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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Biden Names Longtime Aide Ron Klain As Chief of Staff; U.S. Shatters Daily Record With More Than 136K New Cases; Tropical Storm Eta Makes Landfall Along Florida's West Coast; Coronavirus Wreaks Havoc on College Football. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired November 12, 2020 - 05:00   ET

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

[05:00:19]

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is EARLY START.

I'm Christine Romans.

LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Laura Jarrett. It's Thursday, November 12th. It's 5:00 a.m. here in New York.

And President-elect Biden now building out his White House team, naming long-time aide and trusted campaign adviser Ron Klain as his chief of staff. The president-elect spoke to more world leaders Wednesday, including the prime ministers of Australia and Japan, and the president of South Korea, but many messages to Biden from countries around the world are sitting unread at the State Department. Officials there preventing Biden from accessing messages from foreign leaders.

We begin our coverage this morning with CNN's MJ Lee who is live for us in Wilmington, Delaware.

MJ, great to see you again this morning. What's the latest there?

MJ LEE, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, five days now since this race was called, and still no concession from President Trump, and as we talked about yesterday, President-elect Biden is continuing his transition efforts here in Wilmington, Delaware.

One of the key signs that he is now starting to make key appointments to his administration. Last night, he announced that he is naming Ron Klain as his chief of staff. This is somebody who has worked with and known Biden for many decades. He has been a trusted adviser, also served as chief of staff when Biden was vice president under President Obama, and importantly, he had the role of Ebola czar under President Obama.

And if you look at his Twitter feed, he has been very outspoken and critical of president Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic. And another sign that this transition effort is continuing for Biden is that he is now continuing to speak with world leaders. As you mentioned, he has spoken to world leaders from places like Korea, Japan, Australia.

But important side note is that there are messages we are reporting now from other foreign leaders. They are basically being held up at the State Department, and not being conveyed to the Biden team. This is because of Trump's refusal to concede. This is usually a process that would be facilitated by the State Department but simply is not happening right now.

We saw Biden briefly at a Korean War Memorial yesterday for Veterans Day. He also met with transition advisers, and we expect he will have more meetings of that kind today as well.

JARRETT: MJ, do you expect to see anymore personnel announcements, like Klain, other top White House advisers being announced obviously in the coming weeks?

LEE: We do, and that is going to be one of the most important things that Biden continues to do but what we are told right now as far as cabinet appointments go, those are probably going to take a little while longer and one important thing that the Biden team is watching very closely are these two Senate runoff races that are going to take place in Georgia come January because that really will determine the balance of power and control of power in the Senate, and sort of what kind of political environment Biden ultimately will end up inheriting.

And I think it's also just important to quickly point out that as President Trump refuses to concede, Biden's lead continues to grow in this race. He is about 5 million votes ahead in terms of the popular vote. Obviously when it comes to the Electoral College votes, he is ahead as well.

So, nothing about requesting recounts is just going to change that political reality -- Laura.

JARRETT: Good to point out there, MJ.

All right. Thanks for all of your reporting as usual.

ROMANS: So, Oklahoma Senator James Lankford is going where most of his Republican colleagues will not. Lankford says President-elect Joe Biden should have access to daily intelligence briefings and if the White House continues to block him, he plans to intervene.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

SEN. JAMES LANKFORD (R-OK): There's nothing wrong with vice president Biden getting the briefings to be able to prepare himself and so that he can be ready. There's no loss from him getting the briefings and to be able to do that. If that's not occurring by Friday, I will step in as well to be able to push to say this needs to occur so that regardless of outcome of the election, whichever way that it goes, people can be ready for that actual task.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

ROMANS: Now, at the same time, Lankford is defending the president's legal challenging saying he needs to go through the process and get real answers before the Electoral College formally votes in December.

JARRETT: Two of the president's backers are trying to get him to face the simple fact that he lost the election. Karl Rove, the architect of George W. Bush's presidential campaign, and Geraldo Rivera of Fox News both trying to break the news albeit gently. Rove writes in "The Wall Street Journal" op-ed, quote: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is correct that Mr. Trump is 100 percent within his rights to go to court over concerns about fraud and transparency.

[05:05:04]

But the president's efforts are unlikely to move a single state from Mr. Biden's column and certainly, they're not enough to change the final outcome. To win, Mr. Trump must prove systemic fraud with illegal votes in the tens of thousands. There is no evidence of that so far.

And in this "Dear Donald" tweet, Geraldo Rivera congratulates the president for an incredible battle against all odds and tells him the time is coming soon to say good-bye with grace and dignity.

ROMANS: Grace and dignity seem to be in short supply at the White House. This morning, President Trump continues to tweet more misinformation and baseless claims that the White House was stolen. Meanwhile, the president is taking no steps to tame the coronavirus emergency.

We get more this morning from CNN's Jeremy Diamond. He's at the White House for us.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Christine and Laura.

President Trump on Wednesday huddling with his advisers for the second day in a row to try and chart a path forward to contest this 2020 presidential election.

The president showing no signs that he's prepared to concede this election. Instead, urging his advisers to continue to move forward with some of these lawsuits and recounts that they are pushing in several key battleground states.

And while we've definitely seen the president's allies on TV publicly touting the same line as the president on Twitter, which is to say making these baseless allegations about voter fraud, about irregularities, despite the fact we have seen election officials across the country denying there has been any voter fraud, irregularities that would swing the outcome of the election.

But even as they are making the case publicly, the president's allies privately are beginning to acknowledge the facts that there is no path to overturning the outcome of this election. That's been the consensus from sources who I've talked to over the last couple of days, which is to say they are clear-eyed about the fact that this legal effort really is a political effort, aimed at continuing to rile up the president's base, and set him up, set the president up for the ability to continue to lead his base -- tens of millions of voters who supported him in the 2020 election as he moves to chart a path for his post-presidency.

Now, as all of this is happening, we have to note the coronavirus pandemic is worsening, and what we have seen from the president is absolutely nothing. We have seen no leadership from the president, no action, but the White House coronavirus task force in a report this week to several states is warning them about the seriousness of the spread that they are seeing, a community spread that they are seeing, and they are urging states to continue several key efforts, including increasing testing, something that the president himself, of course, has repeatedly maligned -- Christine, Laura.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JARRETT: All right. Jeremy Diamond, thank you so much for that.

The pandemic as he mentioned setting new records every day. More than 144,000 new cases reported overnight. That's the highest daily count of the pandemic so far. Another new record for hospitalizations breaking the one set the day before.

CNN's Nick Watt has more from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He went to work. That was the last time we saw him. That's the last time his children saw him.

NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Daniel Morales, a 39-year-old nurse, among El Paso's dead.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He never recovered.

WATT: This city is in trouble, nearly 30,000 active cases, more than some entire states have had all year.

Another local nurse who helped out in New York in the spring says this.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's been a little bit more rough for me here than it's been for me in New York. I have done compressions on more people in the last three weeks than I have in a year.

WATT: Meanwhile, the president appears to have lost whatever interest he had in the pandemic and the president-elect doesn't take power for another couple of months.

DR. CARLOS DEL RIO, EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATE DEAN, EMORY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: We have a vacuum of leadership, and I think the vacuum of leadership is the biggest problem we have right now in our country in confronting this pandemic.

WATT: That promising vaccine, its impact also still months away, and the holidays are on the horizon.

United now adding 1,400 flights to its Thanksgiving week schedule, anticipating high demand.

Some governors are worried.

GOV. STEVE SISOLAK (D), NEVADA: Do not have people outside of your household over for dinners, parties, or other gatherings.

GOV. TONY EVERS (D), WISCONSIN: It's not safe to go out. It's not safe to have others over. It's just not safe. Our economy cannot bounce back until we contain this virus.

WATT (on camera): Now, President Trump might not listen to his own coronavirus task force much but they put out a report and every week and distribute it to the states. Last week they warned of significant deterioration across the Sun Belt. That's in the South. That continues.

This week, they warn of continued accelerating spread across the top half of the country. It's bad all over.

Nick Watt, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Nick, thank you for that overview.

Breaking weather news this morning, tropical storm Eta just made landfall in Florida. We're going to take you there, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:14:13]

ROMANS: All right. Breaking news, Tropical Storm Ea making landfall this morning along Florida's West Coast after meandering around the Gulf of Mexico for days, hitting Central America twice, Cuba, and the Florida Keys. Now, Eta is lashing northwest Florida with high winds and heavy rain.

CNN meteorologist Derek Van Dam is live in Clearwater Beach for us this morning.

And, Derek, give us the latest. How -- how is the storm affecting Florida right now at this hour?

DEREK VAN DAM, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yeah, Christine. It has been gusty, very rainy all night look in clear water and the Pinellas County region. I cannot believe it's the middle of November and we're chasing hurricanes. But here we are, just to the south of where Tropical Storm Eta made landfall moments ago with winds topping 50 miles per hour. There was storm surge reported in and around the Tampa Bay region.

[05:15:03] In fact, there was about 2 to 4 feet of storm surge, so that's water above normally dry ground, and they had to actually rescue some vehicles from that flood water as well. Now, there were wind gusts reported in excess of 60 miles per hour, just to our south. And that took off some mobile home roofs.

Now, here at Clearwater, in Pinellas County, we have had just a blustery night, but nothing that these residents can't handle. It seems to be another day. We call it hurricane fatigue. We have had so many landfalling storms during this record breaking season.

But what does a hurricane do? It drives people indoors, this set amongst the backdrop of a global pandemic. So, it really is the last thing we need. Last time I checked yesterday, Pinellas County where I'm located, 213 positive COVID cases yesterday.

That's among the 5,000 reported across the state of Florida. The last thing we need is people indoors huddling around restaurants and bars, taking shelter from a hurricane -- Christine, Laura.

ROMANS: All right. Stay safe there. Thanks so much.

JARRETT: All right. Let's get over to meteorologist Tyler Mauldin. He's also tracking this storm for us.

Tyler, who's going to feel this storm next?

TYLER MAULDIN, CNN METEOROLOGIST: So, north Georgia and -- excuse me, North Florida and South Georgia will be feeling the brunt of Eta next. We had Eta make landfall near Cedar Key, and as it pushes to the north, it's going to continue to weaken.

Now, this graphic that you see here, this isn't just a lot of silly string. Well, no, not quite, we actually saw 12 named storms this is hurricane season. It is a record-breaking hurricane season for us, and Eta is the 12th named storm to make landfall. You can see it here on radar imagery, pulling up the moisture across the peninsula of Florida.

We're going to continue to see rainfall and we do have flood alerts in effect, because we're going to continue to see rainfall in areas that have already picked up way too much rainfall.

And just to add insult to injury there. We've got on shore winds bringing on the storm surge threat and that storm surge threat is going to get up to 5 feet today across portions of the West Coast of Florida.

Now, as the storm pushes to the north, we're going to see this tropical storm conditions to continue to push to the north with it. That's when we have a tropical storm warning in effect for North Florida and South Georgia. Where does it go from here?

So, it does go across North Florida, and it starts to push off of the Atlantic, off into the Western Atlantic, where a cold front actually keeps it right offshore. Notice that it will strengthen, though, and it restrengthens up to a 45-mile-per-hour storm.

We have to watch this because it's going to provide moisture to mid- Atlantic, and it could lead to flash flooding in the area.

JARRETT: All right, Tyler. We know you're staying on top of it. Thanks so much.

MAULDIN: Absolutely.

ROMANS: All right. Goldman Sachs is bullish on the U.S. stock market. Wall Street's recovery from the pandemic is just getting started. That's the analysis from its economics team, forecasting the S&P 500 hits 3,700 by the end of the year. What is that? That's a 4 percent gain from its current level.

It's more bullish from next year. Goldman Sachs sees a rally to 4,300 by the end of the year, and 4,600 by the end of 2022.

The S&P 500 closed higher Wednesday in the middle of a pandemic and the jobs crisis, the S&P 500 is up 10 1/2 percent this year. Why? Well, largely on hopes for a vaccine from Pfizer. Goldman Sachs strategist told clients, quote, a vaccine is a more important development for the economy and markets than the prospective policies of a Biden presidency.

Goldman, like others on Wall Street is looking past President Trump's efforts to overturn the results of the election. Adding, elections have consequences both for policies and markets. Goldman Sachs says Congress will most likely stay divided, meaning little scope for tax hikes and other legislative changes.

And, Laura, what really struck me about some of this bullish language coming out of the big banks and economists is that's great for investors but we're at a moment right now where the bridge of government support that was the, you know, the CARES Act, and other efforts is over, and their needs to be a bridge for real people to the bullish times they're forecasting and there's no bridge right now. People are just out there.

JARRETT: Well, and it's resting a lot of hopes on a vaccine that has not been proven completely safe and effective quite yet. We hope that, but it's not there quite yet.

All right. Still ahead, the coronavirus pandemic disrupting college football at a crucial point in the season. We'll have the "Bleacher Report" for you next.

(COMMERRCIAL BREAK)

[05:23:57]

ROMANS: Coronavirus continues to wreak havoc on the college football schedule as eight games have been postponed or cancelled for this weekend.

Coy Wire has this morning's "Bleacher Report". Hey, Coy.

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Christine.

We are five weeks away from the conference championships and the spiking pandemic could impact those match ups. Five teams in the top 25 had their games called off this weekend including three in the top five.

Third ranked Ohio State's game at Maryland cancelled yesterday afternoon eight Maryland players tested positive over the past week. That Big Ten game will not be rescheduled.

No conference has been impacted more than the SEC, four of its seven games scheduled for Saturday postponed, the latest being Georgia at Missouri. Mizzou is short on players due to positive tests, contact tracing and quarantines.

SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey said on a call, a conference call, he was shaken but not deterred by the developments, adding, quote, we are going to keep moving forward. We don't throw up our hands and stop trying but we'll have to come together depending on how much disruption occurs, and we'll have to react to it.

[05:25:01]

It's hard to predict. It's one of the lessons of the last few months, end quote.

To the NBA, Lakers fans will have to wait longer to see the reigning champs in person. No fans will be allowed at Staples Center until further notice to protect everyone's safety. The shortened 72-game season is set to tip off December 22nd.

Finally, we are about 90 minutes away from teeing off the first ever Fall Masters in Augusta, Georgia. It's been 19 months since Tiger Woods claimed his 5th green jacket. With no crowds in attendance, it's going to be a different scene than last year when he was mobbed on the final hole before celebrating that emotional win with his family.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TIGER WOODS, DEFENDING MASTERS CHAMPION: This has been an unprecedented circumstance we are all dealing with, and to have it this long, it's not the way I want to have it. I wanted to earn it back in April. Obviously, we didn't have that -- we have an opportunity to play this week, which, you know, earlier in the year, we didn't think we would have this opportunity. So we're all very fortunate to be able to compete.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WIRE: Tiger teeing off at 7:55 Eastern, that is if the weather allows, Laura, with showers and possible thunderstorms in the forecast today.

JARERTT: All right. We'll wait and see.

Coy, nice to see you. Appreciate it.

Still ahead, among the challenges looming for President-elect Biden is how to deal with the nuclear threat from North Korea's Kim Jong-un.

We'll have a closer look for you, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)