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White House Chief Of Staff: "We Are Not Going To Control The Pandemic"; Pence Campaigns Despite Coronavirus Outbreak Among Top Staffers; Italy's Hospitals Brace For new Surge Of Patients. Aired 5:30-6a ET
Aired October 26, 2020 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[05:31:45]
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Vice President Mike Pence still on the campaign trail after at least five of his aides test positive for coronavirus.
LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: And the Biden campaign is blasting the White House's admission that it's not going to control the pandemic with just eight days now until the election.
Good morning, this is EARLY START. I'm Laura Jarrett.
ROMANS: Nice to see you. It's Monday morning. I'm Christine Romans. It is 32 minutes past the hour.
And there's just over a week to go until Election Day and there are new coronavirus outbreaks and concerns inside the Trump administration and at the president's favorite T.V. network.
Vice President Mike Pence's chief of staff and a personal assistant are among five people in the vice president's orbit to test positive. Now despite this, Pence refuses to accept CDC guidance on quarantining. Instead, he remains on the campaign trail and even plans to be in the Senate for today's confirmation vote on Judge Amy Coney Barrett.
And now, "The New York Times" reporters the president of Fox News and several of the channel's top anchors, including Brett Baier and Martha McCallum -- they have been advised to quarantine. They were exposed to the virus on a flight to Nashville for last Thursday's final presidential debate.
All of this after a stunning surrender to the virus by the White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. Listen to what he told -- what he admitted to CNN's Jake Tapper.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK MEADOWS, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: Here is what we have to do. We are not going to control the pandemic. We are going to control the fact that we get vaccines, therapeutics, and other mitigation areas because --
JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, STATE OF THE UNION: Why aren't we going to get control of the pandemic?
MEADOWS: Because it is a contagious virus just like the flu. It's contagious --
TAPPER: Yes, but why not make efforts to contain it?
MEADOWS: Well, we are making efforts to contain it --
TAPPER: By running all over the country and not wearing a mask? That's what the vice president's doing.
MEADOWS: Jake, we can get into the back-and-forth. Let me just say this is what we need to do is make sure that we have the proper mitigation factors, whether it's therapies or vaccines or treatments, to make sure that people don't die from this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: That's a stark reminder to voters of this administration's failures in handling the pandemic with just eight days to go until Election Day.
Here is CNN's John Harwood.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN HARWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Events on Sunday encapsulated the dilemma facing President Trump and his campaign with just over a week to go before Election Day. The president was campaigning in both Maine and New Hampshire, insisting we're rounding the corner on the pandemic, appearing without masks or social distancing, getting very close to voters.
But reality intruded with a major outbreak of coronavirus with people close to the vice president, including his chief of staff Marc Short, as well as his body man -- the one who travels most closely with Mike Pence. Now, despite that, the White House continued to have Mike Pence out on the campaign trail. He disregarded CDC guidelines to not quarantine himself.
The White House chief of staff Mark Meadows confessed in a conversation with Jake Tapper that we can't control the pandemic. We're simply waiting for therapeutics and a vaccine.
The challenge, of course, is for the president -- the coronavirus pandemic is the number-one issue for voters and they have a harsh judgment of the president's handling of it.
Nevertheless, he's pressing on and he ended the evening on Sunday with a trick-or-treat Halloween event at the White House. The president appearing without a mask -- without a mask. However, he was not handing out the candy itself. That was done by White House staffers who were wearing masks and gloves in a different location. [05:35:09]
John Harwood, CNN, the White House.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JARRETT: John, thank you.
The president was grilled about the lack of mask-wearing at his rallies in an interview with "60 MINUTES" that the president had initially tried to derail but
finally aired last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Lesley, we hand out thousands of masks at every rally.
LESLEY STAHL, CBS NEWS REPORTER, "60 MINUTES": But you look out and they're not wearing them. You don't get up there and say look -- you know, come on --
TRUMP: OK. What's your --
STAHL: -- I don't want you to get sick.
TRUMP: What's your next question, Lesley? We're outside. The rallies are bigger than they've ever been, there's more enthusiasm than we've ever had. There has never been anything like what you're witnessing now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: That exchange hints at some of the tension during the interview as Lesley Stahl challenged the president on the pandemic and his conspiratorial claims about former President Barack Obama spying on his campaign.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: What we haven't done a good job on is convincing people like you because you're really quite impossible to convince.
STAHL: Tell me about the mask-wearing.
TRUMP: You're so negative, you're so negative. These are the biggest rallies we've ever had. You just come in here with that negative attitude.
And they got caught and you will see that, Lesley. And you know that but you just don't want to put it on the air.
STAHL: No. As a matter of fact, I don't know that.
TRUMP: OK.
STAHL: And you're out there --
TRUMP: So why don't you get back to your interview and let's go. Excuse me, Lesley, you started with me. Your first statement was are you ready for tough questions?
STAHL: Are you?
TRUMP: That's no way to talk. That's no way to talk.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: Our fact-checker-in-chief Daniel Dale says the president made at least 16 false or misleading claims during that interview. And, Christine, he was clearly bristling --
ROMANS: Yes.
JARRETT: -- at tough questions. But he had to know he was going to be pressed on this pandemic, given that over 200,000 people have died on his watch.
ROMANS: But he kept trying to pivot back to the size and the enthusiasm at these rallies, which is her point exactly that you've got all these people close together in the middle of a pandemic. He's just trying to rebrand a coronavirus recession and a coronavirus pandemic into enthusiasm for his own crowds and rallies.
You know, president -- former President Obama was in Miami at his own event and listen to what he said this weekend -- listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: When "60 MINUTES" and Lesley Stahl are too tough for you, you ain't all that tough. Hey, if you've got to walk out of a "60 MINUTES" interview then you're never going to stand up to a dictator. If you're spending all your time complaining about how mean reporters are to you, you're not going to stand up to Putin.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: The former president there riffing.
JARRETT: I think he's wrong about that. I think, clearly, Lesley Stahl is pretty tough and the president couldn't take it.
ROMANS: Yes.
Democratic nominee Joe Biden also sat down with "60 MINUTES," by the way. Here he is telling Nora O'Donnell about his approach to the pandemic, pushing back on President Trump's claim that he wants to -- that Biden wants to shut down the economy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: You don't have to lock down the economy. It depends on the community. It depends on where it's real -- in real trouble. And you have to do things that make sense -- that make it easier for people to avoid being exposed.
Freedom is about making sure that you care about the people you're around -- that they be free, too. It's patriotism to put this mask on.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: Biden also addressed a frequent attack line from the president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NORA O'DONNELL, CBS NEWS ANCHOR, CBS EVENING NEWS, CORRESPONDENT, 60 MINUTES: If elected, you would be the oldest president in American history.
BIDEN: I'm in good shape.
O'DONNELL: Seventy-eight years old, 82 after four years. Donald Trump says you have dementia and it's getting worse.
BIDEN: Hey, the same guy who thought that the 911 attack was a 711 attack -- he's talking about dementia?
All I can say to the American people is watch me. You see what I've done, you see what I'm going to do. Look at me, compare our physical and mental acuity. I'm happy to have that comparison.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: All right, with eight days to go until this election, it's time for three questions in three minutes. Let's bring in CNN's senior political analyst John Avlon.
ROMANS: Hey, John.
JARRETT: Nice to see you this morning.
JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Good morning.
JARRETT: All right, John -- so the White House chief of staff makes a little bit of news, I think inadvertently yesterday, saying the U.S. isn't going to control the pandemic. In some ways, he is -- he's being honest with I think what is really a truthful admission that this administration has never had a plan to control this pandemic.
AVLON: You know, I -- this, I think, was more than the classic Washington gaffe, which is telling the truth. I think this was a stunning statement of an administration waving a white flag in front of a national crisis, the likes that we've never really seen before.
I mean, he's just telling Jake Tapper we're not going to control this virus. We're going to try to mitigate it. We're going to try to deal with vaccines. To do that at a time when rates are rising -- yes, the administration may be back ending into the kind of herd immunity the president talked about and his advisers have advocated.
[05:40:03]
But that's where we are -- the people in charge of the pandemic response at this point not only are infected like Vice President Pence's team but also saying that we can't do anything about this. Batten down the hatches. At a time when death rates are rising and the president is still in denial saying we've turned the corner.
ROMANS: Yes, and even --
AVLON: It's tough.
ROMANS: Even on mitigation, there hasn't been clear leadership on mitigation.
AVLON: Yes.
ROMANS: On mask-wearing, on quarantining, on contact tracing. On just endorsing what we have to do if you're going to live with this virus.
AVLON: Yes.
ROMANS: Meanwhile, both Trump and Biden made their closing pitches on "60 MINUTES" last night with, obviously, starkly different visions of the country. Have they done enough at this stage now to solidify their bases and win over the undecided voters?
AVLON: I mean, look, undecided voters are a little bit like a Sasquatch right now. But I'll you what, Donald Trump doesn't -- hasn't seem concerned about winning over undecided voters or the reasonable edge of the opposition since he got in office. That's one of the reasons he seems to have found himself in a hole that he's dug himself into.
By contrast, if you look at Joe Biden's closing arguments, from his speech at Gettysburg to his closing ads that have aired during the World Series, it is constantly about reaching out. You see the ads mention reaching out to Republicans.
We don't all need to agree about issues, we just need to agree we love this country. Biden's core argument is that and Donald Trump seems fundamentally disinterested in that. That's a problem.
JARRETT: John, what states, with eight days to go, are high on your radar that could possibly tip or be a surprise perhaps for the former V.P. in this election? You know, a lot of talk right now about Texas actually being close.
ROMANS: Yes, Kamala Harris is going there on Friday.
AVLON: Yes. Look, I mean -- you know, the campaigns are putting time in Texas and Georgia, which typically are just written off as Republican states.
Now look, Democrats -- if they can peel away Georgia or Texas, this thing is over at 1964 landslide levels. But we also saw in 2016, Hillary's team acting awfully confident about flipping some big states, including Arizona, which didn't go her way.
ROMANS: Right.
JARRETT: Yes.
AVLON: Still, election night -- you want to get a sense of how things are going -- how election week is going to look, pay attention to Florida and Arizona because they count their early ballots early. Then take a look at the upward Midwest. That's still the key piece of the puzzle -- Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania. And then, if it gets down to Texas and Georgia, you've got a whole different night going on.
ROMANS: All right, John Avlon. Nice to see you this Monday morning.
AVLON: Take care, guys.
ROMANS: Buckle up -- eight days.
AVLON: Here we are, let's do this.
JARRETT: Thanks, John.
ROMANS: Thanks, John.
JARRETT: All right.
Join us for special live election coverage the way only CNN can bring it to you. From the first votes to the critical count, understand what's happening in your state and across the country -- "ELECTION NIGHT IN AMERICA." Our special coverage starts Tuesday at 4:00 p.m. eastern.
ROMANS: And, Facebook is preparing tools to combat any unrest following the election. "The Wall Street Journal" reports that if necessary, the platform will use the same measures it does in so- called at-risk countries, like Sri Lanka and Myanmar.
That's right -- employing at-risk country protocols for the United States of America. That includes slowing the spread of viral posts, tweaking new feed content, and lowering the bar for removing posts that could incite violence. Facebook reportedly plans to only use the tools in circumstances like election-related violence.
Facebook told CNN it spent years building for a safer election and that it has created policies to ensure it's more prepared for the, quote, "unique challenges of an election during a global pandemic."
Facebook was widely criticized for how it handled the 2016 election. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg warned last month that there was an increased risk of civil unrest after this election. Zuckerberg will face a Senate hearing this week, along with the heads of Google and Twitter, about how the companies handle hate speech and misinformation.
And, Laura, you know, here is a pandemic -- there is a health pandemic. There's also a pandemic of misinformation --
JARRETT: Yes.
ROMANS: -- and Americans who are very used to soaking up a lot of garbage and nonsense and passing it along. So kind of a twin pandemic there in a very important election. It's going to be a real challenge for Facebook.
JARRETT: Yes. Glad to see they're trying to get ahead of it this time -- at least, hopefully.
All right, still ahead for you, Italy was Europe's epicenter of the pandemic, and hospitals there are now bracing for a new surge. We're going to take you there next.
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[05:48:24]
JARRETT: Welcome back.
Italy's prime minister ordering bars and restaurants closed after 6:00 p.m. in response to a second wave of the pandemic. The new restrictions coming as Italy hit another record daily increase in infections over the weekend. Now, hospitals nationwide are bracing for a new surge of coronavirus patients.
CNN's Ben Wedeman is live in Rome with the latest. Ben, Italy is struggling. But also, Europe, more generally, being really hard-hit right now.
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, actually, across-the-board in Western Europe, the numbers are fairly worrying. This newspaper in Rome here says "E Peggio di Prima" -- it's worse than before. And certainly, what -- the numbers we're seeing are very worrying and the worry -- there's nobody more worried than those who work in Italy's hospitals.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WEDEMAN (voice-over): The intensive care unit is a place of total concentration. No small talk, just the rhythmic beeping of the machines and steady breathing of patients on ventilators.
The Ospedale Maggiore de Lodi was in the front line of Italy's coronavirus pandemic earlier this year and now, the staff is bracing for the second wave.
Dr. Mateo Brambati (sp) anticipates another nightmare. It's like the second jump for a paratrooper, he tells me. The first time you don't know what to expect. The second jump is more problematic because you know what's coming.
[05:50:02]
WEDEMAN (on camera): At the moment, Italian hospitals are able to deal with the number of patients in intensive care. However, that could change as the numbers continue to skyrocket.
WEDEMAN (voice-over): ICU director, Dr. Enrico Storti, regularly gathers his colleagues for a debrief.
DR. ENRICO STORTI, DIRECTOR, ICU: (INAUDIBLE) and how we can now bring to the floor and bring on the table our solutions that we --
WEDEMAN (voice-over): Gathered in this room are some of Italy's -- perhaps some of the world's most experienced soldiers in the fight against COVID-19.
Dr. Annalisa Malara diagnosed the first Italian coronavirus patient on the 20th of February.
DR. ANNALISA MALARA, OSPEDALE MAGGIORE DI LODI: We are ready because we learned a lot.
WEDEMAN (voice-over): But this war, like all wars, takes a toll.
DR. MICHELE INTRONA, OSPEDALE MAGGIORE DI LODI: I think I felt like the soldiers during the World Wars. I don't know, I think I experienced what these young boys experienced at that time when they were going fighting for -- I mean, a war, knowing that they could die.
WEDEMAN (voice-over): The empty beds ready for more causalities.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WEDEMAN: And that head of the ICU there in Lodi told me, putting it all in perspective. He said we are -- and I'm quoting him here -- "at the very, very, very beginning of this second wave" -- Laura.
JARRETT: It's just incredible to see those scenes in the hospital. You feel like it's March or April all over again. But thank you for bringing their stories. It's so important to show the reality of this, Ben. Thank you.
ROMANS: All right, it's Monday morning. Let's get a check on CNN Business around the world. Looking at markets, you can see a mixed performance in Asia, but Europe has opened lower. Frankfurt down a tough two percent there.
On Wall Street, futures at this hour also leaning lower -- one percent for the Dow Industrials. You know, futures falling after U.S. coronavirus cases hit a record one-day high over the weekend. This week, investors will keep a close eye on stimulus negotiations.
Wall Street also gearing up for big corporate earnings. Apple, Facebook, Alphabet, Amazon, Boeing, and Caterpillar all report later this week.
There's also some key economic data. The U.S. reports how the economy fared in the third quarter on Thursday. That third-quarter GDP will be really interesting to watch. Probably a huge bounce back after just an epic collapse earlier in the summer. Dunkin' Brands is up for sale. The parent company of Dunkin' and Baskin-Robbins tells CNN it's in preliminary talks to go private in a sale to Inspire Brands. Private equity-backed Inspire owns several restaurants, including Arby's and Buffalo Wild Wings.
Dunkin' says there is no certainty of a deal here. Inspire declined to comment. "The New York Times" first reported the potential $8.8 billion sale.
Dunkin' Brands operates 13,000 Dunkin's stores and 8,000 Baskin- Robbins. Dunkin', which went public back in 2011, is set to release earnings on Thursday.
All right, don't expect to board a Delta flight if you refuse to wear a mask. Delta says it has banned 460 people from flying for not following its mask policy. It required all passengers to wear masks starting in May.
The Delta CEO Ed Bastian said in a memo to employees that a mask is the simplest and most effective action to reduce transmission.
In June, all U.S. airlines agreed to ban passengers for refusing to wear masks. The airlines say the get-touch policy is vital to protecting both passengers and their crew members.
JARRETT: Well, Pope Francis has named 13 new Roman Catholic cardinals, including the first African-American cardinal of the United States.
The appointment of Washington, D.C. Archbishop Wilton Gregory makes him the highest-ranking African-American leader of the church. The 72- year-old Gregory is best known for leading the church's response to an internal sex abuse scandal in the early 2000s.
Nine of the newly-named cardinals are younger than 80 years old, which allows them to vote on a successor to the pontiff.
Well, astronaut Kate Rubins just cast the longest distance mail-in ballot from space. Rubins is the only American voter not currently on planet earth, at least that we know of. She tweeted a selfie voting from the International Space Station last week.
Here's the way it works. A secure electronic ballot is uploaded to the Mission Control Center. Then the astronaut casts their vote and it's e-mailed back to the county clerk's office.
Rubins says if she can vote from space, all of us should be able to vote on the ground. Good for her. I'm going to go line up later today, actually.
ROMANS: That is amazing. Far out, I will say about that story.
JARRETT: You love the puns.
ROMANS: I do. Sorry, it's Monday. Thanks for joining us, everyone. I'm Christine Romans.
JARRETT: I'm Laura Jarrett. "NEW DAY" is next.
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[05:59:22]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: With just over a week to go before Election Day, the president insisting we're rounding the corner.
BIDEN: The way he's handling COVID is just absolutely totally irresponsible.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: The vice president was in North Carolina yesterday despite the fact that several of his top aides have recently tested positive.
MEADOWS: We're not going to control the pandemic. It is a contagious virus just like the flu. It's contagious --
TAPPER: But why not make efforts to contain it?
MEADOWS: Well, we are making efforts to contain it.
MICHAEL OSTERHOLM, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR INFECTIOUS DISEASE RESEARCH AND POLICY, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA: We easily will hit six-figure numbers in terms of the number of cases, and the deaths are going to go up precipitously.
DR. SCOTT GOTTLIEB, FORMER COMMISSIONER, FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION: We're at a dangerous tipping point right now.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES, NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH: If people are not wearing masks then maybe we should be mandating it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It is Monday, October 26.
