Return to Transcripts main page
Cuomo Prime Time
Georgia Confirms Biden Victory, Finds No Widespread Fraud After Statewide Audit; Trump Campaign Lawyer Rudy Giuliani Baselessly Alleges "Centralized" Voter Fraud; Dr. Fauci: "Each And Every Family Unit Should Do A Risk-Benefit Determination About The Holidays" Amid COVID-19. Aired 9-10p ET
Aired November 19, 2020 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[21:00:00]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: And get information across because it's in this crazy difficult surreal time that we live in, it is nice to talk somebody who knows exactly what they're talking about, and has some perspective on this. So, thank you very much.
BILL GATES, CO-CHAIR, BILL & MELINDA GATES FOUNDATION, PHILANTHROPIST: And a little bit of good news too, so.
COOPER: Yes, even better.
GATES: Thanks.
COOPER: Bill Gates.
The news continues. Let's hand it over to Chris for "CUOMO PRIME TIME." Chris?
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: That was great, Coop. Thank you very much.
I'm Chris Cuomo. Welcome to PRIME TIME.
We've got Tony Fauci tonight, and we're going to do a big walk through urgent COVID matters.
But first, we have major election developments on our watch. Georgia's audit is over. The State with a Republican Governor and officials in charge of the election, they say Biden won. They counted the ballots. There was an adjustment. But it didn't matter. That's a big win.
But the biggest win for Biden today, I argue, came courtesy of Rudy Giuliani. What he suggested today, on live television, revealed the truth. There is no rational argument for delay by Trump. Not anymore! And there is no further justification, not that there ever was, for deadheaded denial by his Party.
Literally, judging what Rudy said today, I have only heard its equal in an intervention with someone who was literally insane.
Now, everybody's talking about this, how Rudy looked. And they will suggest that the picture tells the story. Now, I'll get to what I think all this was about. But what I know, and
what matters more is that this action, was the best thing Rudy had going today because it distracted from what he was saying.
This was his case to you. The vote was a fraud, and you were all in on it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUDY GIULIANI, TRUMP CAMPAIGN LAWYER: There was a plan, from a centralized place, to execute these various acts of voter fraud, specifically focused on big cities, and specifically focused on, as you would imagine, big cities controlled by Democrats.
And they control law enforcement. And unfortunately, they had some friendly judges that will issue ridiculously irrational opinions just to come out in their favor.
That could have been Mickey Mouse. That could have been a dead person. That could have been not filled out properly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: Shocking as what he's saying is, how is that lawyer behind him smiling? Is she smiling watching her future go away?
Biden and staff, Democrats in states, and Republicans in states in charge, all the workers, the judges, any law enforcement investigating, or even overseeing, and even voters like you, you were all in on it.
This was the conspiracy equivalent of swinging for the fences, a Hail Mary, but he never had the ball in his hands. He might have well have started screaming "Attica! Attica!" That's how crazy it was.
This is the argument. There's no reason to joke around about him. The more serious you take it the more effective it is in understanding where we are.
The conspiracy allowed ballots to be stolen from Trump, but still rewarded to Republican candidates, down-ballot, on the same ballot, at the federal and state level. And dead people voted, "Mickey Mouse," except the live people that he and others said were dead but were later literally found in their homes, alive.
Now, my take on the picture of the day is this. The argument is so embarrassing that he's making that BS was literally coming out of Rudy's ears. But again, this mess was as good as he did because it was a blessing that distracted from the message, OK? And that message is what seals his fate and Trump's.
And here's the key.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GIULIANI: What we're telling you is supported by evidence. (END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: As simple as that!
Here's his mistake. You never try to prove a conspiracy. You just make wild suggestions that are hard to completely disprove. That moment was the gift to Biden, because Rudy and the smiling suckers behind him had nothing to offer in the way of proof today.
[21:05:00]
And then they made the lethal mistake. "Ha! Ha! You don't understand. Proof, it takes place in court." What a mistake! This entire farce could only survive if it stayed in the kangaroo court of public opinion.
Why? Trumpers will largely believe anything that they're asked to believe by Trump. That's why he's been so Teflon. There's no objective basis for his lies other than the media telling you facts, and he killed us off a long time ago with his people. So, he was judgment- proof.
I submit the Trump Phenomenon is a modern-day Milgram experiment. You remember that? Regular folks complying with instructions to keep shocking their colleagues?
His followers must accept any and all jackassery for the same reason the people in the experiment did. They are told it is necessary to do this for the experiment to continue. And they're all in on the experiment. They're all in on Trump.
But here's the mistake again. That fiction needed to never be tested. And Rudy and the Trumpets made the mistake of going to court. A lot!
More than 30 lawsuits across six states, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, Wisconsin, all the places they needed people to believe the farce, they went in and tested the facts.
And just today, they lost in three states, and they won almost nowhere, and for nothing. More often than not, their case was about the same fraud farce that Rudy sweated out today.
In Pennsylvania, a judge found, "There exists no evidence of any fraud, misconduct, or any impropriety." Same case!
In Arizona, the judge asked point-blank, "What evidence is there" that someone messed with voting machines? The Trumpet standing for the case couldn't answer. "That's because the lawyers stink," said Rudy, in what may be remembered as the most egregious "Hold my beer" moment in political history.
Rudy went to make the case himself. And here it was.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GIULIANI: The number of voter fraud cases in Philadelphia could fill a library.
It's a fraud.
Clearly voter fraud.
What I'm describing to you is a massive fraud.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: See, repeating is a rhetorical device. Hence the Trump three- step. "Oh, some say the guy's dirty. Is he dirty? Seems dirty! I guess he's dirty." That works rhetorically with the home crowd, not in a place that isn't desperate to believe what you say.
And when asked by a judge, where Rudy's proof of fraud was, you know what he said? "This is not a fraud case." Rudy and the Rubes never produced evidence in court to make anything meaningful change, dozens of cases, not every - not ever, not anywhere.
So, his big shot today, "Wait until we go to court," that would wind up being a kill-shot to his credibility.
As he sprouted more and more nonsense, not only did he start to sound like Trump, he literally started to take on his pallor. He literally started to change colors while he was giving his press conference.
And yet, I argue he still looked better than all those Trump officials who were standing by silently, the same crew who were all about proof during impeachment. Remember this riff?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): They'd rather impeach with no proof.
REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OH): But these guys want to keep stirring it up, based on no direct evidence whatsoever.
REP. DOUG COLLINS (R-GA): Presumption has now become the standard instead of proof. It should cause anyone to begin to question because the entire case is built on a presumption.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: Remember them!
Because remember back then, "Well what about this meeting?" "Not enough." "How about this e-mail train?" "Eh!" "How about these texts?" "Oof!" "What about the transcript? What about this witness who says it was happening?" "Yes, no, it's just it's not enough, doesn't satisfy the appetite."
Now they're OK asking you to help overturn an election for president with literally no proof. Remember them!
[21:10:00] Rudy has been made a fool for this fraud. But the Members of Congress who also know it is a fraud, who rejected a real case full of proof about the President and his pawns, they must be remembered, because they are banking on you falling prey to one of the darkest aspects of deception.
The quote is famous. "People who can be made to believe absurdities can be capable of atrocities." So, they stand by and hope you buy in to the BS, and that you will help them steal an election.
That's why I argue that the GSA head, Emily Murphy, she deserves more attention. Why? She's willingly holding up the transition to the next administration, and she knows there's no proof of any good reason to do so. She's smiling, while you're dying, all over this country.
McConnell and others say "It's always this way. We vote. We settle differences. And we transfer power." Yes, if there are real causes for concern. But despite Rudy's melting moment, we have 30 cases, in different states, and they've all shown nothing.
In that event, the normal process is what? Transition. See, McConnell's not just playing politics. He's playing with the pandemic. And we're all paying the price, in blood and sweat and tears and hunger and poverty.
Congress, no relief payments. President Tan-Trump, ignoring everything to do with the office, except how to keep it. The Task Force hasn't met in months. Today, they do, but they take no questions. And that is why almost 80 million of you rose up to oust Trump.
But I end where I began. Only one American sealed Trump's fate, and that happened today. And that was Rudy Giuliani. He became a metaphor for the campaign melting into a dark puddle of deception.
So, what did this day mean for the future of that effort and our efforts to do anything about this pandemic? Let's talk politics, pandemic.
David Gregory, Anthony Scaramucci, gentlemen, thank you for your patience.
David, where does this leave the Trump effort after what we saw today with Rudy?
DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, AUTHOR, "HOW'S YOUR FAITH?": Well, I thought your takedown was complete and doesn't need to be added to. It is a farce.
CUOMO: You must!
GREGORY: Sorry?
CUOMO: You must!
GREGORY: I must add to it. Look, I mean it is a farce. And I think what Republicans in Washington have been waiting for is
the rather quick burn of the legal challenges, without evidence, to play themselves out, so they don't have to actually stand up and say that what's happening here is an actual erosion of democracy and failure of governance during a medical crisis that is global. So, this isn't just giving the old guy some room to lick his wounds.
As our reporting from Dana and Gloria indicate, the President knows what the game is here. He is just deluding himself. He is the leader of the Grievance Movement to try to seek revenge against Democrats and not caring about the office he holds, he'll run it down.
But I think how ridiculous Giuliani and others who are supporting these efforts seem, it's like cotton candy. It just - it evaporates so quickly. There's nothing to it.
So, if you're inclined to want to believe in some sort of Venezuela Communist conspiracy, which I don't think even a - even a lot of Trump supporters want to believe in. I think there's a lot of thoughtful people out there, who voted for Trump for lots of different reasons. I think it's a real blow.
But it doesn't excuse your other point, which is this is now becoming a real crisis. This cannot be allowed to keep on happening. We're losing too much ground.
CUOMO: Anthony, how did your phone blow up today during the Rudy movement - moment in terms of other Republicans who were figuring out what they do after this?
ANTHONY SCARAMUCCI, FORMER WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, FOUNDER, SKYBRIDGE CAPITAL: Listen, it's bad.
There's a big schism inside the Party. They're trying to even figure out what's going to happen at the RNC Chairmanship level. The donors are super unhappy. That's not going to surprise you, Chris.
The great sadness for me is you had the Mayor on September 11th. I was on the show right after him. And we were talking about 9/11. And now we're fast-forwarding 19 years to this debacle, which is staining and tarnishing his legacy forever.
I wish somebody that really loved him would have an intervention and tell him to stay home. I don't know why no one's doing that for him.
[21:15:00]
But secondarily, and more importantly, the President needs a shove now. The willing accomplices in the Senate have to knock it off, and they have to shove the President. Like every great bully he will topple immediately.
But if they don't shove him, he's going to keep digging in. He's going to make things worse at the Pentagon. He's going to make things worse at DHS. He's going to continue to push as long as no one is pushing back on him, Chris. And so, we've got to do that. And a big shout-out to the City of Philadelphia, the cradle of
democracy, and Judge Baldi for denouncing these guys today.
CUOMO: If--
GREGORY: Again, to your point was--
CUOMO: Go ahead, David.
GREGORY: --what Rudy did today is actually going to stay Republicans' hands, because what your takedown demonstrates, they can say "Look, what do, I have to put my neck out there for? Let this just burn itself out. I mean, these guys are running this into the ground. Let them appease the people who want to believe in all this stuff."
And then McConnell's sitting back, basically winking, saying "Look, there's going to be a transition, let's not worry about it."
But nobody wants to put their political capital on the line, which is the saddest part because of the damage that's being done because of what we talked about last night, that Republicans who are in power are happy to sit back, let Rudy and others do this work, so more and more Republicans - I don't think all.
I think, as Anthony describes, I think there is a schism. We see it in the business community, saying "Stop the nonsense."
But they're happy to sit back and let more and more people think that Biden cheated because, as you would say "Why," because that means that there's more political backing for blocking what Biden wants to do, blocking what the Democrats want to do.
We play very short-term politics. We get on to the midterms and set up 2024. That's our politics. And we also live in an age that George Orwell worried about, which is the loss of objective truth, and now Rudy and his cohorts play into that.
And shorter cycles, less democracy, I mean, that's really what is at stake. And people have to face up to that.
CUOMO: What's the plus-minus in the Party, Anthony, in terms of the power of what David was just articulating, which we saw Kevin McCarthy say, "Look how many people believe this," versus how screwed are we to live with this legacy every time we want to try to have high ground and an argument in the Biden conversation we're going to get beaten to death with this.
What's the plus-minus right now?
SCARAMUCCI: So, the plus, there's a mirage going right now, the people that are with Trump want you to believe that it's all encompassing but it's clearly not true, like everything about Trump, underneath the surface there, there's great discontent.
So, when he leaves, there's going to be a massive schism and, literally, a Civil War inside the Party, worse than the Gerry Ford- Ronald Reagan schism.
And then, if they have a cleansing, and a rebirth of that party, they'll be fine in 2024. If they don't, they're going right into the dustbin of history. And so, we'll see what happens.
This mirage of the 70 million people, Chris, they're voting for themselves. I was a blue-collar kid. They're voting because they're economically desperate and they feel left out of the system. When you talk to them on the ground, they despise the President's personality and the bellicosity of his rhetoric. Most of them do.
And we can do better than this. He was the wrong messenger for their Movement. And the real smart Republicans know that. And I think the fight's going to start on January 21st.
But just to David's point, quickly, we got to move now, though, David, because there's so much cowardice going on right now. If we don't move, none of the certification - the certifications don't end until December 1st, if you look at these certifying websites.
We don't want to wait that long. Every day is damaging the integrity of our democracy, and it's changing our perception globally that we can be walked on by a demagogue. So, I'm begging my--
GREGORY: If - well there's no question about that.
SCARAMUCCI: --Republican friends to stop.
CUOMO: I got you.
GREGORY: Well and this is where the business community has to step up. I mean Jamie Dimon can't be alone. He's not even a big Republican. He was aligned with Obama there for a minute, and now he's more independent.
But they've got to step up and say "Stop the madness here. It's going to affect everything, not just our standing in the world but the economy"--
CUOMO: Well--
GREGORY: --"the financial markets and all the rest."
And the other hook is the pandemic. Here we have a Vice President of the United States who, outgoing, who runs this Coronavirus Task Force, in this moment of crisis, won't take a question.
I don't care whether you like Biden, don't like Biden, you're a Trump person, you ought to expect more from your leaders.
CUOMO: Right.
GREGORY: Especially if you say these leaders are willing to talk truth, and lay it on the line, and aren't afraid of consequences. They're running scared and letting Rudy Giuliani lead this effort? That's not a good day for me. CUOMO: And context is everything. This isn't happening in a vacuum. This is happening during a pandemic.
David Gregory, Anthony Scaramucci, thank you, thank you.
So, let's talk pandemic, OK?
SCARAMUCCI: Thanks, Chris.
[21:20:00]
CUOMO: I'm not going to be distracted by what happened with Rudy, but I'm telling you it was dispositive on the legitimacy of these delay efforts. It's over. It's done. Him melting down, like that today? That was the least of his problems. It's over. If the Republicans don't get it, it's on them.
The pandemic has to be our focus now, OK? We just got word that another single-day Coronavirus record has been shattered. Why do the records matter? Why do the numbers matter? Because we are getting worse. Forget about the numbers. The reality is we're getting worse.
Trump wasn't at the first public Coronavirus Task Force briefing at the White House today in more than six months, and you know why. He's not about this pandemic. And they're not letting us transition to an administration that is.
That's where Dr. Anthony Fauci comes in. He was there today, and he's back here, for an extended interview, where we can talk about the reality of getting people onto the same page, the reality of the holidays, the reality of efforts on testing and, in schools, and the vaccine, and when it really comes.
Real questions, real answers, from the real man, next.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TEXT: LET'S GET AFTER IT.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[21:25:00]
CUOMO: No one took questions at the Task Force meeting today. They haven't had one in months. That's about hiding.
Dr. Tony Fauci is here tonight because he doesn't need to hide. He wants to answer the questions. Besides, I know where he lives. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TEXT: ONE ON ONE.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: The nation's leading infectious disease expert joins us now. Welcome back to PRIME TIME, Doc.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY & INFECTIOUS DISEASES: Thanks, Chris. Thanks for having me.
CUOMO: Defend a proposition. You said today, Dr. Birx said, we have to double down on coming together to do the right things.
You're no politician. But you're no fool either. In the current environment and atmosphere, in this country, what chance is there of people getting on the same page to do things that have been completely politicized?
FAUCI: It's not going to be easy, Chris. It's sometimes very frustrating because we know what works.
I mean, you heard the numbers that we gave at the press conference today. They're daunting. They're very serious. But we can do something about it. I mean, that's the important thing that's so frustrating.
If we had everybody pulling together, as a country, doing the fundamental things that we've been speaking about, the mask-wearing, the keeping the distance, the avoiding congregate settings and crowds, doing things outdoors much more preferential than indoors, that's not big stuff. It's easy to do.
And I'm not talking about shutting down the country. I'm not talking about locking down. Because when I say that, some people come back at me and say "Oh, you want to lock down the country?" I don't want to do that.
I just want everybody uniformly, when we're dealing with such a difficult situation right now, to do that. And you know what, Chris? We can turn it around. We can stop that.
I mean, you saw the curve that Dr. Birx showed today. It's like exponential going up. You can blunt that. You don't have to accept that going up. There's something you can do about it.
And as I mentioned, at the conference today, vaccines are close by. They're coming. I said "Help is on the way," which to me, I think, should motivate people, even more, to double down because pretty soon we're going to get a heck of a lot of help from a very efficacious vaccine.
Two vaccines that just, two weeks ago, and this past week, were shown to be extremely effective, I mean, efficacious, in 95 percent and 94.5 percent, you know, that's almost as good as measles vaccine, which is an extraordinary vaccine that crushed measles in this country. CUOMO: Right.
FAUCI: So we could do it, Chris. We could do it.
CUOMO: All right. So, let's do can versus should versus will.
First, do you believe the efficacy numbers hold? I am told that they are interim data, early data. This is a compressed process. First of all, bravo, on Operation Warp Speed.
FAUCI: Yes.
CUOMO: Bravo to the Trump administration, to you and all the people who worked on it. It was worth the risk of putting that money up-front to see if you lost it, you lost it. You didn't. Bravo!
But do you think those numbers hold?
FAUCI: Yes. Yes. I've seen the numbers. They're going to hold because you look at all the people in the study, and what it was. I mean, you had a situation in the Pfizer study. You had four versus 90, five versus 90. That's 95 percent effective. Those numbers are not going to change.
The issue is how long does the immunity last? How long does the protection last? We don't know that right now. But we know it works.
CUOMO: OK.
FAUCI: That's for sure. I can tell you.
CUOMO: What about this question that was given to me by clinicians? OK, we know that--
FAUCI: Right.
CUOMO: --if you take the vaccine you don't get as sick but we don't know for sure that you can't be infected. I said "What's the difference?" They said, "Well, you could still have the virus and be contagious but you won't feel the same way." Is that true?
FAUCI: Right. Right, the primary endpoint of the vaccine was clinically recognizable disease, symptomatic disease. The secondary endpoints were severe disease and infection, does it protect against infection.
The data that came out indicated that of the people with the primary endpoint, clearly it was 94 percent, 95 percent effective.
We know also that it prevents severe disease because if you look at the severe disease in the Pfizer study, the severe disease was one in the vaccine group, and nine in the placebo group. In the Moderna study, it was zero in the vaccine group, 11 in the placebo group.
[21:30:00] So, clearly it prevents severe disease, and it prevents symptomatic disease. Whether or not it prevents infection, we're going to find out. But Chris, I'll take a vaccine that prevents people from getting seriously ill any day of the year.
CUOMO: But then it will still spread, no?
FAUCI: Well, not necessarily, because even though you may not - and we don't know the data yet. The data has to be thoroughly examined, whether you have enough power in the study, to show that it prevents infection.
In other words, does it prevent somebody from getting symptomatic? But do they still have virus in them?
CUOMO: Yes.
FAUCI: The answer may be yes. But it could be that the virus is so low in those individuals because of the immune response you get from the vaccine that they don't transmit.
CUOMO: All right.
FAUCI: We don't know that now. And you know me, Chris. I'll always admit what we don't know. We don't know that now. But the impact of a vaccine that can prevent somebody from getting ill, and prevent somebody from getting seriously ill--
CUOMO: Right.
FAUCI: --that's huge, Chris, by anybody's standard.
CUOMO: Why all this confidence that "We shouldn't be worried about the timing of the transition because the military has got the distribution all figured out? Don't worry about it. As soon as the vaccine's ready" - why?
Why should we have confidence? We've never given a vaccine to 300 million people before. And you got an administration that's going to be in charge of it that's not going to know what the hell is going on when they get in there and it will almost be time to distribute it.
FAUCI: Well, two responses to that, Chris.
The CDC distributes 80 million doses - I mean 80 million people, not doses, but vaccinates 80 million people a year. So, the idea that this is the first time it's being done, the first time you're going to get 300 million, but this is a situation where the CDC does this every year. That's the first thing.
But the issue with the transition--
CUOMO: 300 million more than 80 million.
FAUCI: No, it is. I know. Well, Chris, if you're talking about transitions, I don't want to get involved in the politics of it, except to tell you--
CUOMO: Right.
FAUCI: --as I've told you before that I've been involved now for 36 years with six administrations. I've been in five transitions. Transitions are obviously important. You do better with transitions. I've been through them, and I know - I know - I use the metaphor "It's like a relay race."
When you're running, in a relay race, you have the baton. You give it to somebody, who's not standing still. You give it to somebody that's actually starting to run. That makes the smooth transition. Of course that's better than not doing it that way.
CUOMO: Better. Help us understand that. What big difference is there that you're not able to talk to Biden's people right now, and you may not be able to for a month and a half?
FAUCI: I mean, it's obvious, Chris, that when you're handing something over to someone else, you want to get them briefed in before the very first day they start. That's what's - that's what the word "Transition" means, that you're transitioning from one phase to another as opposed to stop and then start from a dead-stop.
I mean it's much more preferable to transition in. Everybody knows that. I've done it five times already with six administrations.
CUOMO: Other than the vaccine, when there is a new administration, how aggressive will you be in pushing that they own testing, use the Defense Production Act, start ramping up the reagents that we need for this FDA-approved home test?
Because even if you can afford the $50 for the machine, and whatever the reagents, and the other chemicals will cost, and a lot of people won't be able to, unless it's financed by the federal government, we're going to have a shortage on the manufacturing side.
You need more tests, different kinds of tests. And you know it. How aggressive will you be in making that a priority after what you've learned over these past months?
FAUCI: Well, I have been, for a long time now, very, very much pushing the idea that you need to test people who are in the asymptomatic group.
You need to, I've used the word, it was months ago Chris, "To flood the system with testing," so you can get a feel for the penetrance of this community spread, which is asymptomatic spread. I've been in that corner for a long time, and I'm not going to change.
CUOMO: But how big a difference will it make if the federal government starts subsidizing the tests, creating different types of tests for different kinds of situations, and using the production aspects of their capabilities to get more of these--
FAUCI: Right. CUOMO: --materials out there for people? Because this 150 million test-by sounds impressive only to the uninitiated. That's a drop in the bucket. It would last a week for a couple of communities in trouble.
FAUCI: Chris, you know what I'd like to see? And I would push for this very, very hard.
In addition to the standard highly-specific, highly-sensitive tests that you do, if you want to know that this person is infected, you want to do identification, isolation, contact tracing. That's good. I like that.
[21:35:00]
But the thing I would be pushing for is something that's a home test that's point-of-care, that you can do yourself.
CUOMO: Yes.
FAUCI: Because if you can do that, you can get a situation where someone would know whether they're infected, or whether the family they're bringing over for dinner is infected. We can do that.
CUOMO: Isn't that what the FDA just approved?
FAUCI: Point-of-care - right, exactly. But you need to have a lot of that. That's something that's just the first step. You want to be able to do it. It requires a prescription. I'd like to see one where you don't even require a prescription. That's what we need.
CUOMO: How do you do that?
FAUCI: Sensitive - well, you just develop it. You get the companies to go ahead and do it and say this is something you really need. We need to be able to have a good firm handle on who's infected and who's not.
And let me tell you why, Chris. Because right now what we're seeing throughout the country, that innocent get-togethers of family and friends in a home, where people let their guard down, because they're with people they're familiar with, we're starting to see those kinds of infections.
Eight people, 10 people get together, at a dinner, with friends and family, one of them is infected but with no symptoms. They put their guard down. You're sitting, you're eating, you're drinking, you take your mask off, and that's how we're starting to see infections.
I get on the phone, and I talk to all of my colleagues around the country. Almost every one of them say "That's becoming a very important source of infection," the gathering, the innocent gathering.
If you had a test that you could do at home yourself, point-of-care, sensitive and specific, you could eliminate a lot of that.
CUOMO: But that doesn't sound like-- FAUCI: So that's the kind of testing that I'm in favor of.
CUOMO: That doesn't sound like new thinking. I feel like that's been obvious for a long time.
FAUCI: No.
CUOMO: Why don't we have it?
FAUCI: Yes. That's the point. Let's stop thinking about it, let's just do it. I mean, you're asking me, what I would want to do.
CUOMO: Right.
FAUCI: I'd want to do it now. I'd want to do it a month from now, a year from now.
CUOMO: But how long ago could we have done it?
FAUCI: Chris, I don't know. You make those guesstimates and then people start doing calculations of how many people could not have been infected and it gets, you know where it goes. It gets sound bite.
CUOMO: Fine.
FAUCI: I don't want to do that.
CUOMO: Two more points of contention. One, schools, OK?
I am an antagonist, full disclosure, to the idea of how we're handling schools. It doesn't make sense to me, Doc that one case closes down a whole school. They don't have any real ways of getting you testing. They have different kinds of tests and different periods.
New York City just shut down all the schools. The rate in the City is 3 percent. What's magic about 3 percent? The rate in the schools is 0.17 percent. Why close the schools? Why not close everything else before you close the schools? What am I getting wrong?
FAUCI: You're getting nothing wrong. I agree with you completely. I think one of the things we need to do is to the best of our capability try to keep the kids in school. The numbers you said are true, if you look at the rate of infectivity.
I mean, obviously, you want to be - you want to be sensitive to the safety and the health of the children.
CUOMO: And the teachers and the families and the staff.
FAUCI: You want to have a plan of how to deal with it.
CUOMO: I get it.
FAUCI: Of course. Of course, the teachers. You want to do that.
Having said that, you check that box, you want to make sure you're sensitive and you do whatever you can to protect the children and protect the teachers because then indirectly you're protecting other people.
Having said that, my feeling is the default position, keep the schools open if you possibly can. And you're absolutely correct. I agree with you completely on that.
CUOMO: So why aren't more people upset about this?
Like why aren't more of our leaders saying "We got to do better with the schools? We got to get Fauci to get like 10 of his smartest friends and find the places that have done it better so we can get some kind of uniform standards, so we can figure out what works."
Because we did a better job in 1918, in terms of educating kids outside, and keeping them in school than we're doing right now. And I think it's all fear and not enough fact.
FAUCI: Right. So I'm here talking to you about it and being very transparent about it. That's the way I feel. Many of my colleagues feel the same way.
CUOMO: But why isn't anything changing? Why isn't it getting better?
FAUCI: Chris, I don't have control of all the disparate things that are going on. As I told you before, we have a great country. You have a lot of variation in the country. You have geographic, cultural, and other differences.
When you're dealing with a pandemic that's an infectious disease, everybody's got to be in it together. You got to pull together. We can't have people doing this, this way, that, that way. It doesn't work. We've got to do it in a unified way.
Whether that's the things I mentioned to you, just a few minutes ago, about the four or five public health measures, or whether it's looking at schools, and knowing there may be some differences, but you have to have a fundamental principle of schools.
And as I told you, my feeling is, and I guess it agrees with you, because you just told me, to the best of your capability, you want to keep the kids in school.
[21:40:00]
CUOMO: And look, I'm just trying to figure out if it's the right thing to chase. I mean, Trump, that administration, he's a revenant.
But when Biden comes in, am I wrong to chase after them and say "You got to own schools. You have to own what the right guidance is for people, the right standards, the right thresholds."
Because everything we're doing with schools is making things worse, hard for families. They can't work. There's a lot of stress and anxiety. It's tough for the teachers and their families. The testing isn't there, and, and the inequities. Kids are already unequal based on income--
FAUCI: Right.
CUOMO: --and where they live. And now, they don't have the same technology or WiFi or equipment. A lot of kids need help. The kids who need help can't get the help, as everything's exacerbated.
Should I chase them to own it?
FAUCI: Yes. Go ahead. I would - I encourage you to do it.
CUOMO: Good.
FAUCI: I mean I speak out about that.
CUOMO: I'll say you sent me.
FAUCI: And I would - I sent you. I sent you, Chris. Go for it.
CUOMO: Thanksgiving. Christmas. People have been stuck in for so long--
FAUCI: Right.
CUOMO: --I don't have to tell somebody with your name how important family is. And they've been trying to do it right. And a lot of them, they haven't gotten sick, and everybody who gets sick pretty much lives, 99-point-something.
We need the holidays. What's your response?
FAUCI: Yes, my response is that each and every family unit, and I mean this seriously, Chris is, and I'm not dictating what people should do that each and every family unit should do a risk-benefit determination about the holidays, about whether they want to have the traditional Thanksgiving meal, where you bring in a lot of friends and family, people fly in, they drive in.
You take a look at your family, and you say, do I have a person there who's an elderly person, a person with an underlying medical condition that might put them at an increased risk of a severe outcome if they get infected?
Do I want to take that risk right now or do I want to say maybe the prudent thing to do for now is to just pull back and just keep it within the family unit that you live with instead of having people from the outside come in.
I'm not saying everybody should do that. But everybody should at least give it serious consideration. Each family's different. Each family has a different type of ability to take risks or not. But you should at least think about it.
And I told you, I've been public about it, in my own family, we've spoken about that. And I have three adult daughters, and I adore them, Chris, the way you adore your children. I would love to see them. They would love to see me.
They made the decision that they live so far away in different cities throughout the country that they don't want to take that trip here, and endanger their dad. They don't want to do that.
So, we say, "Well, we had a great Thanksgiving last year. We're looking forward to a great Thanksgiving next year."
But for now, we're going to - my wife and I are going to have dinner. We're going to put the kids up on a Zoom. And we're going to chat with them for an hour and a half while we eat our meal. That's our decision.
That doesn't mean everybody's got to make that decision. But everybody should at least think about the risk that you might be putting your loved ones under if in fact you bring infection into the home.
CUOMO: And if we had--
FAUCI: That's all I ask for.
CUOMO: --if we had those--
FAUCI: Everybody do it differently.
CUOMO: --rapid tests affordable, there, point-of-service yourself--
FAUCI: Hello.
CUOMO: --we would have been much better.
FAUCI: Exactly.
CUOMO: So, I hear you, Tony.
FAUCI: Exactly.
CUOMO: And, thanks to you, I don't get to see my mom either because somehow Governor Cuomo has decided that Anthony Fauci thinks it's better if she's with him. Thanks for that. But - so we're doing the same thing in our family, although there's a lot of sour grapes.
You say "Next thanksgiving will be different." Christmas, I'm saying it's the same thing. What about Easter?
FAUCI: That's going to be - that's going to be a close call because let me just very briefly go through this with you, Chris. We're going to start getting doses of two highly efficacious vaccines available, by the end of December, as we get into January.
Then what you're going to do, according to the CDC's recommendations, from an Advisory Committee, is prioritize the people who should be getting it, health workers, people with underlying conditions, et cetera, et cetera. As you get into January, February, and March, you will have taken care of those people who were in those high-priority groups. Then, as you get into April - the end of April, May, June, then you're going to get the general population, the healthy 25-year-old woman who has no underlying conditions.
So, we hope, as we get into the end of the first quarter of the year, we'll have a pretty good veil of protection, as we get into the second quarter, when you have most of the people vaccinated.
So what happens at Easter? It might be a close call there. For sure, you're not going to abandon public health measures of mask-wearing and avoiding crowds.
[21:45:00]
You may ease up on the stringency of the public health measures, as you get into the spring and closer to Easter. But I don't think it's going to be "OK, all bets are off, we're safe."
I think you're still, even with the vaccine, going to have some degree of public health activity, in the sense of be it masks, be it decreasing the capacity of places, but we're going to be much closer to normal.
I can tell you that by the time we get to the spring, we're going to be much better off than we are right now, because we're going to have good public health measures, which I hope everyone adheres to, but we're also going to have a vaccine. That's what I meant, at the conference today, at the White House, when I said "Help is on the way."
And that's what I want people to do, to realize, that should be an incentive to even be more doubling down on being careful about public health measures, because help is on the way, and that help is a vaccine that we hope a large proportion of the population takes that vaccine.
CUOMO: It's help. It's not a miracle. And there's a difference.
FAUCI: No.
CUOMO: Doctor - Dr. Fauci?
FAUCI: There's no miracles.
CUOMO: I appreciate the straight talk. I appreciate the time. I am thankful for you being in service to this country and being a friend to me. God bless and be well.
FAUCI: Thank you very much, Chris. Thank you for having me.
CUOMO: All right. I'm still upset about the mom thing. But I'll take that offline. Take care. Anthony Fauci.
We'll take a quick break. When we come back, we need the people in society who think about where we are and where we go. Tom Friedman is with us next, to figure out what today meant about our collective future, next.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[21:50:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TEXT: LET'S GET AFTER IT.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: Brother Tom Friedman joins us now, "New York Times" Columnist, Author of the bestseller "Thank You for Being Late."
Welcome back.
TOM FRIEDMAN, FOREIGN AFFAIRS COLUMNIST, THE NEW YORK TIMES, AUTHOR, "THANK YOU FOR BEING LATE": Great to be with you, Chris.
CUOMO: Rudy today, moonshot or kill-shot for the cause?
FRIEDMAN: Watching that, Chris, all I could think of is that if this were a Russian agent - if this were Moscow, a guy in Moscow, declaring that our elections were a complete fraud, without any evidence, well I think a couple of things.
One is that, as a country, we'd, at one level, laugh it off. And on the other level, we'd sick like the CIA on that guy. I mean that's a - that's a direct attack against the crown jewels of this country, our ability to conduct free and fair elections.
It was a direct attack done without evidence, without a single court victory. And the fact that you have a Party that continues to enable that, and tolerate it, and not call it out, is just so disturbing and so shameful.
You know, Peggy Noonan wrote a column tonight, and I thought it made a really good point.
CUOMO: Yes.
FRIEDMAN: If you - if you Republicans keep calling this whole thing "Rigged," you're attacking the very core of our system. And what happens next time?
By the way, why should anyone vote? Why should anyone vote in Atlanta? You are attacking the core crown jewels of our country. Shame on you!
What are you - you really want to ask these people, Chris, "Do you guys go home at night to some offshore island where there's no COVID- 19, you know, where everyone's employed, where no one is able to, you know, everyone is able to pay their rent?" The whole thing is so shameful.
On your platform today, Chris, John Avlon, I thought, had a wonderful column. And yes - this is no longer Trump versus voting, Trump versus voting counts. This is Trump versus democracy. And which side are you on?
CUOMO: The idea of the President reaching out to Michigan legislators openly, and inviting them to the White House, I think, is the fatal flaw. This is the kind of thing that can only be effective if done in quiet. Doing it overtly, doesn't it guarantee it fails?
FRIEDMAN: No, absolutely. And again, it just brings up this core question. You're no longer now talking about vote counts.
What you're talking about is trying to enlist a state legislator - late - state legislature to ignore the vote count and simply nominate a different slate of electors for pure power play.
Can you imagine? That's called a - when that happens in, like, Turkey, that's called a "Coup d'etat," OK? That can't happen. And yet, you have a Party that is sitting silent while that is going on. That is the definition of putting party before country.
Chris, when you listen to Trump, what is he basically saying when he says, "I will not acknowledge Biden's victory, nor will I manage the pandemic," what is he telling the country?
"I demand the right not to lead for four more years. I demand the right not to lead for four more years." That's what he's saying. He's like - he's inviting us to help him kick down the door to an empty room. What is it you want to lead for?
CUOMO: He doesn't want to lead. He just wants the office.
What should Biden do? Biden said today, "We're leaving the door open to legal strategy, legal" - I don't think the law was ever a friend to either side in this situation.
FRIEDMAN: Yes.
CUOMO: The democracy, most courts are going to say, stand on its own, unless the procedures they're under aren't seen to be fair or constitutional. That's not the case here.
What do you think Biden should be doing right now?
FRIEDMAN: I think he's handling it well so far, which is to let this process play out. Again, one of the ironic--
CUOMO: Bidin' his time?
FRIEDMAN: Yes, yes, exactly. But one of the ironic byproducts of it, Chris, is that we've all gotten a real-time civics lesson in actually the quality of our institutions, our electoral institutions, how serious they are.
[21:55:00]
We've had State Secretaries of State, Republicans, like in Georgia, step up and defend the integrity of their system. We had Georgia today, hand-count, every vote. Turns out they're right. That's actually an amazing statement about the vitality of our democracy. That's one of the ironic byproducts of that.
You would think a "Patriotic Party" would be celebrating that, and telling the President, "You know, Mr. President? What a real leader would be doing, right now, he'd actually be inviting Biden to Camp David, inviting the Coronavirus experts, inviting your Secretary of the Treasury, and sitting down and saying, "What's going to be our plan for the next two months, which are going to be hellish, to make sure unemployed people, people who can't meet the rent, people who can't feed themselves, are taken care of, what are we going to do there? How are we going to do the virus together?" Let's do this hand and hand. Let's bring the country together to meet this incredible crisis."
Instead, the President is literally AWOL, has not appeared in public, basically, to lead, in 12 days. And the Party is sitting there enabling the whole thing. And in that statement, in my view, as I've written, it really raises the question, how do you trust this GOP, Chris, to ever be in power in the White House again.
CUOMO: That's - that's the question.
FRIEDMAN: You know?
CUOMO: That's the question.
FRIEDMAN: How do you do it?
CUOMO: We will see if it--
FRIEDMAN: And so.
CUOMO: --if it happens.
Tom, I got to jump. But Tom Friedman, no situation is understood in full until we've heard from you. Thank you very much.
FRIEDMAN: Appreciate it.
CUOMO: Everybody, we'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
