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Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) is Interviewed about Voting Legislation; Jobless Claims Numbers Released; Pandemic Update from Around the World; Variants Pose Threat to U.S. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired March 25, 2021 - 08:30   ET

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


[08:30:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): Around here it's turning the FEC into a partisan prosecutor, the majority controlled by the president's party, to harass and intimidate the other side.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So, joining us now is the Democratic whip, Senator Dick Durbin.

Senator, thank you so much for being with us.

So people know what some of the policy is here, I just want to lay out three of the provisions. One, you're talking about non-partisan districting. That's one of the things you've introduced. Same-day registration. Fifteen days of guaranteed voting. That's the type of thing that is in this legislation. People could debate whether or not they think it's a good idea.

My question to you is, realistically, what chance does this have of passing?

SEN. DICK DURBIN (D-IL): That's a good question. And it really gets down to the heart of the matter because we wonder if there will be bipartisan support on the floor of the United States Senate to give Americans an opportunity to vote.

Listen, four months ago we tested the theory that the Republicans had that there was going to be massive voter fraud. The president of the United States of America, Donald Trump, hired dozens of lawyers and spent millions of dollars and challenged the results in state after state after state. Every one of his challenges was thrown out by the courts. There was no evidence of massive voter fraud or any significant fraud.

And what did the Republican legislators do in response to that? They decided to limit the opportunities to vote for Americans. That is exactly the opposite of what we ought to do. We ought to encourage full participation. That's what this bill is all about. BERMAN: Well, but you present as if we don't know whether Republicans

are going to vote for it, don't we? I mean there isn't Republican support for this bill, certainly. Whether there's support for parts in it, I'm not quite so sure.

And around the country, in states that are controlled by Republicans, your views are losing more ground.

So how do you turn this around? You don't have the votes.

DURBIN: Well, I can tell you that I've spoken to some Republican senators who don't accept the bill as one in its entirety, but may be willing to sit down and talk about sections of this bill. That's what --

BERMAN: Which one?

DURBIN: Well, I'm not going to get into detail. You can imagine this is pretty delicate, but --

BERMAN: Well, which sections, if not which senators?

DURBIN: We're talking about the sections relating to voting rights. The belief is, by many of them, there are existing federal laws that would toss out or challenge a lot of these state efforts. I'm not sure I agree with that premise.

We've got some time ahead of us here to discuss this thing in a bipartisan basis. If it's going anywhere in the Senate with a filibuster, it needs more than the 50 Democratic votes plus the vice president.

BERMAN: Well, what about trying to get it to go somewhere in a Senate without a filibuster?

DURBIN: Well, that, of course, is another conversation. And it's an active conversation, even within the Democratic caucus of the appropriate thing to do.

Listen, when I came to the Senate years ago, a 60-vote margin on a bill was rare. A filibuster was rare. Now it is accepted as routine. Everything that is to pass must have 60 votes unless it happens to be reconciliation, which was the way that President Biden's rescue plan went through, or nominations, where a filibuster doesn't apply. But to get down to the heart of the matter, the issues that really count, where it's immigration or whether it's voting rights, we need to have 60 votes on the floor of the Senate.

BERMAN: Well, how are you going to convince Joe Manchin that -- that made --

DURBIN: Well --

BERMAN: Seriously. I mean how -- do you have any chance of convincing Joe Manchin to change the filibuster rules? DURBIN: We're still talking to Joe. And I understand his point of view

and others share it. We want to have a fulsome discussion within our caucus.

But what's at stake here is not the integrity of the United States Senate alone. What's at stake here is the integrity of our voting process in every election, federal, state and local. We have a sad history in this country after the Civil War of restricting the right to vote, particularly for African-Americans and poor people. We don't want to return to those days. We want to move forward into fuller participation by everyone in this democracy.

BERMAN: So, Senator, I woke up to news reported by CNN that I wasn't aware of that you held a bipartisan meeting yesterday. And I want to repeat that because it seems so rare. You met with a bipartisan group of senators on immigration.

First of all, congratulations to each and every one of you who chose to do that and sit in the room and have that discussion.

What came of it?

DURBIN: It was a good meeting. There's clearly differences of opinion within that subject matter. But people didn't boycott it or stand up and walk out. We talked about putting together the different points of view and seeing if we can find some middle ground.

I want to prove there is a possibility of ten Republicans joining the Democrats for meaningful immigration reform, including the Dream Act, farm labor and expanding the opportunity for legal status for more people in this country. That's the only way we can do it in the Senate. And yesterday's meeting was a first step.

BERMAN: Did you leave with any agreement, any actual concrete, you could say, hey, we agree with you on this?

DURBIN: The agreement was to meet again and that's progress in the United States Senate.

BERMAN: I guess that's not nothing.

Listen, what grade would you give the Biden administration for how it is handling the surge at the border?

[08:35:06]

DURBIN: Well, I can tell you that they are -- they inherited a mess. If you'll look at the Department of Homeland Security under President Trump, they had six different leaders in four years. They had more leaders under the Trump administration than the previous 13-year history of that department. The president shut down the government for the longest period in history over the issue of immigration. He took money from the Department of Defense to build his almighty wall. There's case after case and zero tolerance to separate 2,200 children forcibly.

BERMAN: But how are they handling what they inherited?

DURBIN: Well, they're trying to get some order into the situation. They acknowledge the fact that it's a challenge. And I agree with them. But I've talked to Secretary Mayorkas this week. We had a conversation with a Republican senator as part of it to discuss possibilities. And there are some. I'm glad the vice president is going to take this on as a -- her personal challenge. I know she's up to the job. I've served with her for many years.

BERMAN: Senator Dick Durbin, always a pleasure to have you on. Thanks for getting up for us. Appreciate it.

DURBIN: Glad to be with you. Thanks.

BERMAN: So just in to CNN, a new snapshot of America's unemployment crisis. Is it getting better or worse? Stay tuned.

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[08:40:12]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Developing right now, new jobless claims are near the lowest level since the start of the pandemic.

And CNN's chief business correspondent Christine Romans joins us with the new numbers.

What are you seeing?

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Well, let's look at this trend here. I mean you can see for the first time of the entire pandemic you have numbers that are below 700,000 for a week for jobless claims, 648,000 is the official number. And, Alisyn, that's the first time I've been able to tell you that a week of jobless claims in the coronavirus pandemic is less than the worst of the Great Recession. I mean every single week has been a record breaker in terms of pre-pandemic levels and finally we're seeing some relief.

A couple of things going on here. The weather is getting a little bit warmer, allowing for safe outdoors activities. There's progress on the vaccine front and there's optimism among economists that main street's going to be able to turn the page here and the job market's going to start to improve a little more rapidly.

Still, these numbers are huge by any standard. You have 684 for the first time unemployment benefits. Add on to that the pandemic unemployment insurance. Altogether, that's almost a million altogether.

And in program, every single kind of jobless claims program, you've got 18.9 million people, Alisyn, who are relying on the government for some sort of job -- income replacement check here. So that is still a small army of Americans who have been dislocated from their job in this pandemic and are still in a lot of trouble.

Hopefully this is a sign we are turning the page and that the spring will be better. We will wait to see. But certainly it is historic that we are finally below those record levels again.

CAMEROTA: Thank you for all of that context. Really helpful, Christine.

ROMANS: You're welcome.

CAMEROTA: So on Saturday join us for a new CNN special report. CNN's Ed Lavandera investigates one state, its unemployment system and the impact of the pandemic. So you can watch our CNN Special Report "The Price We Paid: The Economic Cost of COVID." That's Saturday night at 9:00 p.m.

BERMAN: Well, that looks really interesting.

All right, here's what else to watch today.

ON SCREEN TEXT: 10:15 a.m. ET, Boulder massacre court hearing.

12:00 p.m. ET, Big tech CEOs testify on Capitol Hill.

1:15 p.m. ET, President Biden holds a press conference.

BERMAN: So, highly contagious variants have top health officials concerned in the United States. Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us next.

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[08:46:48]

BERMAN: Large, outdoor gatherings now illegal in France as officials try to stop a third wave of coronavirus from sweeping that country. Breaking the rule could be punishable by a fine or even jail time.

CNN has reporters covering the pandemic all around the world.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MELISSA BELL, CNN PARIS CORRESPONDENT: I'm Melissa Bell in Paris.

France's interior minister has urged police chiefs to be strict in enforcing a ban a gathering of more than six people outdoors, and this across the whole country, not just those parts of France currently under partial lockdown.

It is a measure of the nervousness of authorities in the face of rising COVID-9 figures. To give you an idea, here in the greater Paris region, for people between 20 and 50, the incidents rate is now more than 700 per 100,000 inhabitants. ICUs are filling up fast with authorities warning that it is increasingly the young and those without co-morbidities that are entering them.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Fred Pleitgen in Berlin.

As the surge of new coronavirus infections is accelerating here in Germany, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said due to new virus variants, Germany is basically facing a new pandemic. She also said that ICUs in this country are filling up once again and that more and more young people are facing severe cases of COVID-19.

PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Paula Newton in Ottawa, where Canadian public health officials say this is a critical moment in the pandemic as they become increasingly worried about hospitalizations among younger people who have COVID-19. Now they're particularly worried about the variant first detected in the U.K. Those variants are especially high in the provinces of Alberta and Ontario where they are seeing an increase in hospitalizations, even ICU admissions, among younger Canadians with COVID-19.

Now, you'll remember, Canada's vaccine rollout is not where it needs to be right now. Far behind the United States. The prime minister here, Justin Trudeau, promises that that vaccine rollout will ramp up. The question is, will it happen in time to avoid those variants taking hold in Canada.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: OK. Wow. OK. There you go. I love a good music sting (ph).

Let's get an update on those new highly contagious variants here in the U.S. and Europe and Canada.

Joining us now, CNN chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Sanjay, let's just talk about what our correspondents just spelled out there.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

CAMEROTA: So we -- we have been hearing that the new variants are more contagious, OK, but there's something else that's going on, and that is that they are making 20-something-year-olds, younger people sicker.

So here's what got my attention. In Britain and France, sick young people without co-morbidities are entering the ICU, OK, that's how severe their sickness is. In Canada, as you just heard, the most active cases in Ontario province are people between 20 and 29.

OK, so this is not what the previous -- our previous struggle with coronavirus was all about.

GUPTA: Right. So, I mean, we're seeing a couple -- a couple things here. These numbers jumped out at me as well.

First of all, the younger people actually becoming infected, transmitting the virus, that is something that we knew was happening to some degree, but seems to be happening at an increasing rate due to these variants.

[08:50:02]

So these are more transmissible variants. They're more likely to actually infect somebody and then more likely to be transmissible from that infected person to someone else. And that seems to be happening in young people as well.

But it is that second point that I think is more concerning. You know, more transmissible, but also causing more severe disease. How much that affects is -- you know, how much of that effect we're going to see around the world, we don't know yet. I mean, obviously, in this country, we've focused on immunizing the people who have been most vulnerable from COVID all along this past year and that's a good thing. But how much are these variants really going to affect things?

When we look at the trial data across the board, they -- these vaccines do look good in terms of protecting against people becoming hospitalized and dying, but they do seem to drop off, as you point out, when it comes to more mild or moderate disease in terms of protection.

BERMAN: Look, very concerning what we're seeing in France and Germany. But I'm concerned what we're seeing in Michigan, Sanjay, where clearly the cases are rising. Clearly hospitalizations are rising. There is a clear growing presence of the B117 variant. And as Alisyn was saying, there's some evidence there that it's being transmitted among younger people as well.

So, why?

GUPTA: This is -- this is the race that we're talking about, right? We've been talking about this race, about the vaccines versus the variants for some time.

Overall, in the country, things still look favorable, but, you're right, there are certain spots like Michigan where, you know, despite the fact that you've got an increasing number of people vaccinated, still the majority of people are not vaccinated yet. So if you get to the point where you actually can have, you know, widespread vaccination, especially among those vulnerable populations, then I think, you know, you will see a leveling off and then hopefully a drop of hospitalizations and deaths, or at least not a optional increase. Meaning, as cases go up, we've always seen a proportional increase in hospitalizations a few weeks later and then, sadly, the deaths a few weeks after that. Hopefully that doesn't happen.

But, you know, we -- that -- this is exactly the race that we're talking about. As we vaccinate more and the -- and the virus starts to, you know, we start to be more protected either within communities or a country as a whole, that should happen. But we're just not quite there yet.

CAMEROTA: But, Sanjay, in terms of the outbreak that they're seeing back in Britain and France, are they not vaccinating as quickly as we are in the U.S.?

GUPTA: Not as quickly as we are here. And, you know, in France they've talked about the fact that they wish that they had actually started some of these vaccination programs a little bit earlier, been a little bit more robust. We are -- we're not where we need to be, by any means, don't get me wrong. But there's two things that I think may be working in our favor. One is that we are about 14 percent, 15 percent fully vaccination

right now. But we have about 70 -- 65 percent to 70 percent of people over the age of 65 who at least have received some immunity now and hopefully within the next few weeks they're going to get to full immunity.

But, also, keep in mind that depending on which model you look at, there's somewhere between 20 percent to 30 percent of the country that also has immunity because they've been infected, because we have these huge infection rates over the last several months. That does provide some immunity. It's not the way you want to get immunity, but that starts to help as well. So if you add in the 14 percent, 15 percent with 25 percent, you're getting closer to 40 percent roughly of immunity.

It's not herd immunity, but it's better than a lot of other places around the world, and that may be helping us. When we look at countries like Israel, much smaller country that has larger vaccination rates, you do see decrease in hospitalizations, deaths and overall cases.

BERMAN: So we want your diagnosis, Doctor, on the curious case of Ted Cruz.

Let's listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Would you mind putting a mask on for us?

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): Yes, when I'm talking to the TV camera, I'm not going to wear a mask. And all of us have been immunized, so --

QUESTION: It would make us feel better.

CRUZ: You're welcome to step away if you'd like. The whole -- the whole point of a vaccine, CDC guidance is what we're following.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Is that true, Sanjay? Is he following CDC guidance that when you're around a scrum of reporters you don't need to wear a mask?

GUPTA: So charming, right?

No, actually, it's not. The CDC guidance -- I just pulled it up again because the guidance does change, admittedly. But it says, even if you've been fully vaccinated, you need to keep taking precautions in public places, wearing a mask, staying six feet apart, avoiding crowds.

So it's just -- it's not the case.

I mean I realize this mirrors a conversation that most of society is having right now in terms of what can you do if you've been fully vaccinated. The concern is that, for him, he's pretty well protected, admittedly, against getting severely ill, requiring hospitalization. I don't know which vaccine he got, but they're all pretty good at preventing that.

There's a couple issues. First of all, they're not perfect. So you could still get sick.

[08:55:00]

Also, you know, the big wildcard here, as we've talked about, are these variants. Even though he should be very well protected against illness -- severe illness and hospitalization from the variants, he may not be as well protected against moderate illness, mild illness and the possibility that he could still transmit the virus to somebody else. So when he's not wearing a mask, he's potentially putting other people in that room at risk. It's as simple as that.

I mean we've been talking about this for months now. That equation doesn't change yet. When enough people have been vaccinated, when we've reduced viral transmission rates low, that's when we can start to probably pull back on this.

CAMEROTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you very much. Great to talk to you.

GUPTA: You got it.

CAMEROTA: And CNN's coverage continues next.

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