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New Day

How to Safely Reopen Schools in the Fall; Chief Justice John Roberts Hospitalized in June After Falling; Brazil's President Tests Positive for Coronavirus; Australia to Reimpose Six-Week Lockdown in Melbourne; New Coronavirus Cases Hit Records in Israel, Palestinian Territory; Positive Tests Force Several U.K. Pubs to Close Again; Mary Trump Breaks Family Ranks with Tell-All Book. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired July 08, 2020 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Et cetera. Deep clean schools using CDC approved disinfectants. Classrooms should accommodate six feet of physical separation between students. I mean, as you say, in a class of 39, I'm not sure how you do that. Install hand washing stations, hand sanitizer stations, and then have more trained staff in trauma and emotional health for when the kids go back after all of this. And so who's going to pay, Miss Garcia, to retrofit schools for all of that?

LILY ESKELSEN GARCIA, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL EDUCATION ASSOCIATION: You know, one of the things that we know is that when Shake Shack needed some money, the Congress joined hands, sang kumbaya, and threw money at businesses so they wouldn't have to lay people off.

There is a bill sitting on Mitch McConnell's desk right now called the Heroes Act, passed by the House, that has billions of dollars dedicated to schools right now so we could do this right. Donald Trump said dead on arrival. He didn't have a plan, and by the way, all of the funding sources for public schools, the tax base has fallen off a cliff. So we're not even talking about having what we had last year.

They are already sending out pink slips. We could be laying off a million teachers. The janitors, the lunch ladies, the school secretary, the counselor, the school nurse. We need all hands on deck if we have any chance of doing this safely. But that's not what we're hearing from Donald Trump. That he's going to bully governors into prematurely opening unsafe schools. There is another option. Open them safely.

CAMEROTA: But, I mean, you're saying, you can't open them safely unless you get all of this money. I mean, unless you see all of these things, your guidelines, and you know, that's -- as you point out, I mean, you've just spelled it out perfectly, that's going to be a very tall order. And so what do you say to parents who say, I would be willing to take the risk of not having my kids be six feet apart so that they could get back into school and I could go back to work and save our family's finances? GARCIA: So let's not have false choices here. We have an unsafe

school. Do we keep it closed? Do we open an unsafe school? No, you make it safe. And then you say, well, what if Mitch McConnell doesn't want to give you the money?

What if Donald Trump isn't going to sign a bill? Then parents right now should be sending e-mails, phone calls. They should be closing down the White House operations, just saying, come on, you're saying that you could do this safely, but you don't want to? Why wouldn't you want to open a school safely?

By the way, let's just take what it takes to open a restaurant safely. They'll come in and they'll say, oh, you can open at 50 percent capacity. You've got to have cooks and waiters with masks. We need the testing, we need the tracing, we need the protective gear. And we could have it. We could have those things. Except Mitch McConnell, the Senate, the president of the United States is saying, why would I give you money?

I don't have a problem giving it to Shake Shack. But a public school? Not so much. And, by the way, we've gotten very, very creative. Teachers are very creative about how we would space those kids. My 39 kids cannot be six feet apart in that room, but can I bring them in in shifts? I'm going to need extra school buses because we can't stuff kids in the school buses either. Is there creative use of space? Portable classrooms out on the playground.

A lot of people have been working a lot of time and saying, if we could get this, we could actually mitigate the danger. Nothing's zero percent danger. I got coughed on by my kids all the time. I caught their colds all the time. This time a kid coughs and maybe I take home coronavirus and somebody dies. That kid goes home and that parent that wants to go back to work ends up in the hospital.

We have to do this right. Doing it wrong should not be an option when we could do it right.

CAMEROTA: Lily Eskelsen Garcia, president, NEA, we appreciate you coming on and telling us what the NEA says you will need for fall. Thank you very much. John?

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: We want to remember some of the more than 131,000 Americans lost to coronavirus.

Seventy-year-old Artencia Lorenza (PH) of Broward County, Florida, died just days after first experiencing symptoms. Her grandson told the "Sun-Sentinel" that the Venezuelan immigrant suffered breathing problems on Sunday and died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.

Thomas Moore served more than a decade as the beloved principal of Perry Middle School in Perry, Georgia. Known as Big, he'd been a coach, a teacher, an administrator in the area since the mid-'80s.

[07:35:04]

CNN affiliate WMAZ reports most recently he was football operations director at Perry High.

Sixty-year-old Andrei Guest is Indiana's youngest recorded coronavirus victim. His parents tell CNN wellness partner Kaiser Health News that the easy-going high school sophomore who had autism loved YouTube, video games, and photography.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: So happening now, we're just learning that Chief Justice John Roberts was hospitalized last month after falling while on a walk near his home. Now the news does come on the final week of the high court's term.

CNN's Joan Biskupic live in Washington with more.

Joan, really two questions here. Number one, what happened? And number two, how are we only learning now that the chief justice of the United States spent the night in the hospital?

[07:40:08]

JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN SUPREME COURT ANALYST: Yes, very troubling, John. First of all, the chief fell on June 21st, near his home in Chevy Chase, Maryland, while he was out on a walk. He hit his head and it was serious enough to be taken by ambulance to a hospital, require sutures. We don't know how many. And spend the night then in the hospital. He was released the next morning.

The court officials say that he was kept in the hospital only out of an abundance of caution. But John Roberts does have a history of seizures. In 1993, we had a reported seizure. In 2007, another reported seizure when he was vacationing up in Maine, where they have a second home. Now those are the ones that we know about. And that's what's so disturbing, John. The fact that we didn't know about this incident.

It was first reported by "The Washington Post." The newspaper had gotten a tip that John Robert's head had been bloody and he had been taken -- you know, he had sustained a serious fall. And when I asked a court official why we hadn't been told ahead of time, she said, it just didn't seem significant and that he -- the stay in the hospital was not out of anything other than caution and he was released.

But it does -- it does point up the fact that we don't actually know how these folks are doing in this -- we don't know a lot of times, even beyond the era of COVID. We just saw John Roberts in March. He looked healthy when he was on the bench, the last time they sat in public. But this is a very crucial time of the year for the Supreme Court. And a very crucial time for this particular chief justice.

He not only leads this court, after having been appointed 15 years ago, he is the center vote. However he votes in abortion rights, on immigration, on Donald Trump's financial documents, whether they will be released, that becomes the law of the land. That's how important John Roberts is. And it is concerning that if not for that tip to "The Washington Post," we wouldn't have known about this incident.

And, you know, we hope that he is doing fine and that this is just one small incident in a man who's going to live many, many more years and preside over this court many more years, but that's the story so far -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Joan, it is worrisome on so many levels, as you point out.

BISKUPIC: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Thank you for sharing your reporting and what we know now.

BISKUPIC: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Meanwhile, Brazil's president dismissed the severity of coronavirus for months. He has now tested positive for COVID-19. What does he say now?

CNN's Bill Weir is live in Sao Paolo, Brazil with more. What's the latest, Bill?

BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Alisyn, anybody who had hoped to see a humbled, chastened, sickly President Bolsonaro after so many months of dismissing this pandemic were disappointed. In fact, he has taken many of his cues from Donald Trump over this whole crisis and continued to do so by doubling down on his policies. He said he feels great after testing positive, thanks to two doses of hydroxychloroquine.

Of course, this is the controversial anti-malarial medication pretty common in the tropics that President Trump espoused weeks ago, but President Bolsonaro really fell in love with this idea. He has his military stockpile millions of doses and now he is sort of the spokesman, taking it on Facebook, showing that it's helping him. He also says that anybody under the age of 40 has zero to worry about, which again is counter to the medical facts there.

And so his former health minister, who he fired in a conflict over social distancing, I spoke to him yesterday and he says, rather than being converted by COVID-19, you know, in his own body, he's afraid that the president will use this to only amplify his message of more malaria pills and more going back to work and less social distancing and quarantines that many medical professionals are recommending.

Many of his ministers are now getting tested. The U.S. ambassador, who had lunch with him on the Fourth of July, and his wife, both tested negative. But we're seeing the mortality rates here around 1,000 a day. It was 1200 yesterday. 45,000 new cases yesterday. Still per capita, it's not as severe as what you're seeing even in Arizona and Florida, but in a country this large, as they reopen these big cities, John, Alisyn, the concern as to what's next really weighing heavy on the folks who are on the front lines here.

BERMAN: All right, Bill, it's terrific having you there. Please keep us posted. Melbourne, Australia, going back into lockdown this morning, as cases

there soar. CNN has reporters all around the world, bringing you the latest developments.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNA COREN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Anna Coren in Hong Kong. The city of Melbourne and Victoria, Australia, will go into its second lockdown as of midnight tonight that will last for six weeks as the state tries to contain the latest coronavirus outbreak, feared to be a second wave.

[07:45:10]

One hundred and 34 new cases were announced today, taking the total to more than 860 active cases in victory. Today, COVID-19 has claimed 106 Australian lives.

While the numbers are relatively low compared to other countries, Australia has aggressively tackled the pandemic and the latest surge has alarmed authorities. The 620-mile-state boarder between New South Wales and Victoria has also been closed in a desperate attempt to stop the outbreak from spreading across the nation.

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Oren Liebermann in Jerusalem where for the first time since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, Israel has seen two consecutive days with more than a thousand new cases with top health officials warning this is very much the second wave of COVID-19 here.

Israel already this week closed down pools, gyms, event halls, pubs, really anywhere where people could congregate indoors. Now we're seeing Israel lock down cities and areas with a high rate of new infections in an attempt to contain the coronavirus. Another worrying statistic, since late June, the number of serious cases in this country has more than doubled.

ANNA STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Anna Stewart in England, where at least three pubs have had to close their doors just days after being allowed to reopened. The three pubs are all in different parts of the country and for each a customer called in to say they had tested positive for COVID-19. The pubs took the initiative and the situation, each has contacted their customers, closed down to allow for a deep clean and are having their staff tested.

Decisions that the health minister of the UK have applauded, very swift decision making there. It's costly, though, for those pubs. And this will send a shiver down the spine of the hospitality sector here in England, which is only just getting back on its feet.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Our thanks to our reporter all around the world.

The president cheated on his SATs. That's just one of the allegations from the new tell-all book from the president's niece. Details from someone close to the source, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:51:19]

CAMEROTA: A new tell-all book paints a portrait of Donald Trump as someone who lies, cheats and steals his way through life. The author is Donald Trump's niece who also happens to be a clinical psychologist. "Too Much and Never Enough, How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man" is by Mary Trump. It is due out next week but we already have excerpts. Mary is unable to talk about the book because of a court gag order, but her close friends can still speak out, including Alice Frankston, this is Mary Trump's best friend.

Good morning, Alice.

ALICE FRANKSTON, MARY TRUMP'S CHILDHOOD FRIEND: Good morning. How are you?

CAMEROTA: I'm doing well. I understand that she wrote part of the book at your house. You're very close friends, you have been since childhood. So what did she tell you about the motivation for writing this and why now?

FRANKSTON: Her motivation is to get her message out which is basically in the title, how has family created the world's most dangerous man. She felt strongly that she had an obligation to let the American people if not the world understand more about who's in charge and why now, I have been asked that a lot. And in 2016, so many things happened that just seemed to reinforce his base and his power like the "Access Hollywood" tape and the Gold Star family, the Khans and a reporter was made fun of.

All these things that were happening, and Mary was eager to speak out but felt that it would be futile at that point. And as things have transpired and we see how we have a global pandemic that's been ignored, racial strife, food insecurity, you name it, everything that's going on now really helped to propel her forward and say what she wanted to say now.

CAMEROTA: One of the things that's gotten a lot of attention in the book is that she claims that her uncle, Donald Trump, cheated in order to get into the college of his choice. He as you know prides himself on having going to Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, he has said that that is what makes him elite, I think, or one of the things.

Here's what she writes in the book. Basically she said he cheated to get in. So here's what she said. "Trump worried that his grade point average which put him far from the top of the class would scuttle his effort to get accepted. Trump enlisted a smart kid with the reputation for being a good test taker to take his SATs for him. Donald who never lacked for funds paid his buddy well."

What's her evidence for this? FRANKSTON: It's her firsthand account of conversations with multiple

sources and people in her family. It would be wonderful if Mary could be here herself and speak to it all, but she's been muzzled in the most unprecedented way by her uncle. So that's really kind of a crime in it all. There's wonderful stories in the book and people will read it, and see for themselves, but I've always known her to be truthful and I don't doubt a word she says.

CAMEROTA: She is a clinical psychologist and she says that her uncle, Donald Trump, is a sociopath, meaning lacks empathy, lacks a conscience. Does she think that there was an incident that created this? I mean, how did he become a sociopath, does she think?

FRANKSTON: She goes back to the foundational base of his childhood in the book. A lot of it's about her grandparents, his relationship with his siblings as well.

[07:55:03]

She has a massive fund of knowledge from which to draw to speak to combining what she knows about what she has witnessed in her family and as well as everything she knows as a psychologist. And these are her firsthand accounts and her views.

CAMEROTA: I want to read another excerpt from the book. This is about his older brother. This is about President Trump's older brother, Fred, who died of complications from alcoholism. He has always in public put Fred on a pedestal, but she tells a different story. She says, "Donald, following the lead of my grandfather and with the complicity, silence, and inaction of his siblings destroyed my father. I can't let him destroy my country."

What does she believe he did to her father?

FRANKSTON: I think it was a number of things that happened in that family and I think one of the things that bothers her the most is that her uncle seems to portray in the media her father as just some cautionary tale when he talks about the opioid epidemic in this country and he was a living, breathing person who had a career as a pilot and served in the National Guard. So he's just sort of been whittled down to an alcoholic and it's just unfair and she's -- she feels strongly that her father is better represented.

CAMEROTA: The White House -- the White House has reacted to all of this. They have put out a statement. I want to read it to you. This is from the White House deputy press secretary. Quote, "President Trump has been in office for over three years working on behalf of the American people, why speak out now? The president describes the relationship he had with his father as warm and said his father was very good to him. He said his father was loving and not at all hard on him as a child."

Does she have -- look, we've read that there have been complications in the family over money. There seems to be some sort of bad blood between Mary and some of the rest of the family, and so what about this, that she has an ax to grind? FRANKSTON: It's not an ax to grind. That much I know. She, again,

chose now because everything seems to have decompensated and he's been quite destructive in the administration. There's a lack of leadership. He's politicized something as simple as wearing a mask. He has the biggest bully pulpit in the world and he seems to be using it to denigrate her instead of addressing things that need to be addressed.

It's not a revenge piece, it's nothing like that. She feels that people deserve to know and that it was her moral obligation and duty to let everybody know his foundation and how and why and if they have a better understanding of who he is, people can draw upon that.

CAMEROTA: Alice Frankston, you are the childhood friend of Mary Trump and her book is coming out next week. Thank you. We appreciate the insight.

FRANKSTON: Thanks for having me.

CAMEROTA: NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Cases surging in the Sunshine State.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need to look at the younger population that had a tremendous spike in their positivity rate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governors in southern states listened to Donald Trump, and as a result they've got massive surges.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think we are in a good place. I disagree with him. Dr. Fauci says don't wear masks and now he says wear them.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: If governors essentially mandate the use of masks when you have an outbreak, I think that would be very important.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's nothing to stop this train. There's nothing to stop this steep acceleration. This is a public health disaster.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

CAMEROTA: We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY.

The coronavirus outbreak in America is -- appears to be out of control. More than 60,000 Americans were diagnosed with coronavirus just since yesterday. That is the highest number ever in a single day and double the number of cases from the previous height of the pandemic which was three months ago.

In a matter of hours, the U.S. will surpass three million total cases. Despite these numbers President Trump thinks the country is, quote, "in a good place." More than 131,000 Americans have died from the virus. Meanwhile, the president is pressuring schools to reopen next month but he has offered no national plan or strategy for how to do that safely.

BERMAN: And more than 1,000 new deaths reported overnight as well which is a number we have not seen in some time.