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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Opposing Pandemic Strategies in Final Days of Campaign, Extended Deadlines for Absentee Ballots in Pennsylvania and North Carolina; "Terrorist Attack" at Church In French City of Nice. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired October 29, 2020 - 05:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[05:00:20]

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump and Joe Biden push contrasting strategies to battle this pandemic. What Dr. Fauci says now that he has never said before?

LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: And big wins for Democrats at the Supreme Court. Two battleground states will be able to count absentee ballots even if they arrive after Election Day.

Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is EARLY START. I'm Laura Jarrett.

ROMANS: Good morning, and I'm Christine Romans. It's Thursday, October 29th, 5:00 a.m. exactly in New York, five days until Election Day.

And, folks, today is the deadline to request an absentee ballot in Alabama, Illinois, Maine, Oregon and Wisconsin, and early voting begins today in Oklahoma -- the final state to allow early voting.

JARRETT: Well, the road to 270 Electoral College votes runs through Tampa today. Both Joe Biden and President Trump are making appearances in the battleground state of Florida.

Trump also has a stop in North Carolina where absentee ballots can be counted up to nine days after the election. We have more on that in a moment. But a worsening pandemic hangs over the final days of a bitterly contentious race. Biden keeps hammering home the contrast between the candidates as the reality of a dark winter ahead sets in.

Another 79,000 coronavirus cases reported yesterday in the U.S., the three worst days of the entire pandemic have all come in the past week. Forty-one states are headed in the wrong direction. Zero states are seeing a decline in cases.

ROMANS: Dr. Anthony Fauci now warning the U.S. may not be back to some version of normal until 2022. And he went further than he's ever gone advocating for a national mask mandate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

INTERVIEWER: Do we need a national mandate?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: You know, yes. We do. If we don't get one, I would hope the governors and mayors do it locally if it's not done nationally.

As we get through the fall and into the winter, with the holiday season going, we've got to do something different. We can't just let this happen. We're going to have many more hospitalizations, and that will inevitably lead to more deaths. So, this is an untenable situation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: We can't just let this happen.

With the changing weather a major factor, the White House coronavirus task force warns of, quote, listen to this, unrelenting broad community spread in the Midwest, Upper Midwest and West. This will require aggressive mitigation to control both the silent, asymptomatic spread and symptomatic spread.

Now, the difference in how the two candidates would handle what lies ahead, on display as Election Day draws near.

MJ Lee is with the Biden campaign in Wilmington, Delaware.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MJ LEE, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Joe Biden is sticking to a consistent strategy in this final stretch of the 2020 election. And that is to go all in on the coronavirus pandemic. On Wednesday, we saw the former vice president spend the day in his home state of Delaware where he met again with public health officials in Wilmington. These experts telling Biden that they are worried about the spread of the virus and what they see as a wave in cases across the country.

Biden has also gone after President Trump for continuing to hold crowded campaign rallies, and yesterday he also took issue with the White House Science Office saying that ending the pandemic is one of its top accomplishments. Biden coming out and saying this is an offensive thing for the Trump White House to say given how many deaths we have seen across the country.

Here he is.

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: The White House science office and this stunned me, put out a statement listing ending the COVID-19 pandemic as a top accomplishment of president Trump's first term. Top accomplishment of Trump's first term.

At the very moment when infection rates going up in almost every state in our union, the refusal of the Trump administration to recognize the reality we're living through at a time when almost a thousand Americans a day are dying, every single day, it's an insult to every single person suffering from COVID-19 and every family who's lost a loved one.

LEE: Biden also saying that if he does win next week, it is going to be very, very difficult for him to turn things around, that this is not the kind of thing that is going to happen overnight. A very different tone from what we have been hearing from President Trump.

MJ Lee, CNN, Wilmington, Delaware.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JARRETT: MJ, thank you for that.

The president is campaigning as if this pandemic is over, holding multiple rallies per day with thousands of maskless supporters. On Wednesday, he stopped in Arizona, a state Republicans are desperate to hang on to right now.

[05:05:01]

Even in the desert, the president had his eye on the Midwest.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: So, we're one up or even or whatever, but we'll end up winning it. But I get a poll, ABC, "Washington Post," they're fakes, Trump, 17 down in Wisconsin, 17.

(BOOS)

Think of it. Think of it. And they tried it last time four years, too ago, too, and that didn't work out too well. It's just unbelievable.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The president spoke as new audio emerged of his son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner boasting in mid-April about how the president had cut out the doctors and scientists advising him on the pandemic.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

JARED KUSHNER, SENIOR ADVISER TO THE PRESIDENT: The last thing was doing the guidelines, which was interesting, and that in my mind was almost like, you know, it's almost like Trump getting the country back from the doctors, right, in the sense that what he now did was, you know, he's going to own the open up, the three phases, panic phase, pain phase, and then the comeback phase. That doesn't mean there's not a lot of pain, and there won't be pain for a while, but that basically was we have put out rules to get back to work. Trump's now back in charge. It's not the doctors. We have like a negotiated settlement.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

ROMANS: The death toll at that time was 40,000. Now, it's almost 228,000.

Overnight, Dr. Anthony Fauci said there has been quote a pivot away from public health.

JARRETT: I find that just so revealing. How can you have a negotiated settlement with doctors, Christine? The doctors are the ones trying to help us of course.

All right. Well, nearly 76 million Americans have voted so far in this election. That's more than a third of all registered voters nationwide, and overnight, big decisions from the Supreme Court, allowing absentee ballots to be accepted after Election Day in two key battleground states. Pennsylvania can receive ballots three days after the election, essentially reaffirming the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision, and votes in North Carolina will be counted up to nine days later as long as they're postmarked by November 3rd.

Both states are at peak pandemic case levels right now, exactly the reason more people are voting by mail.

ROMANS: Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined the court Tuesday and could have cast a deciding vote but she did not participate in either case.

CNN has reporters on the ground in key battleground state where is record numbers of votes are already coming in.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Sara Murray in Philadelphia.

And the race is on for Pennsylvania's 20 electoral votes of the secretary of state and other officials are saying do not wait to turn those ballots. Do not wait until election day. Turn them in now, turn them in as soon as you can.

Officials here are also warning this is going to take a while. This is the first time Pennsylvania has allowed this many people to vote by mail, and we probably won't know unless it's a major blowout who won the state of Pennsylvania on election night. It could take a couple of days.

Officials are saying, do not worry about that. We are going to keep counting the votes until we know who won this critical battleground vote.

DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Dianne Gallagher in Charlotte, North Carolina.

More than 3.6 million people in this state have cast ballots. That's more than half of the entire number of registered voters.

To put it in perspective, more than 75 percent of the ballots that were cast in 2016, they've already been cast in 2020. Early voting ends on November 31st. But people can still mail their ballots in up until Election Day. It has to be postmarked on that day.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN SENIOR INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: I'm Drew Griffin, in Tallahassee, the capital of the battleground state of Florida.

The big story here, the turnout, 6.9 million voters have already voted in this election. Those ballots, whether mail-in or early, are going to be counted within minutes of polls being closed on Tuesday. This is a battleground state, notoriously tight in the election. But you'll see both candidates here later today.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JARRETT: All right. Thanks to our correspondents for those updates.

Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh forced to issue a rare correction to a controversial opinion he issued this week. While rejecting a bid by Democrats to count mail-in ballots that arrived after Election Day in Wisconsin, Justice Kavanaugh cited Vermont as a state that hasn't made changes to ordinary election rules.

Well, here's the thing, Vermont has made significant changes. It sent mail-in ballots to every registered voter for the first time, and also began counting votes earlier than previous years. The state pointed this out to the court and Justice Kavanaugh corrected the opinion. Justice Kavanaugh also suggested this week that the state courts may not have the last word in interpreting state election rules, and they indicated all votes should be counted on Election Day. Even those states count votes after election day all the time.

ROMANS: All right. Nine minutes past the hour.

Let's look at U.S. futures after what has been a rough ride. Looks like a bounce back if this holds here, trying to get a little bit of ground. Wall Street had the worst day in months as virus cases surged, stimulus stalls and major European economies locked down.

[05:10:03]

The Dow lost -- look at this -- more than 900 points, the S&P 500 down 3 1/2 percent. These are the biggest losses for both since June. The travel industry hit real hard, sharp losses for major U.S. airlines, hotels, cruise lines. There's a lot here for investors to deal with.

The stock market drop complicates President Trump's campaign message just days before the election. The president has touted the stock market as a barometer of his economic success. A sharp decline certainly hurts that argument.

JARRETT: All right. Some breaking news out of France right now, another terror attack. This one at a church in the city of Nice, CNN is live. We'll take you there next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: All right. Breaking just moments ago, a terror attack in the French city of Nice. A knife attack at the Notre Dame basilica.

Cyril Vanier is live for us in France.

What do we know?

[05:15:01]

CYRIL VANIER, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hey, Christine, this news is breaking so there's still a lot we can't confirm and you know the process.

I'm only going to say things to you right now that we can actually confirm. So, I'm going to be careful with the sourcing here. The mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, has been tweeting that there was an attack as you say at the Basilica of Nice, which by the way, is in the city center.

It was a knife attack or using some kind of blade, and that the attacker or alleged attacker has been apprehended. The interior minister is also working on this, of course, and has confirmed that a police operation has been underway. The attacker apprehended. We can't tell you how many, if it was one attacker or more. We can't give you a sense of death toll or injuries.

That is what we know as far as the facts of the case right now. We also know this is serious enough that the prime minister who was at the parliament briefing lawmakers on COVID reportedly had to leave in a hurry. So everybody is taking this very seriously, and really the background here is what our viewers need to know.

Less than two weeks ago, there was a terror attack in the Paris region. A teacher was beheaded after having shown caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed to his students as part of a class on freedom of expression.

That led the president to defend freedom of expression, including the freedom to caricature in France which has drawn ire from parts of the Muslim world, parts of some Muslim leader, in particular, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has been extremely critical of the French president. There has been a call to boycott French products. All of that is the context.

Now, I'm not going to say there is a cause that one thing led to another. It's way too early for that. What I can tell you however is that that is the question on everyone's lips right now.

ROMANS: All right. That context incredibly critical. Thank you so much, Cyril, for that, in France for us.

Laura?

JARRETT: All right. Still ahead, the pandemic putting the Dodgers World Series celebration on hold, and the league is investigating why a player returned to the field after a positive COVID test.

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[05:21:27]

JARRETT: Welcome back. Connecticut and New Jersey are now breaking with New York by adding Massachusetts to the travel quarantine list. New Jersey also putting new safety rules in place for businesses.

CNN has the pandemic covered coast to coast.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Jean Casarez in New York.

Governor Phil Murphy of New Jersey has just signed an executive order to protect New Jersey's workforce.

Now, these health and safety requirements are mandatory, and the thinking is if you protect the workforce, you also are protecting the communities in New Jersey.

Now, there are many new requirements but just to name a few, everyone, workers and visitors must maintain 6 feet distance, they must wear masks, sanitation materials must be given to everyone along with continually cleaning those highly touched areas.

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPODENT: I'm Pete Muntean in Washington.

Police in Maryland arrested a man they say refused to wear a mask when he went to vote early. Sheriffs deputies in Hartford County, Maryland, north of Baltimore arrested 52-year-old Daniel Swain (ph). Election officials say they had the right to turn Swain away. Police tried to reason with Swain, they say, for a half hour. They ultimately charged him with trespassing since he was already asked to leave. Court records show that Swain is suing the county board of elections and its supervisor but the county board of elections say he's not banned from coming back to vote again.

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEATLH REPORTER: I'm Jacqueline Howard in Atlanta.

Some doctors have harsh advice for Halloween this year. Stay home with family. Professors from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine put out statements saying that the traditional door-to-door trick or treating can be hard to do safely with the risk of COVID-19. Instead, they say carving pumpkins with your family, watching scary movies or doing a scavenger hunt for treats can be safe alternatives.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: Yeah, a lot of families trying to figure that out this year.

Thanks to our reporters for that.

All right. Major League Baseball investigates why Dodger star Justin Turner violated COVID protocols and celebrated the World Series title with his teammates after he tested positive.

Andy Scholes has this morning's "Bleacher Report". Hey, Andy.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, good morning, Christine.

Yeah, Justin Turner, you know, he was pulled from the World Series clinching game Tuesday night in the 8th inning. He was told to go isolate away from his teammates, but didn't stay isolated for very long.

Shortly after the game, Turner was seen hugging teammates in the dugout, and sitting next to his manager, David Roberts, with a photo op with the trophy. Turner even taking his mask off on several occasions for pictures.

Major League Baseball said security told him he was breaking the rules by being out there but refused to comply. MLB has launched an investigation into the incident. It is clear that turner chose to disregard the agreed upon joint protocols and the instruction he was given regarding the safety and protection of others, while a desire to celebrate is understandable, Turner's decision to leave isolation and enter the field was I don't think and put everyone had he came into contact at with at risk.

Now, Turner was not with his Dodger teammates as they arrived back in L.A. from Texas yesterday. The Dodgers and Rays were cleared to come home after COVID tests earlier in the day. Turner is still in isolation and could face disciplinary action from Major League Baseball. He became a free agent after last night's game, Tuesday night's game.

[05:25:01]

All right. In the meantime, L.A. health officials are urging Dodgers fans who celebrated without wearing a face covering or practicing social distancing to quarantine for two weeks. Health officials say the sports gatherings and celebrations are partially to blame for an increase in COVID cases in Los Angeles.

All right. Finally, what will this year's Super Bowl in Tampa look like?

An NFL spokesman is telling CNN that the league is planning on having around 20 percent of Raymond James Stadium filled with fans on Super Bowl Sunday. However, they do hope the number could increase. The stadium normally seats around 65,000. Everyone who attended will be required to wear a mask, and will be seated just like we have seen teams around the league doing so far this season, Laura.

You know, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said last month he expected a full Super Bowl come February. I don't think that's in the plans with the league right now.

JARRETT: No, no, it does not seem like that would be the smart thing to do given where we are right now with this virus.

Andy, nice to see you this morning. Thank you. Appreciate it.

All right. Election night, the way only CNN can bring it to you from the first votes to the critical count, no matter how long it takes, CNN's special live coverage starts Tuesday at 4:00 p.m. Eastern.

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