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New York Times: Trump Pressed Pence To Block Biden's Win In Congress; High-Stakes Runoff Races To Decide Control Of U.S. Senate; LA Ambulances Not To Transport Patients With Little Chance Of Survival; Remembering The Lives Lost To Coronavirus. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired January 05, 2021 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST, NEW DAY: Senate run off races will determine in control of the U.S. Senate. Democrats need to win both. This will have a huge impact on Joe Biden's agenda as to why President-Elect Joe Biden and Donald Trump both campaigning in the state yesterday.

More than 3 million people have already voted early and by mail, shattering every runoff record there. Now, we should warn you that while voting ends today, it could take days to count all the votes and determine a winner.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST, NEW DAY: We've seen that movie before. Meanwhile, as John just said, President Trump went down to Georgia, ostensibly, to campaign for the Republican candidates, but he, instead, kept the attention on himself.

He's promising a hail marry to his supporters that somehow he will emerge victorious with the help of Vice President Mike Pence. Vice President Pence is in a pickle. Will he side with the president or with the constitution?

Meanwhile, police and the D.C. National Guard are preparing for a large pro-Trump rally across from the White House tomorrow, including the rabble rousing Proud Boys. CNN's Ryan Young is live in Cobb County, Georgia, with our top story. What's happening at this hour, Ryan?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Alisyn, actually, there's a line of 40 people who have lined up outside. In fact, they have just opened the doors right now at 7:00 am to let some folks in to do that critical voting.

We're in Cobb County, as I look behind we hear. This is one of the areas, a suburb of Atlanta that's kind of shifted from red to blue. We know how much pivotal this vote is. In fact, every time you watch an ad in this city, you know that everyone's talking about the agenda in terms of if the two Republicans get back in, there'll be a red wall.

If the two Democratic candidates get in, they believe they'll be able to push Joe Biden's platform forward. So that's been a part of the conversation but these shifting sorts of demographics in this area kind of show just how important this vote is?

This is one of the areas that saw long lines for early voting. We've been talking to two poll watchers even who walked over to us today to ask us what we were doing here. They said, so far, things have been moving very smoothly.

Now let's not forget, though, there have already been credible threats made in terms of to polling locations where police officers will be standing by. All across the state to make sure everything is safe. Over $500 million has been spent on ads here.

The political eyes of the world are on the State of Georgia of course. People are hoping for this to sort of end give us a little break but a lot of folks of course don't think it's going to end today. They think it's going to stretch throughout the rest of the week, Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: Thank you for preparing us for that, Ryan. OK, so that was Cobb County. What's happening in Fulton County? Hundreds of thousands of votes have already been cast there. That's Georgia's most populous county it is also a Democratic stronghold and it is where we find CNN's Gary Tuchman. So Gary, what's the situation?

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Alisyn, good morning to you. The sun is not yet up in Georgia but the lights are on and the polls are open this morning, all throughout the State of Georgia more than 2,600 precincts including this one at the Ornate Cathedral of St. Phillip and the buck head section of Atlanta.

The doors opened three minutes ago and you can see there are already people waiting in line to vote. Probably 40 or 50 people, it's a nice day to wait outside, even though the sun is not up. It's about 45 degrees, which is pretty comfortable weather for this part of the United States, where it's usually colder in January.

But you can see people are getting ready to vote, like this woman rights here a quick question for you, what made you decide to come so early to cast your vote in this election?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've got to get to work today so I want to make sure I get it there.

TUCHMAN: Getting enthusiastic about voting?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.

TUCHMAN: May I ask you a very personal question?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.

TUCHMAN: Thank you for saying that. Do you know who you're going to vote for the Democrats, Republicans, or split the Senate seats?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Definitely the Democrats.

TUCHMAN: How come?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just think it's time for a change.

TUCHMAN: OK. She brings up an interesting point - thank you for talking about, by the way. This state has not elected a Democrat as a U.S. Senator in the 21st century. But we do want to tell you, there is no such thing as apathy during this runoff election.

Usually, Alisyn, there's a lot of apathy during runoff elections in the State of Georgia or anywhere else. Very few states have runoff elections and runoff elections happen when candidates don't get 50 percent of the vote in the general election.

But there's no apathy whatsoever in the State of Georgia right now, more than 3 million people voted early. And to put that into context, the record for a U.S. Senate election in a runoff was 2.1 million people. And that was for the whole election. Already, it's a record and every single person who votes today will add to that record John, back to you.

BERMAN: Gary Tuchman on the scene, asking deeply personal questions and getting answers. Thank you so much for being there for us, my friend. It's really interesting here. Just a reminder, the Democrats need to win both of these races to control the U.S. Senate.

Traditionally, it's Republicans who do better in runoffs. The fact that the Democrats have a fighting chance here, it is telling. Joining us now, CNN Political Analyst, Maggie Haberman she's a White House Correspondent for "The New York Times."

And on that point, Maggie, we saw the president in Georgia last night. How much does the president and does this White House realize that this would be a pretty huge rebuke of him and have a political impact, I think, serious ripple effects, if the Republicans were to lose these races?

[07:05:00]

MAGGIE HABERMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: John, it depends on who you're talking to. Happy New Year to you guys! It depends on who you're talking to. There are people in the White House who certainly recognize if the Republicans lose these seats or frankly even one of these seats, it's a huge problem for the president's party, it's huge problem for the president because he would be seem as to blame in part for his repeated denunciations about voting in this state.

The president himself does not seeing it that way, which should not surprise you, because he is very good at abdicating responsibility and he has been as a constant throughout his political and his business career. He is not going to change how he's talking about any of this.

I think that if we see surprise results, I don't think we will know a winner tonight necessarily in either race, but I do think we will know in a couple of days. I don't expect the president, if Republicans lose, to say anything other than, see these are people who are angry because they don't trust the system, without paying attention to fact that part of why people don't trust this system is because he has been denouncing it for weeks. CAMERATO: Yes, I mean, given that it's so important, he didn't spend much time talking about the candidates last night when he went down to Georgia. He talked about, as you know, Maggie, himself.

Also, he had promised he was going to present evidence of the so- called stolen election. I was expecting like a power point presentation with big, like, show and tell of posters or some sort of like audio/visual thing. What happened to that?

HABERMAN: Well, instead, he gave a speech, which he read off the teleprompter. He knew what we should take note of the fact that he had all of those details down in the teleprompter speech that he was reading down to fine minutia, whereas, he has not been at all focused on things like vaccine distribution or anything else impacting the federal government right now.

He has just been laser focused on this. But as you say, this is again, him talking about evidence that he has and not showing it and Alisyn, this has been his team's problem for the last two months as they - the team know it two months since the election.

He continues to say and they continue to say, there's massive fraud and yet in their court filings, they don't really show that. Or they don't bring fraud cases. Or they've never presented it publicly. This is where you see Republicans who are not siding with the president finding their patience wearing thin.

BERMAN: All right, scoop Haberman, you and Ann Carney have an article in "The New York Times" today which talks about conversations that the president has had with Mike Pence. Mike Pence, as Vice President, President of the Senate, will preside over this joint session tomorrow, where their constitutional role is to count out loud, frankly.

Their job is to count the electoral votes that have been sent. What the president is trying to convince Mike Pence of what, Maggie?

HABERMAN: He is trying to convince Mike Pence that Mike Pence has some way to throw this to the president or at least to throw it into chaos by somehow keeping Joe Biden under 270 electoral votes and allowing the election to be thrown to the House of Representatives. That's one theory.

There are other theories about - that people have brought forward to the president, about how Mike Pence could use, what is as you say, an entirely ceremonial role or procedural role in order to try to make this happen for the president.

As I understand it, Pence is going to go ahead with his constitutional duty. I believe he will end up certifying this election for Joe Biden, barring, you know, this gallon of information that the president keeps saying that he has, miraculously caught forward in the 11th hour.

And even then, I do not expect this to change. But it will create a very uncomfortable moment for Mike Pence with President Trump. Mike Pence, as you know, has been incredibly loyal to Donald Trump over the last five years rarely having any daylight with the president.

He will be the one to read out loud on president that Joe Biden is the next president and that is going to be difficult for him.

CAMEROTA: And President Trump isn't making it easy. In public, he talked last night about how he would feel about Mike Pence if Mike Pence doesn't pass this loyalty test? So listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I hope Mike Pence comes through for us. I have to tell you. I hope that our great Vice President, our great Vice President comes through for us. He's a great guy. Of course, if he doesn't come through win through, I won't like him quite as much.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Butter him up and knock him down. The old Trump double whammy there. And so, what makes you think, Maggie, that Vice President Pence will be able to withstand this loyalty test?

HABERMAN: Just based on my reporting, Alisyn, and everyone I have spoken to who is around Pence. Again, he is aware of what's going on.

I think that there have been efforts to try to take the temperature down to keep the president's, you know, heat blast from being focused completely on Mike Pence by putting out a statement sounding somewhat, you know, encouraging, if not fully supportive of this effort by some Republican Senators to object to the vote being certified later this week when it takes place.

[07:10:00]

HABERMAN: But because Pence has an awareness of what he swore oath to do, which is to defend the constitution, and the constitution says his role is to certify the electorates that have be chosen and I think that's what he's going to do. It will be shocking to me in every way if he abruptly decides not to do that. Have no reason to think that it's not going to happen.

BERMAN: The constitution doesn't give him a choice. The constitution really doesn't give him a choice. He can rant and rave and that may be what he chooses to do. He may choose to speechify a little bit occupy there and say how uncomfortable he is and say things in order to, you know, fluff the president.

HABERMAN: That's right.

BERMAN: But more than that, the constitution doesn't give him the authority to do. It doesn't mean that ask, isn't alarming. There are a lot of double negatives there. The ask itself is alarming. The president is trying to get Mike Pence to subvert the constitution to undermine democracy and is far from the only example of it that we've seen. There are reports out there that Peter Navarro is out saying that the election date - sorry, the inauguration date, January 20th, which is in the constitution also, that that can be moved. It's just lunacy.

HABERMAN: No, it's not within the realm of reality. It is creating this false expectation in Trump supporters that who doesn't know that this is not real, what he's saying, that something can be done, and he is playing with fire.

We are in a - look, we've talked repeatedly about the president shattering norms. We've talked repeatedly about things that the president has done that are completely at odds with other things the president has done.

Nothing has been like this two-month period since Election Day, not a single further and as we have gone further from Election Day, the president has gotten more dug in; in these false claims that it was really his when in fact he lost.

CAMEROTA: I mean you have to feel for Vice President Mike Pence today, because this can't be easy.

BERMAN: I don't. It's in the constitution. How hard is it to do your freaking job?

CAMEROTA: I'm not saying he won't do that, but what I'm saying, is that it's not just the president pressuring him. Rana McDaniel from the RNC delivered this entire sort of trove of letters that were encouraging him to undo the battleground states' results and to ignore the electors.

And then there's congress, I mean the Republicans in congress in the Senate that he has to listen to. There are all sorts of people who seem to be going against what their constitutional - whatever, what their missions are supposed to be.

And Mike Pence really is in the middle of this. And he hasn't been tested that much, Maggie, in terms of having to step away from loyalty to the president.

HABERMAN: He's been extremely good, Alisyn, at giving the impression that he is with the president, while not saying very much at all at various points over the last four years. And I think you're right. I think there is a world where he gets up there and he certified the vote and says something, one adviser to him put it to me as, that they can see a world where he validates this vote, but doesn't personally accept the result that this is the result.

And he puts some way to put some balm on the president's feelings. But you are right that we have not seen anything like this before. And what we have seen over and over with people around the president in the last five years including the campaign at 2016 is they will spin something in a way that maybe will sound OK to him.

There will be an indisputable fact when Mike Pence certifies Joe Biden as the winner, it's just not spin able, it is what it is. Even as he says all of these things that are aimed at making the president feel better, is it not going to change the fact that this president's term is ending.

Which I just want to say to both of you in some moments in some discussions with some of his advisers, he sounds very aware of what the objective reality is. But then he most of the time is saying these other things.

BERMAN: Poor Mike Pence has to do his job and stand up for democracy. It's hard. It's hard for him. But I appreciate what both of you are saying. Maggie, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you so much for your reporting.

CAMEROTA: I feel your heart bleeding, John.

BERMAN: I really feel bad for him--

CAMEROTA: I know I can tell.

BERMAN: --that he's got to uphold democratic principles as the Vice President of the United States. Poor guy!

CAMEROTA: Sitting out.

BERMAN: CNN's Special Election Coverage of the election continuing in America begins at 4:00 pm eastern. All right, there is alarming news in the pandemic. Out in Los Angeles, paramedics are now being told not to transport patients who have no chance of survival. This is what rationing medical care looks like, because they don't have the supplies to treat all the patients in need. Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:15:00]

CAMEROTA: This morning, another record in the U.S. broken. More than 128,000 Americans wake up in the hospital this morning suffering from COVID and ambulance crews in Los Angeles being told to cut back on the use of oxygen and not to transport patients who have little chance of survival.

Joining us now, CNN's Chief Medical Correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, and Sanjay has written a new book. When he's not saving lives or on our air, he is writing this book. It's out today. It's called "Keep Sharp: Build a better brain at any age." Sanjay, how can you do it?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: We can all build a better brain, right? Thank you. Appreciate the plug. Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Great to have you. So rationing of care is already happening. This is what we've feared. We're already seeing it in Los Angeles. I don't know how ambulance drivers and emergency workers are supposed to figure out who they take to the hospital and who they can't? I mean everybody there is a miracle could happen. Anybody could be

saved and some people who don't look as sick actually do die. So it's now up to them. And in terms of not having enough oxygen when you get to the hospital, this is the worst-case scenario that we feared?

DR. GUPTA: Yes, I mean, we were sort of talking about these potential worst-case scenarios and we always put them in the worst-case scenario bucket, meaning, we hoped that this wouldn't happen, but here's how bad it could get.

[07:20:00]

DR. GUPTA: And we are starting to see this. I can tell you that even at the hospital where I work, we're in a mode that's called essentially diversion. We're a big trauma hospital, but when we're on diversion that basically means that we can't take any new patients.

OK, that's COVID patients, yes, but the ripple effect is also on other patients, as well, that would just be coming into the hospital for other things. Because we simply don't have enough room, trying to move patients around to other beds, things like that.

So diversion is a situation that's happening in many places around the country. Right now, we have more patients hospitalized in COVID in our hospital than we've had throughout this entire pandemic. You obviously talking about the country as a whole, but you're seeing this sort of manifest in all of these hospital systems around the country.

In the spring, you had these various sort of release valves. If you had too many patients in one hospital, you could start to transfer; you could transfer out of the region or out of the state. You can't do that at this point.

We've been talking about that even within our own hospital where would these patients go if we start to have significant surges, which are expected? And it's not clear right now. It's not clear what we're going to do about that? So these are - I mean, this is happening, this has unfolding and it's likely to keep going like this for the next several weeks.

BERMAN: So Sanjay, you're a neurosurgeon, a TV hero, and also now a book author. In addition to all of that, you're a devoted son. And I know your parents tried to get the vaccine, it was hard for them. Which illustrates an issue that is happening in the United States right now which is that, yes, I guess what 17 million vaccines have been shipped at this point?

CAMEROTA: Something like that.

BERMAN: But only 4 million vaccines have been administered. There's a huge gap. These vaccines are not getting into people's arms. And you and your own family have seen 15 million doses have been distributed, 4 million into arms. But you've seen firsthand through your parents the challenges.

DR. GUPTA: Yes, this is pretty remarkable. And I think it's worth just reminding people of those numbers, because the real issue here is the distribution, not to vaccine availability. This is something we'll keep coming back to and discussing.

But yet, you know it's interesting. My parents live in Lee County, Florida. So Florida gets a certain number of vaccines and the vaccines are allocated to the various counties. The counties then decide, essentially, how are they going to try to get these shots into people's arms?

Miami-Dade may handle it different than Broward, may handle it different than Lee County. So where my parents live, for example, the county got a certain number of doses and what they decided to do there is take the doses and sort of divvy them up among various public buildings.

So my parents went on Google, they searched, my mom is very determined and she basically said, OK, well, I found that the Lee County library is going to start vaccinating at 9:00 in the morning. This was last Wednesday now. 9:00 in the morning.

But I also know they have 300 doses and there are thousands of people who want these doses. So they had to line up and my parents got there at 1:30 in the morning. Lineup outside and these are primarily people over the age of 75, because that's who's in this first tranche, and they waited for about nine hours to get their vaccine.

And I'm going to show you some pictures later on in the week of what these lines look like. My parents, it turns, out of these 300 doses, they were given these ticket numbers that said 288 and 289. And eventually they were able to get that first shot of vaccine but it's incredible.

It was like camping out for a grateful dead concert or something like that, except for the fact that my parents are over the age of 75, they have pre-existing conditions, they obviously had to stay space, they had to keep a mask on, and they were worried about getting dehydrated.

It's not super cold in Florida, but it was still chilly outside. So all of these things, that's what's sort of transpiring in order for people to get vaccinated in some places. In other places, it's gone much more smoothly, but it's very uneven as you look across the country.

CAMEROTA: Sanjay, we had Moncef Slaoui on yesterday who was the Chief Adviser to Operation Warp Speed. I was so struck by something he said about in terms of why we're not at the 20 million mark of people who have been vaccinated yet as they projected?

And basically, he suggested that their work is done. They did the great work of getting the vaccine faster than anybody thought. And then they loaded it up on to the FedEx trucks and then it's up to states or it's up to individual Departments of Health or CVS things.

I mean, it sounded like he's waiting for their call in case they need some help or something. Let me just play for you his exact words.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. MONCEF SLAOUI, CHIEF ADVISER, OPERATION WARP SPEED: The Head of the Department from each state has actually ordered the doses. They've told us where to send them. We ship them to those areas and to those locations. We are available and ready to help the states as they ask specifically for help.

[07:25:00]

DR. SLAOUI: We will go and help them there. I don't think it's possible for the federal government to be able to say, you know, we should send vaccines to this particular location.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Who's spearheading this, Sanjay? Why is it not up to the federal government to figure this out?

DR. GUPTA: Well, that's the exact problem, Alisyn. I mean, Moncef Slaoui, and I spoke to him about this, he's a vaccine maker. And exactly as you said, they sort of said, look, we made the vaccine for us. That was goal and we accomplished that.

But the idea of ultimately, none of this really matters unless people get vaccinated and they get vaccinated with some fairly fast protocol here. It's not going to make the same difference. There's no one who's sort of overseeing that exactly.

What they've done, as they've done with testing and as they've done with PPE in the past as they've done with many of these supplies that we've talked about for now several months, the same thing is happening with the vaccines.

The states are being forced to sort of figure this out on their own. They were told who should likely be first in line. That guidance was given by the CDC, health care workers, and people over the age of 75, pre-existing conditions, things like that but beyond that, as I was just talking about in Florida, even county to county, it differed so much.

There is no national strategy here, and that's a shame. There really should be. If the goal was ultimately to say, we need to get 250 million people vaccinated by the summer that needs a national strategy.

I would also point out, because we've been following the story for so long the states asked for a certain amount - they asked for the vaccine doses, but they asked for a certain amount of money to basically establish that infrastructure. And what they asked for was close to $8.4 billion.

What they got was $480 million. I don't know maybe the right number lies somewhere in between, but obviously, those are two very, very different numbers. So the states were not positioned to be able to do the job that Operation Warp Speed really thought that they would do, which was immediately inoculate people upon receiving these vaccines. That is still not happening. The problem right now, as we just talked about, is vaccine distribution. It is not vaccine availability. I mean, the vaccine availability may become a problem later on, but right now, it's all logistics.

BERMAN: Vaccines don't work unless you take them, Sanjay.

DR. GUPTA: Yes, exactly.

BERMAN: Thanks so much for being with us. I know you're going to join us again a little bit later. Really appreciate it.

CAMEROTA: Thanks a lot.

DR. GUPTA: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: A Wisconsin pharmacist is accused of trying to destroy hundreds of Coronavirus vaccine doses. He said he did it because he believed the shots would mutate people's DNA. 46-year-old Steven Brandenburg was arrested last week. Court documents revealed he intentionally tried to ruin the vaccine because he believed this conspiracy theory that the shots were unsafe.

Well, authorities say he tried to spoil dozens of vials of Moderna vaccine by removing them from the refrigerator. Who was released on bond and authorities are trying to determine if the vaccine doses are still effective before deciding on formal charges.

CAMEROTA: We want to take a moment now to remember some of the more than 353,000 Americans lost to Coronavirus. Former Connecticut State Trooper Patrick Dragon was among the first to respond to the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in New Town.

Since retiring two years ago he continued to work as a Deputy Chief with the East Brooklyn Connecticut Fire Department and a 911 dispatcher in Foster, Rhode Island. George Rook was a 22-year veteran of the Los Angeles Fire Department. His death from Coronavirus on New Year's Day made him the second L.A. firefighter to die of the disease in the last six months.

The 57-year-old fire captain leaves behind a wife and four children. JoEllen Engelbart was just 32 years old and six months pregnant when she contracted the virus. Doctors were able to save her baby before she died just two weeks after testing positive.

She was an Assistant Prosecutor in Jackson County, Missouri's Special Victims Unit, often dealing with child victims. Family members say she had been so looking forward to becoming a mother herself. We'll be right back.

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