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Coronavirus Variant Triggers Emergency Meeting in U.K.; Hill Leaders Reach $900 Billion Coronavirus Relief Deal; Sidney Powell at White House Again after Heated Election Meeting; CDC Advises Older Americans, Essential Workers to Receive Vaccine Next. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired December 21, 2020 - 06:00   ET

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


ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

[06:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It's Monday, December 21, 6 a.m. here in New York. Alisyn is off. Erica Hill with me this morning.

We have a ton of news.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: We really do.

BERMAN: All right. Breaking overnight, an emergency meeting just beginning in the United Kingdom, where a new variant of coronavirus looks to be spreading like wildfire.

Health officials say it could be up to 70 percent more transmissible than the current variant. Prime Minister Boris Johnson just imposed major new restrictions. London in close to a lockdown right now.

Overnight, look at this map, a growing number of countries, including Canada, banned travel from the U.K. As of this morning, the United States is not on this list. Why?

Also as of this morning, there are new efforts to determine whether the vaccines in existence right now work against this new variant.

More vaccine news this morning. The first doses of Moderna's vaccine expected to be administered today, and President-elect Joe Biden receives his first dose of vaccine in just a few hours.

HILL: President Trump largely ignoring the virus. Instead, spending his waning days in the White House scheming to steal the election he lost.

Former Trump lawyer and conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell spotted at the White House again last night. "The New York Times" reporting Powell is pushing the Trump administration, pushing the president to seize and inspect voting machines.

All of this coming just days after a heated Oval Office meeting with Powell and Trump's former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, where CNN has learned the idea of using martial law to redo the election was actually discussed, but it's not clear whether the president endorsed that idea. Others in the room did push back forcefully and shut it down.

We will have more on that in a moment, but we want to begin with our top story, and that is this coronavirus variant.

Nic Robertson is live in London, outside 10 Downing Street with the very latest for us.

Nic, good morning.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Good morning.

It's causing big concern in the U.K. because of that global reaction that is effectively isolating the U.K. More than 20 countries now have banned travel to and from the United Kingdom.

The one -- the country of major concern for the U.K. is France, because 20 percent of Britain's goods come and go from France on a daily basis. Some of that is fresh and frozen food produce.

So one of the things the government are looking at in that emergency meeting today is to make sure that all the shelves in all the supermarkets can be stacked full of fresh produce.

The government has been trying to allay concerns over that, saying that unaccompanied containers can come and go between here and Europe, but that is the major concern.

And all of this coming hard on the heels of over the weekend, where just a week ago, the prime minister told the people of Britain that they could share their Christmas with family. That up to three different households could be in your House, have Christmas dinner, stay for five days if they wanted to.

Abruptly on Saturday, because of this new variant that may be more infectious but no more deadly, British government scientists believe, the prime minister said that's no longer possible. Sixteen point four million people in the country, a third of England's population, now told you're not allowed to have anyone else but the family that live with you already in your household at home for Christmas.

Europe's reaction to this new variant is -- is a point of concern. We understand that the French are working with the Europeans to try to see if food supplies can be restarted across the channel. But this is the big concern, and this is the focus this morning here.

HILL: Understandably. Nic, thank you.

Scientists at Walter Reed, meantime, examining that variant and whether the two coronavirus vaccines recently authorized by the FDA will work against it.

CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joining us now. So Elizabeth, how quickly could we know if these vaccines are, in

fact, effective against this variant?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Erica, we could know in just a few days whether it's likely that these vaccines will or will not work against this variant that Nic was just talking about in the U.K. So in just a few days, we could know if it's likely or not.

And I'll tell you, I spoke with the lead researcher at Walter Reed, Dr. Nelson Michael, and Dr. Michael said that he thinks it is unlikely that the vaccine won't work, or to put it a different way, he thinks it is likely that the vaccine will still work against this variant.

And that's because viruses mutate often. It happens all the time. But rarely does it happen that it mutates so much that a vaccine just won't work.

So Dr. Michael is joined in this opinion by two other doctors: Dr. Moncef Slaoui, also Dr. Brett Giroir. So let's take a listen to what they had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. MONCEF SLAOUI, CHIEF SCIENTIFIC ADVISOR, OPERATION WARP SPEED: Up to now, I don't think there Hs been a single variant that would be resistant to the -- to the vaccine. We can't exclude it, but it's not there now. And this particular variant in the U.K., I think, is very unlikely to have escaped the -- the vaccine immunity.

ADMIRAL BRETT GIROIR, HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICE ASSISTANT SECRETARY: Viruses mutate. We've seen almost 4,000 different mutations among this virus. We have not seen a single mutation yet that would make it evade the vaccine. Can't say that won't happen in the future. But right now, it looks like the vaccine should cover everything that we see.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[06:05:11]

COHEN: Now, the Walter Reed scientists are going to be using a computer model to look at the genomic sequencing of this U.K. variant to see how it sort of meshes with the vaccine.

Other labs around the world are doing the same thing -- Erica.

HILL: Elizabeth, we can definitely hear there that there is a real effort to let people know it's not uncommon for -- for viruses to mutate.

But when you hear that it can spread so much more quickly, that understandably gives people pause. Just -- I mean, just how concerned should people be? Is it as scary as it sounds?

COHEN: Erica, it does certainly sound scary. It sounds like one of these horror movies, right? A mutated virus. But the more that I talk to experts in this country, the top infectious disease experts who consulted the government on these issues, it gets less scary.

Boris Johnson talked about how this appears to be spreading more quickly, but that might not be really the case. It might be that it's spreading more quickly because it's in an area where people are densely populated. It might be in an area where people aren't wearing masks. We don't know that this virus in and of itself spreads more quickly, and we have no reason to think that it causes more severe disease -- John.

BERMAN: All right. Elizabeth Cohen, thank you very much for that reality check. Look, we're going to look much more into this, because if it does spread more easily, it is some cause for concern, and clearly, nations around the world are taking it very, very seriously this morning.

Breaking overnight, congressional leaders announcing they've secured a deal for a sweeping $900 billion relief package. CNN's Suzanne Malveaux live on Capitol Hill with the very latest.

There is a deal among the leadership. We're still waiting on some of the nitty-gritty details, right, Suzanne?

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, John. I mean, this is after months and months of lawmakers not even talking to each other.

We did get a sense from the House and Senate leadership late last night that, yes, they do have a deal, that there was a breakthrough on the COVID relief stimulation package.

They're talking about $900 billion. Some of it, there are summaries, not the exact language, but included in this would be $600 direct checks, direct payments to those who earn less than $75,000, potentially up to $2,400 for a family of four.

You're also talking about $300 a week in unemployment benefits. Those were set to expire after Christmas. Two hundred eighty-four billion dollars for small business loans; $20 billion for purchasing vaccinations, as well as $8 billion to distribute them. And a one- month extension for those who are paying rent not to be kicked out of their homes. All of this taken together, about $900 billion.

What's not in this, both sides having to give up what they wanted. That would be aid to state and local governments in the tune of billions of dollars. Democrats were pushing that, saying it was critical. Some Republicans thought it was wasteful.

And then, also, liability protections for employers who might be sued over COVID-related issues, something Republicans were pushing. Democrats saw that as a gift to big business. So those are out of the plan.

What we hope, what we anticipate today is this language. The final language will go to the House first. It will be tied to $1.4 trillion spending package, that it would be approved in the House and then go for a vote in the Senate. This all has to happen before midnight. If it doesn't, it could possibly mean that the president would have to

sign, again, a one-day extension to fund the government for another day to get this across the finish line -- Erica.

Suzanne Malveaux with the latest. We'll be watching and waiting on the latest reporting, as well. Thank you.

Also developing overnight, former Trump lawyer and conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell spotted at the White House again on Sunday night. She was also on hand for a heated Oval Office meeting on Friday about overturning the election. And CNN has learned about what was discussed there: using the military.

Joe Johns joining us now, live from the White House. So what is the very latest on these meetings and on Sidney Powell?

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Erica.

One month to go in the administration, and here's where we are. COVID raging from coast-to-coast. We've had an unprecedented attack on the cybersecurity of the United States that could still be ongoing. And the headline from the White House is about an unhinged meeting over the weekend to talk about overturning the results of the election.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS (voice-over): As President Trump refuses to accept his defeat in public, behind the walls of the White House, he's reportedly continuing efforts to overturn a lost election, while promoting baseless claims about voter fraud.

And sources tell CNN he's bringing back a controversial member of his legal team to help. Attorney Sidney Powell has repeatedly pushed unfounded conspiracy theories about the election, including false claims about rigged voting machines.

A source tells CNN, Trump is considering appointing Powell as a special counsel to investigate voter fraud allegations, which have been debunked by members of his own administration.

[06:10:10]

The president is said to have floated the idea at a White House meeting Friday with White House counsel Pat Cipollone, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, and recently pardoned former national security adviser Michael Flynn. Flynn giving his own suggestions on how to overturn the election results, just one day after saying Trump could consider declaring martial law.

MICHAEL FLYNN, FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR: He could order the -- within the swing states, if he wanted to, he could take military capabilities; and he could place them in those states and basically rerun an election in each of those states. I mean, it's not unprecedented.

JOHNS: House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff outraged by Flynn's proposal.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): It's just extraordinary and, of course, dangerous, destructive of our democracy even to have these kind of talks.

JOHNS: Trump's meeting devolved into a shouting match, according to a CNN source, with Meadows and Cipollone rejecting the idea of giving Powell that kind of power.

This as the Trump campaign filed a new petition with the Supreme Court, looking to reverse his loss in Pennsylvania.

LT. GOV. JOHN FETTERMAN (D-PA): All the public snake handling and -- and carnival barking hasn't changed one single race, one single state.

JOHNS: Republican Senator Mitt Romney saying the president should restack his priorities as his term comes to a close.

SEN. MITT ROMNEY (R-UT): But it's really sad in a lot of respects and embarrassing, because the president could right now be writing the last chapter of this administration with a victory lap with regards to the vaccine. And instead, he's leaving Washington with a whole series of conspiracy theories and things that are so nutty and loopy that people are shaking their head.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: By the way, the president tweeted over the weekend that the business about martial law was fake news, so that sounds like a denial.

Meanwhile, Dominion Voting Systems, which has come under attack by the president's allies, including Sidney Powell, has threatened to sue. They sent a letter to the campaign over the weekend, demanding a retraction and also demanding for all documents related to this issue to be preserved.

Back to you, Erica.

HILL: It is remarkable. Joe Johns, thank you.

Just ahead, we're going to break everything we know about this new coronavirus variant. Just how courageous is it? Do vaccines work against it? Should the U.S. be doing more to prevent it from coming here? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: All right. The breaking news this morning: an emergency meeting underway in the United Kingdom, where health officials say a new variant of coronavirus is spreading rapidly.

Over the weekend there, Prime Minister Boris Johnson enacted tough new restrictions to try to contain the spread. London is really close to a lockdown. At least four other countries have already identified cases linked to the new variant. Dozens of countries overnight banned travel to the United Kingdom,

from the United Kingdom. We're seeing new countries pop up on this list all morning long. The United States, though, hasn't taken any action.

Joining us now, CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner. He's a professor of medicine at George Washington University Hospital.

Dr. Reiner, great to see this morning. And I don't want to alarm people more than they should be. And I get that there's every reason to believe that the vaccines that exist will work against this new variant.

But when you hear concerns that it might be 70 percent more contagious, when you hear the concern coming from the United Kingdom, which has instituted these new lockdown policies. When you see country after country overnight banning travel from the United Kingdom, why shouldn't this be a pretty serious concern here?

DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Good morning, John.

Look, we have an old saying in medicine that when you attend an emergency, the first thing that you should do is take your own pulse. And I think that's what governments around the world should be doing, rather than reacting with -- with panic.

I think we need to be smart about this; we need to get the data. This virus mutates all the time. There are at least six or seven discreet strains of this virus.

And we've already seen this in this country. The original strain of this virus came out of China and infected folks on the West Coast in early January. And then a different strain, which came out through Italy, infected the East Coast of the United States, maybe with different variants. So we've seen this before.

I think the smart thing to do now is to get some real data. Let's really understand whether, indeed, the virulence has changed significantly. It's highly doubtful that this virus will not be susceptible to the vaccines, or the vaccines will not be effective. I think that's highly unlikely.

So I think it might be reasonable to limit travel for a couple of days until there's more data. But I think we should not jump to conclusions at this point.

HILL: Well, as you say, for a couple of days. You know, France starting out with this 48-hour travel ban. They're trying to figure all of this out.

Governor Cuomo here in New York not happy that he is not seeing a lot of action here. Noting there are six flights a day coming in from the U.K., and in his words, we've done absolutely nothing.

So to your point, would a pause of 48 hours or so, a couple of days, be helpful, you think, in the United States at this point? REINER: I think it would be -- I think it would be reasonable.

The other thing is, if this virus is spreading rapidly through parts of London and the U.K., it's almost certainly already in the United States and other parts of the world. We know that that's how viruses work.

So what that means, what we should be doing in this country is what we're not doing well enough, which -- which are very simple things. Masking, social distancing, washing hands, and limiting large gatherings. We need to do all these things that we know are quite good at preventing the spread of this -- of this virus.

It seems that this new virus might be a little bit more avid for the receptors in the respiratory lining, the cells that line the respiratory track, that make it a little bit easier to infect folks. But this is not some super strain of virus that penetrates masks and can jump through vast distances. It's -- it's a coronavirus. And we know how to defeat that. We need to do -- we need to be be better at it.

BERMAN: Thanks, Dr. Reiner, for the reality on this. Again, not more deadly, necessarily. It just --

REINER: That's right.

BERMAN: -- may spread more easily and, given where we are, or where the vast majority of the population isn't vaccinated yet, anything that spreads more easily is of concern for now, until we learn more about it.

I want to ask you about the new CDC guidelines that came out late yesterday. Very interesting. Because they did a little bit of a shift on the priority for who gets the vaccine next.

Right now, with the new vaccine that people are being vaccinated, frontline medical workers and people in long-term care facilities, nursing homes.

The next batch of people will be essential workers: food service industries, firefighters, police but also senior citizens. People 75 years and older. And that group, the 75 years and older, have moved closer to the front of the line than I think was anticipated before.

[06:20:03]

Why was that move made, and what do you make of it?

REINER: I think it's -- I love the new recommendations for the next phase.

Look, the elderly, folks over the age of 75 make up only about 7 percent or so of the population in the United States, but they comprise 55 percent of the deaths from this virus.

If you look at folks that live in -- in long-term care and nursing homes, they comprise 40 percent of the deaths in this country. So there's a fierce urgency to vaccinating these most vulnerable people.

And in terms of essential workers, they've paid the -- a gigantic price. These are people who can't telecommute. These are people who just can't, you know, hunker down in pajama bottoms and -- and a tie on the top and work from home. These are people who drive our buses and -- and who deliver our food and who drive our police cars and our firefighters. These essential workers must be vaccinated as soon as possible, because the infection rates are high, and we need them for our society to function. So I love the fact that they're coming next.

HILL: You know, we're expecting these Moderna vaccinations to begin, as we know. Two authorized vaccines at this point. How much do you think that will help in terms of some of these distribution issues that we've seen over the past week to make sure more people are getting vaccinated?

REINER: I think it will help a lot. It looks like we'll have, by the end of this year, about 20 million -- the ability to vaccinate about 20 million folks in December, then another 30 million folks in January, and then another 50 million people in March. So that's a total of 100 million people, perhaps, vaccinated by the end of March, which is -- would be a huge step forward.

Two point eight, 2.9 million doses was shipped last week. We vaccinated, as per the CDC, about 550,000 people. So a lot of vaccines shipped last week. You know, a relatively small portion of that actually got into arms. So we need to, you know, enhance our systems of -- of bringing large numbers of people in and vaccinating them.

And we'll have to be innovative. We'll have to include things like drive-through vaccination. We need to -- to really get to large numbers of people. And we'll work through that. This is -- this is just the beginning.

I'll note today that today is the winter solstice, so every day from now on, there's a little bit more light, literally, and I think figuratively, as well.

BERMAN: We were just talking about that, how excited we are --

REINER: Yes.

BERMAN: -- that it only gets brighter from here, literally.

REINER: Yes.

BERMAN: Dr. Reiner, President-elect Joe Biden will receive the vaccine today. You got your shot, your first dose last week. What can the president-elect expect?

REINER: He can expect a sore arm, a moderately sore arm for about 24 hours and then to feel great. That's exactly how I feel.

I encourage everyone who gets the vaccine to enroll in the CDC's V- safe program. You get a text every day that reminds you to log in and tell the CDC how you're feeling. This is how we'll be able to track side effects from all the vaccines that come on the market.

I think it's terrific that the vice president-elect is going to get vaccinated today. I want to see the outgoing president get vaccinated.

If you look at vaccine hesitancy in this country, it's split by party lines. And, you know, although over 80 percent of Democrats in this country say they will get the vaccine, only about 56 percent of Republicans say they will either definitely or probably get the vaccine.

It would go a long way for the outgoing president to show support for the vaccine. Not just by words, but by actions. Get vaccinated, tell the public how safe and excited you are about this vaccine.

BERMAN: It is perplexing. It is, at this point, somewhat inexplicable that he hasn't received the vaccine or at least been more present at some of these events when the vaccine was administered publicly, when Vice President Pence received it; when the surgeon general received the vaccine.

Why isn't the president part of this? Just because of that reason you said. It could send a message to a big part of the population that is hesitant.

Dr. Reiner, thank you for what you're doing. We appreciate you being with us this morning.

REINER: My pleasure.

BERMAN: Maybe President Trump isn't getting vaccinated, because he's spending all his time being obsessed with overturning the election and having discussions about declaring martial law. I don't want this to pass you by as something that, oh, this just happened.

The president held a meeting in the Oval Office with someone who's been advocating declaring martial law. And then one of the lawyers in the initial meeting invited back to the White House last night. So what's going on here? Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:29:03]

HILL: Developing this morning, President Trump's former lawyer and conspiracy theorist, Sidney Powell, spotted at the White House again last night, just days after a heated Oval Office meeting on Friday where a possibility of declaring martial law in an effort to overturn the election was discussed.

"The New York Times" reporting Powell met with White House staffers last night about her pitch for an executive order to seize and examine voting machines.

Joining us now, CNN political analyst Toluse Olorunnipa, and -- who's a White House reporter for "The Washington Post." Also with us, Anna Palmer, senior White House correspondent for "Politico." I mean, as we look at all this, I think as John said just before we

went to break, it's important to remember, this is not just another sort of crazy thing that we're hearing about.

The fact that martial law, Anna, was actually discussed in this meeting is a reason for pause.

ANNA PALMER, SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, "POLITICO": Yes, absolutely. I mean, I think that's one of the things that you have to kind of continually remind yourself, is it's hard to stay in a state of shock. But this is pretty stunning, to say the least.

And the fact that it was pushed back and, you know, kind of vociferously argued against by some.