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Trump to Nominate Woman to Supreme Court; Respects and Tributes Pour In for Ruth Bader Ginsburg; Trump's Own Health Experts Don't Agree with Vaccine Timeline; RBG in Her Own Words. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired September 20, 2020 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news.
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hello, everyone. I'm Michael Holmes and this is CNN NEWSROOM.
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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I will be putting forth a nominee next week. It will be a woman. It will be a woman.
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HOLMES: Welcome, everyone. Just 24 hours after the death of U.S. Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, in defiance of her dying wish to pick her replacement after the election, the U.S. president pushing ahead to fill her seat as quickly as possible.
At a rally in North Carolina, President Trump praising Ginsberg and her legacy, calling her a fierce fighter for justice and an inspiration to all Americans. He also said under the U.S. Constitution he has an obligation to name her replacement, quote, "without delay."
And his Republican allies in the U.S. Senate are backing him up, pressing for a confirmation vote by the end of the year. That would be lightning fast and also not to mention a stunning reversal from their own positions just 4 years ago.
In early 2016, they refused to vote on President Obama's Supreme Court pick, Merrick Garland or even give him a hearing, claiming then that it was because it was an election year. As a result, that vacancy wasn't filled for more than a year.
Well, with the U.S. election now barely 6 weeks away President Trump has no time to lose. His success in this fight hinges on a few -- on few, if any, defections among Senate Republicans. Already at least one senator, Susan Collins, says any nomination should wait until after the election. No guarantee in that. The president, though, brushing it off.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: Well, I totally disagree with her. We have an obligation. We won and we have an obligation as the winners to pick who we want.
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HOLMES: Democratic challenger Joe Biden now framing the upcoming election this way on Twitter.
Quote, "The Supreme Court is on the ballot and the outcome will impact everything from health care to civil rights, affecting generations to come," unquote.
Now the death of U.S. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the push by Republicans to replace her and quickly has altered the dynamics of the upcoming presidential election. CNN's Manu Raju explains exactly what is at stake.
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SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: This decision ought to be made by the next president.
MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): That was Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell then when Barack Obama was president in 2016 with a vacancy on the Supreme Court. But times have changed and so has the president.
MCCONNELL: We'd fill it.
RAJU (voice-over): Republican leaders applauding a full throated effort to fill justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's seat with the election just 45 days away, trying to make the argument, it's different now because Republicans control both the White House and the Senate.
Privately, McConnell and Trump speaking about potential nominees on Friday night. And the GOP leader, in a message to his colleagues, urging them to "keep your powder dry" and not take a position on whether the winner of the November election should be the one filling the vacancy left by the death of Ginsburg.
On Saturday senator Susan Collins of Maine, facing the toughest re- election of her career, breaking ranks, saying the decision of lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court should be made by the president who was elected on November 3rd.
But with a 53-47 majority Democrats need a total of four Republicans to vote no and stop the nomination. GOP senator Lisa Murkowski, before Ginsburg's death, made clear she did not want to move ahead on any vacancy before November.
And it's unclear if two other Republicans will agree. Privately, top Republicans are arguing that a Supreme Court fight will only boost their chances at holding the Senate majority in November.
And several Republicans in difficult races are indicating they'll vote to confirm Trump's nominee this year, even though some endangered Republicans, like North Carolina senator Thom Tillis, took the opposite position in 2016.
SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): We're going to let the American people speak.
RAJU (voice-over): Yet moving ahead before November could squeeze Republicans like Cory Gardner, running for re-election in Democratic leaning Colorado. Gardner's office did not respond to questions about whether the winner of November's elections should make the hugely consequential pick.
It typically takes between 2 to 3 months to confirm a Supreme Court nominee, meaning it would be much faster than usual to approve a replacement before November.
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RAJU (voice-over): Yet if a vote slips there's another complication if Arizona's appointed senator Martha McSally loses in November.
That means the Democrat Mark Kelly could be sworn in by the end of that month, bringing the GOP majority down from 52-48. So McConnell has little margin for error and several senators are uncommitted, like Utah's Mitt Romney.
And some senators in the past have been wary about an election year confirmation, like senator Chuck Grassley, who as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, refused to hold hearings for Obama's nominee in 2016.
He told CNN in July:
SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R-IA): If I were chairman of the committee, I couldn't move forward with it.
RAJU (voice-over): On Saturday his office declined to say if that is still his position.
Others have clearly shifted theirs, including Lindsey Graham, who now chairs the Judiciary Committee and said this in 2016.
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): Let's let the next president, whoever it might be, make that nomination and you could use my words against me.
RAJU: Now Lindsey Graham explains himself this way. He basically says that things have changed since 2018 in the aftermath of that vicious Supreme Court fight that got Brett Kavanaugh confirmed to the court. He says he views all this differently now.
But if the Republicans do move ahead, Senate Democrats have their own plans. They're talking about that right now. They had a conference call on Saturday afternoon in which Chuck Schumer told his caucus that all options are on the table if the Republicans do advance a nomination this fall.
And one of those options that Democrats are discussing, potentially expanding the Supreme Court, maybe going from nine justices to 11 justices or even more than that. They would need legislation to do that. And to pass legislation it would have to change the Senate filibuster rules.
And, to do that, they need to win the Senate majority first in the fall. So so much is on the line in this fall's election but Democrats have indicated they're not going to take this fight lying down -- Manu Raju, CNN, Capitol Hill.
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HOLMES: Now one of the leading Democrats in the Senate says filling Ginsburg's seat is about more than politics. Senator Dick Durbin telling CNN the stakes for the court and the country are very high.
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SEN. RICHARD DURBIN (D-IL), DEMOCRATIC WHIP: This is just not a political squabble among the big shots in Washington. What's at stake here is the future of the Supreme Court on issues like health insurance covering pre-existing conditions.
One of the first cases the Supreme Court will take up, basic choice questions for women's rights, moving forward in the wake of losing one of the leaders in our history in terms of forcing the debate in America on women's rights.
So it goes way beyond differences between politicians. I can tell you we have a number of senators on both sides of the aisle who are up for re-election. They're going to hear it at home. This is going to change the conversation in many of these senatorial contests.
And some of them may have second thoughts about reversing and changing the very position that they were arguing for four years ago.
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HOLMES: But wait, say some Republicans, they argue that the circumstances are not the same as four years ago when they said a new justice shouldn't be picked until after the election. CNN political commentator Scott Jennings defended the change of heart to our Chris Cuomo.
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SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: You did have different parties in power so that voters in 2016 had delivered mixed messages. You had Democrats in charge of one institution and Republicans in charge of the other.
In this case Republicans, the voters awarded them control of both and reaffirmed that control in the Senate in 2018. And look, the Constitution does not give the president the power to nominate this and the Senate to just rubber stamp it. You have two coequal separate branches of government that both have a role to play.
And you're right about one thing: it is about power and the Republicans do have power in the Senate and they have a constitutional duty to exercise that power however they see fit. And that's what they're going to do here.
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HOLMES: President Trump has already made the vacant Supreme Court seat a rallying cry for his re-election campaign. There's even a new campaign slogan. CNN's Ryan Nobles reports from Saturday's Trump rally in North Carolina.
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RYAN NOBLES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: President Trump making it clear to his supporters in Fayetteville, North Carolina, on Saturday night that he's not going to waste any time in picking a replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court.
Trump did have a lot of kind things to say about the former Supreme Court justice, calling her an inspiration. But he quickly pivoted to his plans to picking a replacement. The crowd responded, telling him to fill the seat and do it as soon as possible.
And Trump saying for the first time on Saturday night that he plans to pick a woman. Take a listen.
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TRUMP: So we will uphold equal justice under the law for citizens of every race, color, religion and creed. I will be putting forth a nominee next week. It will be a woman.
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NOBLES: Trump also revealing his timing for making that announcement, saying it should happen sometime next week. And sources telling CNN that the president plans to wait until Ginsburg has been officially laid to rest before making the official announcement.
Now in the Jewish tradition that could happen very quickly, meaning the president could be able to make the announcement sometime midweek or towards the end of the week. The goal, though, for Republicans is to get this process moving as soon as possible, even with the hope of getting confirmation before Election Day.
Now that would be difficult. Normally it takes several months to nominate and confirm a Supreme Court justice. But the president and Republicans seizing an opportunity here. And they're hoping to have it done quickly -- Ryan Nobles, CNN, Fayetteville, North Carolina.
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HOLMES: And joining me now is Joan Biskupic, CNN's Supreme Court analyst and has spent some 25 years covering the court.
Great to have you back on, Joan. I mean it's not like Republicans are being caught off guard by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
So who are the top candidate or two for the nomination?
Trump doing badly among woman voters, it looks like he's going to pick a woman. He says he is.
JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, Michael. They've been planning for this. You know, no one knew for sure when Ruth Bader Ginsburg would pass and she might have lasted another couple of years.
But because her health was in jeopardy, they've been planning and they wanted it. Two Supreme Court appointments and hoping for a third. Here's what they have. I'll give you the three names that seem to be most in contention right now.
But we're only, you know, 24 hours since her death. One woman by the name of Amy Coney Barrett, she's been in the running for a while. President Trump looked at her in 2017 when he ended up with first Neil Gorsuch and then the following year with Brett Kavanaugh.
She's a judge already on a U.S. appeals court based in Chicago. She taught at Notre Dame. All these people have very strong conservative credentials. She's a former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia.
They're all smart people; as I said, very conservative ideologically. And also a man by the name of Amul Thapar, who's a friend of Mitch ,McConnell who controls the Senate and what gets done. He was a U.S. attorney in Kentucky and he's now in appeals court in the middle of the country.
And then finally a woman who's just recently been elevated to another appeals court here in the U.S., the southeastern U.S. appeals court for the 11th Circuit, a woman by the name of Barbara Lagoa, who had been on the floor of the Supreme Court. She was the first Cuban American woman appointed to that Supreme Court.
And she recently was named by President Bush to one of our federal appeals courts. So, as I said, you know, things could be in flux. But these are the people who, right now, the smart money seems to be circulating around.
HOLMES: And as you say conservative all and perhaps not surprisingly. The thing is, you know, what are some of the major decisions in play for the court if the GOP does go through?
What sort of decisions are you talking about?
Roe versus Wade, abortion, religious liberty, immigration, health care of course.
BISKUPIC: Michael, you name it really. There's such a full slate of the most hot button cases before the justices this year and coming up soon. Already they've scheduled for mid-November a case testing the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as ObamaCare, President Barack Obama's signature domestic achievement that Republicans have been trying to kill ever since it was signed into law in 2010.
The Supreme Court narrowly upheld it in 2012, then again in 2015. One person who was crucial to a majority vote was Ruth Bader Ginsburg and she's now gone. So when that test comes back in November, it is going to be quite shaky.
We also have several tests of religious liberties coming, affirmative action. There's a major case still in the appellate court right now, testing Harvard's affirmative action policies, challenged by Asian Americans that I was covering last week at the appeals court level.
And that's marching its way toward the Supreme Court, which already was very much leaning toward finally getting rid of -- pardon me -- finally getting rid of affirmative action.
And I think with another conservative justice, that could happen. And then finally you mentioned Roe versus Wade, the 1973 landmark, that made abortion legal nationwide in America.
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BISKUPIC: That's one that's been hanging by a thread in recent years. And if President Trump is able to name a third conservative to the courts, that case could be overturned or gutted.
HOLMES: So essentially, what we've seen with President Trump getting three picks on the Supreme Court, we're talking about a fundamental change in Americans' lives for maybe a generation.
BISKUPIC: Oh, yes, a generation and more. What I've been saying to people, it will affect the law that your children and your grandchildren live under.
I'll use an example I've been thinking about because, in 1991, another civil rights icon in America, Thurgood Marshall, retired and Clarence Thomas was named by George H.W. Bush to replace him. Marshall was a liberal icon and he was the opposite of Clarence Thomas, his successor, who was only 43 at the time in 1991. And Clarence Thomas is still on the Supreme Court nearly 30 years later.
HOLMES: Unlike 2016, when a conservative replaced a conservative, what you're seeing here is a conservative replacing a liberal and it has long-term impacts. Joan, thank you so much. Appreciate it.
BISKUPIC: Thanks, Michael.
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HOLMES: We'll take a quick break here on the program. When we come back, the looming showdown. More on the political battle shaping up to fill Ruth Bader Ginsburg's seat on the Supreme Court. When we come back.
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HOLMES: More now on our top story, the looming showdown over the next Supreme Court nominee. President Trump saying he will pick a woman next week to fill Ruth Bader Ginsburg's seat. She died Friday at 87.
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HOLMES (voice-over): You can see there people gathered outside the Supreme Court for a second night. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell promising a full Senate vote on the president's pick.
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HOLMES: For more let's discuss this with CNN senior political analyst Ron Brownstein, joining me from Los Angeles.
I wanted to pick your brains, politically, when it comes to the election itself, whose base is likely to be most energized to vote because of this issue?
Republicans hoped the Kavanaugh hearings would energize their base in 2018 and there was a blue wave.
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: Historically, as you know, Republican voters have been more energized and motivated by the Supreme Court than Democratic voters. I think that's not true. I think this is likely to further the cultural separation of the parties we've been living through over the last couple of decades but enormously accelerated under Trump.
I think this is going to further hurt Republicans in white collar suburbs, so in states where there are a large number of those voters, I think this is a clear headwind for Republican Senate and House candidates as well as for Trump himself.
And on the other hand in places where there are a lot of conservative Christians, particularly evangelical Christians, it's going to motivate them. On balance, most Americans believe abortion should remain legal and a big majority believe the protections for pre- existing conditions in the Affordable Care Act should remain in place.
In that sense if Democrats can make this more specific as opposed to a broader culture war, they are playing to the majority of public opinion.
HOLMES: Yes, on abortion and health care, I think it's 70-78 percent of Americans want abortion to remain legal. Some key issues -- you touched on this -- coming up before the court. We're talking about abortion, health care, immigration policy and the like. These things are going to be decided with this new justice if it all goes through.
How much will those important issues play into how people may vote in the election with the Supreme Court in mind?
Will they look at what the court might do and vote accordingly?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, look, as you know -- as I wrote this week, this is a very deeply engraved election at this point. You know, Joe Biden leading by about 7 points in the national polling averages. He led by about 7 points last October before there were a few intervening events, including the worst pandemic in American history, since at least a century of American history, in which 200,000 people are now dead.
So we're probably talking about any movement even on this only at the margin. I think, though, that the bigger issue to me is that you now have the potential for rising tension over the role of the Supreme Court through the 2020s because the Supreme Court, you know, if you have six justices that were appointed by Republican presidents and Republican senators, in most cases, the presidents appointing them did not win the popular vote.
The Republican senators who confirmed them, in most cases, do not represent a majority of the country if you assign half of each Senate -- a state's population to each senator.
So I think if this majority increasingly over the course of the next decade is striking down what the Democratic coalition that wins the election wants to do on climate, on civil rights, on racial justice, on voting rights. I think there's going to be a lot of pressure to change the structure of the Supreme Court in the coming years.
HOLMES: Yes, you make a good point on the Senate. I mean, I think Republican senators represent 15 million fewer people than Democratic senators.
Speak to the scenario of Republicans; theoretically, they lose the White House, they also lose the Senate. But then voting in the lame duck session on a Supreme Court justice, what would be -- I hesitate to use the word -- the morality of voting for a pick of a president who was just kicked out?
BROWNSTEIN: Look, we are seeing a escalation of political tactics on both sides.
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BROWNSTEIN: But there's no question that Republicans are moving toward on any means necessary mentality to try to maintain power in a country that, in many ways, is demographically evolving away from them.
We saw every Republican senator but one vote not to sanction the president for overtly extorting a foreign government to try to get dirt on his opponent. We've not heard a peep from Republicans in Congress as the president, really for the first time in American history, is overtly trying to tilt the census to benefit one political party. And, of course, we saw in 2016 Mitch McConnell and the unprecedented
step of holding open a Supreme Court seat for an entire year to prevent President Obama from filling it.
So if after all of that, Republicans come back from an election where they lost and push this through, which they may do. I think Democrats, I think it's pretty easy for them to find three Republicans who may say no. But getting a fourth one is not going to be easy.
If they do that and Democrats win the House and Senate, it'll be hard for Democrats to throw away the niceties, add D.C. as a state for example and kind of really move aggressively in this cycle of action and reaction to implement the agenda over the objections of the Republican minority at that point.
HOLMES: I tweeted out a list of 23 senators and their comments from 2016 last night. It took off because everybody was like, when they see it written like that, I think they call it situational ethics because they're all going to flip basically.
You said something that just resonates, though. You've had the economy, you've had the virus, all the things you just outlined there. Joe Biden's lead has not moved much.
Why?
And could it cost him?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, you know, sure. He is not so far ahead that a small improvement for President Trump would not put Trump in a position where he could conceivably win the electoral college even if he loses the popular vote.
But that would not happen today. President Trump is too far behind. And he's driven away too many of the college educated white voters that used to vote Republican and now are voting for Biden really in unprecedented numbers, numbers we've never seen in a history of polling in a presidential election.
You know, if you ask me -- like I said, this is probably going to affect things at the margin. But to the extent it does affect things, it's going to reinforce those lines, I think. Because the prospect of criminalizing abortion or at least ending the legal protection for abortion is something that is very attractive to aspects of Trump's culturally conservative base, evangelical voters, culturally conservative Catholics, people in rural areas.
But it is a terrifying prospect to an awful lot of white suburban voters already moving away from the Republican Party. So this will push us further into a political system where the parties are divided more by culture than by class.
If you look at the Senate, by the way, this could help Democrats get right to the brink of a majority; it doesn't necessarily help them get over it. Colorado, Arizona and Maine, states where Republicans are in trouble, a lot of white collar suburbanites, a clear majority in those states to maintain abortion to be legal.
So I think this is going to hurt Republicans in those states. But beyond that, Democrats have to win one more and that's either North Carolina, Iowa, South Carolina, Georgia, you know, Montana.
And in those places the politics, I think, are much more equivocal and we don't really know how it'll play out. A closer split, closer to 50- 50 on whether abortion should remain legal in these states. And I think it really is an open question how this actually unfolds in that last state Democrats need to win, although I think it does help them get closer off the bat.
HOLMES: When the law becomes political. Always a pleasure. Good to see you, Ron.
BROWNSTEIN: Thanks for having me.
HOLMES: And CNN NEWSROOM continues after a quick break.
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HOLMES: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM, everyone. I'm Michael Holmes. Appreciate your company.
We're, of course, following the dramatic aftermath caused by the death of the U.S. Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died on Friday. President Trump paying tribute to her at a rally on Saturday.
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TRUMP: As we meet tonight our nation mourns the loss of a legal giant, Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Her landmark rulings, fierce devotion to justice and her courageous battle against cancers inspired all Americans.
You may agree, you may not disagree with her but she was an inspiration to a tremendous number of people. I say all Americans.
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HOLMES: Yet the president wasting no time finding a conservative replacement for that liberal justice. He said he will nominate a woman next week to fill the Supreme Court vacancy. And Senate Republicans pushing to get a confirmation vote by the end of the year, very different to what they said four years ago.
Democrats pushing back. Presidential challenger Joe Biden now framing the election this way.
Quote, "The Supreme Court is on the ballot and the outcome will impact everything from health care to civil rights, affecting generations to come."
Now politics aside, Ginsburg's passing has inspired tributes and respect from across the U.S. The expression showed just how much of an iconic and irreplaceable figure she was. More now from CNN's Jessica Schneider.
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JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: All of the singing and the celebration lasted into Saturday night. Everyone here to pay tribute to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
There were streams of people who came here to the Supreme Court after hearing about her passing on Friday night. And it lasted throughout the day on Saturday. People came here to lay flowers, to light candles, to sing.
There were also many renditions of "Amazing Grace." Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg served at the Supreme Court for more than 27 years and the vigils stretched all over the country, from Denver to San Francisco to tributes in New York City as well.
The morning, on Saturday morning, the vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris also came here in a nonchalant manner with her husband. They wore masks and they stayed silent as they looked to the Supreme Court to pay their own tribute.
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SCHNEIDER: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was referred to as a tireless champion of justice by the chief justice here, John Roberts. And that's exactly what the people have been remembering all weekend -- Jessica Schneider, CNN, Washington.
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HOLMES: Meanwhile the U.S. fast approaching the 200,000 mark when it comes to lives lost to COVID-19. Daily cases here in the U.S. have been ticking up recently. Medical experts say they're worried about flu season and how coronavirus might make that more dangerous.
Around the world Poland, Lebanon and Uganda among the countries now reporting record case surges, while Taiwan has become a case study on how to manage the pandemic.
In London police have arrested 32 people after anti-lockdown and anti- vaccination protests. Officers say there were outbreaks of violence and emergency workers were assaulted.
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HOLMES: Joining me now is Anne Rimoin, professor of epidemiology at UCLA.
Good to see you. It is hard to think of another time when a health issue has been so political and that's directly impacting public faith in a possible new vaccine. And that's what we wanted to talk about.
New polling is showing only 51 percent would get the vaccine. The thing is that's down from 72 percent. Speak to the growing public skepticism and the potential impact of that mistrust.
ANNE RIMOIN, EPIDEMIOLOGY PROFESSOR, UCLA FIELDING SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH: Michael, this is a huge problem. We are losing faith in all of our institutions that dictate public health care. We've lost a lot of confidence in the FDA with politicization.
Now CDC has also fallen prey to politics. And so it's not surprising that people who previously were not vaccinate hesitant or worried about vaccines are feeling worried. The polls are showing this very, very clearly.
You know, taking vaccines normally, under normal circumstances, we do have a do a lot of work at getting public confidence. We've had to do more and more over the years. But with all of the politicization and mixed messaging, we're going to have a tough time here.
Even if a vaccine is very effective, if less than half the population actually take it, we're not going to reach any kind of immunity and we're still going to run into problems. I should also mention that a vaccine is not a silver bullet.
So with the vaccine hesitancy, with a vaccine that is likely not going to be 100 percent effective, we're not going to see major protection here.
HOLMES: I guess, what do you think can be done to convince the public that a vaccine is safe, even if one is genuinely safe?
That doesn't matter if people don't trust it.
Would it be something like Anthony Fauci standing up and saying it's good with me?
What would it take?
RIMOIN: Getting people to trust a vaccine is going to need a lot of -- we're going to need transparency from the government. We're going to have to see all of the scientific experts being able to see the data, both in the government, people like Dr. Fauci, but scientists outside of the government.
Many of us who have been on television, who have been very vocal in the news, that have been really serving as watchdogs for science here. And I think that making these data available to the scientific community and having the scientific community being able to come out and say, yes, we have looked at these data, we agree this is going to be effective, is going to be very important.
And having important public figures taking the vaccine, we've seen this happen with polio vaccine, getting people that are well-known taking the vaccine, the Ebola vaccine, many vaccines. We've seen that using public figures to be able to really show people that this vaccine is worth taking is going to be very important.
HOLMES: Because, of course, the thing is, there's a sizable anti- vaccine movement, regardless of the coronavirus, before all of this. And let's remember, the president once raised alleged links between autism and vaccines.
But then you throw in the concerns that the process is being rushed, fears about safety protocols being short-circuited. You worry that the anti-vaccine movement could grow because of the politicizing of this vaccine.
RIMOIN: Well, I think we have a lot to worry about in terms of politicization of science. And now we're going to be paying the price with vaccines. It is ironic that President Trump was once somebody who spent a lot of time talking about potential anti-vaccine theories. And now it's going to be on him to get the population to take the vaccine.
HOLMES: Just quickly, how much has the president played into this, his own rosy pronouncements, confidence despite the caution of experts?
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HOLMES: How much does that impact people's choices?
RIMOIN: I think the president has to be somebody that you -- the president, in principle, should be somebody you trust. And we're seeing the complete erosion of trust. He's not been relying on his scientific advisers. You see all sorts of mixed messaging.
Dr. Redfield says one thing; Dr. Fauci says another and then Trump comes out and says the opposite. So this kind of mixed messaging is very dangerous. It's very dangerous not only for the coronavirus but for all public health.
And so we need to have our political leaders be on the same page with our scientific leaders and coming forth and giving statements that make sense, that are based on science and that the rest of the public health community, the scientific community, can get behind.
HOLMES: Yes, exactly. Epidemiologist Anne Rimoin, thanks so much.
RIMOIN: My pleasure.
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HOLMES: As we mentioned earlier, Taiwan leading the way in the fight against coronavirus. Taiwan reporting only about 500 cases of COVID- 19, just seven deaths. CNN's Paula Hancocks explains what they got right.
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PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Staying next to the midday sun seems more important than keeping six feet apart for these Taipei residents. The streets are busy, restaurants have lunchtime queues. Life during the pandemic seems fairly normal.
What strikes me is that even though there are an awful lot of people wearing masks in the street, there are still a significant number who aren't. I'm being told, a few months ago when there were still local transmission cases here, people wore masks without complaint.
But now there's more of a confidence in a way the government has handled this pandemic and they simply don't feel the need anymore.
Just one suspected case of local transmission since April. The rest are imported. Out of a population of 23 million, there have been around 500 confirmed cases and just seven deaths. Foreign minister Joseph Wu tells me they learned harsh lessons from the 2003 SARS outbreak.
JOSEPH WU, TAIWANESE FOREIGN MINISTER: At the time Taiwan was hit very hard and we started building up our capacity in dealing with a pandemic like this. So when we heard there was some secret pneumonia cases in China, the patients were treated in isolation, we knew that it was something similar.
HANCOCKS (voice-over): Early recognition of the crisis and suspicions that Beijing was not being transparent spurred the government to respond fast, setting up a command center.
Passengers from Wuhan China, were screened from the start of the year, weeks before other countries started to react. Early travel restrictions, a 14-day quarantine for arrivals, contact tracing and testing.
Mask rationing prevented panic buying and Taiwan increased production to the point it was able to donate 12 million masks to the United States, lifting their world standing. Sil Chen (ph) was a college student in Taiwan during the SARS epidemic and says the country learned social solidarity.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Very few people here will refuse to wear a mask.
HANCOCKS (voice-over): She now runs a psychotherapy practice in New York. She caught a mild form of the virus then mid-March, spending five weeks recovering in her apartment.
SIL CHEN, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: At the time I couldn't even get a test because the -- I remember I think the criteria was for you to have shortness of breath or difficulty breathing or some life-threatening situation.
HANCOCKS (voice-over): Chen came back to Taiwan in July to visit her sick grandmother and was shocked by the difference in realities.
CHEN: Life here is so surreal. It's basically like normal. Every so often, you have to remember to wear a mask and you'll have your temperature taken. But that's about it.
HANCOCKS (voice-over): A snapshot of normality in a world of uncertainty -- Paula Hancocks, CNN, Taipei, Taiwan. (END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: The U.S. Gulf Coast can't catch a break this hurricane season. A new storm system heading for Texas and Louisiana and it is bringing a lot of rain. We'll tell you what else to expect when we come back.
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HOLMES: Residents along the U.S. Gulf Coast have already been battered, of course, by hurricanes Hannah and Laura. Now tropical storm Beta is heading that way, the latest in a record breaking storm season.
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HOLMES: We'll take a quick break. When we come back we'll return to the death and the remarkable life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the notorious RBG, in her own words after the break.
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HOLMES: Welcome back.
We have heard a lot about her from people who knew her. But let's close with her own words. It is a little window into what it was like to be Ruth Bader Ginsberg and to be a successful woman in a changing America.
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RUTH BADER GINSBURG, U.S. SUPREME COURT JUSTICE: If you want to be a true professional, you will do something outside yourself, something to repair tears in your community.
No door should be closed to people willing to spend the hours of effort needed to make dreams come true. We are a nation made strong by people like you.
In my lifetime, I expect to see three, four, perhaps even more women on the high court bench, women not shaped from the same mold but of different complexions. We are at last beginning to relegate to history books the days of the token one-at-a-time woman.
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GINSBURG: The number of women who have come forward as a result of the #MeToo movement has been astonishing. My hope is not just that it's here to stay but that it is as effective for the woman who works as a maid in a hotel as it is for Hollywood stars.
I have had the great good fortune to share life with a partner, who believed, at age 18, when we met, that a woman's work, whether at home or on the job, is as important as a man's.
It helps sometimes to be a little deaf.
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GINSBURG: I have followed that advice assiduously and not only at home through 56 years of a marital partnership, I have employed it as well in every workplace, including the Supreme Court of the United States.
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GINSBURG: When a thoughtless or unkind word is spoken, best tune out. Reacting in anger or annoyance will not advance one's ability to persuade.
To make life a little better for people less fortunate than you, that's what I think a meaningful life is. One lives not just for oneself but for one's community. Thank you so much. Thank you.
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HOLMES: A remarkable human being.
Thanks for watching the program and spending time with me. I will be back with another hour of CNN NEWSROOM right after the break.
