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Cuomo Prime Time
Trump Smears Birx As "Pathetic" After Her Virus Warning, Then Calls Pelosi "Nasty" For Criticizing Birx; Trump Falsely Claims Lockdowns Don't Prevent COVID Infections; NY Prosecutors: Trump Investigation Goes Beyond Hush Money. Aired 9-10p ET
Aired August 03, 2020 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[21:00:00]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, ANDERSON COOPER 360: He was known as a warm and peaceful presence. His daughter says he was always a hard-worker who worked two jobs to support his family. That's how dedicated he was. George Longoria was 50-years-old.
The news continues. Want to hand it over to Chris for CUOMO PRIME TIME. Chris?
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST, CUOMO PRIME TIME: Hey, thank you very much, Anderson.
I am Chris Cuomo. Welcome to PRIME TIME.
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TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.
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CUOMO: When this President tells you something, about this pandemic that is wrong or worse, every time, it is my job to expose it and correct it.
"Ignore him," you say. I wish. I can't. Because I can't ignore the reality that you and I are forced to live because of his action, and inaction, right? There can be no ignoring the man who is keeping us from doing what we could be doing that would shorten our suffering.
The truth? My kids and, in too many places, your kids are likely not going back to school the way they should. Why? You're hearing it, or you've heard it already, or you're about to hear it.
They can't test kids often enough. They can't keep teachers safe. They can't get results fast enough. They can't trace the cases. They can't find the spaces. They don't have the money. The Union doesn't want to do it. Nobody's talking to anybody. That should not be the case.
And at the top of the food chain is our President. Trump must be held to account for the inaction. And he must be pushed to act. Not to just distract, like he did again today.
Proof?
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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We're beginning to see evidence of significant progress.
The virus is receding in hotspots across the South and West.
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CUOMO: First, who wrote that? Have you no conscious? No conscience? No shame?
West? California just became the first State to top 500,000 cases, and whoever wrote that knows it. The South and the West are on fire. Even Trump held a map in his hand today that illustrated the reality. Does he think you are blind?
The numbers that I just told you and that you see everywhere, all the time, show he is wrong. Does he think you are stupid?
And the Doctor he once favored on his Task Force, now he says he's wrong.
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DR. DEBORAH BIRX, WHITE HOUSE CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE COORDINATOR: I want to be very clear. What we're seeing today is different from March and April. It is extraordinarily widespread.
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CUOMO: Now she says he's wrong. Why? Because it's the truth. That's why Trump attacked Birx. It's why he attacks Fauci.
Why? He wants people to stop telling you the truth about the pandemic, why? Because the truth is, not even people in rural areas are safe. Birx just said it. So, what does Trump do? Does he own it? Does he try to do something about it?
No. He pounces, not with better data, but being what he is too often in the face of fact. Not about data. He's a Heta. "In order to counter Nancy, Deborah took the bait & hit us. Pathetic!"
No, Sir. You're the one hitting us. And this is what is pathetic.
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TRUMP: I think we're doing very well. I told Dr. Birx, I think we're doing very well. She was in my office a little while ago. She's a person I have a lot of respect for. I think Nancy Pelosi's treated her very badly, very, very badly, very nasty.
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CUOMO: Logic first, he calls someone he says he respects "Pathetic?" Now, why does he do that? Because he is bathetic with a "B," not a "P," a "B," as in bravo. It is the quality of taking something serious, and reducing it to the ridiculous, creating an anti-climax.
It's a perfect fit, isn't it? Bathetic! Just like the White House, yesterday, calling it deeply irresponsible and just wrong for anyone to attack the Doctor. Anyone, that is, I guess, unless it's the President.
Reducing a pandemic to the ridiculous, bathetic, like this.
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TRUMP: Tough invisible enemy. Lockdowns do not prevent infection in the future. They just don't. It comes back, many times, it comes back. The purpose of a lockdown is to buy time to build capacity.
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CUOMO: I mean have you eaten on the insane root that devours intellect and takes reason prisoner? Shakespeare asked it, but Trump should answer it.
[21:05:00]
The whole point is that we lock down to stop the infection from spreading. The key once we did that was to reopen wisely. What does that mean? Slowly. Social distancing, being careful, wearing masks. The reason the virus overpowered the way it did, in part, is because this virus is very powerful and very contagious.
But what is the biggest part? Because of people who took Trump's lead in doing none of the right things. And why would you, when he kept telling you, you didn't have to? That's why it came back.
For months, this President lied, defied and denied the reality. He did nothing that he could have. If he had treated it the way he did the wall, with the same approach, we would not be where we are today.
Ask the governors. Red and Blue, ask the governors. But he didn't. And now, as fall approaches, the reality is, I don't like to say it, I don't like to live it, we're not ready. We can't do what we want to do, what we need to do. "Get back to work. Get back to school in earnest," why?
Because the reality has always been, if you don't deal with the pandemic, you can't do anything else. You can't wish it away. You can't say it's been too long. You can't say the lockdown seemed to last forever. Not when you don't do them right.
Middle of a pandemic, and this President spent the weekend hitting golf balls and bragging about his large MAGA crowd turnouts and Coronavirus hot zones. "No masks! Big crowd!" Bathetic!
And the reality is, once again, the key is the "We." It's the truth, my brothers and sisters. This man is determined to keep down his golf handicap, not the number of cases that are making us sick. Should we be pushing on Congress? Absolutely. But you know too many on
the Right are playing the game because they're afraid of him. So, it's got to be about us. What we can do and what we can force our local - local leaders to make happen.
And the reality is sinking into everybody, even Trump. You see his last campaign email, asking supporters to wear face masks?
"I don't love wearing them either. But they can possibly help us get back to our American way of life." Where was that months ago? Where was that then? You really think that's enough now?
It's got to be about us. What I can do, what you can do, what we can do for our families, extend then to our communities, what we can get local leaders, state leaders to demand, and yes, pressure on Congress, because I'm telling you, this President doesn't want to own it.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us now to talk about what we have to do.
Now, earlier today, Doc, Trump spoke about taking Hydroxychloroquine, for two weeks, and he said he didn't test positive. How concerning is it that he is still talking that talk about Hydroxychloroquine?
And remember, when he did that session, at the end of last week, where he talked about what was in the works, to help us, he didn't even mention the drug.
What's the play here and what's your concern?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I don't know what the play is any more, Chris. This is - I think I've been spending a lot of time trying to figure out the machinations of how this is working, and there is no logic behind it.
First of all, the Hydroxychloroquine doesn't work. It doesn't work as a prophylactic. It doesn't work as an early treatment. It doesn't work as a late treatment. There is - there is these studies now that are Level I evidence studies that show that.
There were observational studies in the past that said, "Hey, maybe there's something there." The reason you do an observational study then is to try and either confirm it or to prove it false through a randomized controlled study, as have been done.
So, I mean it's - I don't know what the motivation is here still, but we're wasting a lot of time, we're wasting a lot of money, we're wasting a lot of resources. You're wasting your airtime talking about this.
This doesn't do anything to help the American people. We're in the middle of the worst public health crisis of our lifetime. And we're spending time talking about something that doesn't work.
There may be other things that do work, that we're missing out on as a result. So, there's no - I would hate to ascribe a motivation, because that would assign some logic to it, and there is none. CUOMO: Look, I mean I think the play is pretty obvious. When you don't want to deal with reality, you create a surreality, you create a distraction. That's what the drug is.
But again, when he was reading what his people had written for him, about what their plan is, Remdesivir, other things, the vaccine trials, no Hydroxychloroquine.
GUPTA: Right.
CUOMO: Why? Because it's all sell but his own people aren't even buying it.
[21:10:00]
Now, schools and Coronavirus, you and I are in the same jam families, all across the country, doesn't matter, private school, public school, because the private schools, by and large, are echoing what they think is going to happen with the public schools.
The best it seems most are going to do, in most places, where there's any kind of cases, any kind of density, Sanjay, is this hybrid, sometimes home, sometimes not. I got three different kids, in two different schools, they're each going to be in a week, and then out three, it seems, like that's what they're going to do.
I've been very clear. I think the hybrid model is the worst of both worlds. However, I'm going to have to live by it. There's a good chance each of their weeks will be different ones. So, this is going to be hard.
What do people need to know, right now, heading into the fall?
GUPTA: We - this, sadly, and we are in the same boat here, Chris. I got three teenaged daughters. The idea that this may be an exercise in futility, I think, is becoming increasingly real to me.
I get it. We want to send kids back to school. But we're in the middle of a pandemic that's getting worse, so we're not doing anything to stop it. So, this is just going to add fuel to the fire.
Studies have come out showing kids 10 and older spread just as much of it as adults. Frankly, we don't really know about kids that are younger than that. I think the jury's still out on that. So, the numbers will go up.
If we had adequate testing in place, if we had adequate contact tracing in place, if we had brought the numbers down 14 days in a row, before opening up, in these school districts, I think that we may have had a shot at this.
And then - and then, Chris, I was reading a study today, a third of teachers and faculty, in some way or another, are considered vulnerable, right, either because of age or pre-existing conditions.
So, you're putting them in this situation where they may be spreading the virus to those teachers and faculty. They may be taking the virus home, spreading it to their parents, you know this. We've been talking about this for months.
CUOMO: Right.
GUPTA: That hasn't changed. What has changed about that?
When we, shut down, Chris, there were 4,000 or 5,000 people in this country who were infected, and a few dozen who had died. That's when we decided to shut down. And now we're opening up when you have 155,000, who have died, and millions who've become infected? Where is the logic in this?
Again, just like you're asking about the Hydroxychloroquine, this whole thing defies logic. It's all been minimized. And we're still not doing anything about it. You know what, Chris? It's very frustrating.
CUOMO: Oh! Especially--
GUPTA: It's frustrating as--
CUOMO: --when there's a better answer. It's not like--
GUPTA: Exactly.
CUOMO: --"Oh, if ifs and buts were cherries and nuts, we'd all have a beautiful Christmas." No. Look at the U.K.? We'll discuss it more, later in the show with Ashish Jha, from Harvard, who's taken a look at it. How do they get these rapid tests?
GUPTA: That's right.
CUOMO: How are they getting it done in 90 minutes? Is the U.K. so much better than us? Is there some science that's proprietary? I mean, couldn't we be buying up those kinds of tests right now, Doc?
GUPTA: We should have been developing this, ourselves, Chris. And you talked about this very early on. There was a strategic, I think, method to minimizing this, by not testing. Sad to say, but I think that's the truth now.
I mean, you sort of suggested that early on, and I thought, "Maybe we're just behind." But I think it was deliberate now, at this point, to not test, because it would make things look bad.
We should have had some significant breakthroughs in antigen testing by now. It should be as easy to know what your day is going to be like in terms of Coronavirus, as it would be looking at your phone for the weather.
"Do I have it? Do people around me have it? What's the weather look like? What's the coronavirus look like?"
CUOMO: But do we have it even created, Doc? I mean, can't we get it from somewhere else? Where did the U.K. get it? GUPTA: Yes, no, I mean, so that was another thing. The initial test that was available that we did not use was a World Health Organization test. And there was this idea that we'll create our own tests so.
CUOMO: Good thing we pulled out of that!
GUPTA: Look, I mean, there are so - people ask me, like "What have been the mistakes here? What have been the bright spots in all this?" It's very hard for me to think about what have not been missteps here, totally unforced errors.
And Chris, wear a mask, physically distance, don't go to indoor crowded places, avoid large gatherings, and wash your hands. Do that for three weeks as a country.
Forget what your leaders are telling you. Forget what anybody else is telling you. Just the people rise up, do this, rise to this occasion, do this for three weeks, and we'll be looking at the backside of this curve.
How hard is that? How hard is that?
CUOMO: How pathetic is that?
GUPTA: We could--
CUOMO: To use the President's word that applied more to him than his subject in that particular context.
Three weeks, we could be in a different place.
GUPTA: That's right.
CUOMO: And yet, we're all heading into fall. Ready or not, here we come. Kids aren't going to be in school the right way.
It's going to screw up people's work lives. It's going to screw up the economic recovery. It's going to screw up our kids. It's going be more inequalities, because you're going to have wealthier areas, have more aggressive schooling than the poor areas.
GUPTA: Right.
CUOMO: And things are just going to get worse. And there's no reason for this. The only thing I disagree with, Sanjay, as I let you go, is they're not unforced errors. They were forced errors.
This Task Force would have taken a different direction. The Heads of those agencies would have wanted to do different things. The Governors were asking for different things. Trump didn't want to indulge it. That's a forced error.
But Doc, in context, you're of course right, as always, because you're the smarter and better-looking guy. Thank you very much.
GUPTA: You got it. See you soon, bud. CUOMO: All right.
GUPTA: Thank you.
CUOMO: Look, I mean, I've been telling you to get out. We're all in the same boat. We're all in the same boat.
[21:15:00]
We're going to talk later in the show, U.K., 90 minutes, they're getting their tests back. Us, one day, five days, seven days, 10 days, 12 days, 14 days, I mean, what the hell is going on here?
I thought that we were supposed to be bringing it all back. "We're making it great again," right, "Great again." How? Manufacturing. You couldn't get anybody. You got one company, in Maine, to work with on PPE?
We can't find anybody to make these - this antigen treatment, these reagents, really? Really? Nobody? In months? Not one deal, Mr. Deal- Maker? That's why we are where we are. That's why we are where we are, all right?
News developing tonight, on another raging virus, racism. Police bodycam video just leaked out in the case that ignited protests around the world. I'll tell you why I want you to see it. I know you say "Well I've seen it." No.
You're going to get a first look at what the officers saw for themselves. What they were taking in that led them to make the decisions they made in the final minutes of George Floyd's life.
What is the video going to mean to the prosecution? Does it create more questions? Does it create less questions because it makes more obvious. See for yourself, next.
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TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.
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[21:20:00]
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TEXT: LET'S GET AFTER IT.
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CUOMO: I'm about to show you something that we have not seen before. It is valuable context. It is body camera video from Minneapolis police officers as they are arresting George Floyd, OK? This is what the jury is going to be seeing. This is what they'll have to process. Were the officers doing what was reasonable under the circumstances?
Here's what they were seeing and hearing.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's see your hands.
GEORGE FLOYD: I'm staying here, man. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me see your other hand.
FLOYD: I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me see your other hand.
FLOYD: Please! Please!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Both hands!
FLOYD: Do nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Put your - hands off right now. Let me see your other hand.
FLOYD: All right. What did I do though? What did we do?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Put your hand up there.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: Now, what do you see? Was he responding to instructions? Was he being confrontational? Did the gun come out too fast? Does it matter? Did he show his hands?
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I didn't do nothing." What does that mean? What did it not mean? That was minutes before "I can't breathe."
The video is from Officer Thomas Lane's body camera. He's one of four officers charged in Floyd's death. Lawyers for two of the officers say "No comment." Lawyers for the other two haven't gotten back to us.
But we're always going to ask, all right? This is about both sides, their best version, put into the criminal process and fairness under law. There's a lot more. It's about 30 minutes of what they'll be able to process in the jury.
Joey Jackson is here to walk us through some of the most crucial moments.
Joey, thank you, blessings to you and the family. Good health during this difficult time.
What do you - what stands out to you?
JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: What stands out to me, Chris, good to be with you, is, to your point, everything has a context. And so, when you look and evaluate the end result, there's someone's dead here, right? You look at the force that was used with respect to the neck.
When I'm looking for the video, I'm looking to context to what informed their judgment as to this being the end result. Was he irate? Was he uncontrollable? Was he non-compliant? Was he in a state of manic where they felt, that is the officers that they needed really to subdue him?
CUOMO: So, first frame--
JACKSON: And the--
CUOMO: --"Show me your hands." "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry." "Show me both your hands."
I don't see what he was doing with his other hand. Is that reason to draw the weapon and to now start being worried about who this guy is and what he's about?
JACKSON: Well so the reality is that we talk a lot about de- escalation, right?
And in de-escalation, you want to give people common courtesy. Now, I get there's no such thing as a routine traffic stop, to be clear. And an officer will tell you that things can go poorly and badly, every day, and twice on Sunday.
And so, we could debate what the propriety of the gun. I say, it shouldn't be out. But let's say the guy, "Hey, it needed to come out. It's for my own protection."
What I'm concerned about is what happened thereafter.
CUOMO: All right, let's go to the next clip.
JACKSON: What I'm concerned about--
CUOMO: Let's go to the next clip, Joey. Here's the next clip, a moment of where they went from there with George Floyd. Here it is.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got to walk with me.
FLOYD: Ouch! Ouchy!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What are you - are you on something right now?
FLOYD: I got - no, nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because you acting real erratic.
FLOYD: Man, I'm so scared, man.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's go. Let's go. FLOYD: God, man.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got foam around your mouth too?
FLOYD: Yes, yes, I was just hooping earlier.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
FLOYD: Man, why the - All right, let me calm down now. I'm feeling little better now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right.
FLOYD: OK.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: Context?
JACKSON: The context is, in the event that someone like this ended up dead, you would expect they're fighting, they're kicking, they're moving, they're twisting, they're engaging in behavior that the officers feel they need to subdue.
And so, to your point about context, when we look at it, we're all left with the question of why this had to happen. And I don't see any of this--
CUOMO: "Drugs! Drugs, Joey. Drugs! He was on drugs." You heard him. He asked him.
JACKSON: I see--
CUOMO: "Foam around the mouth."
JACKSON: So, so drugs, right, so someone's on drugs, that what - that otherwise necessitates the death penalty. If someone's on drugs, that necessitates you putting the knee on the neck, such that you suppress their breathing. If someone's on drugs, defend--
CUOMO: "He's got crazy strength. Crazy strength from the drugs, Joey, crazy strength! They can't control him."
JACKSON: Yes, I don't see the crazy strength that I know you're being Devil's Advocate here. But when you look at things, and you look for context, and you look for the imminency of threat, the imminency of "Fear for my life, fear for harm," I just don't see it.
And the fact that I don't see it means, look, juries will determine what they determine. But in evaluating it, in fairness, I just don't see why the officers had to apply, at the end of the day, the force that was applied such that George Floyd--
CUOMO: Let's see that force. And one point, you don't have to be a lawyer, certainly not one nearly as talented as Joey, to know this.
[21:25:00]
What was the reasonable reaction to what they were getting? There is this ugly, ugly analysis that happens for too many people, in every case like this, where they say, "If you don't comply, you asked for it." The death penalty for non-compliance? That's what you have to remember.
JACKSON: Yes.
CUOMO: That's perspective. This is the next moment of use of force. Listen very carefully to what you're hearing. Please, it's not easy, pay attention.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FLOYD: Please, Sir. Please. Please. All right, all right.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You want him on his side?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, leave him. Staying put where we got him.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just worry about the excited delirium, or whatever.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's not breathing right, man.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That why we got the ambulance coming.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's fine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: All right, now very hard. They're going to have to transcribe it. Here's what we have figured out, Jack - Joey, you tell me if you get something else.
Obviously, you hear a declining rhythm from Mr. Floyd. He's sighing. He is getting slower and slower in his response. The officer says, "Should we turn him on the side. I'm worried about the drug delirium." And whatever he's getting in terms of feedback is in the negative.
JACKSON: Listen, here's the reality. Officers protect us every day. We get that. They have a difficult job. I get that. I'm not here to badmouth and besmirch the character of the brave officers who are out there, protecting us every day.
But when something's wrong, we need to say so. And so the question becomes, does me saying, "Well should we turn him over now?" is that enough? Don't we expect and anticipate that you do more? And, at what point, do you do that? CUOMO: We have a duty.
JACKSON: And the point that--
CUOMO: We have a duty for our officers to do more.
JACKSON: Without question. And so, the bottom line is that, did you intervene or did you just say, "Should we turn him over?"
Does that absolve you of sin, because you say, "Oh, should we turn him over?" Or perhaps, you should intervene and turn him over, and check the other officer for engaging in misbehavior. That is not an--
CUOMO: But he was a new officer, Joey, and the other guy is the veteran, and is a training - he's the - he's a Training Officer. This guy's just the rookie.
JACKSON: So, every day, we ask jurors, when we're in the court, we say, "Use your common sense and good judgment."
And I think officers also have to use their common sense of good judgment. Trainer or no trainer, you have a decision to make. A person is crying for their mother, a person can't breathe, is saying, "Oh, turn him over now, look, do you think we should turn him over?" does that absolve you of sin?
Let's let the jury determine that. I think a jury will evaluate it, and say, "The officer did not do enough."
CUOMO: Value in this is this is what jurors will be seeing. This will be some of the raw stuff with which they have to process. Was it reasonable for the officers to do what they did?
Joey Jackson, thank you very much, for giving us the experience of what you've learned in these situations, and how it will be analyzed. Appreciate it. And again, bless the family.
JACKSON: Thank you, Chris.
CUOMO: All right.
JACKSON: Thank you so much.
CUOMO: All right, we'll keep putting the pieces together. Every time I get new perspective, every time I get something that I think can forward this and forward your understanding, we'll bring it. We will not forget. We remember the pledge for justice, "Fairness on all sides."
Our President keeps touting our Coronavirus testing. It is a con. Do you understand?
Results are taking way too long. I don't have to tell you, because you've heard it. You've heard it from your own family or from families that you care about. One day, five days, seven days, 10 days, 12 days, 14 days. How? "Well it's just that way. You can't do anything about it."
Really? Look right across the pond, OK? Do you know what they're doing in the U.K.? Do you know what kind of difference they've made for themselves, and what it means for their future, compared to ours?
We'll lay it all out with somebody who knows how this works, next.
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TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.
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[21:30:00]
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TEXT: LET'S GET AFTER IT.
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CUOMO: Look, if you want proof that it could be so much better here, you can just look somewhere else and see that places are doing better that have no distinct advantage over us. The British government now has millions of Coronavirus tests that can give you answers in 90 minutes or less.
Let's get some perspective from a trusted friend of the show, Dr. Ashish Jha.
Welcome back to PRIME TIME.
Now look, we've been talking about this, on- and off-line, and you know this is making me crazy. Did the U.K. develop some technology that is proprietary? Did they come up with some secret sauce that we could have never had here?
DR. ASHISH JHA, DIRECTOR, HARVARD GLOBAL HEALTH INSTITUTE: Good evening, Chris. Thanks for having me on. And the answer is no.
The technology that they are using to roll out millions of tests next week, we've got that technology, and we have companies that can make those tests. We just haven't had a strategy that allows us to ramp up to millions of those tests being available for the American people.
CUOMO: So, let's go through it.
President Trump says "Harvard, I love Harvard. Ashish Jha, love him. Great name! Sounds Norwegian! I'm going to call him." And he says, "You got all the money. Everybody's at your disposal. Can you do what the U.K. did here? What will it take and how long would it take?"
What are the answers? JHA: So, the short answer is absolutely. It takes more than - like U.K. is rolling it out next week. We couldn't roll it out by next week, because we've sat on this for six months. But we could get it going in the next, let's say, six weeks to eight weeks.
CUOMO: How?
JHA: Over the next couple of months.
CUOMO: Who goes?
JHA: We could get this--
CUOMO: What are the first three steps?
JHA: --widely available.
CUOMO: First three steps.
JHA: What's that?
CUOMO: First one is, I'll give you a - you're Harvard. I'm Yale. So, I'll give you a little head-start.
First step is "We want to do it," OK? The President says, "Get all the Ashish Jhas. Get HHS. Get all the procurement guys. Get them in one room. This happens or you're all done." He leaves. Great!
What's the second step?
[21:35:00]
JHA: Well the second step is, first you got to identify the technologies, the companies that are going to work. But there are a bunch, and we've actually identified them. We went through a process, and identified companies that can scale up large numbers of tests.
Then, what you have to do is you have to help those companies scale up. They can't produce millions of tests on their own without help on supply chain, without help on generating capital.
If they have to go to the capital market, and issue bonds--
CUOMO: "No. Emergency order, here's the money."
JHA: --this is going to take a while. The U.S. government says--
CUOMO: "Make the stuff."
JHA: Yes.
CUOMO: The stuff exists. The science that you need, the chemicals you need, everything you need could be made in this country or procured from somebody else. I mean, let's say we need it now, aren't there places that have it? How did the U.K. get it?
JHA: Yes. No, absolutely. Chris, this is not a logistical challenge. This is a challenge of will. This is a challenge of desire to do this.
And if we had applied the full weight and power of the U.S. government, we could have had millions of tests today, for every American back within 15 minutes or half an hour, by now. But we have not had the kind of strategy that would let us have that kind of testing.
CUOMO: What difference would 90-minute turnarounds mean?
JHA: Yes. We know we have people, as you noted earlier, with Dr. Gupta, we have people waiting seven days, 10 days, 14 days. First of all, it starts getting pretty useless by that time. They're spreading the virus during that time.
90 minutes is a game changer, right, because it lets you know right away, if you're infected, you can get isolated. And if you're not infected, you can feel better, and go about your business.
So, it's a huge difference, it would dramatically lower the number of infections. It would just have a very profound effect on the--
CUOMO: Put us back in school. It'll put a lot of people back in workplaces because you'll have a way to do pool testing with a high - even if the accuracy level is lower, right, let's say it's only 40 percent or 50 percent, but doing it every day, you're going to catch more cases than every 14 days, having a 75 percent tests. I mean it's just simple math.
One other thing I want to ask you about, that I don't understand. Only 2.5 percent of Italians have antibodies. A government study shows that despite them being one of the countries hardest-hit, only 2.5 percent of them have antibodies, but their numbers are going in the right direction. Where is the sense in that?
JHA: Yes. So, what we know, from a lot of these studies, is that even though Italy, certainly North Italy was hit pretty hard, a lot of folks - only a small number of folks ultimately were infected in the whole population.
If - compare that to us, we've been hit very, very hard. Our best guess is, probably less than 10 percent of the American people have gotten infected. So, I'm not totally surprised by the Italy data. It just means that kind of trying to go for herd immunity is a bad idea. We've got to really protect people until we have a vaccine.
CUOMO: I'm Italian on both sides for as far back as I could trace. I got tons of antibodies. That's why I'm going to do this plasma thing, with Sanjay, to try to demystify it.
I'm not going to - I'm not going to fake it for people though. They're going to know what is tricky about it and what isn't. It's different than just going for having blood drawn. But we'll take them through it, because it matters so much.
Thank you, Ashish, for letting people know it doesn't have to be the way it is here right now. We could do better and-- JHA: Thank you, Chris.
CUOMO: --we could do better quickly. God bless you and your family.
JHA: Thank you.
CUOMO: All right, impeachment, remember that? Remember when that's what we were concerned about, that was the crisis? It's over. But Trump's legal troubles are not over. It's not may not be. They're not over. Why?
There's new information on an investigation that the Supreme Court allowed to proceed. It's not being done by Congress, OK? It started with those hush money payments. But now, it is going further and it's going further from a Law Enforcement agency.
Former SDNY Attorney, Preet Bharara, is here with the scoop, next.
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CUOMO: Trump's legal troubles go beyond hush payments to a porn star.
A new filing by a Manhattan prosecutor says they're looking into "Possibly extensive and protracted criminal conduct at the Trump Organization." Now, they also argue that their subpoena for his tax records was "Issued in connection with a complex financial investigation."
The President's response? Here it is.
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TRUMP: This is just a continuation of the witch-hunt. It's Democrat stuff.
This is a continuation of the worst witch-hunt in American history.
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CUOMO: Let's bring in a legal mind that knows his way around the courts in New York, former U.S. Attorney, Preet Bharara.
Some transmission issues, you look good now though, Preet, thank you.
PREET BHARARA, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK, HOST, "STAY TUNED WITH PREET" PODCAST: OK.
CUOMO: Anything different here?
BHARARA: Yes. It's a little bit different. There's a confirmation by the D.A.'s Office that they're looking at something much broader than just hush money payments that had been at the crux of this, going back some months.
It has been known, because a record was made, in the House of Representatives, when the President's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, came to testify.
There was a suggestion in there, and also in other reporting, which the D.A.'s Office cites to, that it may be the case that Trump and people in his Organization were inflating income, or assets, to try to get loans from banks.
So, there's a possibility of bank fraud, and other kinds of fraud that they say are legitimate basis to issue a wide-ranging subpoena. You'll remember that this has been litigated all the way up to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court found that the President does not have absolute immunity from this kind of procedure from a District Attorney's Office. He has the same kinds of protections and rights that you and I might have as private citizens.
And so, this is a final skirmish in the District Court under the rules that operate with respect to everyone. And I would expect that those subpoenas will be - will have to be complied with fairly soon.
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CUOMO: What does that mean for taxes?
BHARARA: Well it means that the D.A.'s Office will get them. They'll remain secret. And also, documents that relate to those tax returns, maybe communications between the companies and the accountants.
I know everyone has the question, "But what's going to happen before the election?" That's only, I think, by my count, 92 days away.
It will take a little bit of time to get those documents. There'll still be some fighting about it. Then they have to examine those documents, see if there's other documents that they want to subpoena.
I think the likelihood that there's going to be any huge substantial action, that will be breaking news, at the top of the hour, on your show, before the election, is low.
CUOMO: What do you think of the idea that people are really reaching by thinking there'll be a smoking gun in the taxes that he had these professionally prepared, and filed, and that's often done with an eye towards making sure the person, the filer is safe. You're not going to find anything in the taxes.
BHARARA: Yes. I don't know. I - my perspective is always, you never know.
You've seen very smart people, very wealthy people, who you think would be buttoned-down for their own protection, do very, very stupid things and engage in very, very stupid frauds.
And we've seen on the - in a civil enforcement action that the Trump Foundation was run basically like a piggybank for the family, so you never know.
I'm perfectly able to believe that there's a lot of bad stuff in there. I'm also able to believe that it was papered pretty well. I just think it's impossible to know, which is not a satisfactory answer, but it's the truth.
CUOMO: Based on the filings, at this point, you believe that they will get the taxes, though, because that will be the big takeaway, that somebody got them.
BHARARA: Yes, I do. Look, this has been litigated at every level of Federal Court, the District Court, the Appellate Court and the Supreme Court of the United States. And the Supreme Court did not have a lot of patience with some of the arguments being made by the Trump folks.
And the threshold for getting information, financial information, is not as high as some people think, pertaining to a subpoena. Tax returns are more protected. Usually you have to have a court order, depending on the reason, you're seeking tax returns.
But there's a huge predicate laid down, both by testimony in the Congress, and by reporting, and other things that the D.A.'s Office may have been looking at.
We don't know what other things that - they may be looking at loan applications and other representations made by the Trump folks and the Trump companies to these banks.
What they're missing is the backup to support that Trump may have, with respect to those documents and those numbers in his accountant's office. But they may already have a substantial amount of work done already.
And I don't see how he gets away with anything other than sort of trying to get the clock to wind down, and hope that the statute of limitations kicks in.
CUOMO: Of course, if people are saying, "Ah! So what? How bad can it be?" ask his former lawyer, Michael Cohen. That's what put him away in the first place. It was exactly those kinds of charges.
Preet Bharara, thank you very much. Appreciate you being with us on short notice. BHARARA: Thank you.
CUOMO: Take care.
All right, we've shown you the deep impact that the COVID crisis is having on pro-sports, right?
Now, we got a high school football player, facing the biggest test of his young life, and it has nothing to do with football. He just lost both of his parents, to COVID, just days apart. He too tested positive.
He's here tonight with a message for all of us, in his mom and dad's loving memory. We hope that they rest in peace. This young man has a lot of life in front of him. Let's talk about it, next.
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CUOMO: This is a tough story. But if we want to change our reality, we have to deal with reality. And this is the reality.
A Georgia couple, who was doing it all right, they were taking necessary precautions, they were wearing masks, they still got sick, and they both lost their battle to COVID, just last week, and they were young.
Eugene and Angie Hunter, they were in their 50s. They died just days apart at the same hospital. And it happened fast. They tested positive for Coronavirus just the week before.
They left a child on this Earth, 17 year-old Justin Hunter. He tested positive with them as well. Thankfully, he's been asymptomatic. He joins us now.
Young man, how are you doing?
JUSTIN HUNTER, LOST BOTH PARENTS TO COVID-19, TESTED POSITIVE FOR CORONAVIRUS: I'm doing good, doing good.
CUOMO: I know you're with family. How are you handling this so far, in terms of why do you think this happened? HUNTER: To be honest, I really don't know why it happened. I'm not really sure why it happened. But I'm doing good. At first, I was very angry, very sad and very confused. But I'm doing really good now.
CUOMO: What's helping you along? What are you telling yourself to keep yourself heading forward?
HUNTER: That, well first of all, my parents are in a better place. And they aren't suffering at all. They are probably up there partying, having fun. And, second of all, God's got my back.
CUOMO: Tell me about your parents. And tell me about what this was like for them.
HUNTER: They were, if you knew my parents, they were very loving, very caring. They will be - they're the type to give and not even expect anything to give back to them. They were - they were just some of the nicest people you would ever meet.
CUOMO: Did they have any what we call pre-existing conditions? Were they sick? Were they battling anything? I know they were young. They were in their 50s.
HUNTER: No, Sir, not that I know of.
CUOMO: Has anybody asked the doctors to explain why it took them so quickly.
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HUNTER: Yes, Sir. And we haven't - they don't really have an explanation for it.
CUOMO: When they told you, could you believe that this was happening to somebody at your age?
HUNTER: No, Sir. I was shocked. I didn't believe it.
CUOMO: Just a few days apart. Were you able to visit at all or they wouldn't let you in the hospital?
HUNTER: They wouldn't let me in.
CUOMO: And you are with family now? How's that going?
HUNTER: It's going good. It's going good. I have a lot of support and a lot of - I feel a lot of love coming from them. So, it's good. They're really helping me.
CUOMO: You say your parents were good people. They gave, and they gave you a lot, and they obviously gave you the start that you needed because you are doing very well with your young life.
What do you want people to know about them in terms of telling the story of how they lived as opposed to just what took their lives. HUNTER: How they lived? They really lived with no regrets. They - they just lived their life. That's really all I can really say is that they lived their life. And they were very successful in their life. And I want to be just like them when I'm older.
CUOMO: What do you want to do with your life?
Because I'm sure now, as you're figuring out, everything is going to have more meaning for you. You're going to carry purpose because you know you have people looking down on you. And you know they're watching. And you know they're going to see what you do.
What do you want to do with your life?
HUNTER: I really love - I love to play college football, and then take it to the next level, and play at the pros. And if that doesn't work, then I would like to go into cyber security, and just be the best at what I do, and do it for them.
CUOMO: How are you keeping your spirits up? I am amazed by how you are handling this. I've got a daughter your age. I'm around people your age all the time.
What is giving you what is a huge testament to your character that you've got an incredible sense of perspective? Why? What are you telling yourself? What do you have inside you, you want people to know?
HUNTER: Well, first of all, my dad, he told me, in situations like this, I have two choices.
The first choice is I can sit here, cry, feel sorry for myself, and just kind of be useless and not do any - do anything, or, I can cry, realize what happened, and accept what happened, and move on from what happened, and do everything and their name and do everything for them from now on.
CUOMO: What was the last thing that mom told you?
HUNTER: "I love you."
CUOMO: And those are the most powerful words.
HUNTER: Yes, that was--
CUOMO: And they put in you a faith that God has your back, right?
HUNTER: Yes, Sir.
CUOMO: Well, I have to tell you, I cannot imagine what you're having to deal with. But, when they put those kinds of ideas, in your head, and in your heart, that's the most powerful armor, that you could have, to protect you, against the kind of pain that comes with this.
And I know you have family. I know you have people who care about you and you're going to have more than you know. I know there's a GoFundMe page. I'm going to put up the information right now because you should have arms around you.
HUNTER: Thanks.
CUOMO: And it's an honor of the Hunter family. People can see it there, up on the screen. And I want to make an offer to you that we'll make through your family, who's taking care of you.
When you are ready, when we are allowed to do so, because everything is crazy right now, and you have school, and you're going to have to figure out, and the season is going to be shortened, if you have it at all, I know you got to deal with a lot of things, when you guys are ready, I'm going to bring you up here.
I'm going to show you the City, I want to help you live your life, and help you understand that even though your parents are gone, there are going to be a lot of people who want to put their arms around you, and you deserve that, and you're going to make them proud, and I can't wait to see it, Justin.
God bless you.
HUNTER: Thank you. Thank you so much.
CUOMO: I'll be in touch.
No, thank you. Thank you for letting us see, how someone who is so young, who has every reason to be looking down, is looking up, to where their parents are, and to God's strength and direction to go forward.
You're an amazing testament to your parents. And I hope you keep being that every step of the way. And we'll be watching.
HUNTER: Yes, Sir, thank you.
CUOMO: All right, God bless you, young man.
Justin Hunter, our thanks to him. And we'll let you know how he's doing, if he wants. He is so courageous. Let's carry that courage into more coverage of what matters to all of us together, let's continue it right now.
