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Suspected Killer Of Trump Supporter Shot; Biden Speaks To The Blake Family; Seven Rochester NY Police Officers Suspended; CDC Tells States Vaccine Coming Late October; U.S. Financial Markets Fall from Record Highs; Trump Denies Report He Disparaged Service Members; Trump Continues False Mail in Voter Fraud Claim; U.K. Footballer Takes on Child Poverty. Aired 1-2a ET
Aired September 04, 2020 - 01:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[01:00:00]
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: A vaccine before Christmas? Hard to imagine, but a U.S. health official says it is a possibility. But is it all too much, too rushed?
And fall out after Donald Trump urges Americans to break voting laws. We'll fact check and discuss.
And welcome to our viewers all around the world. I'm michael Holmes. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM.
We are now less than two months away from the U.S. presidential election, and Democrat Joe Biden is trying to draw a sharp contrast with Donald Trump.
Biden spent the day in Kenosha, Wisconsin, just two days after President Trump visited that grief stricken city, where he continued to push his law and order message.
But Biden's trip looked vastly different. CNN's Sarah Sidner takes a closer look at Joe Biden's travels.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden showing up here in Kenosha after days of unrest here.
He says that he was able to speak with Jacob Blake, Jacob Blake was shot in the back seven times by a police officer and is what caused the unrest in this town in part.
He also says he also spoke to his mother, his father and sisters as well. Spent a few minutes speaking to Jacob Blake who is still in the hospital and, is at this moment, paralyzed from the waist down.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, FRM. VICE PRESIDENT AND DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I had an opportunity to spend some time with Jacob on the phone. He's out of ICU. We spoke for about 15 minutes.
His brother and two sisters, his dad and his mom on the telephone. And I've spoken to them a lot before, but we spent some time together with my wife.
And he talked about how nothing was going to defeat him. How whether he walked again or not, he was not going to give up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SIDNER: Biden also was here for a community meeting. So that the members of the Kenosha community could speak to him. And one of the people that spoke created a bit of controversy.
She had a paper that she said she was supposed to read to the presidential candidate. And instead decided to speak her mind. Her name is Porsche Bennett.
She told us that she was able to kind of talk to him from her heart, that it was important that he understood some of the issues that she feels are not being addressed and that need to be addressed.
And she wants to see policy change if, indeed, he becomes the president.
Here is some of what she wanted to impart to Mr. Biden.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PORSCHE BENNETT, ACTIVIST: How they treat us needs to be changed. If they're going to allow them to do -- if that medical examiner declares that as a homicide, that's murder.
Which means they need to be treated just how a black man or a Mexican man or a Chinese -- how they're treated.
It's just that simple.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SIDNER: Bennett said later on that he pulled her aside and thanked her for speaking her mind.
So far, the last few days here in Kenosha, it has been quiet. And again today, only a few dozen people came out, not a huge protest, not big rallies before presidential candidate, Joe Biden, left the area.
Sara Sidner, CNN. Kenosha, Wisconsin.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: Seven police officers in Rochester New York are being suspended over the death of a black man back in March.
Now this comes a day after the release of disturbing body cam video showing what happened to Daniel Prude, seen in this photograph during his arrest.
The Rochester mayor says she was misled by the city's police chief to believe that Prude died of an overdose.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR LOVELY WARREN, ROCHESTER, NEW YORK: I have addressed with the police chief how deeply and personally and professionally disappointed I am. For him failing to fully and accurately inform me about what occurred with Mr. Prude.
Our response to him was wrong. And we need to change how we deal with these situations going forward.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: CNN's Brian Todd with that body cam video now.
And also reaction from Daniel Prude's family.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The police body cam video shows that when police find him at about 3 15 a.m. Daniel Prude is naked on the street as a light snow falls.
[01:05:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get on the ground. Put your hands behind your back, behind your back.
DANIEL PRUDE: Yes, sir.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don't move. Don't move.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: This incident occurred in Rochester, New York on March 23rd, two months before the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Attorneys for Prude's family provided CNN with body cam footage, showing several angles, and the confrontation is getting new scrutiny tonight.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WARREN: Experiencing and ultimately dying from a drug overdose in police custody as I was told by the chief is entirely different than what I ultimately witnessed on the video.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: The New York attorney general is investigating. Prude's family is demanding justice. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE PRUDE, BROTHER OF DANIEL PRUDE: They treated my brother like a piece of garbage. And what do you do to garbage? You throw it out.
So that's basically what they done to my brother.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Daniel Prude's brother called police that morning, saying Prude was experiencing a mental health episode and may have been on drugs.
When officers arrived, Prude complies with them and is handcuffed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you Daniel?
DANIEL PRUDE: Yes, sir.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Daniel Prude?
DANIEL PRUDE: Please, please let me get my money.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Daniel Prude?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Moments later, the footage shows Prude visibly agitated for several minutes, yelling at officers, squirming on the pavement.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DANIEL PRUDE: Stop (inaudible) me. Let me go, (inaudible). Get me out of my handcuffs, brother (ph).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Three minutes after first confronting him, police put what's called a spit sock over Prude's head to minimize exposure, after they say he was spitting.
But Prude becomes more agitated. The officers demand that he lie still.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DANIEL PRUDE: Give me the gun.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stay down.
DANIEL PRUDE: Give me the gun.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stay down.
DANIEL PRUDE: Give me the hand gun. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stay down.
DANIEL PRUDE: Give me the hand gun.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: When Prude doesn't comply and appears to try to stand, three officers physically restrain him and pull into the ground.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DANIEL PRUDE: Take this thing off my face.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, I got it. I got him.
DANIEL PRUDE: I mean it. You're trying to kill me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm already in (inaudible).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: One officer has his knee on Prude's back, and the other is holding his head to the pavement while the spit sock remains on his head.
Another officer can be seen putting his weight on Prude's head. Prude seems to be struggling to breathe.
At one point, the officers realize Prude is spitting, and appears to have vomited.
Paramedics arrive and begin assisting instructing the officers to roll him over.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Does he have a pulse?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible) no.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Start CPR.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: CPR is performed for about two minutes. Prude is then placed on a gurney and put into an ambulance.
He was pronounced brain dead when he arrived at the hospital, and died a week later.
Prude's family is demanding the officers involved be fired and charged with murder.
Rochester's police chief said this week he didn't have evidence to indicate that anything criminal might have occurred. But said if there was something more obvious, immediate action would have been taken.
The mayor has announced that all seven officers involved have been suspended.
The investigations are continuing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE PRUDE, BROTHER OF DANIEL PRUDE: The man is defenseless, butt naked on the ground. He's cuffed up already. I mean, c'mon.
How many more brothers got to die for society to understand that this needs to stop.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: The police union in Rochester said it had concerns about the incident involving its members. CNN was not able to reach the union or the suspended officers for further comment on the case.
The autopsy report rules Daniel Prude's death a homicide caused by quote, "complications of asphyxia in the setting of a physical restraint."
The medical examiner's office also cites, quote "excited delirium and acute intoxication from the drug PCP as the cause of death."
TODD: Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: All right. Well, President -- we can see the markets there. Let's have a look at the markets.
The DOW down today and the NASDAQ futures are also down. And the S&P Futures down.
The U.S. financial market taking a big dip from record highs. The markets had been on a record tear, and now they're plunging.
And let's have a look at Asia and how the markets are faring there.
They are in the red as well. The Nikkei down over a percentage point, the Hang Seng down nearly one and three quarter. The Australian S&P back a little from the last hour. Still nearly three percent down on the day.
Now the U.S. president now using face masks, which are shown to stop the spread of coronavirus, to attack the man challenging his reelection.
Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Did you ever see a man that likes a mask as much as him? And then he makes a speech and he always has it -- not always, but a lot of times he has it hanging down, because you know what, it gives him a feeling of security.
If I were a psychiatrist -- right, I'd say this guy's got some big issues. Hanging down.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: That was the president, speaking at a rally in Pennsylvania.
And this is what the crowd looked like. No social distancing again and hardly any masks. Again.
Two measures that are proven to save lives.
[01:10:00]
HOLMES: And Donald Trump has been pushing for more positive news about the coronavirus pandemic, both in public and also in private.
Officials inside the Food & Drug Administration tell CNN they're feeling the pressure to announce a treatment by election day.
The secretary of Health & Human Services trying to reassure Americans also concerned about the safety of a potential vaccine on such a tight deadline.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALEX AZAR, U.S. SECRETARY OF HEALTH & HUMAN SERVICES: President Trump has made it clear, and I've have made it clear, these decisions will be driven by the standards of science and evidence and FDA's gold standards.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: CNN's Nick Watt now with more on the race to find a vaccine, and one that is safe.
Have a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Pfizer now teasing it might know if it's COVID-19 vaccine is safe and effective as early as the end of next month with a promise no corners will be cut.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: That's unlikely, not impossible. I think most of the people feel it's going to be November, December.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: The CDC now telling state officials to prep to distribute a vaccine also as soon as the end of next month.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ALI KHAN, FORMER DIRECTOR, CDC OFFICE OF PUBLIC HEALTH PREPAREDNESS & RESPONSE: Just picking these dates before the election sort of stokes those fears that the government isn't being duly diligent.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: A charge the White House denies.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETER NAVARRO, WHITE HOUSE TRADE ADVISER: The goal of the administration is to get a vaccine out as quickly as it is safe and efficacious to do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: And on treating COVID-19, Dr. Fauci says more data is needed on that plasma treatment hyped by the president.
And this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THOMAS CUENI, INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF PHARMACEUTICAL MANUFACTURERS & ASSOCIATIONS: There will not be the magic bullet to tackle and contain COVID-19.
The industry is still all in. And we've come a long ways.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: Here in the U.S., we've come a little way in controlling the virus. But again, we are over 1,000 deaths a day, the last couple of days.
New case counts have fallen since mid July but now seem stuck at around 40,000 a day these past two weeks.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FAUCI: That's an unacceptably high baseline. We've got to get it down.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: But there's some resurgence in the Northeast right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D-N.Y.) (Voice Over): "These people of Western New York that if they don't follow social distancing, the precautions, the virus will increase." (END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: But it's going up.
In the Midwest, the White House task force now recommending Missouri close bars and mandate masks.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FAUCI: We've proven that you can actually control the outbreak. To me, that's good news.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: Proven in California. Bars were closed, masks mandated. Case counts, now falling.
In L.A. this morning, hairdressers allowed to welcome customers indoors once more.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KRISTEN BEST, OWNER, DYLAN KEITH SALON: We are going to work our tails off, and we are going to make it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: Dwayne "The Rock: Johnson now on the public awareness train after he, his wife, and two kids caught COVID from friends.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DWAYNE "THE ROCK" JOHNSON, ACTOR: If you guys are having family and friends over to your house, you know them you trust them, they've been quarantining just like you guys, you still never know.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: And ahead of the holiday weekend here in the United States, the governor of Ohio is saying what a lot of people are thinking.
He said to our friends in college, we ask you to be careful.
Nick Watt, CNN, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: And viral specialist Dr. Jorge Rodriguez joins me now from Los Angeles. Good to see you again, Doctor.
HOLMES: So the CDC has told public health officials around the U.S. to distribute a potential vaccine as soon as late October.
How likely is it that a -- and let's emphasize, safe, effective, well tested -- vaccine, could be ready by as soon as then, late October?
RODRIGUEZ: Well -- and to answer briefly, it's going to be very, very unlikely.
When a study, like a vaccine study, is started, the final metrics that need to be met have already been predetermined. You need 30,000 people so that you know that's not just a fluke that a vaccine works on maybe the first three or four.
So in order for a vaccine to even be considered effective very early on, you need at least a 90 percent difference and improvement between the people getting the vaccine and the people that don't.
And there's this unindetermined variable which is the places where people are getting the vaccine may not be very high in COVID cases.
So you need to compare the arm that gets the vaccine with the arm that doesn't.
So it's very unlikely. Is it possible? Sure. It's possible, but not very likely.
[01:15:00]
HOLMES: It's interesting. Dr. Fauci, he expressed doubt on this timeline. He pretty much used your words, "unlikely but not impossible."
He also said that Americans can feel confident in the vaccine process.
Do you share that confidence, given what we're hearing about the administration's apparent pressure on both the CDC and FDA?
RODRIGUEZ: I believe that the process that has happened up to this point with other vaccines is something that I trust.
If a vaccine is approved earlier than we think reasonable, that data needs to be available. So that the medical and the scientific can objectively critique it.
Listen, this pressure that we're hearing about may just be hyperbole, may just be politics.
But unfortunately, the FDA isn't going along to prove us wrong. They have had to backtrack on plasma antibodies, they've had to backtrack on hydroxychloroquine.
So there is a big question mark over their head.
HOLMES: Yes. There was a pharmaceutical industry briefing I think it was yesterday. And one CEO said that vaccinations for things like measles have fallen off, quote "in part because people are worried about the safety of vaccines in general." That was the quote.
Given there were already vaccine doubters before all of this, do you fear a lot of Americans have lost faith in the system -- the CDC and the FDA, the system that protects them and up until now has been widely trusted?
The public's got to trust before they'll take.
RODRIGUEZ: Absolutely, absolutely. And listen, I'm not trying to get bolder (ph) but the FDA has to really get some cojones and do the right thing.
Because not only are they putting the health of the public in jeopardy, they are basically, for a generation or two, they may be undermining the trust that people have on science.
The same science that got us to the moon, that got us cures for hepatitis Correct. That may be the ultimate greatest danger that can come from this.
HOLMES: There's an international cooperation on a vaccine, I think it's around now about 80 higher income economies confirming their intent to participate in what is being called the COVAX facility.
And more countries joining by the hour. The U.S. is not one of them. What does that say?
RODRIGUEZ: Well, what that says is that the nationalism that so many people in the United States are championing, may come back to hurt us. It may come back to bite us.
One of my greatest concerns when the president was trying to get out of or is trying to get out of the World Health Organization is that we're not isolated. No matter how much we try, we are not isolated.
And we also run the danger of other countries, other organizations may come up with a vaccine that works, and ours don't. And then where are we?
We're with a lot of enemies or people that don't look at us in a popular light.
And again, there's travel, there's tourism, there's commerce that has to happen.
And for that to happen, every part of the world needs to be healthy and needs to function at its fullest. We're not alone.
HOLMES: Always good to get you on. Thanks, Doctor.
RODRIGUEZ: Thanks.
HOLMES: Dr. Jorge Rodriguez there.
The U.S. President Donald Trump, pushing for both a coronavirus vaccine, and a treatment.
And he wants it now.
The FDA officials say they are feeling the pressure, as you'll see, just after the break.
Also, still to come we will report on Brazil, the second highest coronavirus death toll in the world.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[01:20:00]
HOLMES: And breaking news for you now.
Sources saying the man being investigated in the killing of a right- wing activist in Portland has himself been killed, possibly by law enforcement.
Alleged antifa supporter, Michael Forest Reinoehl, was wanted in the fatal shooting of the man pictured there, Aaron J. Danielson.
Now Reinoehl was reportedly killed southwest of Seattle, Washington, when a federal fugitive task force moved in to arrest him. A source says he may have killed himself.
Keeping an eye on that. That story is still developing.
Now President Donald Trump taking a vastly different approach than Joe Biden when he visited Kenosha, Wisconsin earlier this week.
The president did not visit or speak with Jacob Blake or his family. Blake, of course, the man who was gravely injured by police a few weeks ago.
Instead, Mr. Trump toured damage from protests, met with law enforcement and pushed his law and order campaign strategy.
He doubled down on that message at his campaign rally on Thursday in Pennsylvania, also taking aim at his opponent's visit to Wisconsin.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Biden went there today. There is nobody there, there was nobody there.
He was a little late. I was going to say hey listen, we ended that problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: And joining me now from Los Angeles, political commentator, Mo'Kelly.
He is the host of "The Mo'Kelly Show". Good to see you.
I wanted to -- let's start with Rochester. Another case where an officer is suspended after Daniel Prude died in police custody the way we've seen.
The thing is these incidents keep coming. Are the protests on the street making a difference? We always talk about the need for change. What change is happening?
Well, they are making a distance -- a difference in terms of perception. We have allies now. When I say "we," African Americans. You're seeing white people who are marching.
And that wasn't the case two years or three years ago or even when colin Kaepernick put his first knee down on the football field.
So the perception is that it's not just an issue which is needed to be dealt with by just African Americans.
You have people protesting in cities like Portland, Seattle, majority non-African American. So they are making a difference.
The question is whether they will enact some sort of legislative change on any level which will impact Americans from coast to coast. And I'm not sure you can.
HOLMES: Yes. Let's go to Joe Biden who was in Kenosha. He spoke with Jacob Blake, the man shot by police officers, met with Blake's family. Neither of which the president did when he went.
In fact, I'm not even sure he's ever said Jacob Blake's name. What do you make in the differences in the two visits?
MO'KELLY: Well, you have the president who is not trying to appeal to calm, he is going there ostensibly for political reasons.
He's meeting with law enforcement and he's trumpeting his law and order message and trying to blame these situations around the country on Joe Biden. He's not trying to be a uniting force.
On the other hand, you have Joe Biden who's trying to appeal to empathy. He is meeting with the family and he understands loss on the way that President Trump doesn't necessarily know or is willing to show.
So they're very disparate pictures which are being painted here.
And from a political strategy standpoint, it's obvious that the president knows that if the media is not talking about coronavirus, COVID-19, then that is a good day for the campaign. Because that's an issue he loses on.
The Biden campaign did put out an ad about race. I want to listen to just part of that and we'll talk on the other side. Let's roll that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. KAMALA HARRIS, DEMOCRATIC VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Part of the point of freedom is to be free from brutality, from injustice, from racism in all of its manifestations.
BIDEN: We have to let people know that we not only understand their struggle but they understand the fact they describe to be treated with dignity.
They've got to know we're listening.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: It's a powerful ad, it goes on for about a minute or so.
[01:25:00]
I wanted to ask you though. How important are race relations in this election with everything else going on?
And how important is it that there is a clear message from Joe Biden on precisely how he would make relations better, deal with systemic racism? Where are the policy specifics?
MO'KELLY: Well, there are two things here. I don't know if America wants to deal with race relations.
I believe that African Americans want there to be an improvement in the criminal justice system, and also those disparate policies which were disproportionately impacting African Americans.
Now to your second point where there's any legislation which may come out of this. I'm not expecting any. Because the Democratic platform only pledges to create a national commission to analyze these things, not actually real legislation.
Now if you were to contrast that to 1963 -- and we're on the 57th anniversary, just past, of the March on Washington, there were specific policies that were going to be produced for President Kennedy, right after that march.
It was supposed to be a show of solidarity but then they would meet with President Kennedy and set forth what would be the Civil Rights Act and also the Voting Rights Act.
The Black Lives Matter movement is not at that point.
There are no specific substantive policies which are for Joe Biden to follow up on.
HOLMES: Yes. That is so true. We've literally got a minute left. I wanted to ask you very quickly, though.
What's your read on black voter enthusiasm?
Former GOP strategist Stewart Stevens with the Lincoln Project he thinks black turnout's going to be massive.
But there's been polling showing support for Black Lives Matter falling in the wake of some of the more destructive protests.
Very quickly, what's your read on turnout?
MO'KELLY: Look at the money. $364 million dollars raised by the Biden Harris campaign in the past month. That's almost double the best month by president Obama when he was running -- or actually Senator Obama running for his first term.
So if you follow the money. Those are first-time donors, a lot of them. That's about 95 percent of the donations that the Biden Harris campaign received in that month.
So people who are donating are people who are going to be voting, they're enthusiastic, they're ready and they want to support Joe Biden.
And I would have to say that's due, in large part, to the addition of Kamala Harris and so by extension African Americans.
HOLMES: All right. Mo'Kelly, going to leave it there. Appreciate your time. Thanks so much. Good to see you.
MO'KELLY: Thank you.
HOLMES: All right. The president is repeating false claims that mail-in voting leads to widespread fraud.
Coming up, we're going to check the numbers in states that vote by mail to see how big a problem there is -- or if there's a problem.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[01:30:12]
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to our viewers from all around the world. This is CNN NEWSROOM.
I'm Michael Holmes. Appreciate your company.
Well, it was a virtual bloodbath on Wall Street as the U.S. Stock market plummeted on Thursday. U.S. futures dipped and now traders are bracing for more losses following what was a very sharp sell off, as you can see there, 800 points.
The Dow and the Nasdaq had their worst day since June after the S&P and the Nasdaq hit record highs on Wednesday. Such is the market of late. Analysts suspect part of the reason could be faltering relations with China, prompting investors to move money out of tech stocks.
And for the first time in a month more than -- fewer than one million Americans filed for first time unemployment benefits.
CNN's emerging markets editor, John Defterios, is live this hour in Abu Dhabi for us.
Pretty nasty sell-off on Thursday. I mean people are just realizing that the valuations, particularly of tech, just got a bit out of hand.
JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Yes. Let's call it the gravitational pull on Thursday, Michael because the valuations were well ahead of normalization, let's put it that way, and almost as high as what we saw in the 1998 to 2000 tech bubble and that ended terribly. We're trading at nearly 50 times earnings back in those days.
The kind of silver lining here is that U.S. futures are holding up and not terribly bad on the Asian market.
But let's kind of recap what happened on the technology front. Kind of the household names that we're used to -- Apple, Facebook, Google, even Tesla as an electric vehicle maker here in that category. The so- called FANG+ index on the New York Stock Exchange that has all these stocks and a lot more, up 75 percent still even after that sell-off, Michael.
Now, if we take a look at nine major stocks in this sector. You can see the cuts that we saw yesterday, the slicing of the valuations, anywhere from 3.5 to nearly 10 percent. But that leaves Zoom even that that drop of nearly 10 percent, up 350 percent in 2020. So you get a sense of what I'm talking about here.
I think the good news in terms of stability for investors is that the Asian markets are down but not terribly. So here's kind of the Big Four, and they are down about 1 percent, to as much as 1.7 percent.
We had Australia down better than 3 percent after announcing that it was going into recession this year, after back-to-back quarters of contraction. It is having a tough time because of the drop in commodity prices as well.
So we can see the sell-off, Michael, the tech valuations still remain extremely high, but there is a realization not just about U.S.-China that we had the spurt in May and June and that the growth going forward is going to be even tougher after all the stimulus (INAUDIBLE) was pumped into the system.
HOLMES: All right. John, quickly -- you've got the monthly jobs report out later today in the U.S. I mean it could below 10 percent. What about, you know, rehiring? Is that keeping pace? Are these jobs still there?
DEFTERIOS: Well, you know, Michael, we're going to see a big number today. Let's take look at the estimate that's out there -- 1.6 million jobs added. It's never a number you would see before the pandemic, it's about five times higher than normal flows of jobs.
So it's a big number, but it's down from the month before, brings us perhaps below 10 percent, but the real worry is that most of the jobs in the last two month have been created in the service sector. Consumer spending is dropping. And that's why there's concern about additional jobs being created in 2021 and in the fourth quarter of this year.
What is the price of all the stimulus, Michael? I think it is interesting to look at the debt rise in America. If you look at this chart, it shows kind of basic, very stable lineup for the global financial crisis 10 years ago and then the pandemic hits, Donald Trump cuts taxes before that.
And now we're knocking on the door of 100 percent of GDP and hitting above that level next year. That's the prediction. At some point, this is going to will erode the value of the dollar and the next generation -- our children, for example -- are going to be paying this for a long, long time to come because of that rising debt.
HOLMES: Yes. Yes. politicians tend to only worry about the debt when they're in opposition.
John Defterios in Abu Dhabi appreciate that.
Well, earlier this week, President Trump suggested that people should try to vote twice. That is illegal, of course. Now, the White House trying to clarify those remarks. We'll have the details for you when we come back.
[01:34:49]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: President Trump is denying a scathing report in "The Atlantic" that claims that he disparaged dead American service members. The story cites unnamed sources, several of them, who allege hat the president called Americans who died in war, "losers and suckers". Mr. Trump says, it is a total lie.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Everyone knows, it's totally false. General Keith Kellogg was a highly respected man and couldn't believe it when he heard it. And he knows everything about all of it.
And to think that I would make statements, negative to our military and our fallen heroes, when nobody's done what I've done with the budgets, with the military budgets, with getting pay raises for our military.
It is a disgraceful situation by a magazine that is a terrible magazine. I don't read it. But I just heard about it. They made it up. And probably, it's a couple of people that have been failures in the administration that I got rid of, and I couldn't get rid of them fast enough. But -- or it was just made up. But it's unthinkable.
As far as John McCain is concerned, I was never a fan. And I will admit that openly. I disagreed with him in the endless wars. I disagreed with him with respect to the vets, and the taking care of the VA. I wanted to do it a much different way and I think it's proven to be a much more successful way when you look at the success we have had with the VA and with our vets -- with choice and with accountability, all the things I've got.
But I disagreed with John McCain. But I still respected him.
(END VIDEO CLIP) HOLMES: CNN initially didn't report on "The Atlantic" story, because we couldn't match the sourcing. We are doing it now because, of course, the president has responded.
CNN did reach out to the author of the article, Jeffrey Goldberg, but he declined to be interviewed on camera.
Joe Biden did react to the article. He put out a statement saying in part, quote, "If the revelations in today's 'Atlantic' article are true then they are yet another marker of how deeply President Trump and I disagree about the role of the president of the United States."
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security says Russia is ramping up its efforts to interfere in the upcoming presidential election with false claims about mail-in voting. A new intelligence document says Russia is trying to undermine public trust in the electoral process.
[01:39:29]
HOLMES: House Intelligence Committee chairman, Adam Schiff says the new document, quote, "Underscores two concerning facts. Firstly, as the intelligence community confirmed last month, Russia is once again seeking to interfere in our elections and sow distrust in our democratic process. And second, among the range of measures it is pursuing, Russia is echoing destructive and false narratives around vote by mail." He goes on that "President Trump and his enablers, including the Attorney General Barr, have been aggressively promoting".
Now, the White House is attempting to clarify President Trump's comments about voting twice to, quote, "test the system" which, of course, would be illegal. It's a felony, a conviction.
The president made those comments in North Carolina discussing mail-in balloting. The White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, says Trump wants enfranchisement, not disenfranchisement, or illegal voting.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAYLEIGH MCENANY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The president does not condone unlawful voting. The president has been very clear about this. I'm once again not surprised the media is taking the president out of context.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: Well, the president tried to clarify his own comments on Thursday but his tweets contained so much misleading information about election procedures they were quickly censored by Twitter, which put a warning at the top of the tweet, as you can see.
This is just one of a number of false and misleading claims, President Trump has made about voting in general.
Drew Griffin has more details on the false narrative when it comes to voting by mail.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN SENIOR INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: This statement from the president of the United States is a lie.
TRUMP: The ballots are lost. There is fraud. There's theft. It's happening all over the place.
GRIFFIN: It is not. What is happening all over the place is the spreading of the lie, even somewhat formally reasonable politicians, like White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, are fueling the vote fraud myth with unreasonable logic.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: But there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud.
(CROSSTALK)
MARK MEADOWS, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: There is no evidence that there is not, either. That is the definition of fraud, Jake.
GRIFFIN: No, there is no widespread voter fraud. It's been proven over and over again. And yes, that includes mail-in ballots.
And if you don't believe me because I'm from CNN, believe the right wing conservative Heritage Foundation, which keeps this running election fraud database prominently displayed on its dashboard -- 1296 cases it says of proven voter fraud. Sounds like a lot, until you realize, it covers every election for nearly four decades, billions of votes. To say the number is infinitesimally small would be overstating it.
TRUMP: The only way we're going to lose this election is if the election is rigged.
GRIFFIN: President Trump is setting the stage to explain his possible election loss with lies. Case in point, California.
TRUMP: When they send out, like in California, millions and millions of ballots to anybody that is breathing. Anybody in California that is breathing gets a ballot.
GRIFFIN: Wrong. California is sending ballots to registered voters, the same people who would be eligible to vote at the ballot box.
But facts don't seem to matter. This is the president last Monday saying 80 million mail-in ballots will somehow litter the country.
TRUMP: They'll be sending them. They'll be dumping them in neighborhoods. There'll be -- people are going to be picking them up. There'll be bribing. There'll be paying off people to grab some.
GRIFFIN: No, this seems completely made up. As are the president's tweets that people will print thousands of forgeries, and force people to sign. Or this tweet in August, attacking the Nevada governor's plan to use universal mail-in ballots. President Trump calling it a coup, adding the post office could never handle the traffic of mail-in votes without preparation.
Weeks later, his own postmaster general, testifies yes, we can.
LOUIS DEJOY, U.S. POSTMASTER GENERAL: The Postal Service is fully capable and committed to delivering the nation's ballots securely and on time.
GRIFFIN: Two recent cases of election crimes have made headlines lately. One in Patterson, New Jersey, a city council election. And one aimed at helping a Republican congressional candidate in North Carolina. A Republican campaign operative has been charged with ballot harvesting, conspiracy, and possession of absentee ballots.
Experts tell CNN these were insider crimes not voter fraud, and both caught. Showing the system worked, and both leading to new elections.
Mail-in voting takes place in almost every state in some way or another. Five states have all mail-in voting. It is the main way people cast their ballots including Colorado, where election officials tell CNN the president is just wrong about fraud.
GEORGE STEIN, JEFFERSON COUNTY CLERK, COLORADO: We have been doing universal vote by mail in Colorado for seven years and we can say, with certainty, that that is not the case.
GRIFFIN: That's not to say mail-in voting is without risk. It's why Colorado and other states pay attention to signatures, bar codes, and verifying ballots aren't counterfeits. It is why the rare examples of mail-in fraud are local and small and caught.
This seems like Deja vu all over again.
MYRNA PEREZ, BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE: Indeed.
[01:44:44]
GRIFFIN: The last time I interviewed Myrna Perez from the Brennan Center it was about President Trump's lies about voter fraud back in the 2018 midterms. Now, Perez says, the lies put the entire system of U.S. government at risk because of the pandemic, protests, and a shaky economy.
PEREZ: All of these kinds of things are just an attempt to try and discredit the idea of a free, fair and accessible election. And we should reject these ideas every time we hear them.
GRIFFIN: The National Association of Secretaries of States, the people who actually oversee elections in the states and who debunked the president's 2016 claims of widespread voter fraud, have recently come out with another statement ensuring voters that their votes are going to be counted this election and that they are prepared for any kind of interference. Still, the president insists on pushing this myth, this false myth that there is widespread voter fraud.
Drew Griffin, CNN -- Durham, North Carolina.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: CNN politics and White House reporter, Stephen Collinson joins me now from Washington, D.C.
Let's start with the president doubling down on that suggestion people essentially try to vote twice, by mail -- mail-in ballot and then in person to supposedly quote, "stress test the system". And some states already warning that is a felony.
What do you make of it? Is it just another attempt to sow doubt on the whole process so if he loses he can claim rigged?
STEPHEN COLLINSON, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Yes, I think there is a couple of things going on. First of all, clearly the president has been working for a long time to give himself a face-saving way out should he lose the election in November by saying the election wasn't completely fair. That would be one way to explain a loss.
There's a few things going on in a deeper level as well. I think the president is trying to disrupt the vote in places like North Carolina. That's a state which is going to be very close, on the borderline between Trump and Biden in November.
If there is the prospect of thousands of Republican voters showing up at polling stations in a pandemic to check their vote, that could potentially depress by a few points and that maybe all that's necessary for the Democratic vote.
And I think all of this election stuff, the casting doubt on the integrity of the entire system -- that's also perhaps an attempt to prepare the political groundwork for some kind of legal challenge in various states if the election is very close, and if there is no clear winner on election night or in the days afterwards.
HOLMES: Yes. I mean this is a president who literally said the only way he could lose was by what he called a rigged election. And you wrote on CNN.com and I just want to quote from it, "There has never been a modern American election in which a president has so publicly and unashamedly tried to portray the sacred quadrennial exercise in democracy as corrupt."
What is the impact or potential impact of that no matter who wins?
COLLINSON: You know, I think it could have a very corrosive effect on American politics and democracy, make the country even more divided. Say, for example, that the president loses the election to Joe Biden and refuses to accept the result. He leaves power anyway, because he really has no choice under the constitution.
But the 45 percent of people who voted for Donald Trump will feel and they will believe, because the president is telling them so, that their vote was taken away from them; that they were cheated. That will make it absolutely impossible, I think, for Biden to try and unite the country, as divided as it is.
If for example, the president wins in a disputed election, then you're going to have the other half of the country, Democrats, many of whom feel that Hillary Clinton was treated very badly in 2016, they are going to feel that they have been cheated out of the election and all that entails, you know.
We'll probably have another couple of conservative justices on the Supreme Court in that eventuality. So will have -- whatever happens, half the country be feeling that the democratic system has been corrupted and that their vote has been taken away. And there is nothing more dangerous to democracy, to the idea that the people are governing themselves than the thought in the United States of all places of a corrupt election.
HOLMES: What do you then see as the, you know, the Biden strategy? Especially in the face of the sheer noise level from this president and this administration. I mean how does he get attention and traction amid the chaos?
COLLINSON: It's been interesting this week, Michael because we have seen this play out in the weeks since the conventions. You basically have the challenger, the outsider Joe Biden going around the country and behaving as though he was already president.
[01:49:45]
COLLINSON: And you have the person who should be president, you know, engaging in all sorts of disruptive and destructive behavior -- the issue with the vote in North Carolina, saying that policemen who shoot black men, unarmed black men are like golfers who miss a three-foot putt. Things like that, you know.
It's completely turned on its head. I think what Biden did today going out to Kenosha in Wisconsin, he was acting like a president normally would -- calling for reconciliation, seeing the victims of an injustice. He spoke to Jacob Blake, the man who was shot seven times by police in the back, over the telephone.
And I think that's what Biden is doing. He's trying to make the case to voters that, if I'm your president, all this noise, all this disruption, all this discord goes away and we can get back to a kind of a more normal political life with a much more traditional model at present.
Of course, Trump's disruption is exactly why his voters voted for him in the first place. So everything he does that is outlandish almost validates the vote of the Trump voter in 2016.
HOLMES: We'll know soon enough. Stephen Collinson -- a great piece on CNN.com if you ever want to go and read it. Appreciate it, Stephen. Thanks.
COLLINSON: Thanks.
HOLMES: The Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg announced that the company will not accept new political ads in the week before the 2020 election. But ads can still run through Election Day, and of course, they can be bought before that ban goes into effect. And Zuckerberg made no indication Facebook would respond to lies in targeted ads.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK ZUCKERBERG, CEO FACEBOOK: If someone is kind of dumping some new information, if it's misinformation in the last days of the election, then there may not be time for the normal kind of debate and process to play out. And that's why I think it's important to have extra restrictions in the last week.
The thing that I'm very sensitive is having us be the ultimate deciders of what is right and wrong, and true and false in the world.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: The social media app has received backlash, of course, since the 2016 election over its fact-checking policies, or rather lack thereof.
Stay with us.
Just ahead, he is already a star on the pitch, and now he is helping needy families fill their pantries. We will meet Manchester United star, Marcus Rashford, up next.
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HOLMES: Welcome back.
In Beirut, rescue teams are back at work, digging through tons of rubble from last month's massive explosion there. Officials halted operations on Thursday, fearing a further collapse if they didn't wait for the right equipment.
A sniffer dog detected possible signs of life under the rubble on Thursday. Thermal imaging showed two bodies. And then a listening device registered possible breathing.
The horrific explosion rocked the capital of Lebanon 30 days ago. More than 200 people were killed, thousands were left homeless.
Now, in the U.K., a star footballer is drawing on his own childhood experiences to fight child poverty.
CNN World Sport anchor Alex Thomas with that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ALEX THOMAS, CNN WORLD SPORT ANCHOR: He is a famous young footballer with Manchester United and England, who scores goals on the pitch and away from it, campaigns to feed children who are unable to get enough food.
[01:54:44]
THOMAS: Marcus Rashford has already influenced British government policy and is now asking for lawmakers to act again. In an open letter to members of the country's parliament, Rashford is urging them to back three recommendations from a new task force he has set up.
Mentioning his own experience of child food poverty, he writes, "I remember the sound of my mom crying herself to sleep to this day, having worked a 14-hour shift, unsure how she was going to make ends meet."
Because this cause is so personal to him, Rashford teamed up with FareShare which uses surplus food to provide millions of meals to charities, feeding those who can't provide enough for themselves.
LINDSAY BOSWELL, CEO, FARESHARE: The government's own number is that 4.2 million people live in poverty in the United Kingdom. I mean that is shocking. And quite often, you know, you come up against a sort of dogmatic position where people go, well I just don't believe these numbers.
And that's why having the authenticity of somebody like Marcus Rashford, who has been there, done it and got the sadly, the t-shirt in terms of being hungry as a young man himself, needing to rely on breakfast clubs and after school clubs in order to get enough food. And, you know, there is an authenticity about that that is absolutely fantastic.
THOMAS: Earlier this year, the sports star helped persuade the British government to extend this scheme to provide free school meals to vulnerable children during the coronavirus lockdown. And how, he is lobbying for a longer term solution after persuading the U.K.'s major supermarkets to join his task force.
BOSWELL: There is something very of the moment and of now about this coalition, where you have got a young 22-year-old black footballer calling on, and I was in the call, the chief executives of all OF the major food businesses. And he said, you know, guys this is what I want you to do.
THOMAS: And they did, signing up to recommendations that would mean millions more children getting fed and possibly a change in attitudes too.
MARCUS RASHFORD, U.K. FOOTBALLER: the children are in school, if you need help in Math or English, it is natural for you to just ask for help it from the teacher because it's something in a different light. It's looked down upon so -- you know, for me, I just say hold your head up high and if you need help, go and get it. Go and get help.
THOMAS: The British government says it will carefully consider the task force's recommendations as it approaches the next spending review. An acknowledgment that the star footballer with number 10 on his jersey is being listened to at Number 10 where Britain's Prime Minister lives.
Alex Thomas, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: Thanks for watching, everyone. Spending part of your day with me.
I'm Michael Holmes.
Robyn Curnow picks things up from here. More CNN NEWSROOM with her after the break.
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