainty or is it just being scrapped?

You can see why people would be concerned, Kevin, because they understand there may be some uncertainty. But numbers are numbers and they want a transparent assessment of the economy.

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KEILAR: Why can't you commit to doing what has been done for 50 years?

HASSETT: Listen, I -- Larry Kudlow and I have been on TV practically every day for months giving an accurate assessment of what we think the state of the economy is. You and I just did it. I've said over and over, even on CNN, that we think the CBO forecast that came out looks about right to us. So, we're absolutely every day transparent about what we think about the economy.

The question is, if you're going to commit months and months ahead of time to a number, is that absolutely helpful for people trying to understand what's going on.

And with the mid-session review coming up in mid-summer, I could see why people think we should hold off a little bit. In fact, that's precedent. I think a number of times in the past people came out with the number much later.

KEILAR: How much later?

HASSETT: I can remember it leaking into the fall in the past. But, again, I think in this time of uncertainty --

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KEILAR: So --

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HASSETT: -- and we're been extremely transparent. Every day, we talk about what we think the economy is going to be doing. I said on CNN that I think the second quarter is about negative 40 percent --

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KEILAR: So, it could go into the --

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KEILAR: Yes. You already said that. So, this could go into the fall?

HASSETT: We'll see what people decide. But there's a high time of uncertainty.

KEILAR: OK.

So, Governor Cuomo today announced that he's signing an executive order that authorizes businesses to deny entry to anyone that doesn't wear a mask. What's your reaction to that?

[14:39:58]

HASSETT: I think that our position, since the task force put out guidelines for opening up, is that it's a decision that each state needs to make. And if Governor Cuomo thinks that's the right call for him, then I think that we support that.

And I personally have a mask in my pocket. And I think it is prudent to wear a mask very often if you're going to be less than six feet from people.

KEILAR: All right, Kevin Hassett, thank you so much.

HASSETT: Thank you.

KEILAR: We really appreciate you joining us from the White House.

HASSETT: Good to be here. Thank you.

KEILAR: Next, Senator Tim Kaine reveals he has tested positive for coronavirus antibodies.

Plus, Mexico records its highest one-day jump in cases as the hot spots in this global pandemic continue to pop up in Latin America.

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[14:45:00] KEILAR: Country singer, Rosanne Cash, said her daughter was accosted in a grocery store over her mask that she was wearing.

CNN's Chloe Melas has more on what Cash has to say.

CHLOE MELAS, CNN ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER: Brianna, Rosanne Cash, the eldest daughter of the late county singer, Johnny Cash, took to Twitter earlier this week to discuss an incident involving one of her daughters at a local Kroger grocery store in Tennessee.

Cash said one of her daughters had gone to by buy groceries when a man approached her and began to yell hateful slurs because she was wearing a mask due to coronavirus. Cash said in her tweet that her daughter had nearly died from H1N1 and was on a ventilator for three days.

She also stated, quote, "The ignorance and hatred is so hateful, she's trying to survive."

No word from Kroger yet on the incident -- Brianna?

KEILAR: Chloe, thank you for that report.

Senator Tim Kaine and his wife have tested positive for coronavirus antibodies. The Virginia Democrat, who has been seen in the halls of Congress wearing a mask, said he had been treated for the flu earlier this year but experienced onset of new symptoms in late March. His wife fell ill shortly thereafter.

Kaine, 62, he and his wife did not get tested earlier for the virus due to the national shortage of tests but they were symptom-free by mid-April.

Elizabeth Cohen, CNN's senior medical correspondent, is here with us now.

Elizabeth, the antibody tests are becoming more widely available. There's still some questions about their efficacy, but there are a lot of people who are going to be in the Kaine situation.

DR. ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: For sure. It's very tricky. These antibody tests are very tricky. The CDC saying the results up to half the time might be wrong and that you're actually more likely to get a false positive, meaning you're told you have antibodies when you don't.

That is problematic, because then people might think, oh, I have antibodies. I'm OK, I can't get re-infected or get anyone else sick.

Senator Kaine is doing the right thing. He said he and his wife are behaving as if they basically never knew they had the antibodies. They're wearing a mask, doing all of the social distancing one is supposed to do.

These tests are very tricky. Of course, it's easy to see why someone would want them. You want to know, did I have coronavirus or not, in a situation like his where you just don't know. But the answer is not clear. Just because you get a positive result does not necessarily mean that result is correct.

KEILAR: Elizabeth, we have just gotten word that Boston has cancelled the marathon this year. I wonder what you think about that. And also, the expectation for other events as well that this is certainly. I mean, this is huge, right? This is a big, big event and it's not going to be happening.

COHEN: As a native Bostonian, it makes me sad to hear that because it is an important event the whole world watches and brings the community together. But I understand why they did that, not just for the safety of the runners who, of course, are very close to one another, but because it draws large crowds.

I remember getting off of school every marathon day in order to go join the crowds watching the marathon pass by.

It seems like a prudent move. You don't want to be creating crowds. That's the last thing we want to be doing right now.

KEILAR: Yes, it is a bummer though, right? Life is not as we know it.

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KEILAR: Elizabeth Cohen, thank you so much for your insight.

COHEN: Thanks, Brianna.

KEILAR: We're keeping an eye right now on Minneapolis where the death of the unarmed black man at the hands of police has sparked protests and very raw emotions.

Moments ago, the White House saying that President Trump was, quote, "very upset" after seeing the video of George Floyd's final moments.

Plus, Brazil's president telling people to, quote, "go back to work or die of hunger," as the pandemic pushes that country into recession.

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[14:53:15]

KEILAR: Latin America is quickly emerging as one of the areas where the rate of new infections continues to accelerate.

Let's check in with our CNN correspondents around the globe.

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MATT RIVERS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Matt Rivers, in Mexico City. Once again, officials announced the largest single-day increase in newly confirmed cases. That's the second day in a row that the record has been broken here and fourth time in the last week.

The death toll continues to go up as the WHO is now calling Latin America the new epicenter of the global outbreak because of the rise in both cases and deaths that we are seeing in places like Mexico, like Brazil, and like Peru.

SHASTA DARLINGTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Shasta Darlington, in Sao Paulo. The economy is collapsing as the number of infections in Brazil tops 400,000. While governors urge social isolation, President Jair Bolsonaro insists people should go back to work or die of hunger.

Many analysts blame Bolsonaro's response to the epidemic for the country's dismal outlook. The IMF sees GDP sinking by a full 5.3 percent in 2020 as the economy heads into one of the worst recessions on record.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Clarissa Ward, in London, where the NGO Human Right Watch has said that closure of schools due to the coronavirus crisis here in the U.K. has led to, quote, "shocking levels of childhood hunger."

A study in May found some 200,000 children had been forced to skip meals. The government has adapted a voucher system to prevent that from happening.

But Human Rights Watch said that the system was riddled with problems, with some families waiting weeks for vouchers to come in. They said the government needs to urgently address this problem.

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KEILAR:

[14:54:10]

KEILAR: President Trump is sending condolences for the first time as more than 100,000 families grieve their loved ones.

And as riots erupt in Minneapolis over the death of George Floyd, the police chief is now apologizing. But his brother is calling for action.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PHILONISE FLOYD, BROTHER OF GEORGE FLOYD: We need justice. Those police officers need to be arrested. They executed my brother in broad daylight.

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