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More Witnesses in Chauvin Trial; Douglas Blackmon is Interviewed about New Voting Laws; State Department Comments on Olympic Boycott; Golfers Sound off on Georgia's Voting Law. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired April 07, 2021 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00]

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: They also showed -- I want to show you this image -- an exhibit that they provided to one of the witnesses. This shows, in their words, a Minneapolis police officer being trained how to restrain someone with their knee on someone's neck. Again, a key piece of evidence for them there as they tried to show that Derek Chauvin was not violating policy whenever he had that encounter here last May.

Again, court will resume later this morning. We are now on witness number 26. We expect many more.

And, finally, just on an unrelated note to our friend Alisyn, just wanted to wish you the best of luck. The humanity that you bring to the news every single morning is so special. John Berman is a human, too, but the humanity that you bring was really cherished, and I will miss seeing you bright and early every morning.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Josh, thank you. Thank you so much for that. I have loved getting to know you and our friendship, and I will see you in the afternoons, and I will look forward to that.

Thanks for all of the reporting.

CAMPBELL: Likewise.

CAMEROTA: Joining us now, CNN legal analyst and civil rights attorney Areva Martin. Also with us retired LAPD Police Sergeant Cheryl Dorsey. She's the author of the book "Black and Blue."

Sergeant Dorsey, let me start with you.

Can I just pull back up that photo? I'm sure you've seen it. It was the photo that Josh just referred to. And this is the photo that shows, during a training, a police officer with his knee on the, I guess, back or neck of a suspect or someone pretending to be a suspect.

And so I don't think that this really makes as much of the defense case as some people have suggested. I mean I see a knee here in between the shoulder blades. And I also just think that this is a very different position than what Derek Chauvin had George Floyd in. But do you think that this is going to help the defense?

CHERYL DORSEY, RETIRED LAPD POLICE SERGEANT AND AUTHOR, "BLACK AND BLUE": Well, I -- you know, I don't know. This deflection and trying to confuse the jury is what's going on right now. And, you know, we're trained to place our knee between the shoulder blades. And before we do that, before we even put body weight on someone, we always direct them to put their hands in the small of their back, palm up, so that they're in the ready-to-be-cuffed position.

But at this instance, we know that Mr. Floyd was already in handcuffs. And so we can't lose sight of the fact that Mr. Floyd was already handcuffed. He actually had been placed in the back of a police car, taken out and then put on the ground. So all of these hypothetical about, you know, if a pig had wings could it fly, none of that stuff was going on, on that day. And it's just to confuse and deflect from what really was occurring and what we saw.

BERMAN: And, look, that's a defense lawyer's job, right, to confuse in a certain way, to deflect, to create other possibilities for the jury to consider.

Areva, I'm curious about what you think is the most important next thing that will happen. We haven't really heard in depth testimony yet on the medical issues and we are on the prosecution witness list going to see Dr. Andrew Baker, medical examiner who performed the autopsy, Dr. Lindsey Thomas, a forensic pathologist.

What do you think the most important parts of this aspects of the case will be?

AREVA MARTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: John, you're right, so important that we're going to move to that phase of the case where we deal with causation. We know that the defense is going to try to hit hard that Mr. Floyd had drugs in his system, that he died not because of the knee on the neck or the knee on the shoulder but because of the drugs that were in his system and because of some pre-existing heart conditions. So the medical examiners, the toxicologists, and the medical experts in this case are going to be critical in establishing the causation. And what we know the prosecution has to do is not prove that Mr. Chauvin's or former Officer Chauvin's conduct was the sole factor of Mr. Floyd's death but a substantial factor. So we're going to be looking very closely at what those medical experts have to say about the conduct of Chauvin and Mr. Floyd's death.

CAMEROTA: Areva, one more -- one more legal question on that note to you.

So we have heard from the eyewitnesses. They gave very compelling testimony. Now we've heard about the police training. The police chief himself saying this was outside the realm of the training in terms of where the knee was on the neck. The -- when you say we're moving into the third phase now from the medical experts and proving the cause of death, do you think that's the most important phase for the jury?

MARTIN: I don't think so. Alisyn, obviously, that's an important, you know, bar that the prosecution has to cross in terms of establishing that causation. But I think this case is going to come down to the videotape and the compelling testimony that we've seen so far. This is a case where jurors are going to be asked by the prosecution to believe their eyes. Believe their eyes and to use their common sense. So it's going to be a lot of technical testimony from these experts, but, ultimately, jurors are going to have to determine whether what they saw in that 9 minutes and 29 seconds constitutes murder, either second-degree murder, third-degree murder or manslaughter. And I think they're going to use their common sense in making that determination.

BERMAN: One of the things the defense keeps on hammering on, Sergeant Dorsey, is the idea that the police officers acted in a certain way because of the crowd that was there.

[06:35:09]

And yesterday they did get a little bit of testimony that may have helped them to that effect where one of the witnesses did say, yes, you know, when you're thinking about administering aid, you're aware of the people around you.

I wonder, you know, you've watched this trial so closely, almost every minute of testimony, what you think the jury has learned about police work in general?

DORSEY: Well, I think all of them come with their own opinions about, you know, what it is that we do. And I'm certain that maybe one or two has had an encounter with a police officer.

But, you know, crowds witnessing what we do is inherent to police work. And this crowd was not menacing but for the black -- but for the fact that many of them had black skin. And so now they want to paint the crowd as scary and intimidating, much like they tried to do with Mr. Floyd. And so none of that has anything to do with, why did you sit on a handcuffed man's neck for nine minutes and, oh, by the way, remain there after he was deceased according to one of the medical professionals who responded on scene.

CAMEROTA: Yes, you make such a good point. That nine-year-old girl didn't seem very menacing on the witness stand at least.

Areva Martin, Sergeant Dorsey, thank you both very much.

So is --

MARTIN: Thanks, Alisyn.

DORSEY: Thanks.

CAMEROTA: Thank you, guys.

So is Georgia's voting law as bad as Democrats say it is? We break down the facts, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:40:28] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It is reassuring to see that for-profit operations and businesses are speaking up about how these new Jim Crow laws are just antithetical to who we are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: President Biden blasting the restrictive voting laws being advanced across the country. It comes as Republicans are defending Georgia's voting law and criticizing the corporate backlash against the state.

Joining us now is Douglas Blackmon, he's a journalist and author of "Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II."

Thanks so much for being with us.

Look, there's been sort of a lash, a backlash, and a new lash when it comes to reaction to the Georgia law. First it was, wow, these laws are restrictive. Then you had a lot of people, Republicans mostly, saying, oh, they're not as bad as you think they are. And now people like you are coming up said saying, oh, yes, oh, yes, they are.

What's the single worst part in your mind to the new Georgia law?

DOUGLAS BLACKMON, AUTHOR, "SLAVERY BY ANOTHER NAME" AND JOURNALIST: Well, there's been a lot of talk about the water bottle provision and making it a misdemeanor to -- to give food or drink to someone waiting in a precinct line. And there's been a lot of debate about, does New York have more or less early voting or absentee ballots than Georgia. Those are all important things and those provisions of the -- of the new law are bad. But the most problematic part of the law is that it simply takes the control of elections significantly away from the Georgia secretary of state and puts that control in the hands of the state legislature and in an elections board that would be very directly controlled by the legislature. And had that law been in place back in November when President Trump was asking Republican legislators and officials to engage in a conspiracy to throw the election, it would have given them the power to have significantly mess with the entire election and throw it into sort of doubt. That's the single, biggest problem.

BERMAN: Let's dive deep into that. It would allow, as you said, much more power for the legislature to jerry-rig the election -- the state election board that has a tremendous amount of power, including the power to go in and take over counties.

So, in Georgia, what would that mean overlaid with what we saw in 2020?

BLACKMON: Well, what would have happened last year, what certainly could have happened, and I think we have every reason to imagine probably would have happened, is that first, during the primary elections last year, there were a lot of concerns and complaints about some difficulties that -- that the most populist counties in Georgia had with instituting some new election software so there were -- it took longer to count the vote than some people thought that it should have and such. Those were all technicalities. But there were a lot of complaints about that. But it was the sort of thing that would have gone down in the book as having been a disputed element or a violation of election expectations. And under the new law, that would then be the basis that if there were similar problems in the next election, because the law says there have to be problems in two consecutive elections. But so if then you had gotten to the November election and you had some of the same kinds of mostly spurious complaints that were being raised by President Trump and others back in November, but that would have been a basis under the new law for the elections board, appointed by the legislature, and it would have had three Republicans and one Democrat under the way the new law is set up, but that would have been the basis for the elections board to have then gone in and suspended the local elections officials all the way down to poll workers and people managing precincts. They could have gone in and ordered that all of those people were out of their jobs and then been replaced by partisans selected by the board.

Now, I'm not saying that the current members of -- or that the people who would be appointed to a board like that are necessarily up to no good, but it would have created an opportunity for badly motivated people, people who were not willing to resist what President Trump was trying to do in terms of throwing the election, it would have been possible for those kinds of folks to have pulled all of the honest elections officials, many of them Republicans, replace them with partisans, and then thrown the election into doubt, to have declared that all of the complaints and made up things that ultimately were thrown out by the court and treated as having no evidence, those would have been taken very seriously, the election would have been cast into doubt, there probably would have been a proclamation that results couldn't be certified. It likely would have been weeks, maybe even months.

[06:45:03]

And there's really -- it's not at all difficult to imagine that it would have ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court to try to sort out what exactly happened in Georgia. And that's the problem, it just creates way too much doubt, way too much opportunity for mischief, and all of those would also be problems if Democrats were the ruling party.

BERMAN: Douglas Blackmon, thank you for coming on, helping us understand what's inside the law. Appreciate it.

BLACKMON: Thanks for having me.

BERMAN: So the State Department -- we heard from the U.S. State Department, refusing to rule out a possible boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in China. We're getting new word from the State Department, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) CAMEROTA: Developing this morning, Arkansas becoming the first state to prohibit doctors from providing gender-affirming treatment for transgender youth. The state's general assembly overrided the governor's veto of the anti-trans bill that he called a vast government overreach. LGBTQ advocates has vowed to bring a legal challenge against this law.

[06:50:00]

BERMAN: This morning, the U.S. State Department backing away from the idea of a boycott of the 2022 Beijing Olympic games.

CNN's Kylie Atwood live at the State Department with the latest on this.

So they leaned into it yesterday, now not so much?

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, that's right. So the State Department, yesterday, suggested that the U.S. would potentially consider boycotting the Beijing Olympics. And this was said from the State Department podium when the spokesperson was specifically asked if the U.S., alongside allies, would consider a joint boycott.

I want to listen to what Ned Price said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NED PRICE, STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN: It is something that we certainly wish to discuss, in that it is certainly something that we understand that a coordinated approach will be not only in our interest, but also in the interest of our allies and partners. So this is one of the issues that is on the agenda, both now and going forward. And when we have something to announce, we will be sure to do that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ATWOOD: So then the walk-back came after those comments with a senior State Department officials saying that the U.S. has not and have -- has not and has not discussed a Beijing Olympic boycott with allies and partners. And then the State Department spokesperson also took to Twitter, sort of cleaning this up, saying that there's no decision that's been made about the 2022 Olympics and also reiterating that the U.S. does work alongside partners and allies when it comes to China broadly, but sort of way saying he wasn't talking about an Olympic boycott in those comments.

But, of course, this comes as there are growing calls for the U.S. to boycott these Olympics. Of course, that's because of China's treatment of the Uighurs in the Xinjiang region of China that the U.S., that the Biden administration, has called a genocide.

There are some creative ideas out there also about the what -- what the U.S. could do. And I want to read to you what Senator Rick Scott put out yesterday on this topic saying, quote, boycotting the 2022 Olympics only hurts American's athletes. That's why I urge POTUS, President Biden, to demand that the Olympics are relocated from communist China and offer for the U.S. to host the games.

And, of course, there are other ideas out there. You know, not sending a U.S. delegation of White House officials, sending religious leaders instead to the games. But the bottom line here is that the Biden administration has not made a decisive decision about how to approach this problem.

John.

BERMAN: China experts do look at this and say the Olympics may be one of the biggest and best opportunities to pressure China over the genocide of the Uighurs in that country.

Kylie Atwood, thank you very much for that.

So, the Boston Red Sox have unveiled a new uniform. Not this one.

CAMEROTA: Which one?

BERMAN: The one they've unveiled looks so very different than this one and what fans are used to. I'll tell you why it's so awesome in the "Bleacher Report," next.

CAMEROTA: Oh, I can't wait.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:57:09]

BERMAN: The Masters tees off tomorrow in Augusta, Georgia, amidst the controversy over Georgia's restrictive voting law.

Carolyn Manno with more in the "Bleacher Report."

Good morning.

CAROLYN MANNO, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, John.

Well, those political tensions are really threatening to overshadow one of the biggest sporting events on the calendar. We saw Major League Baseball move their all-star game out of Atlanta into Denver and now we're hearing from some of the best golfers in the world speaking up on the issue.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CAMERON CHAMP, 2-TIME PGA TOUR WINNER: It really targets, you know, certain black communities. It makes it harder for them to vote, which to me is everybody's right to vote. So to see that was very shocking. And, obviously, with MLB and what they did moving the all-star game was a big statement.

COLLIN MORIKAWA, 2020 PGA CHAMPIONSHIP WINNER: This voter stuff and voters for American citizens is very important. I think that's the topic that we should all be talking about. We shouldn't be talking about whether we're here or not. The Masters, the PGA tour, we do such a good job and we're trying to help communities out. And I think that's our main focus for the week.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MANNO: To a moment that should wake you up this morning. An expensive "my bad" for Cardinal's outfielder Tyler O'Neil (ph) Tuesday. He fouled back a pitch against the Marlins and shattered the lens of the home plate camera in the process. Play was delayed for a few minutes while the $15,000 mistake was cleaned up.

And the Red Sox have unveiled a new uniform for the Patriots Day game later this month. The yellow and sky blue jerseys, a nod to the Boston Athletic Club with the famed "Boston Strong" theme, commemorating the Marathon bombing in 2013. The Red Sox one of seven teams who will wear Nike's new "City Connect" series uniforms. The Red Sox donning their s on April 17th and 18th against the White Sox.

And, John, if I may just wish Alisyn a fond farewell. I know that she's been the mastermind behind your sports repartee with me over the last couple of years.

BERMAN: That's right.

MANNO: Maybe she could provide some running tips to you as well. I know you're a Boston Marathon finisher.

BERMAN: A loser. I was a Boston Marathon -- I lost the Boston Marathon. I know -- I know it's a -- there's me losing the Boston Marathon.

CAMEROTA: Look at that form. But look at the form. It's so spectacular.

BERMAN: This, by the way, totally unnecessary.

CAMEROTA: Carolyn, thank you for recognizing that I am the true sports genius here at NEW DAY.

MANNO: Yes, you're welcome.

CAMEROTA: Thank you.

MANNO: You're welcome. Thought you might enjoy that video as well.

CAMEROTA: I do.

BERMAN: Thanks so much, Carolyn.

MANNO: Best of luck.

BERMAN: I was so bummed out you didn't get to introduce the "Bleacher Report" because one of the things I will truly miss about you is you doing sports phonetically.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

BERMAN: It's like -- it's like reading Red Sox, sox.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely. I don't know. I was like, the inca -- oh NCAA.

BERMAN: Oh.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

BERMAN: I'll miss that.

CAMEROTA: I know. Me too.

BERMAN: NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "The New York Times" has a new report on Gaetz's efforts to head off an investigation in the find days of the Trump administration.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There was a private conversation that he had with White House officials about a blanket pardon. He wanted one for himself.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Demonstrates that at the time he went to former President Trump to ask for this, he knew that he had done something wrong.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: California las a day, June 15th is when this state will be back open for business.

[07:00:03]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're seeing death rates go down, case rates stabilize.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NIAID: We don't even want to be too premature.