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Biden Vows Enough Vaccines For All Adults By End Of May; New York Gov. Cuomo Facing Calls To Resign Amid Harassment Allegations; 13 Killed In Crash With Overloaded SUV Near California-Mexico Border. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired March 03, 2021 - 07:30   ET

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

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[07:30:25]

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JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There is light at the end of the tunnel but we cannot let our guard down now or assure that victory is inevitable. We can't assume that.

We must remain vigilant, act fast and aggressively, and look out for one another. That's how we're going to get ahead of this virus, get our economy going again, and get back to our loved ones.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: President Biden promising there will be enough coronavirus vaccines for every adult by the end of May. That's two months earlier than previously promised.

Joining me now is New York City health commissioner, Dr. Dave Chockshi. Doctor, thanks so much for being with us. Really appreciate seeing you.

That announcement, 300 million doses -- enough for every U.S. adult by the end of May, two months earlier than thought -- what does that announcement mean to you?

DR. DAVE CHOCKSHI, NEW YORK CITY HEALTH COMMISSIONER (via Skype): Well, it's good news for the United States and it's good news for New York City.

What we have been focused on is getting shots into arms as quickly as we can. We've administered over two million doses here in New York City and we're ready to do much more because we know that turning vaccines into vaccinations is what's going to help us turn the corner on this terrible pandemic.

BERMAN: There was an announcement overnight from the governors of Texas and Mississippi that they will end the mask mandates in their states. What do you think of the timing? CHOCKSHI: Well, I don't agree with this decision. I think that it puts too many people at risk. We have to realize that we're all connected. If we haven't learned that lesson at this moment in the pandemic, then I think that is not just unfortunate but puts too many lives at risk, and that's what we're focused on.

I'm grateful that here in New York City because of our support from political leaders, including Mayor de Blasio, we're focused on the science which indicates that masking, distancing, and the other public health precautions that we've been advising for months do help to curb the spread of the virus and will continue to help us save lives.

BERMAN: Will you advise any kind of a change in posture from people arriving from states like Texas and Mississippi where there will be no more mask mandate?

CHOKSHI: Well, you know, it is something that puts New Yorkers at risk as well. We are advising people to limit travel overall. We do have quarantine requirements that are in place, along with testing requirements for people who are traveling, and it's something that we'll have to continue to keep an eye on, particularly with the new variants spreading across the country as they are.

BERMAN: Talk to me about the new variant concerns here in New York City. How much of a problem do you foresee? Dr. Fauci expressed specific concern about what is being seen here in New York.

CHOKSHI: Well, we have so many reasons for optimism with the vaccination campaign as we talked about. And -- but at the edge of the growing light that we're seeing there is this shadow of the variants.

There are three variants of concern that have been identified from places around the world, which we've been tracking closely. And New York City is doing more of the specialized testing, known as sequencing, than just about any other place to track the spread. And we are seeing two of those three variants here in New York City thus far.

There are other variants of interest as well, including this one known as B1526, which we're keeping a close eye on and studying to understand its real-world effects.

So this is something that we are taking very seriously. But at the same time, we also have to communicate that the same steps that have worked for us to halt the spread of the coronavirus works, whether we're talking about the older versions or those newer variants.

BERMAN: The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is just coming online now and it's different. It's different from the other vaccines in that it's just one dose. It's also different -- I think people have a perception of it having a different efficacy in terms of the Moderna and the Pfizer vaccine.

What are you seeing in terms of the acceptance or willingness to get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine here in the city? CHOKSHI: Yes. Well, my simple message is the best vaccine is the one that you can get now. We have three vaccines that have now been authorized by the FDA. Each one of them is safe, effective, and lifesaving. And that includes the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which comes with some advantages as well because it's easier to ship, to store, and to use.

[07:35:05]

We do know that there are some concerns about the numbers that have been shared with respect to effectiveness. It's a bit of comparing apples to oranges because the vaccines were tested at different times and different places.

But one thing is very consistent across the three vaccines, which is that each of them is particularly effective at preventing severe illness. Almost completely effective at averting hospitalizations and deaths.

And when I think about what we want from a vaccine, whether it's for my patients or my parents, avoiding that severe illness is really critical. So I am strongly advising people to get the vaccine that's available to you as soon as you can.

BERMAN: What obstacles are you seeing right now in terms of getting people in underserved communities vaccinated?

CHOKSHI: Well, this is a major focus of our efforts with respect to the vaccination campaign, centering equity in everything that we do. That's part of the reason that as a city, we have located more and more of our sites in some of the neighborhoods that have been hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. We're also working with a range of community partners so that we enlist them as trusted messengers for the people that they have been serving as well.

We have found that when we make it easier for people to access the vaccine, uptick has been strong. We need additional supply to keep those efforts up and I'm confident that we can get as many New Yorkers vaccinated as possible over the coming months.

BERMAN: Health Commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi, thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate it.

CHOKSHI: Thanks for having me.

BERMAN: So it's been a week since New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's last public appearance as he faces calls to resign over inappropriate behavior toward at least three women, next.

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[07:41:16]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has not been seen in public for a week now. This, after two former aides accused him of sexual harassment and a third woman alleges he made an unwanted advance on her at a wedding. So what happens next?

Joining us now is CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson, and Nancy Erika Smith, a civil rights attorney who represented Gretchen Carlson in her case against Roger Ailes. It's great to see both of you this morning.

NANCY ERIKA SMITH, CIVIL RIGHTS ATTORNEY, SMITH MULLIN (via Cisco Webex): Good morning.

CAMEROTA: So, Nancy --

JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY (via Cisco Webex): Thank you, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: -- the New York attorney general has said that she will appoint an outside law firm to begin an investigation into this.

But explain how this investigation works. If two people were in a room, how will anyone be able to get to the bottom of exactly what was said in that room -- barring, of course, any audiotapes, which I know you think are quite effective in these cases? But without that, how will we ever figure out really what was said?

SMITH: Well, Anna Ruch has an incredible photograph of herself with the governor putting his hands on her face after she asked -- removed his hands from her back.

There are e-mails to Ms. Boylan where it shows that the harassment was so pervasive that the governor's aide actually participated in it by writing to Ms. Boylan about how the governor thought she looked.

So I think it's -- there are -- certainly, there is evidence besides women but we have to learn how to listen to women. Why would these women lie? Why would three women lie? And I absolutely guarantee you there are going to be others.

Because this is the kind of pervasive -- this isn't the governor's met somebody and they developed a chemistry. This is the governor harassing. He called it unwanted flirtation; we call that sexual harassment.

This is the governor. He has got a 25-year-old aide, Ms. Bennet, and a 36-year-old aide, Ms. Boylan. And then we have a photograph of him touching a woman he just met at a wedding who was 31 years old.

This is about power and these women should be believed because they're going to -- they've put themselves in a very difficult position.

And the fact that Ms. Bennet, 25 years old, had the guts to complain immediately, and what happened? There's no investigation. I think that the investigation should include whoever received any other complaints about Gov. Cuomo. I guarantee you there's going to be more.

CAMEROTA: So, Joey, let's say that you are assigned to defend Gov. Cuomo. What would you advise him to do? What would the defense be?

JACKSON: So we have to understand, Alisyn, that there's two imperatives, right? So this is not just defending a normal client. And when I say normal client -- not that the governor is abnormal, he's a public figure. And so you have a public relations imperative here as well.

What does that mean? It means he's the governor of the state. He has to attend public events. He will be asked questions with respect to what he did or did not do.

On the one hand, obviously, from a public relations perspective, you want to advise to get out a statement, which he did. Some believe it's insufficient, inadequate, and perhaps victim shaming. That's another issue.

But on the one hand, you want to say something about it to acknowledge that you understand and respect women in this state and every other. That you understand that workplace discrimination -- harassment of any kind is unacceptable -- nor, by the way, or should I say in addition to any harassment in any other place.

At the same time, there is a legal imperative here. And that imperative -- let us all remember that there's a New York state attorney general investigation, and that investigation will be broad- ranging.

[07:45:00]

It will ask the women what he did. And it's not only as it relates, Alisyn, behind a closed room, it's what did those women say to their parents, what did they say to their friends? What did they text and who did they text it to? Who did they e-mail to? What interviews did they do?

So it's very important that you have to protect both the governor, as it relates to this investigation, from a criminal perspective -- perhaps we don't know -- and from a civil perspective, in terms of lawsuits.

Final point, and that's this, Alisyn.

New York State has just changed -- interestingly, about a year ago -- the law pertaining to sexual harassment. This governor signed that. And they're so -- but they're so lax with respect to allowing women to come tell their story. It's very ironic that the governor's in this place having signed and agreed to such broad-reaching reforms that relate to sexual harassment and workplace discrimination.

CAMEROTA: Let me read the statement from Gov. Cuomo.

He says, "At work, sometimes I think I'm being playful and make jokes that I think are funny. I do, on occasion, tease people in what I think is a good-natured way.

I now understand that my interactions may have been insensitive or too personal and that some of my comments, given my position, made others feel in ways I never intended. I acknowledge some of the things I have said have been misinterpreted as an unwanted flirtation. To the extent anyone felt that way, I am truly sorry about that.

To be clear, I never inappropriately touched anybody and I never propositioned anybody, and I never intended to make anyone feel uncomfortable. But these are allegations that New Yorkers deserve answers to."

Was that helpful, Nancy?

SMITH: No. It's helpful in that he admitted that he sexually harassed women. Unwanted flirtation by a 63-year-old governor asking a 25-year- old aide whether she likes to have sex with older men, that is textbook.

And for 40 years I've heard this, that men say oh, I was just kidding. What's funny about asking a 25-year-old aide whether she likes to have sex with older men? That's not funny -- that's not a joke.

In fact, it creates a hostile work environment, which is illegal not only to the woman who was directly subject to this sexual harassment but all women, in my view, in the governor's office -- right now, today -- work in a hostile work environment. Because seeing some other woman be sexually harassed or hearing about it and knowing that that's so pervasive that the governor's aide felt free to e-mail another woman participating in the governor's sexual harassment, it's pervasive.

I believe these women and that statement is outrageous. I'm so sick of these we have zero-tolerance statements. That means nothing. If the governor acted like this and these women aren't lying, then this is a hostile work environment and he should be out of it today.

CAMEROTA: We'll see what the investigation bears.

Joey Jackson, Nancy Erika Smith, thank you both very much.

SMITH: Thank you.

JACKSON: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Now to this story. Twenty-five people were packed into an SUV and more than half of them were killed in this crash near the California-Mexico border. We bring you the latest on what happened here, next.

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[07:52:15]

CAMEROTA: Thirteen people were killed on Tuesday in this horrible car crash in rural Southern California. A semitruck broadsided an SUV that authorities say was packed with 25 people. That's three times the vehicle's capacity.

CNN's Stephanie Elam is live at the hospital where some of the survivors were taken. What's the backstory here, Stephanie? STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. From what we understand, Alisyn, is that this semitruck was proceeding up this highway out there about 10 miles north of the Mexican border when the SUV, for whatever reason -- it's still unclear -- ended up in the traffic in front of it. And that's when it was broadsided by the semitruck that had two trailers that were empty.

We also learned that the two front seats had seat belts but there were no more seats in the rest of that Ford Expedition. We understand that 25 people were in this car. We know that 12 people died on-scene, including the driver of that SUV, who we now know is also from Mexicali in Mexico, and then one person died at the hospital

Of course, right away, early on, investigators and law enforcement was saying that they did reach out to the Mexican consulate because they just thought that this would be a useful thing to do so early. I asked law enforcement if that was standard operating procedure to do that so early. Take a listen to the answer.

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CHIEF OMAR WATSON, CALIFORNIA HIGHWAY PATROL, BORDER DIVISION: A lot of the people in the vehicle didn't speak English so we wanted to make sure that we had all the resources available in order to start expediting exactly where the folks may be from and being able to reach out to their families.

We are close to the border, so we have like kind of jump back and forth on a daily basis for work. So that's something that we couldn't initially rule out.

ELAM: But you say they could have been day -- they could have been day workers, is what you're saying?

WATSON: Potentially, but we don't know at this point.

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ELAM: What we do know now from the Mexican consulate is that at least 10 of the passengers in that vehicle are from Mexico. They continue to investigate. We do know that ICE is investigating whether or not there was a human smuggling element to this. We know that the NTSB is also investigating this crash.

But we know that 15 -- the people in the car were from the ages of 15 to 53 years old. We know that some of the people were ejected from the vehicle because of the fact that there weren't seat belts. And there were some walking wounded when law enforcement arrived on the scene.

The driver of the semitruck is a 69-year-old man, we are told. He has moderate injuries from what we understand.

But still, when you look at how awful this accident was you can see why there's so much interest in making sure that something like this doesn't happen again. And the fact that they had to airlift people out to where I am now in Palm Springs to this hospital, where we know at least four of the patients are because their injuries are so traumatic at this point, John.

BERMAN: Stephanie, it's just horrifying -- just horrifying. Thank you so much for that report. Please keep us posted.

So, with more students returning to classrooms, schools are adapting to the new normal as best they can. While masks must remain, socializing can begin again.

[07:55:07]

CNN's Omar Jiminez has more.

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OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The sounds of school ring through these hallways for the first time in nearly a year.

LEIGH OQUENDO, KINDERGARTEN TEACHER, HAWTHORNE SCHOLASTIC ACADEMY: (INAUDIBLE) because --

JIMENEZ (voice-over): But this Chicago kindergarten class looks a little different than it used to -- mainly, masks.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can read the pictures, read the words, retell the story.

OQUENDO: Wow, you're learning all that (ph)?

We made a graph and we were graphing our times of building mask stamina. So we've been wearing them even though we were on computers.

JIMENEZ (voice-over): Chicago School District, the third-largest in the country, welcomed back thousands of kindergarten through fifth- grade students Monday, a month after it planned to, following a week's long standoff with the city's teachers' union over COVID protocols.

Parents had to opt in to go back to in-person learning. Only about 30 percent chose to do so.

JIMENEZ (on camera): And it wasn't easy to get to this point?

DR. JANICE JACKSON, CEO, CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS: No, it was not. Everybody wanted the same thing. Our teachers, principals, parents, they want their kids in school. They want them to get a great education but they want it to be safe.

JIMENEZ (voice-over): A big part of that, vaccinating teachers, who are now being prioritized, but also making sure protocols are actually enforced inside the schools.

JIMENEZ (on camera): These signs are among what's new when you walk the hallways of this particular school in Chicago. You have one-way only signs also on the ground, please keep six feet of distance - visual reminders of the stakes to returning in person. Stakes that are at play at places all across the country. JIMENEZ (voice-over): New York City, the largest school district in the U.S., welcomed back middle-schoolers in person last week after its elementary students returned in December. All of it under the shadow of President Joe Biden's goal to reopen most K through eight schools five days a week within his first 100 days in office.

JIMENEZ (on camera): Is that realistic?

JACKSON: Well, I think it's a -- I think it's a very aspirational goal. It's going to take time to get people back to a place where they feel comfortable. This is one step in a long journey. We can't go from where we are today to where we were a year ago. It's going to be a process.

JIMENEZ (voice-over): Even with in-person available, Chicago schools aren't in-person five days a week. It's still one to three days virtual and two to four days face-to-face -- a first step, the district says --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Four, five, six --

JIMENEZ (voice-over): -- toward getting back to normal.

OQUENDO: There's things that I'm not changing although we're in person. There are some things that I discovered and learned from curriculum and ways of teaching and being creative that I'm going to continue to implement even though we're here in person.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: Our thanks to Omar for that.

OK, now to our favorite story of the day. Country music legend, and as John said, earth legend --

BERMAN: Universal legend.

CAMEROTA: Universal and cosmos legend -- interplanetary legend Dolly Parton donated $1 million of her own money towards the development of the Moderna vaccine. So yesterday, she received a dose of her own medicine.

DOLLY PARTON, COUNTRY MUSIC LEGEND (Singing to the tune of "Jolene"):

Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, I'm begging of you please don't hesitate. Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, Cause once you're dead then that's a bit too late.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Can we cancel the rest of the show so I can just listen to Dolly Parton sing? That, of course, was "Jolene." She reworked the words, of course.

BERMAN: I like the new lyrics. CAMEROTA: Oh, they're beautiful.

And she posted a video of herself getting vaccinated in Nashville with this message to the American people.

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PARTON: I just wanted to encourage everybody because the sooner we get to feeling better, the sooner we are going to get back to being normal. So I just want to say to all of you cowards out there, don't be such a chicken squat. Get out there and get your shot.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Oh, that's beautiful. I'll do anything Dolly says.

BERMAN: Seriously, but it's such an important message, and good for her.

CAMEROTA: Well, I mean, she's an angel. Everything she says is just imbued with wisdom.

I'm waiting for the moment where a public official or celebrity gets the shot and, like, screams the second they get it. I thought that would be funny.

BERMAN: You know what? Dolly Parton gets the shots in the shot screams. That's what happens. That's how awesome she is.

CAMEROTA: She's that tough.

BERMAN: That's how powerful Dolly Parton is.

She paid for the vaccine. I mean, she gave $1 million for the Moderna vaccine when it mattered -- like, early on. They said it, like, made a huge difference.

CAMEROTA: She's an angel.

BERMAN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: She just keeps showing us that over and over.

And NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: This country will have enough vaccine supplies for every adult in America by the end of May.

GOV. GREG ABBOTT (R), TEXAS: It is now time to open Texas 100 percent.

ROCHELLE WALENSKY, DIRECTOR, CDC: Now is not the time to relax the critical safeguards that we know can stop the spread of COVID-19.

CHRISTOPHER WRAY, DIRECTOR, FBI: That siege was criminal behavior, plain and simple, that we, the FBI, view as domestic terrorism.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The violence that the FBI is worried about is about racism.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Director Wray saying very clearly that there's no evidence.