Return to Transcripts main page
New Day
Biden Picks Harris as Running Mate; Big 12 Conference to Move Forward; Trump Continues Talking about Mail-in Voting; Aired 6:30-7a ET
Aired August 12, 2020 - 06:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:30:40]
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, in just a few hours, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will appear together for the first time as running mates.
CNN's Randi Kaye explores her rise to this history-making day.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D-CA): I describe myself as a proud American.
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): And now Kamala Harris can add two more words to that description, running mate. The first black woman nominated in that role.
HARRIS: I stand before you today to announce my candidacy for president of the United States.
KAYE: It wasn't that long ago that Kamala Harris had her own plans to unseat President Donald Trump.
HARRIS: I feel a sense of responsibility to stand up and fight for the best of who we are. And I'm prepared to fight and I know how to fight.
KAYE: Big dreams for the daughters of two immigrants who she says came to America to pursue their own dreams.
Kamala Harris was born in 1964, the daughter of a Jamaican father and Indian mother. She attended both a Christian church and a Hindu temple as a young girl while growing up near Oakland, California. Her parents separated when she was just seven years old.
Harris later attended Howard University, the historically black university in Washington, D.C. She began her law career after returning to California.
HARRIS: It was just a couple of blocks from this very spot, nearly 30 years ago, as a young district attorney, I walked into the courtroom for the first time.
KAYE: Harris became San Francisco's district attorney in 2004.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Congratulations, Attorney General.
HARRIS: Thank you.
KAYE: In 2011, she became California's first black female attorney general. She considered herself an innovator on crime, including a controversial truancy program which threatened to jail parents for failing to get their children to school. She married an L.A. lawyer in 2014 and has two stepchildren who she says call her maamala (ph). In 2017, Harris became only the second black woman elected to the U.S. Senate.
HARRIS: I do.
KAYE: It was there that Senator Harris' experience as a prosecutor was on full display. Her no-nonsense, rapid-fire, slicing and dicing of testimony during key televised hearings kept witnesses on their toes. When she grilled then Attorney General Jeff Sessions about whether he had contacts with Russian nationals during the 2016 campaign, he practically pleaded for mercy.
JEFF SESSIONS, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL: I can't --
HARRIS: I do want you to be honest.
SESSIONS: And I'm not able to be rushed this fast. It makes me nervous.
KAYE: In 2018, she set her sights on Trump's pick for the Supreme Court, Brett Kavanaugh.
HARRIS: Can you think of any laws that give government the power to make decisions about the male body?
JUSTICE BRETT KAVANAUGH, SUPREME COURT: Um, I'm happy to answer a more specific questions.
HARRIS: Male versus female.
KAYE: And last year Senator Harris took on Attorney General William Barr.
Has the president or anyone at the White House ever asked or suggested that you open an investigation of anyone? Yes or no, please, sir?
WILLIAM BARR, ATTORNEY GENERAL: Um, the president or anybody else?
HARRIS: Seems you'd remember something like that and be able to tell us?
KAYE: She also took on her now running mate.
HARRIS: I do not believe you are a racist. And I agree with you, when you commit yourself to the importance of finding common ground. But I also believe -- and it's personal. And it -- I was actually very -- it was hurtful to hear you talk about the reputations of two United States senators who built their reputations and career on the segregation of race in this country. And it was not only that, but you also worked with them to oppose busing. And, you know, there was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools. And she was bused to school every day. And that little girl was me.
KAYE: Despite Harris' story, some have challenged her racial identity and criticized her for identifying as black when her parents are Jamaican and Indian.
HARRIS: I'm black --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
HARRIS: And I'm proud of being black.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely.
HARRIS: And I was born black. I will die black.
[06:35:00]
And I'm proud of being black. And I'm not going to make any excuses for anybody because they don't understand.
This is the same thing they did to Barack. They're trying to do what has been happening over the last two years, which is powerful voices trying to sew hate and division among us. And so we need to recognize when we're being played.
KAYE: Harris ran on Medicare for all. She opposes the death penalty and is hesitant to commit on reparations. She likes the green new deal and is in favor of legalizing marijuana. She's also a proponent of LGBTQ rights.
HARRIS: I now declare you spouses for life.
KAYE: Officiating at the first legal same-sex marriage in California back in 2013. In March, after Biden became the presumptive nominee, Kamala Harris officially threw her support his way.
HARRIS: I have decided that I am with great enthusiasm going to endorse Joe Biden for president of the United States. I believe in Joe. I really believe in him. And I have known him for a long time.
KAYE: Once a challenger, now a partner.
HARRIS: I intend to fight for truth and transparency and trust! I intend to fight!
KAYE: And with the Biden/Harris ticket set, they could soon make history.
Randi Kaye, CNN, Palm Beach County, Florida.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BERMAN: And they will appear together for the first time in a few hours.
And, Erica, one of the things that's very interesting, I think you learn a lot about the type of pick that one ticket makes by the response from the other. And it's clear that this is a complicated pick for the Trump campaign. Donald Trump doesn't know how to respond. This is not the easiest pick for them to attack. Why? Well, because Kamala Harris is not, was not the most liberal possibility that Joe Biden could have picked. She's more in the middle. Why? Because she has experience as a prosecutor, as well. So on the whole law and order idea that the president's been out there, it's a complicated thing. It's hard for him to lay a glove on her. So what has he resorted to, the type of slurs and things that he hurls at people, calling her nasty and the like.
ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, he goes back to the same, you know, bag of tricks that he's always used, specifically with women, right, "nasty," we know, always comes out there. And, of course, with women of color.
The other thing that's interesting is they've had plenty of time to prepare for this. So it's also kind of fascinating that on day one that's all you're coming with. Not that we don't have a long road ahead.
BERMAN: Yes.
HILL: But it will be interesting to watch.
Developing overnight, progressive Congressman Ilhan Omar defeating her well-funded rival, Anton Melton-Meaux, in the Minnesota Democratic primary. Her challenger raised more than $4.1 million to take on Omar, who painted her as devices -- painted Omar as divisive. Omar tweeting, quote, organized people will always beat organized money.
BERMAN: So also developing overnight, Republican businesswoman Marjorie Taylor Green defeated neurosurgeon Dr. John Cowan in a runoff for Georgia's 14th Congressional District. The important thing here is that she has embraced the baseless right-wing conspiracy QAnon theory and has a track record of racist and anti-Semitic comments. Several high-profile Republicans, including the House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy -- Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, they spoke out against her candidacy. But she is in a strong position to win in November. Again, an unapologetic supporter of QAnon, will almost definitely end up in Congress, which is significant to say the least.
All right, this morning, some college sports conferences pulling the plug on the fall season, but others are moving forward. So if they do play, how can they do it safely? Who will they play against? That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:42:40]
HILL: Developing this morning, ESPN reports the Big 12 Conference is expected to announce today they're moving forward with a fall football season. The ACC and SEC also planning to play football this fall, while the Big 10 and the PAC 12 conferences postponed their seasons.
Joining me now, Dr. Preeti Malani. She's the chief health officer at the University of Michigan. She's also the university's representative on the Big 10 Emergency Infections Task Force.
Doctor, great to have you back with us.
I know you didn't tell anybody what to do. You were helping to advise on some of the protocols out there. But based on what you see, is a pause the smartest, safest decision at this point in time?
DR. PREETI MALANI, CHIEF HEALTH OFFICER, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN: Yes, thank you. Thanks for having me back.
You know, with the pandemic, every decision is very difficult. And with sports, just like getting back to the classroom, opening businesses, getting back to travel and leisure, it's -- it's a difficult decision. And unless you have control of the pandemic, it is fraught with a lot of risk and unknowns. And so I do feel that a pause at this moment, where we're trying to do a lot of things at once, including getting back to school, it -- it's prudent.
HILL: In terms of getting back to school, bringing students back on campus, how does hitting that pause button on fall sports, how does that help to limit the spread on campus?
MALANI: Well, it's -- it's one more of many factors. And with fall sports, if we think back to spring sports and the rapid cancellation of NCAA Tournament, one of the discussions, as we're thinking about a return to sports, it really required that communities are in a good place in terms of containment. And there are a number of places in the United States that are not contained and then there there's others that are contained, but the risk of resurgence is very high. And with a return to campus, it's not just local return, it's, for a lot of students, they're coming internationally, they're coming from all over the country. And so there's a thought that the campus could become a place where there are going to be more cases. And it's going to take a lot of effort, testing, quarantining, and also making sure that there's not spread beyond that. And with sports, it's one more factor, and it's -- there's some difficulties in terms of the social distancing, the mitigation efforts that -- that add complexities beyond the regular return.
[06:45:10]
HILL: They certainly do. And there are all those scientific factors, right, that you point out there, the public health factors.
Football, though, especially football, there is a largely emotional reaction for most people across the country who are big fans when they think about what it means to not see college football this fall, or to not see their team play college football.
What would you say to those people who say, you know what, we've got to give this a shot?
MALANI: Yes, well, I'm actually one of those people. I'm a big fan of my Michigan Wolverines, and football and Saturdays in the fall, they go hand in hand.
I would say to be patient and to be careful. And there may be some conferences that ultimately do move forward and maybe it's a modification. One of the things that we can learn is really what's been happening in the professional leagues with really unlimited resources and a situation that's very, very different from campus where you even remove people into bubbles. And the difficulties that even the professional leagues are having with almost daily testing, twice-a-day testing and having incredible control, the thing that we all need to remember is that student athletes are students first, and that they're not just living in a bubble, that they're part of the community and they're going to class, they are interacting with non- students.
And so to really keep an eye on that. And I think, I mean, we focus a lot on testing, and testing is not the same as prevention. Prevention has to go hand-in-hand. But in order to move forward, you do really need to have accurate testing, lots of testing and testing with really rapid turnaround.
HILL: Yes, and that is something that is still a challenge across much of the country.
Dr. Malani, great to have you back with us this morning. Thank you.
MALANI: Thanks.
HILL: President Trump continues to falsely claim that mail-in voting is ripe with fraud. Well, now one state is considering a way for voters to bypass the Post Office, drop off their ballots. We've got those details, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:51:08]
BERMAN: Millions of Americans expected to vote by mail this fall, as the nation grapples with the coronavirus pandemic. The state of Connecticut recently expanded the use of ballot drop boxes, which give people a way to bypass the U.S. Postal Service.
CNN's Abby Phillip takes a closer look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: You can walk up or drive up. Either way, this is the newest way to cast your ballot in Connecticut.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's very simple. Fill it out. Drop it off. No problems.
PHILLIP: Drop boxes like these have been installed all around the state, one of several changes made to create more options for voting during the coronavirus pandemic. Here, it's been pretty much uncontroversial, Connecticut's secretary of state Denise Merrill says.
DENISE MERRILL (D), CONNECTICUT SECRETARY OF STATE: They're strongly in favor, strongly in favor, because it gives them more options.
PHILLIP: But in the battleground state of Pennsylvania, Republicans are already challenging the state's use of drop boxes that allow voters to bypass the Postal Service altogether, arguing in the lawsuit that allowing ballots to be collected in drop boxes allows illegal, absent, mail-in voting, ballot harvesting and other fraud to occur and or go undetected and will result in delusion of validly cast ballots.
Meantime, President Trump continues to spread false claims of fraud with ballots submitted by mail.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They're -- in all the mail boxes and kids go and they raid the mailboxes and they hand them to people that are signing the ballots down the end of the street.
PHILLIP: Opponents say ballots could be stolen or vandalized in unsecured drop boxes.
PHILLIP (on camera): You've seen so far no evidence of fraud, tampering, vandalism?
MERRILL: No. No. The clerks empty these things a couple of times a day, actually, and they usually are in very prominent places. I think it would be really difficult to vandalize one of these boxes.
PHILLIP: You can't even stick your hand in the ballot box.
MERRILL: That's right. That's right. They're bolted to the ground. I mean it's really quite a secure system.
PHILLIP: This is just a regular USPS mailbox. And, normally, you could just pull down this lever and put your ballot right inside. The opening is a little bit larger than the drop box, but it's pretty much the same.
PHILLIP (voice over): In Hartford, local election officials say they emptied these boxes every hour in the days before Election Day.
NOEL MCGREGOR, HARTFORD TOWN AND CITY CLERK: Insert the key. Both keys have to be in.
PHILLIP: Ballots are taken here.
MCGREGOR: The envelope contains a ballot. We time stamp it.
PHILLIP (on camera): This bar code that you're scanning, what is that telling the system?
MCGREGOR: That's -- that -- that John Doe has mailed his absentee ballot in.
PHILLIP (voice over): That part of the process, ensuring one person, one vote. But this year, drop boxes may be the next front in a partisan battle over vote by mail.
MCGREGOR: To me it's just another voter suppression, you know? We -- we're supposed to enhance voters' ability to participate in an electoral process.
PHILLIP: States like California, Washington, and Colorado have used them for years. In Colorado, which votes almost entirely by mail, 75 percent of all ballots in 2018 were returned through ballot boxes or manually at polling locations, officials say. And officials in Connecticut see little reason for the controversy.
MCGREGOR: It's a way of scaring the public and trying to make them doubt their election system. And it's very destructive.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: And, John, over the last several weeks there have been a lot of questions about whether the U.S. Postal Service is ready to deal with this crush of ballots that we expect this fall as millions and millions more people are expected to vote by mail. These boxes are designed to give people another option that allow their ballots to be counted on the day that they are cast.
And, as you can see in that package, you can see that this mailboxes, regular USPS mailboxes, are sometimes also in unsecured locations. So it raises some questions about that argument, as well, John.
BERMAN: That's exactly right. There are people who say the U.S. Postal Service will be overtaxed. Well, the drop boxes are a solution to that. If you're against that also, then you have to wonder about what your motivations really are for the criticism.
[06:55:02]
Abby Phillip, terrific reporting. Thanks so much for giving us the facts there.
Coming up, we have brand-new reporting about how Joe Biden decided on Kamala Harris. The incredible process that he went through. How many people he interviewed. It's a lot.
NEW DAY continues after a quick break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Kamala Harris, running mate. The first black woman nominated in that role.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senator Harris will be only the third woman in U.S. history to be on a major party's presidential ticket as a running mate.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There will be representation at the highest office that represents what we value as a country.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Perhaps some progress on a coronavirus vaccine.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're on track to rapidly produce 100 million doses.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NIAID: Having a vaccine and proving that a vaccine is safe and effective are two different things.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[07:00:00]
ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.
BERMAN: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY.
END
