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New Day

Biden Nomination for Defense Secretary; Venezuela's Pandemic Devastation; Steelers Lose for First Time This Season. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired December 08, 2020 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00]

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Policy. It makes a lot of sense. There have been real problems in this country in the past when you have military and civilian leadership clashing over the direction of our military policy. That hearing that's going to have to be endured by Congress, they're going to have to ask some real questions about whether you want an on the ground commander running the whole military.

As I've said, we've run into problems in the past when we've done that before.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: And so, Margaret, this would require a waiver of the National Security Act because General Austin is also recently -- only recently retired. I think 2016.

So why do you think Biden did go in that direction?

MARGARET TALEV, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I think that the reporting's accurate, that they -- he did have real personal comfort level with him from their mutual work during the Obama administration, specifically on Iraq policy. Other than Austin, this selection process was believed to have come down to two other officials, Michele Flournoy and Jeh Johnson. Of course she would have been the first woman tapped to lead the Pentagon.

But I think we can expect, in this case, a couple of things. One is this debate over waivers. The other is going to be a re-litigation of the Obama's administration policies towards ISIS and Iraq policy, which is going to be something that Republicans are going to want to bring up. He can expect a rigorous confirmation. And then another piece of this is going to be that while he's regarded as a very smart, thoughtful leader, he's not regarded as someone with a tremendous amount of political expertise or comfort level in the public spotlight or as a public figure. And so, you know, he hasn't always crushed every congressional hearing he's participated in. And I think he's going to be put through the paces here.

But this is -- this is President-elect Biden's choice. It was a thoroughly thought through choice. And now they're preparing for what could be, you know, one of the big, first major tests of his ability to get his nominees through the Senate. JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Coming up in a little bit we're going to talk

to retired general Mark Hurtling, who was in his West Point class. We'll find out much more about Lloyd Austin, the man and the commander.

Errol, the president said something which wasn't comedy but it's very high on the unintentional comedy scale Saturday night when he was at his rally in Georgia about how hard he has been working.

So, listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I thought we were going to easily win. And then maybe, for the first time in a long time, I'd go take a nice little vacation for about two days and then we'd go back. And, instead, I probably worked harder in the last three weeks than I've ever worked in my life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: He has worked harder in the last three weeks than he's ever worked in his life, he says. This as we are now averaging 2,200 deaths a day to coronavirus. And as far as we can tell has done nothing to address that, has done nothing to promote mask wearing. He held an event indoors at the White House yesterday in a small room (INAUDIBLE). If anything, he's working to promote bad practices, which spread coronavirus.

The only thing that he seems to be working on, Errol, there's the pictures from inside, nary a mask in this tiny room with people we know who have had coronavirus and the White House itself seems to be a hotbed of infection.

LOUIS: Yes.

BERMAN: Errol, he's working to overturn the election in public, literally throw out Democratic votes, on the phone with Republican leadership in various states exploring the different possible avenues for undermining democracy, Errol.

LOUIS: Yes. Well, look, these are two elements of the Trump style that I think we've grown to see over the years. One is that Trump is for Trump. The president called himself at one point a war time president, saying he was going to make war on the coronavirus. If that's the case, he clearly has been absent without leave. He's been AWOL. He really works for himself far more than the public good. That's why he lost the election. People sensed that. He's not doing what he's supposed to do. And so it's perfectly in character to see that over the last few weeks he's been working full time for himself, for his own interest, trying to throw out the election. It's not going to work. But this is -- this is what we -- this was on the ballot on November 3rd, John, and this is what people, I think, saw and it's why they said we've got to have a change. We've got tens of thousands of people who are at deadly risk right now and you have a president who is at best indifferent and at worst making things worse by making the White House into a super spreader site. It's really quite remarkable. It should all be over in, I think, what are we, under 50 days at this point. But it can't come soon enough from the standpoint of actually getting somebody and a team in place that's going to fight against this deadly virus.

CAMEROTA: I mean, in fairness, Margaret, he's also been working on his golf swing, you know? We have seen him a lot on the golf course. OK, I mean, so, please.

BERMAN: You're right. I (INAUDIBLE). You're right. You're right.

[06:35:01]

CAMEROTA: But -- but he also is calling -- I mean back to the other thing he's working on, which is overturning the election, he's calling these local, state election officials and trying to apply pressure to them. I mean even if he's not overtly asking them to overturn the results and subvert democracy, he's putting them in a horrible position.

The Pennsylvania house speaker had to put out a statement about a phone call this weekend because the reporting was that he was -- that President Trump was applying pressure for the president of the house to -- or the speaker of the house to overturn the results in Pennsylvania. So the statement is, Trump never pressured Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan Cutler to overturn the results or seat rival electors. The conversations were briefings on the changes our state supreme court made to the state's election law, the impact of those interventions and what steps are being taken now to challenge those changes.

OK, I mean that sounds like pressure about the election.

TALEV: Yes, there's a reason you don't see a statement like that from every outgoing president every time there's an election. It's because this doesn't happen.

But, look, the electoral calendar, the realities of the way elections happen in the United States is slowly but surely catching up to reality here. Today is what is called the safe harbor deadline for states that have certified their results to make sure that Congress counts those electors that way, the way the voters will was expressed. Almost every state has now completed that process. There is like one asterisk on this, which is an effort -- one effort out of Pennsylvania to get the supreme court to throw out the certification. People don't believe that that's going to happen. And so and Georgia, as you know, joined kind of the movement towards this by doing their third -- yes, number three, third official count of results yesterday.

So these doors are closing bit by bit. The process is moving forward. The Electoral College does its thing. It's supposed to do its thing in six days from now. But it's just going to be an ugly, drawn out process day by day until we get there.

BERMAN: You know, and, watch -- watch senior Republicans to see how they behave over the next six days. Watch and see if Mitch McConnell stands up for democracy and says he will abide by the votes of the electors. We already know the likes of Ted Cruz, who have said he's going to fight this. Jim Jordan wants to fight this on the floor of the House in January, which won't work, by the way. But let's see what Mitch McConnell has to say about this.

Margaret Talev, Errol Louis, great to have you on this morning. Thank you.

LOUIS: Thanks.

BERMAN: All right, CNN has an exclusive look inside crumbling hospitals where doctors say a government is covering up the true extent of the coronavirus pandemic. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:41:44]

CAMEROTA: Breaking news, Britain becoming the first western country to vaccinate people this morning. The first patient was 90-year-old Margaret Keenan of northern Ireland. And while images like this offer hope, the situation is far more desperate in other parts of the world.

In Venezuela, doctors tell CNN that the numbers of coronavirus cases is a lot higher than the government admits and that many people are staying away from the country's crumbling hospitals fearing they will not make it out alive.

CNN's Isa Soares has received exclusive access to two of Venezuela's largest hospitals where power and water are intermittent and medical supplies are scarce.

ISA SOARES, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Alisyn, John, doctors here in Caracas tell me that Venezuela is entering second wave of COVID-19 and doctors simply do not trust the numbers. And there's a reason for that. There are only three government controlled labs in the country. And what the doctors are telling me is that if the government control the labs, they control the numbers. And if they control the numbers, critically they control the narrative.

So we really wanted to get a sense of what was happening behind closed doors, what was happening in these public hospitals and whether they were buckling under the weight of COVID-19 and what we found is really a health care system on its knees.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SOARES (voice over): In Los Maga Janis (ph) Public Hospital in Caracas, remnants of this once wealthy nation lie strewn on the dirt floor. Its shackle wards hiding what the Venezuela government doesn't want us to see. Here, COVID-19 has unmasked Venezuela's open wounds, and practically every floor of this hospital is empty, tells me this hospital worker who prefers to remain anonymous.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It's empty because there's nothing here, there are no supplies, there's no way to treat patients, no lights, no working pipes, the baths are clogged, and there's no water. If patients don't die of their disease, they die of contamination.

SOARES: It's a risk only a few dare to take. This is the COVID-19 ward. Only this part of it is functional. The rest is completely run down after years of mismanagement. So it's no surprise many would rather face the pandemic outside these walls, choosing instead their homes over these decrepit rooms where darkness has literally taken over.

SOARES (on camera): This is the intensive neonatal ward. And the reason I'm holding up this light right here is because there is no electricity in this hospital. Have a look around. Bare bones. And what I have been told by doctors around Caracas and outside of Caracas is that this is the situation day in, day out.

SOARES (voice over): Even in the morgue, death comes with shortages. There's no pathologist here. And with intermittent electricity, the stench is unbearable.

Now, imagine having to face a pandemic in these conditions. It's why doctors like Gustavo Villasmil are no longer afraid to speak out.

I have friends of mine who have been criminally charged, he says. Why? For protesting the conditions in which they've been forced to practice. So he doesn't hold back.

In Venezuela, he tells me, there are only as many recognized COVID cases as the regime wants.

[06:45:05]

With testing limited to three government controlled labs, Villasmil says it's impossible to paint an accurate picture. With regards to COVID, he says, we don't know where we are.

The government, however, claims the pandemic is under control, saying its strategy has worked. A government minder shows us inside a hotel where suspected infected patients are kept in quarantine for up to 21 days. It's a lockdown strategy employed by China, which the government of Nicolas Maduro has been keen to extol.

Venezuelans have shown an immunity to the virus, says this doctor, towing the government line.

The families of those who have died on the front lines may see it differently. Two hundred and seventy-two health care workers have lost their lives in Venezuela as of November the 30th.

At hospital Vargas (ph) in Caracas, you can see why. They are overworked and unprotected.

SOARES (on camera): It's one nurse for this whole area here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We don't have masks, we don't have gloves. They turn on the water one hour in the morning, one in the afternoon and one at night. There's nothing. There's no barroom, no mop, no cloth.

SOARES (voice over): This is evident all around. And as I walk this ward, I stop to speak to a patient's daughter.

She tells me her frail 69-year-old father is here because of malnourishment. The same state-imposed malady that we've seen across Venezuela. His immune system is compromised, yet he shares this ward with a COVID patient.

His daughter tells me he needs iron supplements that the hospital simply doesn't have.

SOARES (on camera): Have a look at this. I mean this is what -- this is what they -- they have to work with here, nurses and doctors, syringes. It's astounding. They've got nothing.

SOARES (voice over): There's a vast emptiness all around, and a sense of disillusionment and surrender. Painful no doubt for those who saw this once oil-rich country as one of the wealthiest of Latin America, now teetering on the brink of survival.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SOARES: CNN reached out to the Venezuelan government for comment on the conditions we've shown in that report in these two public hospitals, as well as the criticism from health care professionals. To date, we have not heard anything.

Alisyn. John.

CAMEROTA: Isa, thank you very much for that glimpse into those deplorable conditions.

Meanwhile, here, police in Florida raiding the home of a fired data scientist who accused state officials of covering up the extent of the pandemic. The raid was captured on tape. And we have all of the details, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:51:48]

BERMAN: Developing overnight, a former coronavirus data scientist is speaking out to CNN after state police in Florida raided her home. Rebekah Jones was fired back in May. She has accused Florida officials of trying to cover up the extent of the coronavirus pandemic. Now they're investigating whether she accessed a state government messaging system without approval to urge employees to speak out about coronavirus deaths. Jones posted video of this police raid on social media.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REBEKAH JONES, FORMER GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS MANAGER, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH: There are children in here! What the (EXPLETIVE DELETED). UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Open the door!

JONES: They have a gun out! They have a gun out!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Open the door!

JONES: They have a gun out!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Open the door, ma'am.

JONES: Keep the -- I'm trying. Stop grabbing the doorknob.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Open it now! Come outside. Outside.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who else is in the house, ma'am?

JONES: My two children and my husband.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where is your husband, ma'am?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Calm down.

JONES: You want the children now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police, come down now!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Search warrant, come down the stairs!

JONES: (INAUDIBLE) my children! He just pointed a gun at my children!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Jones tells CNN that she believes the raid was orchestrated by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who she has publicly accused of mishandling the pandemic.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REBEKAH JONES, FORMER GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS MANAGER, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH: This is just a very thinly vailed attempt of the governor to intimidate scientists and get back at me while trying to get to my sources as he's been firing DOH staff left and right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Jones denies improperly accessing any state messaging system and says she lost access to her government computer accounts after she was fired.

CAMEROTA: All right, we'll follow that.

Meanwhile, Chuck Yeager, a history-making pilot, has died. Yeager, a World War II fighter ace, became the first person to break the sound barrier in 1947. Decades later, his legend was cemented thanks to the book and movie "The Right Stuff," which told of his exploits. NASA's administrator says Yeager's death is a tremendous loss for the nation. Chuck Yeager was 97 years old.

BERMAN: What a pioneer.

CAMEROTA: I mean what a life.

BERMAN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: At 97, I think that that is impressive on every level.

All right, so Britain administering the first doses of Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine this morning. We have details on how they are doing it and what we can learn ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:58:19]

BERMAN: So, the '72 Dolphins safe once again. The Pittsburgh Steelers run as the NFL's only unbeaten team is over.

Andy Scholes with more in the "Bleacher Report." And it was Washington that did it of all teams.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And it was a surprise comeback. You know, John, the Steelers looked like they were on their way to 12-0, but they ended up blowing their second largest home lead in franchise history. Pittsburgh was up by 14 right before halftime. That's when Alex Smith started to lead the comeback. Smith here, unfortunately they go deep for Cam Sims and he's going to haul in a pretty impressive one-handed catch for 29 yards. That grab would set up Washington's go-ahead field goal in the fourth.

Now, the Steelers did have a chance to retake the lead with two minutes remaining, but Ben Roethlisberger going to have his pass tipped at the line here. It's intercepted. Washington wins 23-17. Their first victory against the Steelers since 1991.

And another game on Monday night football. The Niners hosting the Bills in their home away from home. They're playing in Arizona due to coronavirus protocols in Santa Clara County. Josh Allen dominated this one. Four touchdown passes. Bills win 34-24. First victory for them on Monday night football since 1999.

And finally the Jets firing defensive coordinator Greg Williams yesterday on Sunday. Instead of guarding the goal lines with just five seconds left, Williams called for an all-out blitz in one-on-one coverage that allowed the Raiders to easily score the game-winning touchdown, dropping the Jets to 0-12.

John, I guess, at the end of the day, it's kind of good for the Jets because they're still in line for that first pick and can get Trevor Lawrence, but, I mean, just a bizarre play call there at the end of the game. BERMAN: Yes, I don't think the Jets are very good. You know, as for

the undefeated Miami Dolphins, the '72 Dolphins, Miami's got "Miami Vice" and the '72 Dolphins still.

[07:00:05]

What else, I don't know, but they have that.

Andy Scholes, thank you very much.

SCHOLES: All right.