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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

House Dems Vow To Impeach Trump If Pence Doesn't Remove Him; Corporations Cut Ties To Trump, Suspend Some GOP Donations; Two 24- Hour Locations Among Five NYC Vaccination Sites To Open. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired January 11, 2021 - 05:30   ET

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


[05:30:00]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (on camera): By the House of Representatives.

Now, of course, a trial in the Senate is another matter highly unlikely to happen before President Trump leaves office. But nonetheless, President Trump facing not only this threat of a second impeachment but also calls for his resignation, including from several Senate Republicans and House Republicans as well.

And he's also facing this talk of the 25th Amendment with pressure rising on Vice President Mike Pence and members of the cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment and strip President Trump of his presidential powers.

And that's what's so interesting about this move by the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, to introduce this resolution calling on Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment. It really ratchets up the pressure on the vice president to make his position clear about whether or not he supports invoking the 25th Amendment and whether or not he intends to do so.

We know through sources close to the vice president that it's highly unlikely that he would invoke the 25th Amendment. But at the same time, one source close to the vice president saying that he has not taken this off the table. That he wants to preserve this as an option -- this mechanism as an option should President Trump's behavior become increasingly unhinged.

But it remarkable that so far, we haven't heard the vice president in his own words weigh in on this talk of the 25th Amendment, especially given how unfailingly loyal he has been to President Trump through his four years in office. But it just shows you at what a low point that relationship between those two men is.

In fact, we know that President Trump hasn't called Vice President Mike Pence since that siege on Capitol Hill. And he didn't even call him when Mike Pence was in a secure location sheltering in place, effectively, as those rioters stormed the Capitol. Now, what the president did on Sunday, though, is he did finally relent on this issue of lowering flags to half-staff in honor of Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick. He's the officer who was killed in the line of duty as he was defending the Halls of Congress from those rioters. The president finally moving to lower flags to half- staff, including the one over the White House. But, two days -- it came two days after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi did the very same thing.

It's part of a pattern that we have seen of the president delaying simple traditional moves like this. He did the same thing after John McCain -- Sen. John McCain passed away. The president waiting two days and only again, after blistering criticism did the president finally relent -- Christine, Laura.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: Jeremy, thank you so much for that.

Christine, you know, there's all this chatter about whether the president could try to self-pardon himself. You know my position on that has long been that he can't under the Constitution but he may still try. I don't know how he'll do it when he can't tweet. He can't get -- you know, use his megaphone to get that out --

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Right.

JARRETT: -- to all of his supporters.

At the same time, if he quits early and tries to have the vice president pardon him, how is that going to work if the two aren't even talking?

ROMANS: Yes, it's fascinating. And, you know, we know he's not going to be going to the inauguration. We know that he'll be -- he'll be leaving the White House residence -- I think our reporting is he's leaving the day before, right?

JARRETT: Right.

ROMANS: So there's just so many things happening here.

And from the perspective of the Democrats as well here, pursuing a second impeachment of this president, one wonders if that takes attention and energy away from the agenda -- the Biden agenda.

JARRETT: That's the debate.

ROMANS: And that is a really significant debate here right now.

I mean, you will hear from Democrats who say we could do both, and maybe that is true. But there's a lot of work to do here for Joe Biden and there are a lot of American people who are suffering the financial consequences of this -- of this -- of this virus. So it's just a remarkable position we're in here. JARRETT: Well, as America confronts the reality of this attempted coup, experts warn the calls for more violence have only intensified ahead of Inauguration Day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

Rioters inside the U.S. Capitol.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JARRETT: The more video that emerges, the more deadly this riot becomes. Just look at that officer as his torso is crushed. And then in the latest video, you can see the mob dragging an officer down a set of stairs there as they beat him with poles and sticks. This was 10 minutes after the White House posted that video with Trump telling his supporters we love you -- go home.

ROMANS: Just shocking.

New details overnight about what was happening behind the scenes from outgoing Capitol Police chief Steve Sund, who was forced to resign given all of the obvious security failures. Sund has faced criticism for not asking other agencies for backup.

And now, he tells "The Washington Post" he asked for the D.C. National Guard to be put on standby, but he says those requests were turned down by the House and Senate sergeants at arms because it would look bad. They have since been forced out as well and have not commented.

JARRETT: Sund also tells the "Post" he called the Pentagon in the middle of all of this saying, quote, "I am making an urgent, urgent immediate request for National Guard assistance. I have got to get boots on the ground." Only to be told by an Army official again, optics -- optics were a problem. Quote, "'I don't like the visual of the National Guard standing a police line with the Capitol in the background,' the official said, according to Sund and others on the call."

[05:35:08]

This echoes what other officials have been saying for days now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. LARRY HOGAN (R), MARYLAND: Our Guard mobilized and was ready but we couldn't actually cross over the border into D.C. without the OK, and that was quite some time. We kept running it up the flagpole -- our generals talking to the National Guard generals. We had already been mobilizing. We already had our police there. We already had our Guard mobilized and we were just waiting for that call.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Now, Sund says he suspects that pipe bombs at Republican and Democratic headquarters were an intentional effort to draw officers away from the Capitol as terrorists looked for lawmakers. CNN learned overnight federal authorities are working to determine the level of coordination among the insurrectionists, including members of law enforcement and the military. Among the questions, was there a plan to hold members of Congress hostage?

JARRETT: Federal authorities arrested two men seen in these photos inside the Capitol wearing protective armor and carrying those plastic handcuffs. One of them is a retired Air Force Reserve officer. His ex- wife identified him in a tip to the FBI. Some of the charges against them carry up to 10 years in prison.

ROMANS: All this is causing real concern nine days ahead of Joe Biden's inauguration. Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser asking the White House for emergency funding. National Guard members from at least 11 states will assist in Washington during the inauguration.

The outgoing Capitol Police told "The Washington Post" quote, "My concern is if they don't get their act together with physical security, it's going to happen again."

Some of the country's biggest companies are taking major steps to sever ties with President Trump and the Republican lawmakers who helped spark the deadly Capitol riot.

The PGA tour is canceling plans to play its 2022 championship at a Trump golf course. Blue Cross Blue Shield, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and Marriott among the companies suspending all donations to GOP members who objected to the counting of the Electoral College votes.

JARRETT: On Friday, Twitter took away President Trump's megaphone, suspending his account. And now, Parler, the social media platform by some other conservatives, has been forced offline entirely.

But despite all the blowback on the president in the last few days, there is no evidence that his base -- his core base of supporters has shrunk even a little bit. And some of them may be going underground, potentially posing even more of a threat.

Now the president is preparing to take on big tech in his final days in office, we're told. CNN's Brian Stelter has more on this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Yes. Hey, Christine. Hey, Laura.

The headline on CNN Business overnight says money talks, and that is true in more ways than one right now. Companies large and small are taking dramatic action against President Trump, his campaign, and in some cases his allies from Twitter to Twitch.

The latest example is a company called Stripe, a payments company that processes credit card payments. The president's campaign can no longer use Stripe to receive donations. That's a serious blow for Trump and it's also a sign going forward that his business interests may be imperiled as a result of what happened last Wednesday.

We've all heard about the ban by Twitter and by other social platforms. The president's megaphones have basically all been taken away from him.

And, Parler is also coming under scrutiny. Parler is that relatively new social network sometimes called Twitter without rules. It's a favorite of far-right extremists.

Over the weekend, Google and Apple both suspended Parler, making it a lot harder to find that app in various app stores. Amazon also taking action against Parler. This startup says that it is basically a victim of big tech censorship, but it's going to have a hard time making that argument in the days to come.

Some companies are also halting their donations to political action committees -- to PACs that support the GOP lawmakers who tried to overturn the results of the election.

So this is bigger than Trump at this point. We are seeing corporate America in big ways and small ways wanting to be on the right side of history. And in some ways, it's notable that these companies -- these businesses are taking swifter action than the House or the Senate or the cabinet or any part of the government that is under pressure right now to hold Trump accountable.

Companies, obviously, are thinking about their bottom line. They are thinking about making sure customers stay with them. And they do not want to be associated with President Trump anymore -- Christine, Laura.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JARRETT: Brian Stelter, thank you so much for breaking all of that down.

And the kind of video that we are seeing from Capitol Hill last week is nothing short of anarchy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RIOTERS: Hang Mike Pence! Hang Mike Pence! Hang Mike Pence! Hang Mike Pence!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JARRETT: Calls to hang the vice president -- and for what? For doing his job upholding the Constitution in what is supposed to be a democracy. This is the kind of thing the United States would easily denounce in any other part of the world.

[05:40:00]

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh has covered many of these conflicts up close. He says despite the horrors the nation witnessed Wednesday, in the end, America was lucky to be saved by its democracy. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK PATON WALSH, INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR (on camera): But I think, as I argued in a piece on CNN Digital, that there were many similarities here between the violent, ugly scenes of rioting, frankly, that forged their way into the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday. But there are also some key differences, frankly, in how the United States reacted to that situation now.

In so much of the attempted coups that I or others have seen around the world, there is the next morning, an extraordinary sense of uncertainty. A real sense of fear, perhaps, that something fundamental has changed in the fabric of the country.

You might see the president perhaps in hiding or appearing much more bullish on television, depending on what's just happened. You might find state T.V. playing propaganda. There can be a real sense of an abyss opening up.

What was quite extraordinary the morning after Wednesday was to see how the system simply picked up again in the United States. The perhaps comforting vision of seeing cable news and rolling news channels reporting the events, openly and transparently dissecting them. Other branches of the government -- parts of Congress -- parts of the Democratic opposition standing up expressing their fury about what had, in fact, happened.

The capacity, frankly, for people to do that openly is something that is extraordinarily rare around the world, particularly after attempted coups. And certainly, I think some of the language that was used around that particular violence, it reflects how extraordinarily surprised Americans were to see this. There'd been multiple warnings but still, no sight like that.

But the key thing I think you need to remember, particularly they'll be urged on perhaps in that sense of recognition by people who genuinely have survived or still live under tyranny, is that the U.S. system did still manage to prevail. Yes, it has flaws. Yes, it had flaws to enable it to get to that particular savage point outside the Congress where five people lost their lives. Important to remember that.

But still, there were parts of democracy that kicked into action. There was law, there was order.

The rioters, when they got inside those buildings, didn't to some degree seem to get what it was they perhaps had gone there for. They were stopped by brave police officers. They were prevented from achieving whatever it was, in fact, their goals had indeed been. And then swiftly afterwards, finally, the Pentagon moved into action and other law enforcement as well.

So I think it's important to Americans who perhaps look at those scenes and think gosh, what is happening to our democracy -- is the fabric of our system falling apart -- to remember that it isn't. And to remember that there are many around the world who have been through similar scenes of unrest and who've seen the foundations of their daily lives shaken by coups or attempted coups -- by scenes like that -- who will look at how America managed to recover quite so fast.

How we had law and order. How we had those guardrails. And feel an extraordinary sense of possibly jealously to some degree.

Yes, America has a deeply flawed system where extremists are often allowed too much of a voice, many might argue. But it's important to remember how much order there was still there. How much fairness the law still seemed to provide to those who sought justice. And how that may hold America in a better position as it navigates the complicated nightmarish political environment that's in the weeks ahead.

Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: Fascinating perspective from Nick. We thank you for that.

Next week, join CNN for live coverage of the inauguration of President Joe Biden. Special coverage all day Wednesday, January 20th, on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:47:56]

ROMANS: Welcome back.

Millions of Americans have lost the right to guaranteed paid sick and family leave after Congress failed to extend it in that new stimulus package. Lawmakers included that pandemic-related benefit back in March giving workers and parents a cushion if they became sick, if they were waiting for test results, or if they were staying home with kids whose schools were closed. But Congress left out the guaranteed paid leave in that $900 billion deal that passed days before the benefit was supposed to end even as the number of coronavirus cases and deaths surged around the country.

Now, the new legislation does provide a tax credit through the end of March to employers who volunteer -- voluntarily chose to offer the paid leave, but they're not required to do so.

President-elect Joe Biden has called paid sick leave critical to stopping the spread of coronavirus. Democrats have called for passing another stimulus package that would reinstate those benefits. Now that they will control the House and Senate, that could be easier to do, Laura.

JARRETT: Could be, the key word there.

ROMANS: Yes.

JARRETT: Well, giant arenas and stadiums are stepping up to get Americans vaccinated faster. Minute Maid Park in Houston, State Farm Stadium in Arizona, the Alamadome in San Antonio, and Alaska Airlines Center in Anchorage all trying to repurpose their facilities into mass vaccination sites. But logistics here, they're challenging between filling out all the forms and social distancing, and the fact that only so many slots are available each day.

ROMANS: President-elect Biden is changing course from the Trump administration. He is planning to release nearly every available dose of the vaccine. Now, that could quickly ratchet up availability but it comes with a risk. Both Pfizer and Moderna's vaccines require two doses at specific intervals and manufacturing has not ramped up as rapidly as many experts had hoped.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. SCOTT GOTTLIEB, FORMER COMMISSIONER, FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION: The game has changed on the vaccine. We really need to get this vaccine out more quickly because this is really our only tool -- our only backstop against the spread of these new variants. If we can get a lot of people vaccinated quickly, we might be able to get enough protective immunity into the population if this stops spreading at the rate that it is.

So we need to acknowledge that it's not working. We need to hit the reset and adopt a new strategy in trying to get that out to patients.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[05:50:04]

ROMANS: And New York City is adding to its list of 24-hour vaccination sites. Three more opened this week.

Evan McMorris-Santoro has more from one of those sites.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

EVAN MCMORRIS-SANTORO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Christine and Laura, I'm standing outside the Brooklyn Army Terminal, which is one of the vaccination sites across the city turning into 24/7 vaccination sites starting at 10:00 on Monday.

Sunday was a soft launch -- seven hours of vaccinations for a newly- expanded list of eligible New Yorkers. That list was originally very, very restricted, leaving some local leaders to say the vaccine was going unused. But last week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo expanded the list now making the vaccine available to a much larger group of essential workers and any resident of the state over the age of 75.

The doctor running the site here in Brooklyn said he was excited by the expanded list.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody in every category is going to want to get the vaccine. And we want to just, at this point I think, provide the vaccine to as many people as want it, at this point. This is really going to be a big campaign over the next year as more people get vaccinated to become more normal. And I think then, that group of people that are comfortable will expand. MCMORRIS-SANTORO (on camera): In comments to reporters on Sunday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he urged New Yorkers to go ahead and take advantage of a newly-expanded accessibility pool of vaccine. He says this thing is now in a foot race between the rising numbers of COVID and the vaccine available -- Christine and Laura.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JARRETT: Evan, thank you for that report.

Vogue in hot water this morning as Vice President-elect Kamala Harris' team says they were blindsided by the change made to the magazine's February cover. A source says this is the image that Harris and Vogue agreed to for the cover. Vogue, instead, went with this image for its print edition, causing an uproar when it leaked over the weekend.

The magazine, in a statement, says they felt, quote, "the more informal image captured Vice President-Elect Harris' authentic approachable nature." I will let you judge that for yourself.

Vogue plans to use both images in its digital version.

ROMANS: All right, let's take a look at markets around the world to start the trading week. Markets in Japan closed for a holiday. European shares have all opened lower. And on Wall Street, futures are down this morning to start the week. It was record highs last week for stocks but here is your daily reminder that Wall Street is not Main Street.

A disappointing jobs report served as a reminder of the work ahead for the incoming Biden administration. One hundred forty thousand jobs were lost in December, the first net jobs lost since April.

When you dig deeper into that report, women accounted for all of the job losses, losing 156,000 net jobs while men gained 16,000. Again, these are net numbers, of course. There are men who did lose their jobs in December but balanced out, women are suffering greater job loss than men. The coronavirus recession, a reminder, is a she-cession here.

Millions of Americans have to wait longer to get their stimulus checks. The IRS says it's fixing a distribution glitch that sent the $600 payments to the wrong accounts. Americans who use TurboTax, H&R Block, and other tax preparers did not get their checks and instead noticed the money was deposited in a bank account they did not recognize.

One banking industry source says this is about 13 million people who may have been affected.

JARRETT: What a mess.

Well, we end this morning recognizing a Capitol Police officer whose quick thinking may have saved lives in the Senate last Wednesday.

Officer Eugene Goodman, outnumbered dozens to one, was chased up the steps by an angry mob. You can see as he reaches the second floor he glances through the doors to the left and he seems to notice that a door to the Senate floor there is still unsecured. He then lures the mob -- with himself, of course, as the bait -- in the other direction.

The "Huff Post" reporter who took this video says that this all happened at 2:14 p.m. eastern. A "Washington Post" reporter inside the Senate says it was exactly one minute later that it was sealed.

It's just, you know, so many moments like this, Christine, that we don't even probably know about yet that made a huge difference and saved lives that day.

ROMANS: Gosh, I just can't imagine how terrifying that would be to be followed by that crowd of people up those -- up those steps, you know. And he's talking to them and they're taunting him and they're yelling. What a split-second decision -- amazing. Good for him.

JARRETT: Yes.

ROMANS: All right, thanks for joining us, everybody. I'm Christine Romans.

JARRETT: I'm Laura Jarrett. "NEW DAY" is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:58:58]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president faces the increasing possibility that he will become the first president in American history to be impeached twice. He's also facing calls for his resignation.

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): He has done something so serious that there should be prosecution against him.

SEN. ROY BLUNT (R-MO): The president touched the hot stove on Wednesday and is unlikely to touch it again.

SEN. PAT TOOMEY (R-PA): I think the president did commit impeachable offenses. There's no doubt in my mind about that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We should certainly expect more violence. And in particular, we should expect violence in and around political entities, individuals, and events.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It is Monday, January 11th, 6:00 here in New York.

And it turns out the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol was even worse than we knew. We have new video that shows just how blood-thirsty the mob got.

So this morning, Donald Trump could become the first president in history to be impeached twice. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is also pressuring Vice President Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office. If Pence will not, the House plans to move quickly to impeach Trump.